First distortion pedal?

[RDV]

After the Shin-Ei Fuzzwah came an Original BMP with the tone switch. Then someone gave me an LPB-2, and I bought an original Ibanez TS-808 & a CS-505 which lasted till I didn't think the 808 had enough distortion and sold it and a Fender Deluxe w/a 25watt celestion for $200.00 and bought a HIWATT thinking I'd sound like Pete Townshend.....well I didn't. And the guy I sold my really wonderful(in hindsight) rig to wouldn't sell it back. Imagine that.

Regards from the memory vault.

RDV

[EdJ]

Hi,my first stompbox wasn`t able to resist my stomping.It was a booster/overdrive that a friend from school build for me.Little did i know and put it in a black bakelite box.A few weeks later,in my enthousiasm,i stomped the thing litterly in two.
The big muff came next.
Greetings,Ed

[Doug H]

An Anderton "Optimum Fuzz Adapter" I built in '74 or '75. A few yrs later I had an MXR D+.

Doug

[Phorhas]

My first pedal was a Metal Zone but I got sick of it and sold it (and then bought another one - and sold it... only to buy another one) (and sell it again)... LOL seems it's hard to get rid of the little dark bugger... after that came a TS9 (which I screwed - tring to mod) and to day I play with may tube driver or the sweet drive of my amp (classic 30).


(I wonder how long it will pass befor I'll get anothe MT-2... to sell once more - ofcourse...)
LOL
:lol:

[ErikMiller]

The first distortion device I used was a Sony cassette recorder.

I ran my guitar into the mic input, then took the signal from the earphone out and ran it into the input of my Premier 1-12 tube bass amp.

My guitar was a Gibson non-reverse Firebird with a bent-piece-of-metal vibrola. I turned the tube amp all the way up and muffled it with a beanbag chair. The kid next door said it sounded like a hydroplane.

Next one after that was an Anderton Tube Sound Fuzz (still have it, but can't find it in all my crap after 5 moves).

First purchased distortion was a Big Muff Pi direct from E-H in 1983, just before Mike closed the doors.

[Jay Doyle]

An Anderton "Optimum Fuzz Adapter" I built in '74 or '75.

Wow Doug, you've been building stuff for as long as I have been alive! I hope that you are OK with that  

My first distortion pedal was the Boss Super Overdrive SD-1, I still have it and it still sounds great for an off the shelf unit. I've never modded it and still use it from time to time. It was my second pedal, my first was a Cry Baby.

[Doug H]

An Anderton "Optimum Fuzz Adapter" I built in '74 or '75.

Wow Doug, you've been building stuff for as long as I have been alive! I hope that you are OK with that  

I'm ok with it, Jay, if you are.

I built that fuzz box and a treble booster in high school. I tried the "leslie sim" (on JD's site) back then too but never got it working. It was fun scavenging electronics magazines for projects, different world then... Didn't do much since then except for a buffer and a tube fuzz until about 5yrs ago when I got bit by the bug again here.

Doug

[Chris R]

smash drive ! ;p

i mainley used my amp distortion before i started building pedals (mmm mesa)

C

[casey]

i think my first pedal was a RAT.

my first build was a jack orman "son of screamer."

[Paul Marossy]

My first was a Black Cat OD-1 clone. That was two years ago.

[JohnM]

A DS-1 over 20 years ago.  Didn't know what I was buying, and didn't really appreciate it until recently.  I like it more now than ever.

[brett]

Took 15 years of playing (1981-1996) before I finally bought a decent amp and an Ibanez TS-7.  Sold it last week on e-bay.  

First build was an NPN fuzzface, then tube-sound fuzz, then several more, and recently a Bluesbreaker, modified Distortion+ and some Miss Piggies.

[keko]

My first distortion device was my father's home stereo, over the christmass night I got my first guitar.

Then I started pluging that axe into anything I could, and my 'wireless transmitter was born'....a 70's portable tape recorder: guitar into mic input, tape recorder 'taped' to guitar strap, and adhesive 'tape' (tape tape tape again) fiddling with the 'REC' sensor.

And then I got my first distortion box. It wasn't a pedal, it was a Radio Shack delay, so crappy you could only get like 100ms out of it, but it did sound in an interesting way...

then DOD came with Supradistortion, Grunge, and that's it for DOD pedals. Enter Digitech RP-5 (all of them sold; delay was lent and never came back). Enter BOSS MetalZone...

Enter DIY!!! --: tube screamer, bigmuff, dist+, smashDrive., blueBox (great tone by itself)

[jsleep]

1973, Lafayette Fuzz Sound.  $9.95 plus shipping from the Lafayette Catalog.  Same one shown on top of page 15 in "Stompbox" book by Art Thompson.  used a double-A battery, not a bad Fuzz, don't have it any more.

JD

[Mann]

Big Muff back in 76 or 77. Bought a russian BM and it still sounds good.
Started building my own effects couple of years ago.

>Following up on the 1973 thread, what was your first distortion pedal???