Joe Davisson Shocktave - Peculiar transistor issue

[nocentelli]

I breadboarded this last night: http://www.diystompboxes.com/analogalchemy/sch/shocktave.html

...and was wondering if anyone could shed some light on some peculiar issues I've had with it.

As I was laying it out, I realised I was one 2N5089 short: I've got a stash of various other trannies, so after a quick scan of the internet I identified BC549c as a popular substitution (btw, I'm pretty confident about the pinouts of both, i.e. that they are reversed). So I started off with the BC549 as Q1 and 2N5089 for all the rest, carefully observing correct pinout. No joy, didn't work at all. I then swapped it around so the mongrel was at Q2 - Still no sound. Getting frustrated, I swapped it into all positions with no success. At this point, I was about to give up and reluctantly order a handful of 2N5089s when I suddenly got the effect I was after with the BC549 as Q2. I assumed there must have been a short/dodgy connection etc that must have shifted, and the effect sounded pretty much like soundclips I've heard, seemed to be working fine. However, as I was looking over the circuit, I realised that Q1 (now a 2N5089) was actually reversed, i.e. emitter and collector were swapped over. I put it back to how it should be, and the effect stopped working