Please School Me on Boss HM-2 Clones

[retinal orbita]

Finally got to test out my XIX HMD-1 at my space and fuck does it ever crush. Great at bedroom levels too but man this thing is a gnarly beast.

[ck3]

The Earthbound Audio Throat Locust and Walrus Audio Red sound less boxy than the original HM-2 IMO. This may not bode well for cold, industrialized doom bass.

Now Mothra is stuck in my head. It's like a soundtrack to high school on repeat. Just add loads of Floridian death metal, early 90's Pantera, Type O Negative, Anathema, and My Dying Bride for extra LOLs.

I thought Godflesh used Boss GL-100 preamps back in the day.

[D.o.S.]

I am jamming Type O right now.

[nogodsnobedtimes]

I am jamming Type O right now.

[ck3]

I am jamming Type O right now.

Still one of my all time favs so many years later.

[XIX tech]

If someone is still interested, there is the Boss HM-2 and XIX tech HMD-1 shootout video.

[actual]

So the main difference is that one uses a single font, while the other one uses four?

[retinal orbita]

I've got an HM-2 and a HMD-1 on my board right now.

Consider me "a big fan".

Basically I'm thinking about ordering that Octave fuzz thing I saw on the XIX instagram later this year.

[retinal orbita]

Just in case you guys think I'm joking.....

[BetterOffShred]

My man has a CS-2 as well I ditched the CS-3 once I finally got one.. Nice setup.

[gila_crisis]

I ordered a Throat Locust last week. Looking forward to play with it ^^

[ck3]

The T.C. Electronic Eyemaster is about as bare bones as it gets, but seems to nail the HM-2 chainsaw texture decently with plenty of output for boosting amp gain. Other than a wonky switch that has to both be depressed and release for the pedal to toggle on/off, there's an adequate amount of bang for the buck.

[rfurtkamp]

If all I wanted was chainsaw, yea.

I have never used it for that!

[systemofameow]

Came to thread expecting to see a photo shopped HM-2W pic and was sadly disappointed.

[ck3]

If all I wanted was chainsaw, yea.

I have never used it for that!

Though I'm also not 100% about the chainsaw setting, it's nice to stomp on an affordable pedal and achieve comparable timbres. Internal trimmers would have been a nice Eyemaster bonus, but the circuit board is oriented in such a way it is difficult to determine if any exist or if mods are possible.

I wish Valeton would add a HM-2 knockoff to their Loft series, though it probably wouldn't be possible to miniaturize the circuit.

I spent a bit of time doing some A/B/C comparisons between the Eyemaster, Red, and Throat Locust. The latter two of the three seem to have a similar clipping character, while the TC Electronic take on this circuit seems slightly less focused overall when palm muting. EQ curves of each pedal differ ever-so-slightly, but are all in the same quadrant of the chainsaw ballpark. My current favorite of the 3 is the Throat Locust with the Red a close second (based on versatility/gain).