The Virus - Mutated Overfuzz

[Jero]

https://stompingstones.bigcartel.com/product/virus




*artwork by Mike Skattum https://www.instagram.com/draculazer/?hl=en *








https://soundcloud.com/the-jero/ogres-have-layer

[Jero]

https://soundcloud.com/the-jero/virus-overfuzz

[rustywire]

Tfw learning you are a type 2 fuzz personality

[Chankgeez]

Is there any treatment for The Virus?

[Jero]

Tfw learning you are a type 2 fuzz personality

Does that mean you didn't like it? Cause that was set on type 1

:sick: Is there any treatment for The Virus?

More Cowbell?
...I mean more Virus


More clips coming! Hopefully a video instead.
Was editing a video for the Haxan today, and I think I'm just going to have to re-shoot it, so I might just do both in one.

[UglyCasanova]

Love the look of those veros!

[rustywire]

Tfw learning you are a type 2 fuzz personality

Does that mean you didn't like it? Cause that was set on type 1

Nah it means your OP description hit a lil close to home

[Jero]

Love the look of those veros!

thanks! I just got tired of that boring tan color

Tfw learning you are a type 2 fuzz personality

Does that mean you didn't like it? Cause that was set on type 1

Nah it means your OP description hit a lil close to home

I sent this one off for some others to play with, but got this brief clip...
Type 2 with the gain around 2 o'clock the whole time. I change the bias from low to high around the half way point.

[Jero]

Too 90's?

...not 90's enough?

I've heard this thing is pretty cool on bass

[goroth]

Do want.

[rustywire]

Yeah, that'll do

[Jero]

Do want.

Yeah, that'll do

Thanks!
Sorry for the delay in pricing and getting stuff up. That will be done soon.
Also working on fancy artwork, though I can do the current hand finishing or stamping still

[goroth]

Dude, the finish in that vid is crazy nice.

How do you propose on improving this?

[Jero]

Dude, the finish in that vid is crazy nice.

How do you propose on improving this?

Hopefully jrmy will be able to help me answer that soon

[Dandolin]

So, Virus...phwoar!



I'm going to restrain myself from Uncle Hipster cornball cowbell comments about fever/more virus, but I won't be able to restrain myself from a bit of textwalling on this critter....

To start with, this is Jero's joint from the ground up--that much is obvious from one look at the guts. Furthermore, this is a fully ILFian thing--it goes places and does things your granpappy's fuzz was woolgathering about in Sunday school when it was supposed to be on the lookout for Satan and his minions.

Now, it's not a full on howler, but it does speak in tongues. On the milder bias setting in Type 1 mode, with a standard gitfiddle, it comes on like a MKI Tonebender with all of the gate and spit, which is absolutely adorable and forever useful. Plenty of gain and volume here. Granpappy's fuzz would definitely approve, but Virus isn't emotionally needy--it knows it is temperature stable and built to travel regions and climes grandpappy's fuzz can't handle.

This is the mode for bass whompasauri. I rode it all night at my most recent gig, and at standard 4 string tuning with crazy hot 8Ts Ibanez humbuckers there is ample lowdown and everything from crisp ratty edge to synthibloom on tap, and none of the settings make the girth go poof.

Type 2 mode reserves its charms more for the upper frequencies in my experience, and I also found bias selection less overtly influential on tonal outcome with bass. So far, though, just for the one mode, on bass, I already want my own Virus.

With Type 2 mode selected and standard tuned guitar in line, things start to ramble the (st)range....
Rolling the guitar volume back in this mode makes this incredible whoosh that I want to rig up somehow to an expression pedal--never played another fuzz that does it. All of the cranky, oddball little overtones when rolling back the volume are just so satisfying--much more fun than the patented Hendrix-fuzzface-treble-zazzzTM trick.

About the bias switch--the differences between bias settings are much more apparent in Type 2 mode, and the more extreme bias setting ups the ante on fuzzy attack and artifacts in such a satisfying way that it is a possible candidate for a second stomp switch. Kick it in and things get edgier: things back up or they get cut. Attack starts to smear out, and as the gain goes up, especially when the guitar's volume is rolled back a ways, this slightly coy, babbling squeal starts to edge in, which I like because it just pokes the listener a little and reminds them that chaos could take over any moment...but it never quite does.

With the right settings on gain and bias you can also coax some beautiful octave up sounds out of the Virus. Pushing with a boost can, up to a point, result in a purer, more stable upper octave, but push a little harder and chaos will reign. The chaos is more swash-like than fuzz factory-esque, and when pushed by another fuzz (or anything supplying both clipping and gain at the Virus' input), things start to get quite reminiscent of the justly coveted HEQ-1.

I have a tiny MKI Tonebender build that does a similar kind of burbling, cackling mumblesqueal, just a slight touch less in control than the un-pushed Virus, and the guy who sold it to me told me it needed to be behind a buffer. That got me thinking.

Rather than bust out an actual buffer to test my brainwave because fml , I set up the Haxan to act as much like a buffer as possible (gain way down, LED clipping, volume up to reach unity) and slapped it in front of the Virus, and sure enough the squeal was gone. It also tightened the Virus up, pumped the gain and got rid of the splat--with a little tweaking it was metal mayhem; kinda HM-2ish actually. Had a great time gettin' shreddy for a while, but soon enough I went back to the strangeways the Virus brings on its own and put it back where it belongs, at the head of the chain (another one of the few commonalities Virus deigns to share with granpappy's fuzz).

Actually, it's been so easy to get lost in the well of sounds produced by just the Virus and some different inputs, I still haven't gotten to some of my usual fuzz moves like starving it or running it into various filters. I did get in a great grimy droney sesh with Chankgeez recently during which I ran my lapsteel through the Virus, and that was fantastic--long vibratoed notes through Virus fit in so perfectly with all the droning wash. I always find that lapsteels bring out unique character in fuzzes--something about all that metal on heavy gauge metal strings, it just cuts through even the spongiest fuzz, and the slower than usual note decay lets you coax out and prolong all the vocal and other more oddball qualities of a fuzz' decay envelope...and the Virus is no different in that regard; it was the perfect companion to grimy drone

hmmm, been a while since I put a steel bar on one of my basses

Welp, that concludes today's textwall transmission. The only thing I'm concerned with now is what kind of enclosure magick will be necessary to do the Virus justice

Great job on this one Jero