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This is the first pedal I ever had, though it was my Dad's. I had no idea what 'TUBE' meant but I liked that it was pink and yellow and felt those colours ought to somehow affect the guitar sound. I used to use it in into a 10watt Badger practice amp with the effect disengaged because the bypass boosted the signal and made the Badger overdrive which I thought sounded great.
The first pedal I bought was (can't be sure) a Dod Ice Box. I'd read a review of it in Guitarist Magazine, something I read everyday for about 2 hours! Again I had no idea what a chorus was or what any of the knobs really did - I just played around with it and liked the idea of my guitar sounding like 'ice'. I think it stopped working so I threw it away - this happened to most of my pedals for the first few years.

Ben79 wrote:

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There's one of those sitting on my desk right now waiting for me to get around to looking at it - dodgy sockets or pots or something.

Doog wrote:I think most of our 'Jesus, that pedal sounded awful' memories have gottttta be shaped by the crappy amps and maverick EQ settings we all used in our early days.

Was going to say this when Mike posted the HM-2, cause It's a great sounding pedal... just not for teh METALZ.

Everyone just likes the HM-2 because some bands use it. I remember it well and it's not great. Really sensitive and harsh EQ.

Mike wrote:Everyone just likes the HM-2 because some bands use it. I remember it well and it's not great. Really sensitive and harsh EQ.

I got mine in the days before the internet, and didn't know anyone who used them. My father in-law bought it and HATED it and gave it to me as I liked it. The eq can be harsh but there's plenty of good sounds to be had.

I think there's a certain amount of that with your first pedal love. You get the best out of it because you have NOTHING ELSE and then that special "first pedal" status means you never get rid of it and love it regardless. Most people hate the Boss OS2 or it least it gets unfavourable reviews but I love the tone I get out of it. Or at least I did before I sold it on. Twice. I expect it will always be THE repeat offender which ends up back in my collection at various times. But luckily you can buy them for peanuts.

dezb1 wrote:

Mike wrote:Everyone just likes the HM-2 because some bands use it. I remember it well and it's not great. Really sensitive and harsh EQ.

I got mine in the days before the internet, and didn't know anyone who used them. My father in-law bought it and HATED it and gave it to me as I liked it. The eq can be harsh but there's plenty of good sounds to be had.

I like mine, it sits somewhere between a Rat & a Muff for me, that's why its on my board & not them. I stack it with either a Hot Cake or Fuzz Face for fatness.

I like my HM-2 too. Have had it for about 20 years (God, that makes me feel old). I've always found it fairly easy to get some great sounds out of it, although some of the "color mix" settings can sound hideous.

My first pedal was a Boss HF-2, which lasted about 3 days before I traded it in for a DS-1. Like a total n00b I had tried the HF-2 out in a shop through an amp with a really nice drive sound. I assumed all the tonal goodness was coming out of the flanger, even when the effect was off. I had no real idea what a flanger was but someone had told me that's how I could get some of the sounds I was after. When I got it home I was soooo disappointed with how it sounded through my (rubbish) set up. Fortunately the shop let me swap it for a DS-1, which I found far more useful and still own.

Have never bought another flanger.

mine was a barnes and mullins fuzz unit i brought off a mate for £5. little did i know that had i kept it instead of giving to another mate, i'd have a piece of original tonebender mojo right now.

My first one:


Still have it, since I haven't got around to buy a proper tuner.

First "real pedal":

Johno wrote:

dezb1 wrote:

Mike wrote:Everyone just likes the HM-2 because some bands use it. I remember it well and it's not great. Really sensitive and harsh EQ.

I got mine in the days before the internet, and didn't know anyone who used them. My father in-law bought it and HATED it and gave it to me as I liked it. The eq can be harsh but there's plenty of good sounds to be had.

I like mine, it sits somewhere between a Rat & a Muff for me, that's why its on my board & not them. I stack it with either a Hot Cake or Fuzz Face for fatness.

Aye, I use it with a cool cat drive for the same sort of effect.

I like the EQ on the HM-2, its almost vowel like on high settings.

I picked up a DOD OD, a Reagun Stereo Phase and my CE-3 at the same time off a friend at uni. I couldn't use the DOD because the input jack was missing, I didn't like the sound of the phaser (I think the knobs were mislabelled) so the CE-3 was the only one I used regularly. Over the years I used it less and less often, and recently sold it to Fran.

Concretebadger wrote:I picked up a DOD OD, a Reagun Stereo Phase and my CE-3 at the same time off a friend at uni. I couldn't use the DOD because the input jack was missing, I didn't like the sound of the phaser (I think the knobs were mislabelled) so the CE-3 was the only one I used regularly. Over the years I used it less and less often, and recently sold it to Fran.

It arrived today, thanks Martin

Fran wrote:

Concretebadger wrote:I picked up a DOD OD, a Reagun Stereo Phase and my CE-3 at the same time off a friend at uni. I couldn't use the DOD because the input jack was missing, I didn't like the sound of the phaser (I think the knobs were mislabelled) so the CE-3 was the only one I used regularly. Over the years I used it less and less often, and recently sold it to Fran.

It arrived today, thanks Martin

Glad to hear it arrived safely! *thumbs up*

This was mine. I remember liking it well enough but I sold it as soon as I had an amp that had a footswitch and decent drive channel. I only used this back in the days of my first amp, a fender frontman 15, and my first loud amp, the fender princeton 112 plus that I mentioned in the worst gear you've ever owned thread.

Boss Super Fuzz

DOD Flanger, a childhood christmas present.
I remember that my Dad dragged me down to the local guitar shop to choose an FX pedal cos he had even less of a clue than the teenage Adam did.
I think I chose the flanger cos I read in my Nevermind tab book that Kurt used a flanger on Come As You Are...

I still have it, and it still works, but the bypass switch doesn't and the weird power jack doesn't help it's popularity with me.

wwrrss wrote:[img]
Rocktek Metal Worker!

haha, I think this is probably the coolest pedal in this thread. and solely based on the fact of it being called "Metal Worker".

most people's first pedal is probably pretty much crap/uninteresting. I got a behringer tremololz and digitech hotrod distortion. still have the former, as tremolo is at the same time non-desirable yet always at least somewhat useful.

My first pedal was a Morely wah. I rocked that thing forever.