Mick Ronson Fuzz...

[Tone Eee]

...on the "Man Who Sold the World" album: Is this a Tonebender (I? II?)

I heard this album for the first time in years and his tone is kicking my ass.

Dang!

[english_bob]

Apparently a Tonebender Mk1 user. That and a wah pedal used for tone variation. And a big-ass Marshall stack. Glitter and pretending that David Bowie is blowing you optional

 

I'm not sure about "The Man Who Sold The World", but on "Hunky Dory" and "...Ziggy Stardust" there are a few points where some delay is added- probably by the mixing engineer rather than by Mick, but that's likely to be as much to do with the expense and unreliability of tape echoes back then as anything, so putting an analog or tape delay (or a digital model of one) in your "Mick Rig" wouldn't hurt your rendition of "Moonage Daydream"

[Tone Eee]

Thanks, Bob.

I am already fantazing about Bowie in heels, so that might help.

 

Hey, I see you've got a 'Bender with FF mod. Does it do a convincing FF? I might have to build one and scrap my FF for the 2-for-1.

[english_bob]

It's my first fuzz of either persuasion, so I can't really compare it to anything. Both sound good with a little tweaking (I can get somewhere in the ballpark of Clapton's Cream tones with my semi), and that's what counts I guess.

 

I'm told that electronically the two designs are almost identical- the Tonebender is essentially a Fuzz Face with a full range boost tacked on to the input, which the BYOC kits allow you to bypass. There's a diagram on the BYOC forums that shows how to achieve this with a DPDT toggle switch, although I don't think their new ESV MkII kit still has the extra solder eyelet that allows this- there's probably a way round that though, and the BYOC forum folks will no doubt help out if necessary.

 

The other modifications I made to mine were an external bias control (just replace the trim pot on the kit with a regular pot) and a voltage sag control (taken, but altered for reverse circuit polarity, from Beavis's Ultimate Fuzz Mods, also on the BYOC site). The bias adjustment is essential- it controls the voltage going to one of the transistors, and varies the sonic quality of the fuzz from fat and warm to really ugly, spitty, broken and wrong. The Fuzz Face and Tonebender circuits sound best with different settings here, but I've managed to find a compromise that suits both for ease of use.

 

The voltage sag allows you to dial down the amount of battery power that the circuit runs on. Duane Allman apparently used to carry around a box full of partly used 9v batteries for his Fuzz Face, and again, it helps to increase the palette of tones you can get out of the pedal.

[TheGareth]

The Catalinbread Varioboost seems to do an excellent job at capturing the Mick Ronson tone.