I recently found out that Menatone has added another pedal to their lineup called the "Howie". Apparently they addaed a tremelo as well. I own the Blue Collar and really love it. Can anybody give some info on what the Howie sounds like compared to the other pedals? Also, any info on Frantone products?

Thanks
J

Here's Frantone's site: http://www.frantone.com Fran has a few new pedals that are coming to market soon. Hopefully Toyz will be carrying the new line (Teddy...?) The Sweet is a germanium based fuzz that is really quite nice. You can get all kinds of useable fuzztones from it. It's not as over the top as a Way Huge Swollen Pickle(as an example...) but you can get as equally thick a fuzz going. The sustain and tone controls are amazing and work very well through out their range. The Peach Fuzz is also a fuzz but is sounds different than The Sweet. I would say the fuzz is not quite as thick and full-bodied. If you're looking for a fuzztone to add that extra bit of "classic" fuzziness to your sound this might be good for that. Depending on how you set the controls it can go from a distorted to compressed fuzz and somewhere inbetween. The Hepcat is an overdrive that at the extremes can sound like a compressed fuzz. It's a higher gain pedal so it has little more punch than a TS-type of OD (I A/B'd it with a Maxon OD-808). It's much cleaner in the mids than the OD-808. These are my experiences/observations, of course. If you can try them with your gear you'll have a more accurate sense of it. These pedals are all well built, with quality parts by Fran and her staff in Brooklyn, NY. Every now and then they come up on Ebay or HC for decent $$$. BTW, I have seen some of the newer Menatone stuff at a local shop, maybe Toyz can update the page to include those.

yes we will have the Frantone when they come out!!

Howie pedals and tremelo will be here this week just like I told you...

I just got a Hep Cat off eBay and I'm liking it a lot. I'd call it a more natural, tubey overdrive than a Tubescreamer. A TS without the compression and midrange. Quite mild though. Cranked all the way up it's still just a touch of tubey overdrive, not fuzzy at all.

There's a Web site, and by golly I can't for the life of me think of it, that has some WAV samples of the new Howie (which sounds great!) and the Trem 5000 or whatever it's called. I'll think of it in a second.

Gotta love that "history" button on your Web browser! Here's the site:
http://chapinguitars.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/pedalsAndEffects.html

Ash...I wasn't accurate in my description of the full-out sound of the HepCat, it isn't a fuzz, but I didn't have the terms to describe it. You did...thanks for clarifying that. You're also right that even pegged the HepCat is not over the top. Have you tried it as a clean boost yet? Glad to hear you like it...they are nice pedals, eh?

Hi, if you want more info on the Menatone Howie pedal, it's been discussed quite a lot about 2-3 weeks ago on the PRS Forum. Bill Chapin of Chapin Guitars owns and sells it , and a few of the bb's participants really liked the pedal. I have 1 net friend who bought and sold it quickly as he didn't like it, but the other reviews I've heard have all been extremely positive!

ERIC