PAUL TROMBETTA DESIGN
TORNITA!
Bias control for gating, smoothing, and clipping fuzz
BY MICHAEL ROSS
Boutique manufacturer Paul Trombetta came to the effects business via a pretty
traditional path. His pedals, though, are
anything but typical. At 16, he started wiring his own guitars and rehousing effects. By
2003, he was modifying Electro-Harmonix
Big Muffs and Pro Co Rats for friends, and
in 2005 birthed Paul Trombetta Design to
market pedal creations of his own.
Trombetta says his primary design motivation is to provide cutting-edge tones in
pedals that are also capable of generating
more recognizable and universally useful
sounds. His Mini-Bone, for example, offers
fat, dynamic Fuzz Face-style drive, yet also
yields trumpet and trombone sounds, low
octaves, and can harmonize a fifth down.
All Trombetta’s pedals are true bypass,
handwired, point-to-point, with carefully
selected and matched components. And as
many as half the pedals he sells are ordered
with custom paint or engraving. They’re real
works of art, from both an aesthetic and
musical perspective. So it’s little surprise
that Trombetta’s work drew the attention
of experimental guitarist and soundtrack
composer David Torn—or that he and
Trombetta would conspire on a pedal to suit
Torn’s needs. The result is the Tornita!
Phase
switch
Oversized Blend knob for improved foot control
Torn and Paid
Torn and Trombetta’s relationship dates to
2009 when Torn (David Bowie, k.d. lang,
John Legend, Tori Amos, Bill Bruford, Mick
Karn, David Sylvian, Meshell Ndegeocello,
Don Cherry) ordered a Mini-Bone from
Trombetta. Pleased with his purchase, Torn
had Trombetta send him one of the now-dis-continued Donita pedals—a six-knob, high-gain distortion that could produce self-oscil-lating feedback. Discussions ensued between
Torn and Trombetta concerning modifications
to the Donita design—things like latching
and momentary feedback buttons, and foot
adjustable feedback pitch control. The inclusion of these options and the layout of the
resulting stompbox created something that
was as much an instrument as a guitar pedal.
Though Trombetta produces over 200
pedals a year, the appearance of our test
Tornita! retains a DIY aesthetic: The word
“in”—like all the pedal’s details—is hand-carved into the brushed metal casing to
indicate the whereabouts of the input, a
circle with a line across it (presumably representing negative tip) marks the adapter
input, and the big Blend knob looks like it
was pulled off a piece of gear from the ’50s.
The controls include Volume and Bias,
as well as the oversized and unlabeled Blend
knob. The Bias control creates cool bit-reduction effects and affects the way the
feedback reacts to both your playing and the
fuzz sustain. There is a 3-way, mini-toggle
Presence switch on the back, which has a
very subtle mid-boost effect. A mini-toggle
Feedback phase switch offers Up and Down
modes. Up emphasizes the upper frequencies
in feedback mode, while down favors—you
guessed it—the lower ones. Either mode
has the potential to unleash auto arpeggiating patterns, low octaves, and droning. The
Momentary feedback footswitch enables you
to engage the feedback effect for as long as
you hold it down. The Latch mode holds and
sustains feedback so you can use your foot to
adjust the Blend knob for pitch changes and
other surprises. The Tornita! operates on a 9V
battery and standard 9V adapter.
Chaos Theory
I tested the Tornita! with a Fernandes Strat-style and a Fender Stratocaster run through
an Egnater Rebel 30 and an Orange Tiny
Terror. I also recorded some samples by
running the Tornita! directly into Ableton
Live using Live’s Amp and Speaker plug ins
to warm up the recorded tone.
With the Bias all the way up, the straight
fuzz sound of the Tornita! was fat, warm,
and reed-like, with plenty of sustain.
Backing off the Volume thinned and cleaned
up the sound significantly, creating a sharp
cutting tone that sliced through a mix.
Turning the Bias down transports you to
more experimental realms. A slight nudge
counterclockwise added a cool crackle to the
fuzz and shortened the sustain considerably.
Turning it almost totally down transformed
my guitar’s tone into an electronic blip.
Moving beyond the straight fuzz setting,
I entered a world of character-rich tones
that are definitely designed with the more
adventurous guitarist in mind. Stepping on
either the Latch or Momentary Feedback
switches gave me pitch shifts, random
arpeggios, and synth-style oscillator sweeps
that I could control—and I use the term
loosely—with my pickup selector switch,
guitar volume and tone knobs, and/or the
pedal’s Blend control. As I began to change
