BREEDLOVE
GUITARS
FOCUS SE
CUSTOM
WALNUT
Breedlove built its rep’ on top-quality
guitars that walked just a little off the
beaten path. The Focus SE Custom Walnut
couldn’t do a better job of holding up that
tradition. With walnut back and sides and a
redwood top, it’s a beautiful deviation from
bread and butter tonewood combinations.
The result, as reviewer Gayla Drake Paul
noted, is a guitar that’s “simultaneously dark
and brilliant, thanks to the snappy-but-deep
qualities of the walnut back and sides—
which sound a bit like a cross between rose-
wood and mahogany—while the redwood
has the warm detail of cedar.” Gayla also
loved its rich and varied personality: “it’s
quite loud, projects extremely well, and is
responsive to a light touch—all of which
translates to great dynamic range. Play it
whisper-soft and you’ll get a crystalline, del-
icate tone. Dig in, and the Focus SE rocks
without significantly blurring overtones.”
We also noted it’s a guitar that “gor-
geously illustrates how Breedlove has helped
bridge forward-thinking and old-world
styles.” We’re thankful that Breedlove still
knows how to walk that walk.
BLACK CAT
BEE BUZZ
In tackling a re-interpretation of the underground legend that was and is the Roland
Bee Baa, Black Cat not only gave new
life to one of the great unsung fuzzes, but
lent some of its own twists that make it a
standout in a cluttered cosmos of buzz ‘n’
fuzz boxes.
The strength might be a beautifully
skuzzy, but surprisingly meaty, ’60s-style
fuzz in Bee mode, a switch to Buzz mode
rendered our candy apple Bee Buzz a
brawny cousin to the Fuzz Face and Big
Muff clans.
Gear Editor Charles Saufley was moved
to gush that the “Bee Buzz is a brilliant
beam of stinging light in the world of
brawny, super high-gain fuzzes,” and that
“with the flip of a switch it transforms into
a meatier Muff-like fuzz that can run with
those tigers, too.” For those who don’t mind
risking the sting, the Bee Buzz is one burly
little bugger that can rise above the din.
blackcatpedals.com
EVENTIDE
SPACE
Rarely has such an ambitiously named piece
of gear lived up to its handle. No joke, this
little box really can sound like the whole
freaking cosmos in all its exploding, nebulous glory. It’s a pretty nice straightforward
reverb, too, if that’s your need or fancy. But
smart and free-ranging players will take
advantage of all its multitudinous capabilities, and will no doubt make some very
interesting music.
Space does its magic by spinning out sonic
tangents from 12 basic reverb algorithms,
including Hall, Room, Plate, Spring, and
Reverse and more esoteric algorithms like
Mangledverb (distorts and detunes reverb
tails), Shimmer (shifts pitches in reverb tails
and lends a touch of harmonizing), and
Blackhole (lends an overtone-rich, more-spacious-than-space feel).
The latter is a particularly apt descriptor
because this Eventide can truly be a Black
Hole for practice time. Few pedals have ever
made a single D chord so cool in so many
ways. Those who care to venture further
into the ways it will interact with more
nuanced playing risk never returning. Like
the universe itself, Space is virtually endless.
If you go, don’t forget to write.
