Guitar for Worship

(See? That’s the happy gear look on my face every time I play guitar or
touch an amp or pedal. But…….without the cheeseball fans blowing up
at my hair to make me look rockstar. And yes, he does have electric fans
plugged in on either side of his monitor blowing up at his hair. Sorry Steve Vai people. Now, I’m not very big into his playing, but I do admit the dude can jam.
But the fans on his hair and the giant cardboard cutout of an MXR Dynacomp
behind him on stage? Someone needs to tell him no.)

So craigslist is awesome. (Like my transition? Oh ya.)

You can buy things without paying paypal or shipping fees, and most of the
time you can try out awesome stuff, and then sell it off again without losing
any money.

We meet the craigslist guy in the El Torito parking lot at The Block in Orange.
(Do you know they have a gelato place there where you can pack gelato into
cookies? That’s like the best thing I’ve ever heard in my life.) So, we meet the
guy, and here’s the coolest thing about guitar people……there’s no, ‘Here’s the
money, here’s the pedals.’ It’s like, 30 minute conversations about every
incarnation our rigs have ever gone through. And I love it. Why is talking gear
so fun?

‘Oh, that has the 4pdt switch?’
‘Ya, man, Mike special made this to have more presence in the depth knob.’
‘So, how does it compare to the Fulltone Chorus?’
‘Well, back in ‘97, when I was playing with Mike from Fulltone, we designed….’

And so on and so forth. But note that earlier, I said ‘we’ met the pedal guy at
The Block. It’s date night for my wife and I , and she so graciously just sits
in the car and laughs at us as we can’t help but share our gear’s life stories.
She’s so awesome.

So, I really wanted to try out an Analogman Chorus and MI Audio Crunchbox,
and the OCD just came in the package. I had tried version 1 of the OCD years
ago with a completely different rig and musical mindset, and hated it. And that
view has just kind of stuck, so I just figured the OCD would be the one I would
flip without listening to it.

(And it has a bright blue led. Have I mentioned how much I adore blue led’s?
They change the tone of the pedal……no, I’m serious…..they really do. Not
just in my mind.)

Well, as fate would have it, I sold my Zendrive 1 for a Zendrive 2 (because
the higher the numbers, the better they are, of course), and then the
Zendrive 2 didn’t work for the application I wanted it. Incredible blues
overdrive, but couldn’t cop the higher gain distortion sounds like the Zen 1
could.

So while I’m in high gain pedal limbo, I throw the OCD on my board for a night
service at a church. And I don’t know if there’s just been huge changes between
versions 1 and 3 (supposedly they increased the mid sweep, which takes out some harshness), or maybe it’s the running it at 12 volts now, or maybe the changes
in my gear and mindset, but wow, that’s a good pedal. Nice and high gain, but
with a cool glassiness in the upper registers that just sings in a very original
way. Awesome pedal. The knobs are very responsive, too, making it versatile,
and the switch from low to high gain is very cool.

And then I bought a Hermida Mosferatu and sold the OCD. Ya, as Jason says,
it’s a sickness.