Klinger Buzz Fuzz II

     This review is for a pedal that's my new favorite pedal of all time.   It's a hand-made Boutique version of the rare Burns Buzzaround pedal, as used by Robert Fripp during his heyday with the original King Crimson.   It's got the traditional three knobs the original has (Sustain, Balance, and Timbre), plus an added Pre knob, which controls the amount of signal going into the circuit, giving the overall gain of the unit more options.   Sustain controls the gain, Balance is kinda like a volume knob, and Timbre shapes the tone.   The Pre and Sustain knobs are highly interactive.   The pedal does overdrive, distortion and fuzz type tones with it's own unique sound.
     The pedal gives a wide variety of gain structures depending on the Pre and Sustain settings, from a nice crunch to a highly saturated yet very musical fuzz with a lot of natural sounding warmth and a smooth, yet bright high end, while still maintaining a healthy bottom end, with a distinct texture that recalls Prog-rock type tones, yet still sounds very modern.   The three germanium transistors give the pedal a smooth breakup, yet it maintains a healthy dose of crunch, and practically every setting of the four knobs is very useable.  The pedal stays touch responsive at all settings.    Arpeggios and complex chords ring fairly clear.   The effect retains relative note clarity for a fuzz, even at high gain settings.   It never mushes out.  The gain  cleans up well with the guitar's volume knob and retains its high end edge even as the volume is turned down.   This pedal is one of the best stompboxes I've ever had the pleasure of playing.
      This pedal is hand-built to order and uses premium NOS and modern parts mounted and hand-wired on turret strips, yet the price to order direct from Klinger is still very reasonable, even with the extra $20.00 AUD for shipping.    My pedal features a custom enclosure in silver Hammer, the first Buzz Fuzz II in that color, which Shaun Klinger did free of charge.   He stayed in contact with me during the building process and his replies were prompt and very helpful.   Check out the inspiring youtube videos of his current pedals.   I'm sure you'll be as impressed as I was, they are truly magical.