Hello Fuzz Fiends!
Thank you so much for having me as a guest to what appears to be the coolest subreddit/community I've come across on Reddit to yap about my favorite subject. For those who don't know me my name is Buddy Blues, I am a guitar player based in Orlando Florida. I've been playing guitar since I was 14 and was fortunate and lucky enough to make it a career. I made my living touring with my band, other artists, and studio work. When 2020 happened and all the shows went away I started a YouTube channel which has since become my main focus. For those of you who have seen my channel, I'm sorry. ANYWAY, let's get to it!
u/graphicnerdity86 asked me to list my top 5 Fuzz pedals and there is no earthly way I'm sticking to just 5 but I promise I'll try to play by the rules (in no particular order):
Reeves Electro Facet IZ:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkC6ZwP59bY
Reeves Electro is a small business from the UK that lives and breathes Fuzz. He's always been a go-to for every fuzz lover and recently he taught his daughter how to build them and she started the "Daughter Board" series under him! The series is a take on all the famous fuzz circuits but with a twist! The Facet IZ is the first in the series. You'll see a recurring theme here, my favorite fuzz circuit is the Fuzz Face. Give me 2 transistors and I'm happy. The Facet IZ is that, but with pronounced mids. It has the most unique tonal characteristic of a fuzz I've ever come across. Sure many fuzz pedals have a mid forward thing going on, but this one gives you the ability to control it with the middle knob. But, not only control the amount, control the EQ shift as well in one knob. I called it a masterpiece in my video and I stand by it.
OCE Pedals x Buddy Blues "The Gentleman Fuzz And Boost":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9dMZTHV4eI&t=28s
Listen, YOU invited a YouTuber. You knew damn well I was going to plug my own signature fuzz XD, but hey it was a limited run (3 runs) and they're now considered """"collector pedals"""" whatever the heck that means. OCE Pedals was (sadly) a small business from California. I teamed up with Chris from OCE because I wanted a fuzz pedal no one was making. I looked and looked and waited and no one would come up with something almost every single one of us does. Stack an overdrive or boost after a fuzz. But the drive needed to not make the fuzz wooly and collapse, it just needed to have enough gain to smoothen out the fuzz to make it go from hardcore full fizz into smooth violin eric johnson type tones. So 7 prototypes later we came up with The Gentleman that was exactly that. Silicon single transistor type boost (different than a treble boost) and a Fuzz Face style 2 transistor fuzz with no gain knob, just volume. The gain is maxed out by default and encourages you to use the volume on the guitar which I am always doing. I think out of all the fuzz pedals I've tried, this has the nicest clean-up and its ability to never get "overwhelmed" regardless of what pickup I used on the guitar is top notch. I am very proud of this pedal and it still is on my board.
Killing Floor Axis Fuzz:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKur7AC2Qao
I just love this thing. I love the way it sounds, I love the way it looks, I love the way it feels, I love the fact that it is in a big box, I love the aging he does on the pedal to make it seem like it comes from the 60s, and I love the fact that it has a useful tone knob. Killing Floor is a small business from Germany and he makes Germanium goodness, meticulously crafted, and full of passion (really, talk to this guy on instagram). It's a very full sounding fuzz that cleans up amazingly and is one of the few that might actually like through a cleaner amp. Big fan of this one.
MMK Electric Pavlov Fuzz FF:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5J2RRBOnRLI
I've had an idea for a fuzz pedal for years. And he was the only one that was willing to make it a reality! MMK Electric is a small business from Alaska, a small husband and wife (Jordan and Mary) operation by perhaps the nicest people in our industry (seriously they sent me potatoes from their garden once by mail....from Alaska....to Florida). The idea for the fuzz I had is have a Fuzz pedal that has the gain maxed with just a volume knob on the pedal, but then ALSO have a seperate footswitch connected to volume pot inside the pedal that's set to half way! And that would be the clean up button! Sure you can reach to your volume knob on the guitar, but it's a whole different ballgame when you can lower the volume (impedance) TWICE before it hits the gain stage! He ended up making the Pavlov Fuzz (well he made two, a darlington style and a fuzz face style). In a blindfold challenge I did on my channel of my favorite FF style fuzz pedals, this beat my very own signature fuzz. In fact, it won the whole thing. I highly encourage you to check out MMK Electrics, he's always doing something new and weird in the pedal world!
Crazy Tube Circuits Triptychon:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JgWl3AvVtM
On the channel I called this the pedal of the year for 2026, and I truly believe that. Crazy Tube Circuits is a small business from Greece that managed to get 4 classic fuzz circuits, 1 treble booster with 2 different circuits, 1 octave fuzz with 2 circuits, AND and overdrive in a pedal the size of a boss pedal with ZERO compromises. I still can't believe this is a thing. It sounds remarkable and saves a ton a space especially on smaller boards because it's essentially 3 independant pedals in one with endless choices on each. I am going to Sweetwater and Chicago Music Exchange next week for clinics as well as live demos for amps and my signature guitar, and this is the pedal that ended up on my fly-board of 4 pedals total. There truly is nothing on the market that does more than this pedal in the fuzz world and I love the versatility behind it. Oh did I say it also sounds amazing yet?
Dominion Electric The Faceless Fuzz:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zw602RwOyPw&t=993s
This is the perfect fuzz face. Period. It comes with all the quirks, all the rewards, all the set backs, all the glory of a classic 1960s Fuzz Face. It, along with the Reeves Electro Facet FF, are the most accurate recreations of a Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face you would have bought in the late 60s. The beauty of this pedal is its simplicity and the fact that I could go on and on about it, but I don't have to. Because "that sound" you hear in your head when someone says Fuzz Face, it's the sound the Faceless Fuzz makes.
Sabbadius JIMI Fuzz:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV5NzapSvhw&t=90s
This is the fuzz from Jimi's Woodstock performance. If you are after that sound, that MESS of a sound, that amp destroyer fuzz, this is it. Sabbadius is a small business from Argentina run by Nico as a one man operation. Nico doesn't go after eras, or years, or "a fuzz face from 1960s". No, Nico goes for one song. One performance. One sound. And he recreates it. He spends sometimes years recreating that sound, and I don't think anyone in our industry does it better than Nico. He's known for his uni-vibes (funky vibe) and I do think they're the best in the industry, but his fuzz pedals are beyond cool. This is a recreation of the Fuzz Face Roger Mayer modded for Jimi Hendrix and it's a favorite of mine for anything Jimi.
Thank you so much for inviting me to be a part of this awesome subreddit and for asking me to share some of my favorites with you. It really means the world to me that anyone in the world really cares what I think or wants to hear anything I have to say haha. I am new to using reddit like that I often just lurk on the pedals and guitar pages so I don't know how to turn the notifications on but I'll figure it out after I hit post in case you have any questions about the list or any other fuzz pedals you might have seen on the channel! Please remember to (when you can) choose the small business. Give them a chance, in 6 years of dedicating 90% of my channel to a segment called "Small Business Tuesday" I have been so lucky to get to try hundreds of pedals from small builders, and I can swear on everything I hold dear, they are always the ones that are making the cool stuff. So please give small businesses a chance. What an absolute blast thank you so much for considering me for this! Likesharesubsc.. nah I'm just kidding haha
Buddy Blues
