The new Giygas by Catalinbread: a three-transistor box full of delicious fuzz tones
The new Catalinbread Giygas is a super versatile three transistor fuzz with a clean blend circuit that, according to the company, is both “brawny and fierce”, while maintaining “violin-like sustain and articulation”.
Catalinbread Giygas
This new boutique fuzz pedal from Portland, Oregon USA looks really impressive, both on paper and aesthetically. I really like its aesthetic, which reminds me of a Dungeons and Dragons monster (Gary Gygax?). The Catalinbread Giygas uses three transistors to drive its fuzz circuit, and seems to be able to cover a lot of tonal ground.
The Giygas has a JFET-driven clean blend circuit plus a mid boost section, meaning you should easily be able to get this fuzz pedal to cut through in a mix, whilst still retaining both the distorted and the original note definition.
It also has a gyrator-based mids boost and a tilt EQ circuit… yeah, I don’t know what that means either, but it sounds cool! Apparently it ’tilts’ around the 900Hz range, with a centre notch that has no effect when you leave it in the middle position. Then, if you roll the blend knob all the way back, you can still use the powerful high-headroom EQ to sculpt your clean tone, with the fuzz effectively turned off.
Catalinbread Giygas with tilt EQ · Source: Catalinbread
Bass & Guitar
With its handy internal guitar/bass switch, you can set the Giygas to handle low end signals as well. This is obviously good news for bassists, but baritone guitar players too. Maybe we’ll be seeing it become popular among Doom players… There is also an internal trimpot that provides 10 dB of boost or cut at 40 Hz. The pedal runs on an external 9-Volt power supply and does not use batteries.
Check out YouTube’s Fluff giving it a workout in the demo video below, as he makes a good overview of this sweet little dirt box. I’m pretty impressed by this pedal and think it could be perfect for many applications. For starters, it is flexible EQ-wise, and its ability to handle lower-tuned instruments will be a huge bonus for many players. I can’t wait to try one out myself.
You can pre-order the Giygas for yourself using the link below.
RRP – GBP 199
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