Catalinbread Octapussy Octave Fuzz Pedal

Catalinbread are big fans of the original octave fuzz circuits that were extremely popular back in the 60’s and 70’s. Instead of cloning an already popular pedal that instead looked at how to make something better so they went back to the drawing board and came back with this…the Octapussy.

Dynamic and Responsive Fuzz

A lot of fuzz pedals are focused so much on giving you one specific sound that they lose all concept of dynamic control and responsiveness. The goal for this pedal was to bring the level of control we love from drive pedals and introduce that in an octave-up fuzz circuit. So not only will this pedal respond really well to your guitar’s volume control but also to the tone control and pickup selector.

Controlling The Fuzz

This pedal has 3 key controls that you will be using to craft your sound. The Gain control sets how much fuzz is added to your signal. The Body controls how much low end response and thump you get in the mix. Both of these controls increase output and harmonic content so it is worth playing with these to find your ideal ‘maxed out’ sound. Finally the Attenuate control is there for when the output becomes a bit too much and you need to lower the output before hitting your amp or other pedals.

We mentioned that your guitar also heavily affects this sound but just how does that work? Well your volume control is essentially the intensity turned up you get gnarly lead sounds that really cut through while dialed back you get a cleaner more subtle sound for chord sections. Ideally for the smoothest heaviest fuzz you will dial back the tone on the neck pickup but experimenting here is a great way of finding subtleties in the fuzz that you can use.

Here’s what Catalinbread say about the Octapussy Octave Fuzz

The Octapussy is essentially, an octave-up fuzz in the tradition of the Octavia. But it’s not a clone of that circuit! Nope, it’s an original circuit utilizing 3 silicon transistors and two diodes that takes the tradition to the next level! The preamp section is custom voiced to give you an extremely dynamic playing response. You’ll get those famous high-octave lead tones up high on the guitar neck but you’ll also get an amazing array of fuzz tones anywhere else on the neck – just by how you play it and how your GUITAR’s volume, tone, and pickup selector is set.