Talking with Joshua of FXdoctor

I had a great opportunity to send some questions over to Joshua of FXdoctor. For those of you that aren’t familiar with FXdoctor, it’s a shop out of Boston, MA building, customizing and repairing pedals and amplifiers since 2001.  Taking a look at their website and blog I was immediately impressed with the look of the pedals. From super clean/pro to crazy and off the wall. Their range of effects is broad as well – from volume to fuzz to overdrive to oscillation noise makers.

When initially hitting their site, I noticed their kickstarter campaign. I’ve seen a few companies do this to start development on prototype units, etc., but this is a little different.. and it really caught my eye. Their kickstarter campaign is to do a US tour of major cities to demo their product line. I think this is a great way to get out there and get noticed by musicians as well as various dealers.

Here is a great video explaining the campaign as well as a demo of the Super 8 Bit Fuzz and Scalpel Volume.

So I emailed Joshua a few questions about FXdoctor, and this is what he had to say:

– What got you into working on pedals?
When I was about 12 years old my first guitar cable broke and my natural curiosity got the best of me. My father told me it was as simple as resoldering the connector and my obsession with modifying my gear spread from there.

– At what point did you decide to work on your own line of pedals?
Probably around 2000 or 2001 I decided to make a switchable treble/clean boost for my Sovtek MIG100H. It had this awful red, white, and blue paint scheme which was terrible but the pedal sounded awesome.

– What pedal is your hot seller?
The hot seller for pedals has always been the Scalpel and the Super 8-Bit Fuzz. For modifications the Phase 90 mods and Whammy true bypassing has been incredibly popular this year.

– I see that you do pedal re-housing. Do you find a lot of people requesting this?
Rehousings are a funny thing; the labor costs more than most of the pedals are worth but some people are so attached to the tone that they’ll pay to have it last forever. It’s been very popular over the years and has always been one of my favorite aspects of my job.

– What’s the story on your oscillation pedals?
While working on new pedals sometimes I like to entertain myself with designing circuits to make strange noises for use in mixing and post-production. Some of the more abitious musicians even work them into their live sets.

– Loved the Tetris inspired enclosures. Are you going to continue to do those?
Man, what a pain!  My dream is to make my entire pedalboard and rehouse everything into tetris shaped pedals. Unfortunately the cost is high and the time to assemble is outrageous.  I originally made them as a challenge to myself but unless they are requested I won’t be stocking them in the future.

-How are the individual squares secured on each pedal?
I sanded down the sloped edges so they were flush, used epoxy to keep it level, and screwed everything together.

– How is the 8Bit Fuzz Kickstarter campaign going?
It’s going great! I’ve had so many people email me just to give input and help me find places to visit. We’ve hit the $1000 goal and more importantly made a lot of great contacts and friends.

– What inspired you to design the 8Bit Fuzz?
I’ve always been a fan of vintage gaming consoles and especially the soundtracks. Contra and Ducktales were probably my two favorites!

– Are you working on any new designs?
We always have new designs in the works. We just finished our latest revision of our Preamp pedal (3-band EQ with gain and volume controls) and a Super Bass Bit fuzz to compliment the Super 8-Bit Fuzz.

– How does the future for FXDoctor looking? Staying busy? Staying inspired?
Things have been going well. We’re working on making our pedals in larger quantities while looking better and costing less. So yes we’ve been very busy! Hopefully, our tour of the US will be a source of inspiration.

As you can see FXdoctor is doing some great things, be sure to check them out at their website and like them on Facebook when you get a chance!