Fuzzrocious Li’l Fella
The Li’l Fella is based on the Fuzzrocious Demon – and the Demon used to be called the Oh Cee Demon and that gives more than just a hint on where the idea for the Demon might come from. I did own an OCD for a while in the past – I never set out to buy one, but purchased an entire pedalboard at a too-good-to-pass-up price, and that had, among half a dozen others, an OCD on it. I do not particularly agree with the world views of Michael Fuller and while I’m happily treating the entire pedal market as a non political thing, when someone in the business feels the need to step on a soapbox and make their position abundantly clear …. let’s not get into this. Music is meant to bring people together.
However, the short time I did own that device clearly showed me that it’s useless for me, a bassist who values low end. I do know the Fuzzrocious Demon has some traction in the bass community and is said to be capable of some heavy lows, and the Lil’ Fella is the successor of that. Its reputation is that of an incredibly versatile pedal. Furthermore, I did like every single Fuzzrocious pedal I ever used, so I’m having some high expectations here.
Apart from the three knobs one would expect, there’s a fourth knob and a switch.
Volume, Tone and Drive reside in the expected places, but there is also a Gain knob, and to the left of that, the switch is labeled ‘Gate’.
The pedal comes in the usual Fuzzrocious quality – handmade with fine components and a pedalboard friendly configuration with top jacks.
With all knobs at noon, I did check the frequency response of the Tone knob first to make sure there’s no loss of bottom end on the Li’l Fella:
Tone 1 is minimum, Tone 8 is maximum, the other are increments of roughly 1/8th of the knobs travel. As you see there’s not much going on south of 600Hz. With the tone knob a bit past noon, I get the flattest possible response from the pedal, increasing Tone from there will boost upper mids and treble.
The Gate switch will, when activated, set the Gain knob to its maximum value. With Gate active, the Gain knob is out of the circuit. It also applies a gate, and the sensitivity of it is determined by the setting of the Drive knob.
The vibes I get from the Li’l Fella are quite angry.
And I don’t mean the kind of anger you get from a majestic lion when you touch his testicles with a glowing, white hot poker.
I mean the feeling you might get when you drive to work, park in the last corner of the car park, walk over to your office, sit down and realize your login does not work, and while you’re checking if you have caps lock on, your phone rings and you’re informed that HR wants to talk to you NOW. You go over there and are informed that they will let you go now because of some bogus accusations you cannot disprove. You go back to your office, escorted by security, to get your personal stuff and from there you’re escorted back to the car park to get your stuff from the company car that’s not yours any more. You ride the bus home and break the news to the Wife, who proclaims that this is the last straw. She only suffered your presence because of the financial stability you provided and hastily packs some stuff, leaving to stay with her mom, of course taking the kids. Two weeks into your new reality, you wake up with a thoroughly installed hangover, order three cheesburgers for brunch and have to find some cash to pay the uber eats driver because your credit card won’t work. You check the unopened envelope sent from your bank, in which they explain to you that with your job situation they don’t see a way forward and they deleted your account.
While you’re at it, you open the next envelope and learn that you’ll have to leave your home by the end of the month.
You decide to go for a walk because it’s nice outside and there might be some calming down to be found in the park. The sun hits your eyes with fierce intensity, driving painful spikes through your optical nerves into your brain and it seems that you fell down on the way home last night, because the shades in your inside pocked are broken. You walk at as brisk a pace your current situation allows for, keeping your vision limited to the few feet in front of your feet and someone bumps into you. One of these hormone filled 17 year olds that desperately try to cultivate a ‘stache – a few little hairs on the upper lip that you could shave with a butter knife. He’s with some friends so he feels especially strong, so he starts to insult you. You gather the very last shreds of patience to explain that you’re not in the mood, when that pimply faced youth tries to spit in your face.
You’re a wreck and in no shape for quick movements, and the little brat is part of a pack, so violence is not an option, but you can’t think of anything else.
This seething hot-and-cold rage that balls up in your upper chest and sends pulsing waves through the back of your neck towards your face. That’s what I’m getting here.
It’s not the rage of the heat of the moment. This has been cultivated through an immaculate and deeply seated frustration that sets your nerves on edge and leaves your fuse so short, it’s invisible to the naked eye.
Though often praised for its versatility, in my little cosmos, the Li’l Fella is not exactly excelling at low gain sounds. Since there is no manipulating the gain setting when Gate is active, and the way the gate reacts is tied to the Drive knob, There is a clear sweet spot for me, with the Drive just past noon. I must admit that I’m not a big fan of gated pedals and therefore do not have too much experience with them, but the Li’l Fella is the first pedal where I did enjoy the gated setting. There’s heavy distortion going on and lifting the finger on a fretted note will choke that note in a very satisfying way. I still don’t see where I would use such a thing in a real band setting, but I immensely enjoyed myself playing around with it.
Apart from that, the best feeling setting I found was with the Gain well past noon and the Drive around 10 o’clock, Tone at 1 o’clock.
I am a fan of most Fuzzrocious products I used, but I feel there is a gap between what the Li’l Fella likes to provide in a signal chain and what I like and enjoy.
This is the Li’l Fella in my personal sweet spot, my Aria Pro II Rickenbacker 4001 copy, bridge pickup, played with a pick: