DOD and Morley have pooled their R&D resources for the Wah-ocTo-Fuzz, a stompbox that is a wah pedal, a fuzz pedal and an octave pedal all at once.
The Wah-ocTo-Fuzz is equipped with a treadle with glow-in-the-dark grip tape, with controls for the octave and fuzz circuits on either side, and this DOD/Morley two-hander allows players to use these each of these three effects individually or to stack them, running two or all three together.
The wah, as ever, is activated by Morley’s optical circuit, so just step on it and it comes into play. You will find separate footswitches for engaging the fuzz and octave effects. The fuzz section has dials for Intensity, which controls the amount of gain in the signal, and Fuzz Level, which controls your overall output when the fuzz is engaged.
You’ve got three dials on the octave side, with controls for Octave Level for the octave-down effect, Tone for adjusting brightness, and a Direct Level that operates as a wet/dry for your effect, allowing you to keep it super-subtle or bring that octaver to the fore.
We can see an obvious appeal here for fans of Jimi Hendrix. Indeed, the sounds offered by the Wah-ocTo-Fuzz are old-school, only we’re talking ‘70s and ‘80s. These are all classic circuits from the DOD and Morley Archives.
The octave section comes from the FX35 Octoplus, a mid ‘80s DOD classic that wasn’t a million miles away from something like the Boss OC-2, offering analogue monophonic sub-octave that works a treat on single-note lines then starts to get messy with chords, which can be a cool sound in an of itself.
As for Morley’s side of the bargain, you’ve got ’70s-style Power Wah and Power Fuzz circuits, and that makes for a 3-in-1 pedal that you don’t see everyday.
It has been done to an extent. Dr No Effects’ RoadRunner ‘Octave Fuzz Wah Flying Machina’ springs to mind; it was definitely designed with Hendrix in mind, pairing that Roger Mayer Octavia-style octave fuzz with wah, and housing it in an enclosure that looks like it was designed by Evel Knievel and Jeremy Scott.
At $679, that is a considerably more expensive pedal. You can pick up the Wah-ocTo-Fuzz (DOD and Morley call it the WTF pedal for short) for $249.
Feed it 9VDC (300mA minimum) from a pedalboard power supply or 9V battery and you’re good to go. The WTF enclosure is made of rolled steel and is road ready. That electro-optical operating system for the wah pedal won’t break down on you. DOD/Morley says it's not just for electric guitar – it'll work fine with keyboards and bass guitar, too.
Find out more over at DigiTech/DOD.
