Thursday, November 20, 2008

Devi's Zvex Fuzz Factory Story.


















Devi Ever of Effector 13 is selling her custom made Zvex fuzzfactory, the story goes a little deeper than that, its a little eerie actually. I figure this eBay auction is gonna be history in 2 days so I'll preserve the information here


This is the copy/pasted text from the auction.

"This is one of those pedals that has a great story behind it, if you are into guitar gear lore.So here we go.In 2001 I had off and on worked on a website known as the Guitar Pedal Archive, attempting to catalog all the guitar pedals of the world into an online database. A few years before that I had purchased my first boutique guitar pedal, the Zvex Fuzz Factory (around 1998... not the fuzz factory in this auction). At the same time I was attempting the archive I was also trying to start a band. I put an ad out in the paper looking for like minded musicians and got a response from a girl named Ashley and we quickly hit it off online.I was supposed to meet her on 9-11-01, and then of course... 9-11 happened, but I was determined to keep my life moving forward, even if the world was going to hell, so we agreed to still meet each other, and while everyone else in the world was freaking out, we were listening to each other's rock tracks.We fell in love, started a band, and in a few years, I got into the guitar pedal business building strange fuzz pedals (this was around 2003). Through out all this I had become a devote follower of the Harmony Central Effects Forum. Ashley hated all the time I spent on the boards, but I eventually convinced her to get involved, and eventually she did.Sometime around the starting of my pedal business, originally known as Effector 13 ( or before hand) Ashley and I had split up, but were still friends, and we tried to do music, but it just wasn't working out. During this time, while she became more involved with the boards, she began communicating with a mysterious online gentleman known as Zachary Vex.So, while I was beginning to build up a business that in some ways was inspired by the likes of Zvex... and while my friendship was slowly drifting apart from Ashley, she was drifting towards Zachary. :) So much so that she decided to move to Minneapolis to work for him, and they fell in love.She left, I moved on with my business, and in a few short years was doing fairly well for myself. Her and I continued to stay in touch... I was privy to things I never thought I'd be privy to, and a lot of drama went on that I'm not at liberty to divulge the details of. Suffice to say, in the end, Ashley ended up falling in love with Jason Myrold and they have been living happily ever after since.Sometime during her stay at Zvex effects, a girl by the name of Laura Bennett began painting alongside Jason Myrold, and I was enamored by her work. Since Ashley and I were on good terms I decided to ask for a favor and get a custom painted Fuzz Factory done by Laura Bennett, and there you have it... in 2005, two years after starting my own fx biz (and around 7 years since my first boutique pedal which was a Fuzz Factory), I got a groovy custom Zvex pedal. :)Of course the story doesn't stop there. For reasons I shall not go into, Laura eventually left Zvex effects, and I asked if she would paint for my company Effector 13. For a while she did (there are very few and rare LB painted E13 pedals out there!), but shortly there after things weren't working out, and she decided not to paint for me any longer. Now she is painting for Penny Pedals I believe.So... fast forward to 2006 or so, and things start shaking up over at Zvex. The business manager (Amada), painter (Jason Myrold), and Ashley all decide to leave Zvex, and Ooh La La Manufacturing was born. Still being on good terms with Ashley at the time, I was asked if I wanted to have this new company build any of my pedals, and of course I jumped at the opportunity, selling my business name "Effector 13", and four of my top selling design to them, which they continue to build and sell to this day.This ultimately end up being a boon for Zvex as much as it was for myself, because since Jason left, he's hired on an entire team of amazing artists and they are busting out some incredible custom pedals the likes of which the boutique world has never seen! :)Who'd of thought that the girl I met on 9-11-01, and the business I started in 2003 would ever have been involved on such a strange journey full circle and back again!So there you have it... a guitar pedal with more mojo than you could possibly imagine, tieing together the lives of quite a few key people in the boutique business and then some! A true collector's item if there ever was one in the guitar pedal biz, and I'm usually not one to flaunt such things, but you gotta admit, this pedal hass some powerful meaning (kind of literally) written all over it.I'm done being sentimental with gear I'm not using, so I'm letting this, and many other pieces of gear go out into the world! Check my other auctions for other interesting oddities! :)"


EDIT: and for the closing price??


no judgements...

8 comments:

  1. I'm glad this was preserved somewhere. I won the pedal and am very happy to have it. It ties together the lives of several different individuals who have inspired me in different ways. It has a good home... and is part of a new story now.

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  2. welcome to my blog! you have excellent taste in fuzz.

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  3. Thank you! Being a huge fan of Devi and Zvex's pedals, plus Laura & Matt's collaborative "Fingerprint" pedal from Penny Pedals really did bring together all of these different influences for me. My taste in music has led me down a certain path with my own music as well as other aspects of my life like my writing, so I feel a bit of a common connection with Laura as much of that same music inspires her work as an artist. So to have the pedal that ties ALL of that together... and then to be able to create my own art with it... well, how could you not be inspired? Some folks see it as dirty laundry, I see it as life. We joke about it being the "Drama Factory" but in fact is is very meaningful to me in nothing but a positive way. And you have to admit... its about as beautiful a pedal as you'll ever see.

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  4. i have touched the "drama factory", and it is INDEED a historic fuzzbox!

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  5. IDK what's more interesting. the story or when i Google 'Fuzz Factory' i find this blog post???

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  6. great story! Devi Ever is my hero. She is the most punk pedal maker in the universe!

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  7. Such an excellent story! I am aware this is over 4 yrs old, but I still find it touching.

    Also, I do own several pedals by Devi Ever and Z Vex, so...

    Best,

    Wolfgang von Bockenheim

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