Jacques Stompboxes Fuseblower II

This box has some great possibilities, but it's not always easy to get what you're looking for. I've owned this pedal for a few years, and have spent some time with it more recently. When I first bought it, I was less than enamored with it's tone, so I loaned it to a friend. I recently got it back, and have spent some time with it. I think the best bet is to tweak the knobs slowly, and keep in mind they are interactive.

This is a very rewarding pedal if you spend some time with it

At first I thought it was just a raspy-sounding distortion, with little tone, but after much tweaking, I have found it to be a very quirky, and toneful distortion and fuzz pedal.

I can get great lead tones from this box. The top three tone controls are difficult to get a hold on at first. I think of them as Bass, High Mids, and Presence, left to right.

I get nice tones by first setting the bottom three controls set at:

Vol - 12 O'clock
Tone - 12 O'clock
Fuzz - 7 - 9 O'clock

Then I move on to the top 3 controls, and a good starting point is:

Bass - 11 O'clock
Mids - 2 - 4 O'clock
Presence - 8 - 10 O'clock

I find that if you start at these settings, you can get a very convincing Fuzz Face sound by turning the Fuzz control to it's minimum, or just a bit higher. Set the Volume so it's a little louder than unity gain. Adjust the tone to taste, I go just below noon usually. This works well into a very clean amp.

I can also get a cool Tone Bender sound by tweaking the Fuzz around 7 - 10 O'clock, and setting the tone around noon. It sounds very Tone Bender through an overdriven amp, or by boosting the input with a Tube Screamer, or similar overdrive.

If you use the above settings, and bring the Fuzz up to noon+, and set your guitar on the rhythm pickup, with the guitar's tone at minimum, a cool upper octave emerges, creating a cool Octavia tone.

Too much Presence makes this box sound ugly.
Too much Fuzz can also make this box sound ugly

This pedal also cleans up very well the guitars volume control, roll it back for a rhythm distortion, and even overdrive. I think one of the Fuse Blower's great strengths is how sensitive it's input is. You can truly go from Overdrive to Fuzz; many pedals claim to be touch and volume sensitive, but few deliver.

Also, it's not very compressed, so as others have stated a Strat still sounds like a Strat, and a SG still sounds like a SG. The low compression also means that this box will not cover up sloppy technique; I think seasoned players will appreciate this box more than novices.

This pedal is not true-bypass, but the buffer is excellent, it has no negative tone-suck at all, and I'm very picky about a pedal's bypassed tone.

It's not perfect, or the end-all tone, but it's a cool pedal.

Mine has not been abused, but it has been gigged. I've had it a few years, and it still works as new. The switch works every time, and none of the pots are scratchy.

I emailed Jacques a few years ago when I forst bought this pedal, and received fast and courteous responses.

It's not the most incredible, to die for effect pedal I've owned, but it weird, and cool.

It is great for people who like to tweek sounds alot. It has 6 knobs 4 of them contribute to the distortion sound (3 blow and distortion). It also has a volume and tone knob. The three blow knobs also contribute to the tone, so finding the right balance between all the knobs can be a bit tricky, but worth it in the end.

Jacques has 4 production distortion boxes. In case you haven't tried them all it goes like this: the tube blower is the least heavy, mercer box is the a bit more heavy, tube blower is very high gain and bat fuzz is the full out high gain.

This box starts out from a pretty high gain sound and the distortion knob gives it even more harmonics and grit. It doesn't seem to actually raise the gain though. It's hard to explain.

The three blow controls can be thought of as volume controls for three parts of the spectrum. The gain level is preset. Think of these as mixing the amounts of low, mid, and high fequency distortion as opposed to changing them. They do not acually change the gain level, just the volume level of their respective bands. If you turn all three blow knobs to zero you will have no sound at all.

It is kind of a multi-band distortion, but I'm not sure if the cross over occurs before the distortion generator or after. I tend to think it goes through one distortion generator and is then crossed over and fed to three volume (blow) controls.

This pedal excels at lead guitar tones but would not be my first choice for chord work. It just has two much gain for most rhythm situations.

The clarity for the amount of gain is pretty impressive, but the fact that you have little control of the gain makes it rather limited. The mercer and tube blower are much more versatile.

I have to point out an error in another review. These are NOT made of plastic. Only the footswitch is plastic the body of the pedal is METAL that is painted the same color as the footswitch. Before I had any jacques pedals I also thought they were plastic but now I have all the distortion units and they all have metal housings.

Good solid feel to the pots and jacks, but the plastic footswitch I don't trust. They have never let me down.

This is a very unique pedal. I will certainly keep this pedal for the times that I want it's sound, but It's not my go to box. I would buy it again.

This is not the easiest dirt box to use, but that's because it's more flexible than most dirt boxes when you're dialing in a sound. 6 knobs, 3 fuse nobs which effect the low, mid, and high, level, tone, and fuzz. Again, super flexible, but not super simple.

This is a VERY dirty box. Even the lowest gain settings were too much for the sound I was looking for. But just cause it didn't fit the sound I was going for does not make this a bad sounding pedal. If you're looking for a very aggressive distortion sound with the flexibility to eq it precisely, you will LOVE this little box. For me, it was a little too over the top.

Yes, Jacques pedals are made out of plastic and not metal like the boss pedals, but this isn't cheap plastic that looks like it could break if you sneezed at it. This is very hard, tough plastic that I think would be able to stand up for a long time. The knobs seem very sturdy and well attatched. I don't think anyone would have reliability problems in normal gigging situations.

This is a VERY flexible, aggressive distortion pedal. If you are looking for something that bites more than your run-of-the-mill dirt box, you should check out. I returned mine because it was a little too aggressive for my tastes, but I was impressed enough with the sound that I'm trying the Jacques tube blower instead.

6 knobs but very intuitive.

I'm playing a Les Paul into a Blackface Fender Twin Reissue. This pedal has a great natural distortion tone. It is unusual in that it has lots of distortion but it really preserves you guitar tone. It's not as smooth as a TS808, but is similar in that you can tell the difference between a Strat and a Les Paul. I had a Fulltone Distortion Pro, but I thought it was terrible for rhytmn but ok for leads. The Fulltone really masks your tone unlike the Fuseblower. I got rid of the Fulltone. I like the Fuseblower much better for lead work also.

Very solid, no problems in a year of gigging.

Unneeded

I've tried tons of boutique distortion boxes and this is the best by a longshot. it has great sustain, and is very tweakable.

A bit trickier than usual, but just read the manual. If you can't understand it, go learn how to read.

I have a Fender mexican standard strat (ick...) and a Gibson explorer 76 reissue. I plug this through....wait for it...... a Mesa boogie dual rectifier 100 watt head and a Marshall 1960A cabinet. First the negatives: 1. Noisy when the gain is all of the way up, this is on the standard strat though. Next...No other company in the world seems to have learned their lessons from Jacque. This thing is amazing. It is completely indescribable. The sound is immaculate. I've tried Ibanez and Maxon TS808's, Fulltone DP-1 and all that stuff. This makes all the other pedals it's bitches. The blow 1,2, and 3 knobs are so different, but once you try them sooooooo necessary. They do different things for the frequencies, but all make sense once you play around. This can go from hard rock to blistering metal. It has more of a marshall sound, but even then, that's making an unfair statement to the Fuseblower. Light blues and jazz players won't like the gain. The minimum setting will be too much. (HINT: go check out the Tubleblower for you blues and jazz players, works great too.) This is probably the best distortion/overdrive pedal out there. It's on the underground.

Can't say. Havent' had problems.

Emailed Jacque about power supply question. Emailed back in less than 24 hours himself.

I've A/B'd this with my mesa/boogie dual rectifier's distortion. This is a great addition because it just adds a different kind of distortion to it. It's definitely tighter than the Mesa's. Worth every single penny. Even all you tone snobs should check it out. The is the first really high gain pedal that nails the sounds. It lets all of the notes in chords come out instead of a Wash. Doesn't change your tone at all. The other drawback is the sustain isn't quite on par, but still manageable.

This unit is a little hard to get to know. But is pretty cool. You tweak knobs to design sounds. Well with this unit you have six knobs. One for fuzz, three blows(EQ), one level and one tone.
Experiment and you will see what is all about.

It sounds pristine clean. The sounds range from a simple Boss Ds-1 to full blown Nine Inch Nails.
My set up is a Gibson Les Paul Classic -> Fuse Blower II -> Digitech Whammy 2 -> Boss V-wah -> Electro Harmonix Small Stone Phaser -> DOD Supersonic Flanger -> Jaques Meistersinger chorus -> Jacques Mercer Box concept distortion -> Jacques Tube Blower overdrive -> Jacques Bat Fuzz metal dist/fuzz -> Digitech X-Series Synth Wah -> Digitech X-Series Digi Delay -> to a Kustom Tuck N' Roll 100w Tube Half Stack.

As with all stompboxes it makes noise but is low compared to the rest of the stompboxes in the market this days.

I have had mine for about a year and a half. It is pretty strong and sturdy. Made Tough. Metal protected with rubber.

Never had dealt with them

It is a fantastic value. It is versatile and well constructed. What else you want?

it's analog with 6 knobs, so it is easy to understand. so far i did not get the point naming the knobs after the electronic innards (blow 1 instead of low boost).
there are some example settings in the manual, but you will not need them.

setup: ibanez telecaster thinline special, custom modified -> fuse blower -> yamaha g50-112II (high gain input, clean channel). the amp is in a transparent setting with treble at full gain and bright knob pulled, mids depressed by parametric equalizer. i tested at living room level. i tested in direct comparison with the marshall drivemaster.
for a three stage distortion box it certainly is not noisy. you get a hiss at high settings (above 12 o'clock) for both tone and fuzz, but what do you expect with my amp setting?
it is very versatile due to its 5 knobs for setting up the sound. It is analog and gives a nice distortion over a whole range of settings, following volume and attack of the guitar quite well. to my taste a little more sustain would be nice. compared to the marshall drivemaster (my favourite overdrive) you can get a little more transparency and a higher gain, but the last one for the price of a little more noise.

i have not used it long enough to give a final evaluation. it is built in a sturdy little metal box and looks quite reliable. the pedal switch is made of some plastic material, but looks tough enough, especially as the switch works quite easy and you certainly don't have to "stomp" on it. i've opened it and found a very neat electronic system, so this should last for some time.
Now here comes one major drawback: it eats batteries at a rate of about 30 mA as compared to my drivemaster at about 4 mA. so you need a 9 V adaptor, and it does not have the standard input jack like all my other boxes, so i just have to look, if i can get an adaptor for this one. Hope it is not a special french product.

have not dealt with them yet

i have been playing blues to hard rock for 30 years. so i do like analog overdrive and distortion boxes. i bought this one from ebay due to enthusiastic reviews in papers and on the net. for my kind of music i can see little advantage over my old drivemaster and i think i'm more or less going to use it as a backup for that, only if i find a 9 V adaptor for it. i like its variety of sounds and its transparency. i don't like its sustain, dropping off the distortion too early for my taste. the non-standard adaptor jack is a real nuisance. i would give it an overall 8, if it weren't for that.

A bit daunting at first since you have 4 distortion circuits + a tone control that's really more like Presence. Once you get used to it no problem

I play a bunch of different guitars into either an old Fender Vibrolux, Ampeg reverb-o-rocket reissue or Boogie MK IIc. Std effects: Chorus, Trem (Voodoo Labs), 2 Delays and TS10 Tube screamer.

Seems really well constructed, nice and small too, which is good as far as pedalboard space goes.

I understand Jacques is great though.

I play punk, alt & psychedelic rock and this box lets me get as massive or as subtle a distorted sound as I want. Also responds beautifully to dynamic playing and cleans up nicely via the guitar volume knob. Dead quiet too. Bravo!

Enough said about this in the other reviews on this page.
The three boostknops on top was a bit confusing at first, but after a while you get the point with them and starts to wonder how you ever got your sound without them. Thank's to these this baby delivers virtually any sound you can think of.
As said before here. This is the real deal. Not some beginners, easy to approach toy.

I play a stock Strat or Tele through a Fender Prosonic With a minimum of pedals and mostly with very little overdrive.
I bought the FB to replace a ts9 which to my taste made too much unwanted changes to the sound delivered by the amplifier.
Compared to the the TS9 the FB delivers much more gain, but it seems to do my overdrive as well. With flying colours.
After getting familiar with it I tried to do the SRV thing.
The two upper mikes on the strat together delivers a wonderful sound in my ears, but easily tends to get a little muddy when overdriven.
So, kicking in the Fuseblower and adding a little topboost (blow 3) for som bite and, voila.
So damn close it almost made me cry.
And that's just one of the possibillities with this thing.
Maybe I will have to invest in a couple more for stage use.
Best pedal I've tried. Worth every penny.

Haven't owned it long enough yet, but it looks and feels really steady in it's metalcasing.

Haven't had any reason to contact Jacques and from the looks of this baby, I probably never will. Except maybe to buy another one of his products which is under serious concideration.

Only one thing to add actually. Go get one.

6 knobs - low, middle and high boost, volume, tone and fuzz. Twiddle with them get the sound you want. It can take a while though. If you go to Jacques web site there are a number of recommmended settings you can try out.

Set up - vintage twin humbucker les paul copy, laney linebacker combo. I bought this pedal for low noise and rich tone overdrive and distortion. It does exactly that. It's got a good range from light overdrive to full on crunch. It is not, however, a metal pedal, for that you need the bat fuzz. I have used boss, danelectro, marshall, korg, dod and snarling dogs overdrive/distortion pedals and this is by far the best out them all.

Built like a brick, will be gigging with it later in the year.

Jacques responds to enquiries within 24 hours and even sent me half a dozen mother of pearl picks.

I've been playing various styles (rock, metal, funk, electro, pop, etc) for 15 years or so and this is the best overdrive pedal i've had. If it got nicked (not likely to break down) i'd get the insurance people to fork out for another. Other gear I own include: whammy pedal, jacques bat fuzz, dunlop crybaby, danelectro back talk, tc electronics m300, behringer t9153 tube ultra gain pre-amp, plus a pile of synths and computer gear. I have no money left and appear to be single handedly keeping the credit card company sector in business.