How Useful is Fuzz?

[Mesotech]

Gris, I think you're saying what I was trying to say as well. A fuzz can be very useful when used appropriately. Unfortunately, not everyone does that, and too often trys to use one as a dirt pedal to cover any and every kind of distortion tone. The fuzz is great when used in a solo, but when used as a generic dirt type box for chordal work it gets muddy and lost quick unless you clean it up somewhat by using the guitars volume to throttle back the input signal.

The other point you made is putting it in front of any other dirt pedals rather than behind them. A fuzz is typically tempermental to input levels, and a dirt box in front of it simply puts too much signal to the input. The result is mush. Placing a dirt pedal behind the fuzz helps smooth the harshness out. Sometimes even putting a wah in front of a fuzz is too much, especially if the wah has a built in boost capability.

And with respect to Don, a good fuzz can be employed as the only dirt pedal. As he suggests, you need to be very aware of how to use it correctly. He has the right approach, but not everyone I've seen or heard with a fuzz "gets it".