Another week… another new Carl Martin stomp! The Danes must be working overtime coming up with new pedals. Their third new offering this month is a small opto-compressor. The Classic Opto-Compressor performs gain reduction control via a light source into a photo sensitive cell… as the light source gets brighter, the photo sensitive cell sends a signal to reduce dynamic range, or what becomes a compressed signal. The pedal boasts Gain, Level, Compression and Attack controls. Carl Martin promises a short time with this compressor will allow you to find some of those classic guitar sounds which may somehow have escaped you before.

There are few bands that, on a night-to-night basis, “bring it” like New Orleans’ own Galactic. Call it funk, jazz, rock, whatever… the quintet from the Crescent City is all business when they hit the stage. And hit it they do… hard! The band made a quick stop in H-Town last night as part of their Brass Tacks tour with a couple of extra horn players in tow! The stomped through stellar versions of their originals like Doublewide, The Moil and Shibuya, while also ripping up covers of Hendrix’s Manic Depression and Herbie Hancock’s Rockit! Check out the crappy iPhone pics from the show after the jump!

Working closely with the Bolin family and estate, Hartman Electronics has recreated legendary guitarist Tommy Bolin’s fuzz tone in an all-new pedal. California-based Hartman used an original model of Tommy’s go-to fuzz and refined the tone against the original, isolated guitar tracks of Bolin master recording. The result is a ‘three-knob box of dynamite’ featuring a definitive palette of tones from deep within the Bolin zone, according to the company. The 100% hand-wired stomp features Attack, Tone and Volume controls, true-bypass switching, on/off LED and external 9v (tip-negative) jack. The Bolin fuzz is available from Hartman’s website and is priced at $189.99.

Keith at Build Your Own Clone is close to releasing a ‘1 Second’ Analog Delay kit for do-it-yourselfers eager for the a healthy bit of echo. Beta kits of the new pedal are being tested right now. B.Y.O.C. expects to have these kits up for sale during the second week of November. Sticker price on the ‘1 Second’ delay will be $149.99. Keith expects this kit will be a bit complex for first-time builders and suggest buying a pre-built model. Hit the B.Y.O.C. website for more details… and if you haven’t run across this month’s Premier Guitar magazine yet, there is a killer spread on B.Y.O.C. Check it out!

News came down late today that pedal guru and Sweetsound founder Bob Sweet passed away after a battle with cancer. The pedal-maker community came together on the web earlier this year and sponsored several auctions to raise money for the ailing Sweet. I never had a chance to meet Bob, but getting the chance to play one of his excellent vibe pedals is a wonderful, toneful experience. I know that Sweetsound had plans for new pedals in the future. I am not sure what becomes of those plans or the company’s current offerings. Rest in peace, Bob.

When we fired up WTDP? earlier this year I found that lot of music equipment vendors call my neck of the woods home. Promark drumsticks is here, Diamond Amplification, Red Star cabinets, ElectroniX Effects… and XTS Custom Pedals. I met Greg Walton at the recent Austin Pedalfest and came to find out that XTS calls Deer Park, Texas home… about a 30 minute drive from WTDP? world headquarters in Houston. A cool fact? You bet… but not near as cool as the stomps Greg creates. The XTS pedals were some of the most popular test drives at the Fest. We had to know more, and Greg obliged. Check out The Five after the jump…

Our favorite Danish pedal maker Carl Martin has unveiled a new flanger pedal the company said was designed for guitarists who desire a unique form of modulation. The Vintage Flanger has four knobs to control Speed, Depth, Pre-delay and Feedback, plus a dual speed mode that is foot-switchable. As with all the Vintage line pedals from Carl Martin, the Vintage Flanger comes in a solid, diecast housing with the cool graphics and chicken-head knobs. The stomp can be powered by 9v battery or – as recommended – regulated 9v power supply like the Carl Martin Big John. Stay tuned to the Carl Martin website for clips of the new stomp coming soon.

The crew at Barge Concepts sent word today that its long-awaited Grinder filter stomp is ready to ship. The pedal is a versatile envelope-controlled filter, based on the Lovetone Meatball design. The company said it started with the original Meatball design and added the usual improvements – fully buffered effects loop, support for higher supply voltages, variable output gain, and three expression-controllable options including an optically-isolated expression-controlled Blend circuit. Barge Concepts’ mailing list members get a discount on the purchase price of the Grinder. The discount runs to 16 November or while supplies last!

If you’re looking for a little ‘hardcopy’ reading material, you might want to check out the November 2008 issue of Premier Guitar. This is the mag’s pedal issue and boasts reviews of 28 stomps including boxes from Mad Professor, Lizard Leg Effects, Wampler Effects, Visual Sound, Demeter Amplification and many more. There are also features on modding stomps, collecting vintage pedals and an interview with Keith Vonderhulls – the brains behind Build Your Own Clone. If you’re not in pedal overload after that, surf on over to the magazines website for even more stomp reviews. Check it out!

Full Moon Amps/Pedals is introducing a new overdrive/distortion pedal that it says will cover just about any type of grind you want to lay on your amp. The company calls its Fraternity drive a versitle vintage voiced pedal with its circuit ancestry rooted in Fatcats, Rats, FKRs, Dist+ and FatBoxes. The stomps five controls consist of Level and Gain knobs on top, a six-position clipping diode selector in the middle, Tone and Fill knobs. The pedal will come in a wide variety of ‘DonnerBox’ finishes. The first 22 pedals are being sold for $222 shipped… so act fast!

Canadian pedal purveyor Fairfield Circuitry has unveiled an all-original design drive stomp dubbed the Barbershop Overdrive. The pedal boasts three knob – Drive, Sag and Volume. Sounds clips of the new drive are available – along with pedal itself – on Fairfield’s website. The Barbershop OD carries a price tag of C$175 – or about US$139 at the current exchange rate. Fairfield has a couple of additional pedals in development including The Unpleasant Surprise gate/fuzz and the Randy’s Revenge ring modulator. The ring modulator is almost ready, according to the company, and is getting good response from those who have tested the prototype.

Cusack Music expects to ship its small, single knob boost pedal – cleverly dubbed ‘More Louder’ – in the coming weeks. The pedal also boasts a toggle switch that selects between buffered or true bypass mode. The knob is to add gain. Due to its small size, More Louder will be external power only. According to Cusack. with the More Louder in buffered bypass mode a player will notice sounds from their guitar that they didn’t hear before. Because it’s a high impedance buffer, it does not load down a guitar’s pickups. As a result, pickups are allowed to operate at their full range. Be sure and stay tuned for details on the pending ‘Less Quieter’ sibling stomp!

The effects hounds at Xotic have hooked up with jazz/blues great Scott Henderson for the release of a new signature take on the company’s popular RC Booster stomp. According to Xotic, Henderson wanted a pedal that left the EQ of the guitar unaltered as it went to the amp, kept out the muddies distorted front pickups can sometimes give, have better chord articulation and improve the low-end bass response across the low to high strings. The limited edition package will include the RC/SH Booster, certificate of authenicity and a copy of Henderson’s latest CD ‘Well to the Bone.’ The signature pedal is available now for the same price as the regular RC Booster.

Not long ago it was made public that Best Buy stores intended to launch a series of music gear shops in select store locations across the US. Few details surfaced about the plans beyond word that it would be more than the typical ‘Strat pack’ entry level equipment stocked near the vacuum cleaners. Two of these shops opened in Houston this week and I was able to stop by and see first hand just what Best Buy was up to. In a nutshell, very interesting stuff. It was like someone dropped a ‘Guitar Center lite’ over by the car audio section. Check out the pics and further analysis of this new entrant in the gear game after the jump!

Word of mouth is a powerful tool when it comes to growing any small business, and the word is out on Mellowtone pedals – especially the Wolf Computer fuzz stomp. The Wolf Computer is a hairy, glitchy fuzz that can produce some very unique sounds ranging from growling fuzz to 8-bit video game tones that sound like they are coming from an old Atari 2600 that was fired up after spending a few hours at the bottom of a swimming pool. WTDP? called out to Mellowtone’s pedal guru Eric Edvalson to learn more about the company and, of course, to put him through The Five! He answers the call after the jump!