Earthquaker Gary Automatic Pulse Width Modulation Fuzz and Dynamic Natural Overdrive

Automatic Pulse Width Modulation Fuzz and Dynamic Natural Overdrive

Announcing Gary, our pedal collaboration with Lee Kiernan, guitar virtuoso and all-around great person from IDLES! We’re excited for the world to meet Gary, and he will be introduced on November 14th, 2024. Please see all the important information below and let us know how many you'd like or if you need any samples.

EarthQuaker Devices is proud to introduce you to your new best bud, Gary. This little big guy was dreamt up by the one and only Lee Kiernan from the crushing and necessary band IDLES!

Gary started as a simple request to create a compact version of the now-discontinued Gray Channel, which was a mainstay on Lee’s board and a big part of his main drive tone. This was all fine and good, but Gary demanded we explore his dark side a little more—Gary after dark, Saturday night Gary. So, we sat him down and figured old Gare-Bear out once and for all. The result is an exercise in light and dark; smooth to shredded and everything in between.

Gary’s right brain consists of a dynamic and destructive fuzz that is both domineering and interactive. It features a ripping fuzz tone with an envelope-controlled variable pulse width and enough volume to blow everything up. This fuzz turns the signal into a square wave and lets you dynamically adjust the duty cycle with your pick attack. The Yes! control adjusts the sensitivity of the envelope. At lower settings, you get a thick, heavy square wave fuzz tone that sustains for days and goes dead quiet when you stop playing. As you increase the Yes! control, the pulse width narrows with harder picking, making the tone more nasal and biting until Gary goes to his dark place and disappears completely. This creates a cool effect, sounding like an exploding amp, fading in and out.

This effect can also be controlled with an expression pedal for manual operation, allowing you to fine-tune the pulse width. When using an expression pedal, Yes! sets the peak of the sweep, and you can control the pulse width as desired. The Oosh knob acts as the master volume for the fuzz side, providing an insane amount of volume, so use it wisely!

Gary’s left brain shows his softer side. This is a natural-sounding overdrive based on the green channel of the Gray Channel, EarthQuaker's take on the classic yellow overdrive. Lee used this pedal with the clipping switch set to the middle position, removing all diodes from the circuit, producing a full-bodied, cutting op-amp distortion with plenty of volume. The Go knob controls the op-amp drive, ranging from a clean boost to smooth distortion. That’s It is the master volume for the drive side, letting you use Gary’s softer side as a clean boost or crank up the gain for gritty distortion.

Gary’s signal path is fuzz into overdrive for total tonal integrity, as Gary put his foot down on this, and we obliged.

Each and every Gary was crafted by the delicate hands of EarthQuaker Devices in Akron, Ohio, USA.

Tech Specs

• Developed with Lee Kiernan from the band IDLES
• Dynamic and destructive pulse width modulated fuzz paired with natural-sounding op-amp overdrive
• Fuzz pulse width modulation dynamically controlled by an onboard envelope or external expression pedal
• Yes! controls envelope sensitivity or pulse width limit with an expression pedal
• Oosh is the fuzz master volume
• Overdrive section based on the Gray Channel, capable of full distortion or clean boost
• Go is the overdrive gain control
• That’s It is the overdrive master volume
• All-analog signal path
• True bypass with silent relay-based switching and Flexi-Switch® Technology
• Lifetime warranty

Specifications

• Current draw: 20 mA
• Fuzz Input Impedance: 1 MΩ
• Fuzz Output Impedance: <1 kΩ
• Overdrive Input Impedance: 500 kΩ
• Overdrive Output Impedance: <1 kΩ
• Artwork by Charlotte Gosch
• USA MAP price: $199.00
• Dealer price: $139.30
• GTIN-12 (UPC): 810019914478
• SKU: EQDGARYV1USA
• Boxed dimensions: 5.5 x 3.25 x 3.25 in / 13.97 x 8.255 x 8.255 cm
• Out-of-box dimensions: 4.9375 x 2.625 x 2.25 in / 12.54125 x 6.6675 x 5.715 cm
• Boxed weight: 0.87 lbs / 0.3946254 kg
• Out-of-box weight: 0.690 lbs / 0.3129787 kg

This device features Flexi-Switch® Technology! This relay-based, true bypass switching style allows you to simultaneously use momentary and latching style switching.

• For standard latching operation, tap the footswitch once to activate the effect and then tap again to bypass.
• For momentary operation, hold the footswitch down for as long as you’d like to use the effect. Once you release the switch, the effect will be bypassed.

Power: 

This device requires a standard 9 volt DC power supply with a 2.1mm negative center barrel. We always recommend pedal-specific, transformer-isolated wall-wart power supplies or multiple isolated-output supplies. Pedals will make extra noise if there is ripple or unclean power. Switching-type power supplies, daisy chains and non-pedal specific power supplies do not filter dirty power as well and let through unwanted noise.

DO NOT RUN AT HIGHER VOLTAGES!