built myself a wah in a standard sized
pedal box so I could find the frequency
position I liked and leave it there. A
few of my midrange loving friends dug
it and wanted one too. It is quite an
addictive sound! After a few years of
building various fixed wah circuits in
different incarnations, I arrived at the
Midphoria.
I love a fixed wah. Many classic, mix
cutting, guitar tones were recorded
with a wah left in one position instead
of rocking it back and forwards. Jimmy
Page’s slicing tone on the “Whole Lotta
Love” solo springs to mind. Many great
Mick Ronson lead tones during his
Bowie tenure were a wah left in one
position. The list of fixed wah loving
guitarists is long. Hendrix, Schenker,
Bolan…
A fixed wah offers a great, unique tone
that has no trouble being heard in the
mix. Often it is more about frequency,
than volume, when it comes to being
heard.
The goal with the Midphoria was to be
able to have classic fixed wah tones
but with more flexibility. First on the
agenda was adding a clean blend. As
much as I love the straight up, no holds
barred fixed wah sound; sometimes it is
nice to dial it back a bit. Adding a clean
blend gave the pedal the ability to
balance the sonic mix between straight
guitar signal and fixed wah. Nice for
adding just a hint of mid all the way to
over the top quack. The second was
adding more output level because who
doesn’t want more? I know I do! Finally,
in addition to the standard Frequency
control, I added range switch to extend
the overall frequency range.
Classic tones, psychedelic Swedish
artwork, the Midphoria.
—Christian Livingstone
I used to use an old Crybaby wah
to achieve fixed wah tones until the
treadle wore out and would keep
falling forward. Frustrated by this, I
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