A little background: I was as much of an analog(ue) distortion purist as anyone; especially after fighting those horrible digital distortions from ’80’s rack units. Izotope’s Trash turned my head, but it was an ITB solution. SA Multiwave Distortion won me over. And that led me to giving CrushStation and Sculpt another hard look.
The three distortion algorithms are a progression, and somewhat related. All three have that auto-gain Squeezer somewhere in the path. But each one brings another unique focus to the table. Sculpt for swept wah FX, ‘spectral panning’, & multiband capability. CrushStation for fine-tuned EQ, that glorious Sag, & blended octaves. Both have that parallel compression / dry feature, routing options, & wide ranges of distortion types.
PitchFuzz is its own animal. Multi-FX, really. You can use it alone for overdrive / distortion, chorusing, parallel intervals, dual delays … or in any combination. There’s a huge range in that singular Fuzz control (especially the lower half). And, in any of the 3 algorithms, I really like their sensitivity to input. It’s possible to squeeze out a lot with technique, playing dynamics, pickup selection, and your onboard volume & tone controls.
The best part: With a little work, you can make them sound close to any classic pedal. One just has to get past the 3-knob mentality. And if you have no desire to sound like everyone else, that capability is baked in, too.
