Please note: This item requires a power supply for operation. Sold separately.
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Product Description
The Benson Amps Jeez takes a new approach to germanium fuzz design. Instead of refining historical circuits, it starts fresh with an original design. At its core are two germanium transistors (two GE transistors... two GEs... Jeez) paired with an improved version of Benson's proprietary transistor warming system. The heater keeps the transistors at a stable temperature, which keeps the tone consistent. Earlier versions of this took about 3 minutes to warm up from room temperature, but the Jeez is ready in about 30 seconds.
THE WRAPPER
The Jeez incorporates high headroom input and output amplifiers that offer unprecedented flexibility in a Germanium circuit. Like Benson's previous fuzzes, it features a high input Z (doesn’t care what’s before it in the chain), plus a low output Z. This means Jeez can drive 16 volts of peak to peak signal through a guitar cable with amazing fidelity for cleaner settings, or absolutely punish an amp at higher settings if you want it to!
THE RANGE
This flexibility also allows a huge range of usable gains and tones from the 2N404 transistors that are running at the normal 9Vish volts. With a turn of the gain knob, Jeez can go from a pure and low noise full frequency germanium clean boost, hit some treble booster overdrive and vintage dirt between 2-6, briefly entertain some truly tough sounding cranked Plexi tones at around 7, and bliss out in germanium fuzz heaven at the very top. This massive range of uses might make it hard to choose how to use it. The interesting thing about the Jeez is there is some envelope dependent bias excursion that has the effect of sustaining notes that don’t seem like they would normally sustain. There are settings where you can play overdriven chords lightly, and then just picking a little harder break into more of a sustained sequence.
TONE CONTROL!
The tone control is unique for a pedal in that it has more in common with a vintage style amplifier - it is entirely pre-gain. At noon it is relatively flat. Turning it up boosts treble going into the transistors, and below noon cuts treble going to the transistors. Like an amp, it is most obvious at clean settings and becomes more of a coloration at higher gain settings. You can think of the GE transistors as the power amp in a tube amp...they take any excessive and harsh eq and smooth it out!
THE LIGHTS
Two internal heating systems are tied to an LED indicator which has 4 states - green, aqua, yellow and white - which are mixtures of red blue and green. White means both heaters are on. After powering up the light eventually shifts to yellow or aqua to indicate that just one of the other heaters is on, or green if both are off since the transistors have reached their target temperatures. Jeez should continually toggle between states and this is how you know the temperature control is working
Features
Specifications
| Input Connectors | 1/4-inch TS |
|---|---|
| Output Connectors | 1/4-inch TS |
| Power Supply |