So, yeah, I finally caved...

[Heath]

..and built a Clari(not).

I said I never would.  It's a stupid pedal for making stupid noise and I'm stupid because I kind of love the stupid thing.

When I first fired it up, I was a bit of the "well.. fuck this thing..." mind, but after fiddling with it some and really having fun with it, I realized it was 4am (up to work at 6am so I'm feeling shitty today).  

So, yeah, if you haven't built one and maybe you've built 8,000 pedals and you're feeling a bit burned out, not sure what to bother with next... this one is just stupid fun.

Oh, yeah, it's also kind of a badass fuzzstortion pedal all on it's own.  With the dirt on, I like turning the Blend all the way up so I'm only getting the affected signal, turning Delay all the way up so it's nearly immediate with your playing, set the tracking to just below "LSD trip" and it's a kind of unique sound without being too crazy.  I dig it.

[Travis]

Great pedal. I need to build another since I sold the one I made

[rocket88]

It's on my list, along with the *gulp* little angel. Hopefully this is not as evil as the little angel. I know how much you love that one Heath.

[Travis]

Nah Rocket, no problems with the clari(not). Build with confidence. The Little Angel on the other hand might be more trouble than it's actually worth haha

[rocket88]

Hey, that's the one that actually drew blood from Heath. I know I shouldn't, but for some reason I want it. It might be due to all the trouble people have.

[Heath]

Little Angel Chorus, may it rot in hell.

The Dimension P is along the same lines but without the LAC's bitchy attitude.


The Clari(not) is really easy to make sound like crap, so I was initially like "Ah, well, junkpile."  For some reason I felt compelled to play around with it a bit more and started finding some really neat settings.

I think one thing that put me off is that the controls don't really tell you much and the description page from MidFi is about as informative as a loud fart.  

To the best of my knowledge having used it for a bit:

Volume: Well, duh.  One thing to know is that it is not very loud.  I think mine is at unity almost all the way up, so not a big problem, but something to be aware of with your expectations.

Delay: This how quickly the single repeat occurs after the string pluck.

Depth: For lack of a better term, this is how much leeway you give the Tape Fuckery Effect to go straight up Alien on you.  Very interactive with the Tracking Control.

Tracking: How far off from normal do you want it to sound?  Depends somewhat on how much Depth you give it to play with.

Blend:  Goes from Dry signal only to Wet signal only with a mixed signal in between.  Not sure if this is just something with my build or not, but towards the middle of this control you do get a volume dip.  Ie. if Blend all the way dry is a 10 volume and all the way Wet is a 10 then it's sort of a gradual dip to about a 7-8 at 50/50 Dry/Wet

[Synsound]

I'm on my 4th one. Every time I make one someone demands to buy it off me. I don't use it a lot but I do love it and refuse not to have one.
I came to interpret the tracking as sensitivity(how much input it takes to get weird) and the depth as the degree of tonal bend from center/reality.

I put a 500R pot in line with the fuzz lift and get a fair degree of variance. I also put the fuzz lift on a stomp but it's not very useful as you usually need to correct the volume in accordance. Perhaps a secondary volume on the same switch could be preset to level it out (like the pseudo boost switch in the WTF)

[Travis]

My favorite setting on this pedal gives you basically a warbly old tape recording sound. It's kinda subtle to use live but would be great for recording. The best thing about that setting is it really doesn't track your playing hardly at all with the envelope so it actually sounds really natural and random. It really nails the tape sound

[Kinski]

Got to say, the Clarinot is one of my favorite pedals ever. I use it ALL THE TIME. Many many tours, albums, etc. With all kinds of music. Its quite capable of really subtle and really extreme sounds. And Travis is correct, it nails the tape warble really well. Also a nice chorused slap back. Using the gtr volume knob to control the intensity of the pitch warble is fantastic when used with chords to create smooth transitions from scattered to unaffected pitches. This pedal is endless, and so much more than a silly noise maker. However, noise is often very useful, and the clarinot can do it wonderfully.

[Kinski]

I've also modded mine with a fuzz lift and a switch to toggle between the standard envelop control for modulation, or an LFO with a speed control.

[rocket88]

Stupid question. How did you add the envelope/mod switch. I did some digging on this circuit and to see what mods there are and all I found was essentially adding  daughter board and changing the tracking pot to an lfo speed pot.

[Kinski]

I etched this PCB drawn by FrequencyCentral on DIYStompboxes.

Full thread here: http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=74294.220

[rocket88]

Ah. I saw that tread and was reading it earlier. I remember him mentioning that he had made a second board for the switch. I must have missed it further down about it all on one board. I was hoping it would be a simple add-on to the vero layout, so I might figure how to add it. Thanks buddy.

[Kinski]

Yeah, I did this a few years ago, before I realized how much I absolutely hated etching PCBs. I'm done etching. I'll happily pay someone to do it for me. Haha.

[rocket88]

Hahaha. I can't agree more. Plus I just find it rewarding to do things on vero. Ya know what I mean?