Dunlop FFM1 Silicon Fuzz Face Mini Distortion Pedal Reviews

I'm new to fuzz. This looked like a good place to start. Board friendly, easy to use, and not too expensive. And, I like blue.

This is a classic effect pedal. Buy it, learn to use it. You will love it.

As to Sweetwater, you are one of the few show a complete power spec (3.4 mA @ 9 vdc), making my vendor choice simple. Thanks.

whenever i acquire a new stomp box the tonal colours inevitably inspire to write something new. its amazing how technology a generation later could miniaturize this classic. i do value the ability to keep the ff cranked and massage the level of grit with the guitar volume.

i bought it primarily to use with strats but when i plugged my epi proplus paul in last night...more pleasant surprises. also...i realized you can use the fuzz control as a tonal pot. moved to the left it will take the highs out...moved to the right the brightness increases with its off the wall flame throwing ability. a rugged little monster by any accounting with that classic silicon blaze.

The silicon Fuzz Face Mini is worth every penny. I put it through its paces for four hours last night with my Pink Floyd tribute act "A Few More Bricks". Authentic Gilmour pre-Animals tone. Roll the volume pot on my guitar half way and I get a pleasant crunch. Roll the volume down more and it is clean with slight breakup. Roll the volume to "11" and get searing, "hairy" fuzz. Love it!

Has a wonderful sound! Its super close to David Gilmour's fuzz on the solo for Time from Dark Side of the Moon. Strongly recommend giving this pedal a try.

The silicon Fuzz Face is one of my favorite Fuzz Faces. I prefer the brighter and more aggressive sound of the BC108 silicon transistors. The mini Fuzz Faces are exceptionally pedalboard friendly, almost to a fault. I feel like they could be a little bigger, as the on/off switch seems too close to the knobs for my comfort.

Another thing is volume drop. This pedal is not unity volume until around 3-4 o'clock. There is a reason people say to basically dime the volume and gain all the way up. I like both backed off a little, maybe 5% from dimed, as it doesn't seem to overload the pedal with that "blown out" sound and feel. Backing them off a little yields a brighter tone and aggressive fuzz that is full and on the edge of blown out and sputtery but not so.

This pedal must go first in your pedal chain. It must see the low impedance of your guitar's signal to work best. If you want other pedals in front of it, get the MXR 108 as it has a buffered bypass button that allows it to go anywhere in your signal chain.

Last thing. Best way to mount this pedal to your pedal board is to remove the baseplate, wrap the baseplate fully in gaffers tape where it wraps literally around and secures on the underside of the baseplate, screw it back on, and then add your pedalboard Velcro strips from there. Make sure to wrap the tape around in such a way that it conforms to the curve of the baseplate, and gets all folded up on the underside. That will keep it as clean and neat as possible. The gaffers tape is incredibly secure and strong and won't lose its grip on the rubber bottom, nor the Velcro to the tape.

This little guy seems to be tweaked for more modern guitars having higher output pickups. Vintage-type strat pickups simply don't have enough output to drive this pedal into distortion unless the volume knob is on 10 and with the fuzz knob on the pedal nearly maxed. However, those settings lack dynamics and aren't the sweet spot of this pedal. With a higher output tele bridge PU, I was still able to drive this pedal into distortion without going past half way on the guitar volume knob and the fuzz knob also only needed to be set half way. THIS is the sweet spot of the pedal, in my opinion. It's here where the dynamics and clean-to-dirty character of the pedal can be achieved. I've noticed a lot of reviews arguing the pedal doesn't clean up well. Those reviewers are right, but I think they tried this with the wrong PUs. With the right PUs, this pedal is great--it's rippin', touch sensitive, dynamic, and low priced.

Over the years I have run through Fender, Marshall, Ampeg and Boogie... Definitely like tubes. Recently, though I built a pedalboard to eliminate carting hassels and simplify gigging. I have a Chandler tube drive and a Fulltone OCD but wanted something more. This fit well, size-wise AND tone-wise. It has added the voicing I wanted and is very responsive to my pickup volume settings.

Old school fuzzes like this are quirky pedals that are not for everyone. This pedal definitely has a vintage sound and can indeed sound great, but expect to adjust all your other gear to accommodate this egomaniac. It didn't sit well with my other pedals, so keep in consideration that you'll have to experiment with placement. The best solution with my gear was this 2nd in the chain after my phase 90 and before my wha. I tried several true bypass pedals (Viscus Vibe & Dunlop wha) before this and it sounded like poo. Only the buffered phase 90 worked. Who would have thunk? This fuzz is pretty scooped so the middy phase 90 puts back some of those frequencies. Everyone likes to max the controls on a fuzz, but with this pedal the more you back off the more mids seem to come back. It also seems to clean up better with the guitar volume this way, though it's not as ripping. It's a trade off.

There are probably modern silicon fuzzes out there that have addressed these issues, but this has "that" sound at a cheap price. Just expect to tweak.

Pros: sounds great, can be externally powered
Cons: fussy pedal, ridiculous tuna can format (yeah, it's cute, but it's impractical for a pedal board)

I dunno about Pink Floyd, but I hit this little blue stomper when I need that nasty snarl ala The Cramps. Passes for a '60's box o' noise without the price tag that usually comes with those or boutique pedals - even the ones I make!

Highly recommended for loads o' fun!

I got this as my first fuzz, but it's just a little too harsh for me. you might have fun with it. :)

OK pedal. I've had it running into crappy Bugera amps the entire time I've had it, so I'm certainly not getting it's full potential, or maybe I am, I'm not sure. They claim this is spec'd from a 1970 Dallas Arbiter model. I was somewhat hoping for a Band of Gypsys tone, or even Gilmore's "Time solo" but instead it's somewhat of a generic high gain blast. It's cool for punk, which I've used it for heavily. I did have the mini red germanium fuzz for a short time (Nov '21) and while that one cleaned up very well, it was very muddy in the low end, like a malfunctioning overdrive on steroids. I've had the blue one since Oct '20, and it stayed in my possession, between the two. I guess since it's supposedly a 1970 model, it has historical clout. I prefer it, for some reason, but I can't really say why. Therefore, I'm giving both the pedal, and my own review, three and a half stars. Maybe if I had a Marshall Class 5 or some Twin Fender, I'd be more inclined to love this even more. Despite running it maxed-out into a cranked V5, it does still have a neat crispy tone when I lower my Strat's volume. Not a bad pedal, probably not a great one either. But still, 1970 — I feel alright!

I got radio interference. Bad hum. Didn't much care for the tones.
Not all of headroom. Bought a Bass big muff instead. Much better tones