Have a Sweet Honey--do I need a Honey Bee instead?

[sannella]

My wife gave me a Sweet Honey Overdrive for my birthday. I mostly love it—particularly the character of the distortion, which has a certain ratty quality (or fuzziness) that reminds me of cranking up one of the big Ampeg models from the early 70s. I find it great for tones including Faces-era Ron Wood and early-70s Stones among others.

The only thing I don’t like about the pedal is that it’s a little too bright for me, even with the focus knob in the lower half of its range. Rolling back the guitar’s treble knob works for most, but not all of the guitars I play.

Will a Honey Bee give me the same type of distortion but with less brightness? Also, I often hear people talk about sag when describing the Honey Bee. How much sag are we talking about? I mostly play through a tweed Vibrolux and a brown Princeton, so I already get all of the sag I need. In fact, one of the things I like about the Sweet Honey is its lack of sag.

Thanks for any advice.

[youngupstart]

as far as i can tell they dont have much in common other than being overdrive pedals with "honey" in the name.

[DGTCrazy]

The HB is just a great organic-natural sounding low/mid OD. Nothing like the Sweet Honey.

[duaner58]

I have a bjfe HBOD, Bearfoot HBOD, and had both the HW and CB version of the SHOD.

The SHOD will always have a place in my heart, but I sold both of them. They are great pedals! But the HB's to my ears are far superior sounding, even more touch sensitive, and just have this mojo behind em.

Get

[Bobby D]

sounds to me like you would dig the honeybee better.

get the new Bearfoot FX Honeybee, it's $222 and a much shorter wait time, sounds just about identical to the BJFe model :stir

[Liquid_Mojo]

They're different. I have both on my board and use them for different purposes. The HB is warmer and more touch sensitive then the SHOD. I love the small sound of the HB and the way it overdrives when you dig in.

[KrazyKarl]

The only thing I don’t like about the pedal is that it’s a little too bright for me, even with the focus knob in the lower half of its range.



I totally agree with what you're saying about liking the character but finding it a bit bright. What helped a lot for me was to make sure there are no buffered pedals before the sweet honey (actually, I don't have any after either. Just my boosts at the beginning of the chain to act as buffers when I'm playing clean). That helped to warm it up a bit. It seemed to be a bit picky that way, kind of like a fuzz.

[sannella]

What helped a lot for me was to make sure there are no buffered pedals before the sweet honey

I didn't think of that, but it makes sense, so I'll give it a try.

[Octafuzz40]

I had a SHOD and now have a Bearfoot HBOD. I prefer the latter, particularly b/c it is not as bright. I find them pretty similar myself, but the HBOD is a bit warmer and has a slightly different feel to it (altho' I'm not sure I can put my finger on exactly what is different about the overdrive character). They both stack very well, altho' I might give the edge to the HBOD.

[playon]

I like the SHOD better than the HB, and I like the newest PCB version of the SHOD even better as it has the best clarity. The original HB (I've owned two of them) didn't have enough headroom for me, or enough cut, it has a smoother saturated distortion and the low end sounded weird to me. You may have a bright speaker that isn't a good match for the SHOD. Do you play onstage or just at home, in a band or by yourself? For me the original HB doesn't cut thru the mix enough, it's fine if you are just playing at home.

[Braunzo]

Weren't one of these allegedly modeled after an old Supro? If so, which one was it? I'm intrigued.

[NeilYoungFan]

The only thing I don’t like about the pedal is that it’s a little too bright for me, even with the focus knob in the lower half of its range. Rolling back the guitar’s treble knob works for most, but not all of the guitars I play.

Will a Honey Bee give me the same type of distortion but with less brightness? Also, I often hear people talk about sag when describing the Honey Bee. How much sag are we talking about? I mostly play through a tweed Vibrolux and a brown Princeton, so I already get all of the sag I need. In fact, one of the things I like about the Sweet Honey is its lack of sag.

Having owned both, I'd say they are very different one another. Yes the SHOD is bright as you mention, resembling the biting overdrive of a blackface amp IMHO. If that is something you didn't like, then the HB is more suitable as it can't be set to sound as bright as the SHOD. On the other hand, this comes courtesy of the inherent sag of the pedal. Sorry, you can't have both!
If both qualities (not bright - not saggy) are an absolute must for you, then you should probably look elsewhere. Based on what you're describing and the amps you're using, I'd suggest you give the Clark Gainster a try. Love mine.

[Bobby D]

funny story -- when i first got a honeybee years ago, i liked it, but suggested to Bjorn that he modify it to make it tighter and brighter.

where the honeybee is a ragged old tweed amp cranked up, the sweet honey is like a nice blackface super that has new speakers, new caps in the power supply, and is indeed brighter and tighter.

but once i got the sweet honey, i MISSED the saggy, warm sound of the honeybee :YinYang

[Shiny McShine]

My wife gave me a Sweet Honey Overdrive for my birthday. I mostly love it—particularly the character of the distortion, which has a certain ratty quality (or fuzziness) that reminds me of cranking up one of the big Ampeg models from the early 70s. I find it great for tones including Faces-era Ron Wood and early-70s Stones among others.

The only thing I don’t like about the pedal is that it’s a little too bright for me, even with the focus knob in the lower half of its range. Rolling back the guitar’s treble knob works for most, but not all of the guitars I play.

Will a Honey Bee give me the same type of distortion but with less brightness? Also, I often hear people talk about sag when describing the Honey Bee. How much sag are we talking about? I mostly play through a tweed Vibrolux and a brown Princeton, so I already get all of the sag I need. In fact, one of the things I like about the Sweet Honey is its lack of sag.

Thanks for any advice.

See the following thread:

Stop searching for tone and start practicing! (http://thegearpage.net/board/showthread.php?t=874000)


Incidentally, I have SHOD original version. If I could find someone to buy it for what I paid, I'd instantly get the PCB version.

To answer your question, an extra half hour of practice will do you more good.

[Jet Age Eric]

I was under the impression the new HB wasn't so saggy. True? False?

Playon's asking the right questions: Context may mean everything in terms of which pedal is more useful to you. -E

[sannella]

The reason I chose the Sweet Honey over the Honey Bee was that I also felt it cut better in a band situation. And it works great with my Les Paul Junior and Tele, but not so well with my Gretsch, where I really miss having a tone knob.

There's a simple high pass filter at the output: a 4n7 cap in parallel with a 47K resistor. I may try to tweak that this afternoon.

Incidently, a '65 Super Reverb was my main gigging amp for 10 years. While I think the Sweet Honey has the tight bass and brightness of that amp, I don't find its distortion characteristics similar at all. It may just be the way I hear things, but I find the Sweet Honey distortion to be more similar to the VT series Ampegs.

[playon]

I agree, I would not call the SHOD an overdriven Fender sound at all... it puts me more in mind of a British amp.

[dsw67]

Had both. Liked the Honey Bee better with my tele and Carr Rambler. To my simple ears, the BJF had that 'amp like' tone people here are always talking about. The Honey Bee has been a keeper for me. Of the many many pedals I've tried it's been one of about 3 that I've kept longer than 3 years.

IMO and YMMV.

[phoenix 7]

I really like the HB, but it doesn't have a lot of gain. Definitely a light OD pedal if you're using single-coils, light-to-medium with PAF-style humbuckers. And definitely not too bright.

[tjmicsak]

I've had both the BJF HB and the SHOD for a while. Bobby is right on in the description. They both are really very different as far as feel and tone, even if the break up itself is similar and they may overlap at some point. They have very different response dynamics. The SHOD is like a tight and immediate solid state rectifier and the HBOD is like a nice loose saggy tube rectifier amp. If the Les Lius is considered Tweedy, the HBOD is Supro-ish, yes.

funny story -- when i first got a honeybee years ago, i liked it, but suggested to Bjorn that he modify it to make it tighter and brighter.

where the honeybee is a ragged old tweed amp cranked up, the sweet honey is like a nice blackface super that has new speakers, new caps in the power supply, and is indeed brighter and tighter.

but once i got the sweet honey, i MISSED the saggy, warm sound of the honeybee :YinYang

[Nork]

I didn't think of that, but it makes sense, so I'll give it a try.


that's interesting...why does it make sense? i have it post my polytune and SHO clone...should it then be before the polytune? hmmm....that would require a board re-arrangement of sorts...i like having my tuner first.

[thesjkexperienc]

funny story -- when i first got a honeybee years ago, i liked it, but suggested to Bjorn that he modify it to make it tighter and brighter.

where the honeybee is a ragged old tweed amp cranked up, the sweet honey is like a nice blackface super that has new speakers, new caps in the power supply, and is indeed brighter and tighter.

but once i got the sweet honey, i MISSED the saggy, warm sound of the honeybee :YinYang

Bobby D nails it! You can run the HBOD at 12 Volts for a bit less sag, but I run my HBOD into a Victoria 5e3 (Tweed Deluxe) and a Swart AST PRO and it is a great match.

[rabbuhl]

What about the Little Green Wonder instead?