Dunlop and Daredevil Pedals Cry Baby Daredevil Fuzz Wah

The Cry Baby Daredevil Fuzz Wah (model DD95FW) is a wah pedal with a built-in fuzz circuit, made by Dunlop in collaboration with Daredevil Pedals. Dunlop describes it as combining "the bright, aggressive vocality of a modded Cry Baby Wah with a custom fuzz circuit that's downright gnarly"¹. Flip the side switch one way and you have a Cry Baby wah on its own; flip it the other way and the fuzz kicks in on top of the wah, in the style of the classic fuzz-wah pairings of the late 1960s.

The design came from Johnny Wator, Daredevil Pedals' builder and proprietor, who fine-tuned the circuit over several years before bringing it to Dunlop as a new addition to the Cry Baby lineup². It was announced in May 2023 with a preorder price of $229.99 and planned to ship June 1st of that year³⁴.

Fuzz and wah in one housing

The pedal houses two circuits: a modded Cry Baby wah and a custom vintage fuzz circuit⁴. Rocking the treadle sweeps the wah's resonant peak, which the manual measures at 2.1 kHz with the toe down in both wah-only and fuzz-wah modes⁵. With the fuzz engaged, the same sweep drives a much hotter signal: the manual lists maximum gain of +55 dB heel down and +63 dB toe down in fuzz-wah mode, against +17.2 dB and +23.5 dB in wah-only mode⁵.

Dunlop says the pedal is hand-built with thru-hole components and true bypass switching². The enclosure has a vintage crinkle finish base with a polished aluminum rocker top and a custom tread².

In Premier Guitar's review, the reviewer found the wah side has a character of its own⁹:

Premier Guitar's reviewer, on the wah's character and its interaction with the fuzz⁹

The controls: baseball bat switch and internal pots

The pedal keeps its control surface deliberately simple. The only external control is a heavy-duty baseball bat switch that toggles the fuzz on and off¹. Everything else is inside:

To reach the internal controls, you remove the bottom plate⁵. Premier Guitar's coverage described the internal pots as controlling "pedal output and fuzz intensity, perfect for instant lead tone"⁶, so the practical use is setting the fuzz once as a lead boost and leaving it there, rather than tweaking it mid-gig.

Power comes from a single 9-volt battery under the pedal, or from the Dunlop ECB003 adapter or Dunlop's DC Brick, Iso-Brick, and Mini Iso-Brick supplies¹⁵. In Premier Guitar's demo video, John Bohlinger noted the battery life: "you can run these things on a nine volt for like a year"¹⁰. The manual lists the power supply as 9 VDC, and RockBoard's spec page gives the adapter voltage as 9V DC, center negative⁵.

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In that video, Bohlinger walks through the pedal's fuzz-wah sounds and battery operation for Premier Guitar¹⁰.

A collaboration between Dunlop and Daredevil Pedals

The circuit began with Johnny Wator of Daredevil Pedals, whose love of classic vintage circuits drove the design¹¹. Wator had been building fuzz wahs as one-offs for friends and fellow musicians for years before the design was given a full release; Daredevil's page describes the result of "almost 3 years of collaboration with Dunlop"¹². In Dunlop's announcement, Wator framed the pedal as "a full palette of raw and aggressive tones from Daredevil Pedals and the Cry Baby team"².

Wator's own account of the project, quoted by Guitar.com, traces it back to his start as a builder: "The whole beginning of my path as a pedal builder started with me and a Cry Baby pedal"³.

Daredevil Pedals sells its own version of the pedal on its site, signed and dated when available¹². The Dunlop release remains the widely available version, at the price shown above.

Videos

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