Foxx Foot Phaser studio model 7

The Foxx Foot Phaser Studio Model 7 is a phaser pedal with a treadle, a rocking foot pedal like a wah's, that puts the phasing motion under your foot. It was made in 1976 by Ridinger Associates Inc of Chatsworth, California, under the fOXX brand, and the current Studio Model 7 is a reissue of that original design¹². The retailer listing describes what it does plainly: "Take it slow to get a smooth, swirling effect or crank it up to get a wicked, undulating euphony"².

The pedal is best known for its Brian May connection. The listing states it "was used by Brian May of Queen to create rock rhapsody"², and PastFX, whose reproductions are built on the same circuit, notes that of the several versions Foxx released, "it is Version 1's design that is most synonymous with Brian May"³.

A treadle-controlled phaser

A phaser splits your signal and shifts the phase of one path through a chain of stages, then recombines the two, creating notches that sweep up and down the frequency range. That sweep is normally set by a speed knob and left to run on its own. The Foot Phaser's difference is the treadle: as PastFX puts it in its documentation of the original, "its treadle design allowed the Phase speed to be controlled by knob or treadle"⁴⁵. You can set a rate and leave it, or rock the treadle to push and pull the sweep in time with your playing, the way a wah player works a wah pedal.

Foxx released several versions of the Foot Phaser over its run, "with different number of phase stages and circuit design"³. More phase stages means more notches in the sweep and a more pronounced, fuller phasing character; fewer stages sounds subtler. The Version 1 design, the one most associated with Brian May, is the circuit the modern reproductions follow³.

The treadle and mode switch

The Studio Model 7 carries a switch that decides what the treadle does¹:

The manual position is the more unusual of the two. Instead of a moving sweep, the pedal holds the phase at one spot in the frequency range, and the treadle moves that spot, giving you a foot-controlled fixed filter rather than an automatic one¹. Pete Cornish's rundown of Brian May's board shows both functions in use on the original: the unit carried a bypass switch, and "the 'Cry Baby' in his pedal board is the 'Foxx Phaser' speed control"⁶. The mislabeling on May's own board says something about how the treadle reads from the audience: it looks and moves like a wah.

Maker and history

The original was made by Ridinger Associates Inc, Chatsworth, California, in 1976¹. The fOXX brand of that era is better remembered for fuzzes and distortion boxes, but the Foot Phaser is, by the retailer's account, "one of the most requested pedals in the fOXX Pedals collection"², which is what led to the Studio Model 7 reissue.

The reissue itself has a thin recent record. The Godlyke listing is for a B-stock unit that "shows signs of use" and includes the original window box, priced at £268.00 GBP, and it is sold out as of October 2026². No US list price is on record.

The circuit lives on more visibly through PastFX. The PastFX Nick James Foot Phaser is a collaboration with Nick James of Peril Pedals built on the Foxx Foot Phaser V1⁴, and the PastFX Foot Phaser Deluxe expands that design with a 6/10 phase stage selector, a three-position speed range switch, depth and feedback knobs, a manual/auto mode switch, and an expression port⁴⁷³. Its manual mode works much like the Studio Model 7's manual position: "Manual mode allows the speed knob to select a fixed point in the phase"⁵. Guitar Pedal X's reviewer described the Deluxe circuit as "fantastic sounding richly flavoured 10 x JFET Transistor Stage Phaser"⁸.

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