Stomp Under Foot Hellephant

The Stomp Under Foot Hellephant is a fuzz pedal, and specifically builder Matt Pasquerella's take on the silicon Fuzz Face circuit. It keeps the classic layout of just a volume knob and a fuzz control, but adds an internal voltage bias trim pot that you can use to shape the gain and voice of the pedal. Premier Guitar reviewed it in August 2021 and listed a street price of $155¹.

What it does

At heart the Hellephant is a Fuzz Face-style circuit, but Premier Guitar's reviewer found it runs hotter on the top end than your average Fuzz Face-style pedal, and described it as a surprisingly expansive-sounding fuzz¹. With the fuzz all the way up, unity gain comes with the volume knob at around 9 o'clock, which leaves a good deal of volume knob travel for cleaning the pedal up or pushing it harder¹.

The internal bias trim is the main departure from the two-knob template. Set into the circuit rather than on the surface, it lets you shape the gain and voice of the pedal, which is where much of its range comes from¹.

How it sounds

Premier Guitar's reviewer found that with the fuzz set to about 3 o'clock, the Hellephant generates the buzzing, circa-'66 fuzz that garage-psych players reach for¹. The circuit is built around spindly, NOS metal-can 2N222A transistors, and the reviewer noted that its high-gain orientation does emphasize some silicon brashness at near-maximum volume and fuzz settings, especially with single-coil pickups¹.

That responsiveness to playing dynamics and the guitar's own volume and tone controls is the practical payoff: like most Fuzz Face-derived designs, it cleans up substantially as you back off the guitar's volume¹.

The Pink Hellephant

Stomp Under Foot has also offered a related two-in-one version, the Pink Hellephant. Pedal of the Day described it in August 2019 as a pedal pairing a drive side with a fuzz side giving off classic silicon fuzz sounds from its Level and Fuzz controls. The two sides can be controlled individually or stacked together for a drive/fuzz combination, and the unit was built exclusively for Mass Street Music. Pedal of the Day called it an extremely versatile dirt box suited to classic rock and roll tones².

Where it sits in the Stomp Under Foot range

The Hellephant is the silicon Fuzz Face entry in a catalog that leans heavily on classic fuzz and distortion circuits, including the Ram's Head and Green Russian Big Muff interpretations, the Sonic Generator fuzz, and the Red Menace. If you are comparing Fuzz Face-style options against Big Muff-style ones, the Hellephant's reviewer-found strengths, abundant fuzz flavors and lots of range in the volume and fuzz knobs, are the points of difference worth weighing¹. For more on the effect type itself, see Fuzz Pedals.

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