A duo of Rangemasters!  I’ve written about Rangemasters before so i’ll keep this one light.

These were requested by two buds of mine that are doing a one-off Black Sabbath tribute night.  They were searching out that Tony Iommi sound and I told them there’s only one pedal needed: a Rangemaster.  A germanium booster running up into a classic British tube amp like a Marshall or Laney is really all you need to get that thick, goopy overdrive that is all over the first couple of Sabbath records.  Tony’s original rangemaster was supposedly modded, and it sounds like it, but no one knows what the specific modification was.  The most common way to mod this circuit is a switchable input cap to go from treble boost to other ranges of boost. That’s what I did on these 2 units, and by my own tests I think the full-range setting is the most Iommi of them all.

Controls are boost level and a range switch which selects the original treble boost, full range boost, or bass boost. The original delivered units were plain polished aluminum but the new owners made some graphical adjustments to be more in-line with the looks of a vintage unit.  A nice touch for sure….look for a run of these with graphics from me in the future.