BJFE / BearFoot fx Guitar Effects Community

Just plugged in the Bearfoot FX Honey Beest and found it to be quite interesting (and AWESOME) in comparison with the BJFE Honey Bee.

I am sure most of you can hear in your mind the sound of the BJFE Honey Bee into your favorite amp -- nice amounts of warmth and drive on tap, very dynamic and transparent, cleans up great, etc.

I went into the Beest expecting something similar, yet gainier, but I was quite wrong. Thus far I have played my MIM Strat (van zandt vintage plus pups) into my AC30 on the top boost channel. This yielded a bright, sparkly result that went from a nice, clean treble boost to what I envision the SYOD sounding like. Engaging the pedal made my rig much brighter than when bypassed. I found the "third knob" to serve as a bias, compression shifter and tone emphasizer. Turning the knob to 9:00 yielded an open, high headroom sound that could be cranked with the drive. Turning the knob to 3:00 yielded a more sparkly sound with a little compression. This sound felt more raw to my ears.

Overall, the beest has an extra level of gain on tap -- almost into distortion territory. It felt less dynamic and transparent than my BJFE HBOD, but the beest maintained those characteristics to a different degree. I have never played a HBOD Deluxe, so I cannot compare to that. I am surprised how bright the beest is, and I really enjoy how it took my dark AC30 and turned into a more spanky, sparkly version of itself. The sound was still AC30 but with a more pronounced brightness.

I hope to stack the beest with the Model H and EGDM soon. It is getting a little late.

If there are any questions or suggestions, I would love to give them a shot.

Love the BEEST, Donner.

Cheers.

That sounds vaguely like the MP Sky Blue OD.

thesjkexperience wrote:That sounds vaguely like the MP Sky Blue OD.

Never tried that one either! I am missing out...

Rocker ~ thats a really good description of it ... what I liked was how the nature to the left is really usable since its overall more open --- kind of like the HB on many rigs is too bassy to be used with the Nature full counter clockwise, but the Beest is about normal there and is brighter (maybe too bright) on other rigs --- sort of covers alot of ground the HB doesnt ... but its not really like the HBDeluxe and may need to be tweeked back in that direction ..........

anyway lets hear what the other 3 guys think ......

I am planning on trying the beest with my SG and mesa boogie tonight. I imagine the beest to serve nicely as a treble boosting gain pedal with darker set-ups. I also imagine it stacking nicely with pedals that thrive on chunkier settings. The beest should open those pedals up nicely.

On more "American" voiced rigs (say a Deluxe and Strat), the Beest might be too bright with how the amp is typically set. The simple solution I discovered for this (and it REALLY makes the beest valuable) is utilizing the tone knobs on the guitar. I was able to roll off the treble with the tone knobs for a nice, thick rhythm tone ... rolling the tone up for a trebly, hot lead. In this regard, the beest can cover a massive amount of tones -- including ones already covered by the HBeeOD.

I plan on playing with the pedal live in the near future, and I will probably set the pedal as follows:

Volume 1:00
"Tone"/"Nature" 9:00
Drive 11:30

I really liked the different dynamic character at these settings. The pedal still cleaned up nicely, but the drive was aptly available without having to dig in too much.

Cheers (until tonight)

Oh for the other guys that got them --- part of the research batches point is for you guys to compare notes and come to a consensus or something like it .............. so if yo all want to jump in here that will work...

Donner wrote:Oh for the other guys that got them --- part of the research batches point is for you guys to compare notes and come to a consensus or something like it .............. so if yo all want to jump in here that will work...

I wanna hear from you!!!

I feel like I have no one to talk to about this.

Can't wait for Beest to arrive in Boston. Have been checking with the post office everyday.
I have a v1 syod, and v2 syod that I have been playing a lot, and have a strange feeling there will be interesting similarities.
Thank you rockeroo, very, very, very, very interesting explorations. keep them coming!

sounds like a bright kick in the amps pants.

....though....your AC30 is dark ??
did you dial the tone back ?

amp boy wrote:sounds like a bright kick in the amps pants.

....though....your AC30 is dark ??
did you dial the tone back ?

I run my AC30 on the dark side through the blended input. As a result, I find myself with a nice, warm tone through which my strat/tele can operate. I use pedals to introduce additional treble, and in this case, the BEEST is fantastic at doing so.

I tried using my BJFE HBOD to refresh myself of its character, and it is very transparent. The dark-character of the amp shines through and is slightly brightened through the pedal. When I plugged the BEEST back in, I immediately noticed a significant treble character at all drive settings. When dialing the nature knob counter-clockwise, the sound is more open, having increased headroom. Dialing the nature knob clockwise produces a much tighter, raw tone. The treble introduced is always present, though compressed in varying degree.

I hope this makes sense, ampboy.