How 'bout a story?
So, it's the early 2010s and the boutique effect pedal community is finding its footing. Independent pedal builders are still mostly running around on their own websites, eBay, and if-you-know-you-know local networks. Distribution and awareness are still a pretty spotty and overall, the effect pedal game is largely the domain of big-box, legacy brands and builders established decades earlier.
Out of this ecosystem comes Fairfield Circuitry. Today, one of Canada's premier dynasties in boutique effect pedals, Fairfield has become an institution in guitar pedals not only in their own customized lane, but in guitar pedals at large. Every time someone posts a SOTB pedalboard pic online with a stark, simple, unmistakable Fairfield Circuitry pedal, an angel gets its wings. That's how that saying goes, right?
Angels in the Fairfield
Fairfield Circuitry History
As you might guess from their unified, can't-miss-it, no-questions-asked aesthetic, Fairfield Circuitry isn't one to focus on themselves all that much. Founded by Guillaume Fairfield in 2008 and based out of Quebec, Canada, the Fairfield story is more about the Fairfield philosophy rather than any kind of name-drops or shout-outs. Fairfield centers its direction of design around a "less-is-more" philosophy meant to inspire with quality circuits at square one. Minimalist in design inside and out, there are truly no hat tricks or slight-of-hand with Fairfield Circuitry designs. It's tempting to put a bow on this description as, "What you see is what you get," but that wouldn't be accurate, either, because what do you see on a Fairfield Circuitry pedal? In all fairness, not much.
Fairfield Circuitry proves to be a trusted elder of the boutique pedal community almost twenty years on. Let's talk about it.
Super Circuit
Fairfield Circuitry Effect Pedals
The Fairfield Circuitry line of effect pedals is a concise, unified library of all-analog pedals. Clean, industrial, and to-the-point, Fairfield Circuitry line puts forth powerful, expansive, and experimental effect pedals that bend from tradition with a sound all their own. More than a dozen Fairfield Circuitry pedals make up the current pedal lineup. Let's talk about a few.
Fairfield Circuitry Drives and Distortions
Those in the business of getting down and dirty might not immediately picture the experimental boutique Canadian effect brand as the one to turn to first. However, you'd be doing yourself a disservice in passing by Fairfield Circuitry in your drive journey. Fairfield drives cover your more traditional bases along with your charmingly "What the heck?" bases for plenty of directions to take.
For one, their The Barbershop Millenium Overdrive punches in with a more traditional, tube-style-transparent drive to serve as an "always on" companion. For another, their ~900 ("About 900") summons a ferocious, cascading JFET-driven fuzz to break the mold. Inching into even crazier pastures, the Fairfield 20% More Slew Limiting Distortion introduces truly off-the-wall slew limiting dirts with distinct synthetic artifacts.
Fairfield Circuitry Modulations and Delays
Some of the real crowd-pleasers among the Fairfield Circuitry line are undoubtedly their modulations and delays. If you're seeing a board with a Fairfield Circuit, there's a pretty solid chance you're seeing an ambient delay or lo-fi modulator. The two "big" names among the Fairfield line these days are the Shallow Water K-Field Modulator and Meet Maude Analogue Delay. These two instantly expressive, deeply weird pedals create murky, otherworldly mixes of modulation and delay, respectively, to set the scene on any ethereal soundscape.
The Fairfield line has since expanded from these two time-tested, fan favorites with additions like the Roger That FM Demodulator and Placeholder Bucket Brigade Reverb for off-the-wall modulating and bucket brigade delay clouds to give your signal a loving shove into the inverted and introspective.
Across the full Fairfield Circuitry line, you're sure to come across an effect that turns any preconceived notion of sonic tradition on its head. Of course, that's all by design.
Fairfield of Dreams
A true pillar of the boutique effect community almost twenty years on, Fairfield Circuitry has become a trusted name and institution for a reason. Not ones for the spotlight and adulation they so rightly deserve, Fairfield Circuitry carries on with a unified, concise artistic vision driven to inspire musicality in the important ways – the real ways. Fairfield Circuitry pedals aren't ones for getting gussied up or sweating the small aesthetic details, but who could blame 'em when the magic's on the inside?
