Generation 1 (2013)
Produced in collaboration with composer, violist, and visual artist Liz Meredith, the Gold Standard is a stripped-down, blown-out, gated “racing-fuzz” based off our very own Number 24, but adapted for those that crave high-octane spontaneity with just a pinch of soul. This particular number, housed in a decorative gold enclosure accenting artwork derived from an original graphic score prepared special to be played using this pedal (meaning for all you shoe gaze experimenters out there, you don’t even need to look up from your pedal to check your charts) is a true pleasure to behold, conjuring a symphony of resonant buzz saws backed by a choir of bees in SATB formation. Colorful language aside, it’s pretty killer – totally wooly, but responsive, gated yet able to really carry a note and harmonically rich while equally destructive. As a bonus, it feeds back when you pull your volume knob back and in certain situations the tone control acts as a fairly decent resonant filter. I can’t guarantee that this box is for everyone, but for those willing to take a plunge into a fairly versatile sound-palate with a familiar interface, what’s there to lose?
Generation 2 (2015)
At some point along the way, I had a bit of a revelation – if I stopped using gold enclosures (which were already being discontinued by the supplier I was buying them from), I could use the same enclosure across the board for all VF builds, effectively making things more efficient and adaptable for me since I could pull from the same supplies for nearly any build.
Generation 3 (2018)
Not much of a change internally (in fact, up until this point the GS and the 24 used the same PCB with only a couple variations between the two) but I opted for a blue enclosure to differentiate between DIY workshop builds and production stock.
Generation 4 (2022)
As with most of my pedal designs, the Gold Standard also got an upgrade over the pandemic – at this point the 24 and GS now have entirely separate PCB’s, the LED and pots are board-mounted and the PCB itself it much better designed. The first batch came to Iceland with me for a workshop that we did at Mengi.
Eurorack (2022)
Yet another port of one of my pedals from enclosure to Euro to make use of the reduced footprint and expand it’s potential. Ala artwork, for this critter, we used the cat from Xime’s Playmobil Vet kit with a cone of shame around its neck in top of a bed of bubble wrap. For this one, it’s been exclusively DIY-only so far but you never know, I can always ramp up a batch or two, I suppose.
DIY
A quick and friendly link to the good ‘ol GitHub for anyone interested in building a Euro version on your lonesome.
https://github.com/vauxflores/Electronics/tree/master/Eurorack/GS
Hypermetacontextual 