Kingsley Jester Joy

lukedlb

i just had the evening only playing strat, jester, clean amp and for the first time strayed from my safe just on the point of breakup drive to full on almost LP bluesbreakers sounding licks. From a strat!
pick strength and volume pot control with the jester opened up a new way of playing that mimicked my unplugged practicing where I would dig in to get some rawness.
Furthermore, the boost channel provided solid ground for 2&4 positions. 
Definitely one of those pedals that make you play better. I'm so glad I picked it up from this forum.
 Long live Kingsley and God save the fretboard. 

JohnPerry

and God help your wallet. His other pedals are as good

lukedlb

The boost enriches all the harmonics. My compressor helps too but lacks the depth and space provided by the boost. 
As for the OD I'm getting blues breakup, Santana sustain, acdc Rock... And that's only half way. Who knows what the 3rd gain provides. A tighter response, i imagine. 
Understand, my guitar sounds great direct into the amp. But with either the boost or the OD, it just sounds even better.

Gassage

I know. Mine replaced 2 Cornish pedals, that's how good it is.

StrummyBrummie

I sold my V1 with the intention of buying the smaller footprint V2 and never got round to it. I probably should,  but I'm buried in dirt pedals at the moment. 

lukedlb

I ordered a plexi jtm45 type pedal from my local tech just before the jester arrived and I'm glad to hear that the plexi does provide a different voice, where the volume remains constant and only the drive changes as the volume pot is turned, allowing for a clean plexi and saturated plexi according to the guitar output. The jester instead cuts the highs as the volume increase never really becoming clean, rather reducing vol and strength. A good fuzz cleans up before it blooms into all out fuzz and a substantial increase in output. 
I found the mid boost very similar to the boost provided by the Bard tremolo and the Fulltone fat boost v1. However, the fat boost has much more grit and drive on hand; perhaps the Page is similar?

Hootsmon

Luke

tell us more about your clean amp/Kingsley and Santana settings/sound  

lukedlb

hootsmon said:

Luke

tell us more about your clean amp/Kingsley and Santana settings/sound  

a kelly amp from the late 60s, strong and directional without any distortion unless you boost it and it lightly breaks with hard attack on the guitar. with the kingsley OD on gain switch 2 above 12 o'clock, some of the Black Magic Woman sounds ring true, though it's more about the playing than the pedal. I'm not a Santana fan and suggested it as a more saturated LP tone. I play Hendrix, SRV and the Buddy Guy, Albert King side of blues. the jester OD helps with the breakup on the blues side but hasn't shown itself to be helpful with Jimi or SRV. the Boost is great for punching out the Clean side of Hendrix's guitar.

tonight's observations were the mid boost is identical to the Bard's boost and more or less attainable with an old 6 band mxr EQ. As the mid boost is my favourite, I would suggest that if you already have the Bard, you could go with the Minstrel or a Page rather than get the Jester. problems again were related to the guitar volume control pot. turned down doesn't clean up the drive, rather it loses its top end and rings a little muffled, something I hadn't expected.

Brad

lukedlb said:

hootsmon said:

Luke

tell us more about your clean amp/Kingsley and Santana settings/sound  

a kelly amp from the late 60s, strong and directional without any distortion unless you boost it and it lightly breaks with hard attack on the guitar. with the kingsley OD on gain switch 2 above 12 o'clock, some of the Black Magic Woman sounds ring true, though it's more about the playing than the pedal. I'm not a Santana fan and suggested it as a more saturated LP tone. I play Hendrix, SRV and the Buddy Guy, Albert King side of blues. the jester OD helps with the breakup on the blues side but hasn't shown itself to be helpful with Jimi or SRV. the Boost is great for punching out the Clean side of Hendrix's guitar.

tonight's observations were the mid boost is identical to the Bard's boost and more or less attainable with an old 6 band mxr EQ. As the mid boost is my favourite, I would suggest that if you already have the Bard, you could go with the Minstrel or a Page rather than get the Jester. problems again were related to the guitar volume control pot. turned down doesn't clean up the drive, rather it loses its top end and rings a little muffled, something I hadn't expected.

In my Jester user manuel, Simon does recommend a treble bleed on the guitar volume control. But if you have one fitted already I guess that is no help at all!

But the Jester is indeed a joy, and the Minstrel, and the Harlot...

lukedlb

I should add that I'm playing the 60 watt amp on 1 volume which may not display any of my pedals sonic possibilty. However, set to 1 is the equivalent of setting a Twin to 5. It's a very loud amp. I still have no idea what it's capable of. 
I'm using a strat which suffers from treble drop with the vol down. Not a problem with my germanium fuzz. 
Fuzz into OD is poor. Clipping loses all the highs. 
Compressor into OD and boost helps sustain if that's your thing (Santana now that I remember). 

Gassage

lukedlb said:

I should add that I'm playing the 60 watt amp on 1 volume which may not display any of my pedals sonic possibilty. However, set to 1 is the equivalent of setting a Twin to 5. It's a very loud amp. I still have no idea what it's capable of. 
I'm using a strat which suffers from treble drop with the vol down. Not a problem with my germanium fuzz. 
Fuzz into OD is poor. Clipping loses all the highs. 
Compressor into OD and boost helps sustain if that's your thing (Santana now that I remember). 

If you get that clipping, turn the gain up. @ThorpyFX was explaining this to me- you exepct to reduce it and it'll stop, but it's the other way around.

lukedlb

Gassage said:

lukedlb said:

I should add that I'm playing the 60 watt amp on 1 volume which may not display any of my pedals sonic possibilty. However, set to 1 is the equivalent of setting a Twin to 5. It's a very loud amp. I still have no idea what it's capable of. 
I'm using a strat which suffers from treble drop with the vol down. Not a problem with my germanium fuzz. 
Fuzz into OD is poor. Clipping loses all the highs. 
Compressor into OD and boost helps sustain if that's your thing (Santana now that I remember). 

If you get that clipping, turn the gain up. @ThorpyFX was explaining this to me- you exepct to reduce it and it'll stop, but it's the other way around.

No luck, I'm afraid. Even with the fuzz set to clean, all its character disappears with the OD; not so much with the boost. Still, it's unnecessary as the sonus 68 fuzz has all the tone I require. However, I had hoped to use the jester as a limiter of sorts since the spike in volume as the guitar pot goes from 8 to 10 is such that I fear using it. It's deafening. I'll probably use my g2 post vol as a dedicated control of full on fuzz madness.