If you're like me, and I assume most of you are, you have great T-Shirt ideas every day*. But do you then go out and press and sell several hundred thousand copies of that t-shirt? No. Tom Dalton, on the other hand, is not like us. See, he designs pedals for FuzzHugger(fx), and when he's got a great idea, he doesn't sit on it, he steps on it! That's why you're now reading about the FH(fx) Tea Bagger, a pedal inspired by recent events. Like they say, one great idea deserves another.

I won't try to dissect what "Tea Bagging" is**, but I will say this: you want to get your local representative's attention? Set up you 100-watt stack outside his or her home, plug in you guitar through the Tea Bagger, and let loose the screaming, flamethrower melody of your interpretation of Jimi's interpretation of The Star-Spangled Banner.

Recreating those thick waves of fuzz will be easier than filling out the 1040EZ e-file return with the excessively high-gain Tea Bagger. Four controls are provided:

• Gain: increases both the fuzz level and the amount that the second half of the fuzz stage is overdriven, from a fat, thick fuzz, to more open, to over-fuzzed and more focused.
• Tone: Tone control to filter with a broad range to adjust your frequencies (with on/off toggle to bypass the control, thus opening up the sound for full-on, unfiltered, rawer tone)
• Tone Bypass (Toggle): Allows you to bypass the tone control, eliminating its filter and allowing you to open up the tone for a less filtered, full-on sound!
• Level: Your master volume control . . . with a huge amount of available volume!

In the spirit of our countries orange pekoe-hating forefathers, FH(fx) is offering the Tea Bagger at a limited-time discounted rate of $109 US. This pedal has been announced as an extremely limited run . . . if they're before I get one, I'm starting up TeaBagFH(fx).org, and I'll invite everyone to send tea bags to Fuzzhugger until they reissue the Tea Bagger. WE SHALL PREVAIL!

* What, you think I'm gonna share my great ideas with you? I'm a start that company. . . someday
** And I don't recommend you Google it