Faded Twin vs Core Twin: what’s the difference?
The Twin was the first pedal I released as Hamilton Effects, originally designed on paternity leave with my twins. This latest version has been redesigned into two versions: the simpler Faded Twin and the more flexible Core Twin.
Both are based around the same idea: two transistor boost stages that can be used separately, stacked in series, or blended in parallel.
The Faded Twin keeps the main sound and feel, but strips the controls back. The gain and bias are fixed internally, and the routing is simplified to parallel or boost one into boost two. It’s smaller, more immediate, and has the worn-in Faded finish that will age more like an old guitar.
The Core Twin gives you more control. You can adjust gain and bias, choose the routing direction, use the two sides in parallel, cut presence, and attenuate the output. That means you can set one side clean and the other more compressed, gated or fuzzy, or stack them in either order for very different responses.
In parallel mode, the Twin can keep clarity while adding thickness and texture. In series mode, one side pushes the other, giving anything from clean boost to compressed drive, fuzzy saturation or spluttery bias sounds.
Faded Twin gives you the core idea in a simpler format. Core Twin gives you the full version with more control over feel, gain, compression and routing.