Zacky's vision was to create and alternate universe - and it sounds like grit, fuzz and munching on brains.
How did we come to make a pedal with Avenge Sevenfold's Zacky Vengeance?
From MISFITS to Avenged Sevenfold
Some time ago, we built a pedal for MISFITS under their own brand. The Static Age (now long sold out) was a huge hit and Zacky snagged one of the pieces.
He loved it so much, he asked us to build him his own pedal...and the rest, as they say, is just the sound of brain slushies.
Zacky wanted us to encapsulate his signature tone with a heavy distortion and added fuzz for extra grit. Esentially, it should be an homage to his love of metal and punk rock.
Thus our collaboration began!
Zombie Family Comes To Life
When Zacky and I sat down to discuss the art concept for this new pedal, he had a unique vision in mind.
Zacky is a huge horror fan and with his pedal, he wanted to create a parallel world -- a world where the zombies had already won the war with humanity and were now living their best... death.
To bring this concept to life, we reached out to one of our go-to artists, the great Mario Lopez.
You might know Mario from the artwork for JSL pedal we built for Scott Ian on Anthrax, our classic Unicorn Blood III pedal or most recently the Cate pedal, on which Mario immortalized an outraged Cate Blanchett ("DoEs AnyBoDy AcTuaLly LiKe hEaVy MeTaL?!?")
Zacky instantly loved Mario's sketches - his vision was for the zombies to be a similitude of his own family, so Mario included special tweaks to the zombie boy that Zacky's son would approve of.
The personal touches made the artwork even more special for Zacky, making the pedal a true labor of love.
Creating an Ultra Heavy Distortion with Fuzz
The circuit took us much longer to perfect.
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Zacky's early pedal prototype
Under his direction, our head engineer Antonin Salva worked on several prototypes, adding tweaks and making changes until Zacky's full satisfaction.
From the first prototype to a production-ready piece it took us over a year - also taking into account Zacky's insane recording and touring schedule, this was no easy feat.
These creature take their time to spawn!
I am beyond proud of this pedal. The collaboration between Zacky, the KHDK team, and the artistry of Mario Lopez has produced something truly extraordinary.
Night of the Living Shred is the essence of Zacky's tone, his love for metal and punk rock, and the parallel world he wanted to create.
Now go chew on some brain jerky ya beasts!!!