The Berko Fuzz (Foxey Lady)...

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As you probably know by now, the history of Electro Harmonix goes all the way back to the late 60's, with a pedal that collector nerds have dubbed the "AUL Fuzz" or the "AUL Foxey Lady". And while this story has been told and retold for decades, there are a few incorrect and even untold pieces of the puzzle that I think are worth exploring.

As the narrative goes, William (Bill) Berko had his own electronics shop, ABCO Sound, in Manhattan on 48th Street in the mid-60s (which would have put him directly in the center of Music Row, among stores like Sam Ash and Manny's Music). Having previously (and then later again) worked at the Ampeg factory in New Jersey, Berko was very familiar with the technology of amplifiers, so this type of repair became his main occupation. But in addition to amps, he would get visits from local guitar players who wanted to modify or fix their new fuzz tones. And this happened enough that it eventually drove him to start building his own fuzz boxes to sell directly out of the shop. 

What came next has two conflicting accounts (both from Mike Matthews 😂):

-Either; Berko contacted Mike because he was doing well selling his fuzzes and wanted some help. But unfortunately, Berko stepped away from both the shop and the new fuzz partnership almost immediately after it began. Leaving Mike in a most unfamiliar position, having to build fuzz boxes himself. So to remedy this problem Matthews went to a local large-scale electronics factory called AUL Instruments and contracted them to build the pedals instead. This new version of the fuzz began to do very well, and based on that success word got out to Guild Guitars owner Al Dronge, who made a deal with them to start supplying Guild with the newly dubbed "Foxey Lady" fuzzes. 

-Or; At some point before Matthews was involved, Berko connected with Dronge and agreed to build fuzzes for Guild directly, as they wanted to capitalize on the hot new trend as well. And faced with an order from a major guitar brand, and attempting to simultaneously run his repair shop, Berko reached out to Mike Matthews and proposed that the two go into business together building and expanding on his new fuzz box venture. Mike agreed, and took on the task even though he was still working full-time at IBM.

*side note; although it has been written differently over the years, it was actually Dronge who came up with the name "Foxey Lady".

The story comes back together here, where Mike states that he would drive out to AUL, pick up the orders and deliver them directly to the Guild factory in Hoboken, NJ every few weeks. He has also stated that the "Guild branded" versions were only brought to Guild and not sold directly to dealers. The implication here could explain the blank AUL units we typically see that have residue left over from what appears to be a Manny's Music sticker (*see first image above).

Well this is where the things start to get even more convoluted, as Guild apparently made a similar deal with Mosrite to also build their version of the Foxey Lady pedals, either concurrently with the deal Mike had or very shortly afterwards. It is unknown why this happened, but the most common theory is that Mike was simply unable to keep up with the orders that Guild had requested.

This would not turn out to be a great decision though, as Mosrite had run into financial troubles, and by 1969 went bankrupt. In the meantime, Mike had decided to go all-in on guitar effects and started Electro Harmonix with engineer Bob Myer in the Fall of 1968. Shortly afterwards he picked up where he left off with Guild, and began producing the Foxey Lady pedals with EHX.

So that's it! That's the story we all know and love, and not just for the history of the Foxey Lady fuzz, but also for the genesis of Electro Harmonix. But if you were reading through all of that and had tons of questions; yeah! me too! But the one I want to focus on today goes back to the very beginning, where everyone just glosses over the fact that Bill Berko was building fuzz pedals and selling them out of his shop. 

This means that there were/are, somewhere out there, pre-Guild, pre-AUL, pre-Mike Matthews, Berko Fuzz boxes! This idea has my collector brain going crazy. Was it the same circuit as the Foxey Lady fuzz? What did it look like? Did it have some kind of label on it? Was it called the "ABCO Sound Fuzz", or a ridiculous hyperbolic 60s name like, "Berko's Wild Fractured Sound Box" or something? I have so many questions.

If we are at the complete speculation part of this article, then let me throw out a guess that it WAS the same modified Fuzzrite circuit. And if it is the same, then all we would have to do is find a really old looking, seemingly home-made pedal, with a silicon Fuzzrite-ish circuit in it. And MAYBE, just MAYBE, this could be an original Berko Fuzz???

So be on the lookout friends! And who knows, YOU might have potential fuzzy gold just sitting in a box in your basement at this very moment. 

There are plenty of other points about this story that I want to touch on in later posts; like the possible reason Berko just disappeared shortly after teaming up with Mike, the potential sequence of Foxey Lady builds, Berko working for Ampeg and the possible connection to the Manny's Fuzz, and so much more. But for now, just let it sink in that somewhere out there is an unknown fuzz box that was essentially the beginning of Electro Harmonix, and no one has ever seen it before...

thanks for reading!
-ed