Red Witch

Ben Fulton had spent more than two decades in the New Zealand music scene, touring and recording, before he started building pedals in his garage in Paekakariki in 2003 and selling them through ordinary retail channels rather than direct-to-player. Red Witch's whole identity has stayed close to that origin — small-batch, hand-built analogue pedals referencing 1960s and 70s circuits but with features those originals never had, made in New Zealand rather than outsourced overseas. The company ran a crowdfunding campaign in 2015 to fund expansion, one of the earlier boutique pedal makers to go that route. Limited-run and one-off pedals, including some named after people close to the company, are a recurring theme in what we cover. Here's what we've written.