If you play guitar in Vancouver and have decent taste, then you probably know Chris Young as a long-time fixture and classic gearhead at the defunct Not Just Another Music Store. Two years ago, Young decided to start privately building equipment after failing to track down a rare ’60s fuzz pedal by Kay.

“I couldn’t find it for love or money,” he told the Straight. “So I thought I’d make one.” With his business partner Kirk Elliott, Young subsequently built 30 copies of a pedal they christened the Buzz Bomb. The team followed with the Beelzebuzz, while their newest product is called More. Young describes More as “abnormally clean and abnormally loud”.

Young managed to get a Buzz Bomb to Neil Young and a More to Daniel Lanois. The response was excellent. Lanois promptly asked for another two, while Shakey’s guitar tech Ian Galloway said the Buzz Bomb “might be better than the original”. Young’s next product is an amp he’s designing with guitarist Kris Welch.

There’s no Web site for the company Young and his partners have since created, called Union Tube and Transistor. But interested parties can always find him playing bass with Spoon River.