EarthQuaker Devices Hizumitas

The EarthQuaker Devices Hizumitas is a signature fuzz pedal developed in collaboration with Wata of the Japanese drone-metal band Boris. Released in 2021, the pedal recreates the sound of Wata's longtime go-to fuzz — the Elk Sustainar, a rare 1970s Japanese clone of the Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi. The Sustainar has been Wata's signature fuzz for decades, and the Hizumitas captures the tonal character that Boris fans have associated with her sound across countless records.

The Elk Sustainar is one of many Japanese-built Big Muff variants from the 1970s and 1980s, but its specific circuit and component values produce a sound that is meaningfully different from the EHX original. The Hizumitas faithfully reproduces this voicing: thick, woolly low end, scooped midrange, and an aggressive top end that cuts through dense, distorted rhythm parts in a way that the standard American Big Muff doesn't quite manage. It is unmistakably a Big Muff family circuit — the four-stage cascading silicon clipping topology is preserved — but with the specific Japanese voicing that Wata uses.

The control layout is the classic three-knob Big Muff format. Volume sets output level (with unity gain at around 9-10 o'clock — the pedal has substantial output gain). Sustain controls the amount of distortion and sustain — at low settings the pedal acts as a thick, gain-heavy fuzz; at maximum it crosses into the territory of pure saturation with extended note bloom. The Tone control is a tilt EQ in the Big Muff fashion, but with the polarity inverted compared to standard Big Muffs: turning clockwise boosts bass, turning counter-clockwise boosts highs. This is faithful to the Elk Sustainar's behaviour and catches some Big Muff users out at first.

The pedal uses EarthQuaker's relay-based true bypass switching (requires power to pass signal — without power, the pedal cuts the signal entirely), 9V centre-negative power at just 10mA, and the standard EQD compact chassis at 4.75" × 2.50" × 2.25". Input impedance is around 150kΩ (the lower-than-typical impedance is faithful to the original Sustainar and contributes to its tonal character), and the output impedance is below 10kΩ. The pedal is hand-built in Akron, Ohio.

Who Is This For? The Hizumitas suits guitarists who want a thick, woolly Big Muff-style fuzz with the specific Japanese Elk Sustainar voicing rather than the standard EHX American character. It is particularly well-suited to drone, doom, sludge, shoegaze, and stoner rock players — the genres where Wata and Boris have established the sound as a tonal reference point. Bass players also use it for thick, saturated bass fuzz — the extended low end the Hizumitas produces handles bass well. Players wanting a more standard Big Muff sound should look at the EHX Big Muff Pi or Russian Muff reissues; players wanting a multi-Muff pedal might consider the JHS Muffuletta. For the specific Wata / Boris sound, the Hizumitas is the only pedal that delivers it in current production.