Converse All Star combined with wah wah guitar pedal

A creative design agency have developed a Converse All Star shoe with a built-in guitar wah wah pedal.

Critical Mass developed new technology that allowed them to built the effects pedal into the sole of a Converse Chuck Taylor sneaker and they’ve named it after Chet Atkins – the guitarist who pioneered use of the wah wah pedal.

Staff at Critical Mass say: “We wanted to make Chucks even more rock’n’roll. So we thought, why not turn one into a wah wah pedal? Having the idea was the easy part, the difficult part was learning to make it.

“The amount a wah wah pedal moves up and down is measured by something called a potentiometer. In order to allow the Converse, as it flexes, to act as a wah wah pedal, we needed to replace the potentiometer with something called a flex sensor.”

In a video explaining the concept – which can be viewed below – staff reveal how the sensor then wirelessly sends the information it gathers to a digital potentiometer.

The creators of the unique shoe add: “Finally we came up with a name for it – the Chet Atkins All Wah, after Mr Chet Atkins, the first guitar player to use a wah wah pedal.”

There is, as yet, no details on whether the Chet Atkins shoes will be available to buy or how much a pair will cost.

Kiss pinball game could be yours.. for $6000

Mogwai launch skateboard range

Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.