Yeah you read that right, Harts and Subaru turned one of their brand new WRX’s in to a Wah Wah pedal. Why you ask? Because “Awesome-ness”.
Aptly re-named the W-WAH-X (top points for the pun guys) the Subaru technical team wired the accelerator pedal through a wah-wah pedal so that acceleration essentially controls the effect. As you might expect things get off to a bit of a shakey start as having to keep revving the engine to make the wah-wah effect work while also not dying a horrible horrible death proving quite difficult for driver Richard Bowers of Magic Bones. Bowers was of course chosen because in this situation knowing how a wah pedal works was seemingly more important than tactical driving experience lol.
They soon realise though it’s not so much the technology that’s to blame as their concern for own safety and well-being. Putting on their big boy pant and taking off on the track, Harts and the Bowers begin to ‘collaborate’ with the guitarist churning out Hendrix-esque riffs as they burn around corners, bowers putting the car through it’s paces as it never gives an inch.
The project was originally inspired by the idea of flying down the highway with your favorite tunes blaring out of the speakers, with the final results proving to be just as entertaining as it is impractical. To the great relief of Police and Road Safety Authorities everywhere (and my great disappointment) this is obviously a one off experiment. Still for those of us hankering for some automotive madness like this ever since Top Gear was cancelled, the video is a sight for sore eyes.
Hopefully this isn’t the last such collaboration between car and musician as I can see a lot of other potential team ups on the horizon. Flume could get the team to hook up a compressor to the shock absorbers to create a side-chain effect every time the car hits a bump, Kevin Parker could compose and record and album in a station wagon, and Peter Garrett could come in after hours to give the car some Midnight Oil (crickets).
I’m very sorry, I should be ashamed of myself for that.
Anyway, why listen to me any longer when you can watch the video here.
2016 Subaru WRX ‘W-WAH-X’ Premium featuring Harts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7jbVHFn6dQ
