20 Best Guitar Pedals For Metal (2023 Updated)

Ok, lets get real. If you’re a Rock player this pedal will work for you and then some. If you’re into 80’s-90’s Metal this will work for ya too. Modern Metal players could use this as a layering pedal – to thicken up your fave Metal pedal tone.

(Behringer Ultra Metal is great if you don’t have a fave – Yet). The Heavy OD sounds great and has that useful low pass filter adjustment that gives it the ‘Heavy’ name. The dual Gain /Dist. controls are FANTASTIC.

Sounds nearly as good as my fave amp on ’10’! Can’t get a better tone from ANY dirt pedal. Sound is great for anything above crunch level up to Modern Metal. About the Behringer plastic housing criticisms: I weigh 240 and have accidentally stepped on the hinge points of several pedals over and over.

The only one broken was a Boss OD – so it’s not the plastic, it’s the hinges. Ironic thing is if the Boss didn’t break I wouldn’t have this Heavy OD, that I like better! Boss breaks – I replace with tougher, better sounding Behringer – How ironic is that? Having Behringer pedals: (EQ, Heavy OD, Ultra Metal.

Tube Monster, Vintage Delay, Vintage OD, Digi Reverb)- here’s my take: Pros: Sound Quality; Flexible Tonal options: Silent Switching; True Bypass: Build Quality; Price Cons: Difficult Battery access; Mediocre Jacks; Everything else is Good or Great.

Solve the battery problem with a power supply. If the jacks become faulty – replace with Switchcraft. (I’ve been waiting years for the jacks to quit – hasn’t happened yet. ) I originally got my Behringers as back-ups to “other big name pedals”.

But when compared side-by-side The Behringers sounded better – those extra tonal controls! Try the Heavy OD and you’ll love it. Or, if you’re rich. keep buying pretty paint-job ’boutique’ pedals that offer minimal tonal control – – those guys need your business!.

I’m a dirt box junky. I own 40 plus distortion,overdrive& fuzz pedals. I play through orange, marshall, carvin and jet city amps. I ordered the HD300 cuz it was cheap and I thought why not? I didn`t think I`d be writing this review.

wow this thing is waaaay better than I expected. because of the two cascading gain types you can get a lot of different distortion types out of it. Both of them turned to zero will give a pretty good early ac/dc.

I wasn`t expecting that. yes the tone can go to buzzsaw. dial it back and the mids come out a little. no,it is not tube screamer bump. but that’s not what you were going for with this anyway. the heavy distortion sounds great.

kudos to Behringer.

Like the UM300 (ultra metal 300) this product also is worth around 20 times what pay for it as you would have to invest 20 times what you pay for it to get this high of sound quality. This little monster will give you a classic hard rock distortion with lots of sustain.

Like the UM300, it is great for both live and recording as it’s output at highest level (all the way up) exactly matches line level inputs of mixers. I recommend that you get the power supply though because access to the battery compartment is a royal pain.

Have tried many “high gain” distortion pedals but nothing comes close to this fire breathing beast! Able to reproduce some absolutely crushing distortion to fit many subgenre’s in the universe of metal.

everything from your basic metal to extreme tech-death. You get what you pay for. it is pricy but absolutely worth the money! The tight/open switch is essential to craft a specific tone, when paired with the 3 band EQ the options are limitless.

And it sounds amazing in front of the amp or through the loop. I am running into a DSL40 clean channel with modded tube setup and is possibly the best sound I have ever found. Pushing this through an old custom Sheffield 150W 2×12 cab accomplishes the chugga chugga.

Studio quality sound. Build is all metal housing, like a tank. Knobs are some type of phenolic compound, and the in/out is on top. love this arrangement (other companies should take note and stop putting in/out on the sides).

You can feel the quality. Wampler scores big on this one— Thank you Brian!.

My taste in spring reverb has been tainted by my first amp being an original Fender ’68 Princeton Reverb drip edge. I have other great amps without spring reverb i. e. Supro Black Magick & BK8, Vox NT15, Ibanez TS15 & 5.

I have gone through several traditional type reverb pedals for these amps and everything sounded to sterile to me. Had the 1st HOF twice and sold it twice. If you are looking for a simulated, touch sensitive, authentic sounding spring reverb this is the one I found to work the bes with all my amps.

Don’t get me wrong, I love my Eathquaker Afterneath and my Walrus Fathom but that’s a whole other thing. If all you care about is a spring reverb sound Wampler nailed it. If you have the cake it’s worth the full price, if you catch it on sale better yet.

It is that good.

Sound: This pedal gives you that Fender Spring Reverb tank sound and more. I play super clean and on occasion add some overdrive just for that amp breakup sound. As for times to make it sound better, the Wampler website has downloadable manuals that explain what each control knob does and gives you four starting point examples for getting different tones.

Features: With three functions you can dial in your tone to suit what you are doing. Ease of Use: You get Depth, Tone and Volume on this pedal and I have found the sweet spot that works for me with very little effort Quality: This is an American made pedal from Wampler which should tell any guitarist that its 100% in craftsmanship and durability.

Its a tough little pedal that is going to last a long time even on the road. Value: Have you ever heard the term “you get what you pay for?” With this pedal you get a great reverb sound that is worth every penny of the price.

Manufacturer Support: I’ve met Brian Wampler and he was as nice as he appears on his YouTube videos. This company started as a mom and pop shop and grown into a superstar worldwide and yet Wampler has not gotten greedy and outsourced its production to other countries just to turn an extra buck.

Wampler is a company with great integrity. The Wow Factor: The wow factor here is that for such a small pedal you get an incredible sound. I have played a lot of mini reverb pedals and other larger over $500 reverb pedals.

This Faux Spring Reverb pedal by Wampler sets on my board and gives me exactly the tone im looking for! Overall: I have looked high and low at reverb effects only to find this incredible pedal from Wampler.

There are several choices for reverb pedals and they have a lot of options from Hall, Plate to Spring just to name a few. I realized quickly that I wanted a reverb that gives you reverb like a Fender Deluxe Reverb amp does and this pedal gets you there and more.

I would highly recommend this reverb pedal as an always on pedal. that what it has become on my pedal board.

I LOVE THIS PEDAL!!! I adjust the four graphic equalizer setting controls and the distortion level and it produces a massive array of distortion tones. Once I dialed in the searing distortion sound I was looking for I was in HEAVY METAL HEAVEN! I leave my amp settings at 12 on clean and use my pedal to adjust my distortion tone.

Also, if you don’t know where to start, the pedal comes with diagram setting for different types of music to get you started. As always, start the controls at 12 o’ clock and move them. There are hundreds of distortion pedals out there, mostly with 2 or 3 knob controls, this pedal has 6.

Four of those knob controls are stacked on top of each other. The guitar players who don’t like this pedal are the ones who don’t want to take the time to learn how to use this pedal properly and they give up, blaming the pedal, when in fact the guitarist needs to learn how to adjust the pedal.

If you buy this pedal as I did, it gives tons of different distortion tones and you’ll never have to buy another distortion pedal.

Every guitarist must make a choice in life. I choose to walk the Metal Zone path. I run the Metal Zone > Klon > front of amp. Many swear by guitar > Metal Zone > FX return for the typical metal high gain chug/shred.

I use it more for a mid gain shoegaze type tone. The MT2 has a biting gain and I use the Klon to smooth it out and get a more articulate tone. But I also enjoy the 3 o clock distortion sound. Perfect for gettin the chugs and squealies out.

Due to the insane amount of gain it has on tap, the EQ settings are very very potent and actually quite useful for tone shaping. The parametric mid knobs are critical to using this pedal. With that in mind, check out any number of demos on this thing.

That really should be all you need to figure out if you need this thing. Its tone is distinct, and kind of finicky in regards to where it goes in your signal chain. But you can easily get some great metal tones out of it.

What more can you expect from the Metal Zone?.

Level gives control of over all volume. low sounds best at 3pm hi sounds best dialed down to 1/3 of the way on. mid sounds best anywhere from noon to 5pm i keep it around 1pm freq sounds good around 2pm Gain control gives me plenty turned up only 1/3 of the way on.

I prefer to run it through a peavy mixer head. It sounds good to my ears. I play doom/death/black metal and it nails the sound.

I needed a pedal to add distortion to my BOSS amp. It has gain, distortion and all that, but it is nowhere near what you need to play heavy metal. This thing takes it up to all you need and probably more.

Before I guess the sound from my amp was what I would call weak. This has made my guitar sound totally different. Definitely made for high gain/ distortion. If this is what you are after it shouldn’t disappoint you!!.

I needed something to take me into very heavy territory, but couldn’t justify buying a whole new amp. While there were some more expensive options I considered, price ultimately lead me to the Fullbore Metal.

There is an enormous amount of gain in the pedal, and it doesn’t “go away” when you turn the gain down. The Gain knob is there to fine-tune the gain structure in combination with your amplifier, not to control varying levels of gain.

Keep that in mind if you’re considering this pedal. Having said that, it does respond well to your guitar’s volume knob. The basic tone of the pedal is a little jarring in the treble register, so you’ll have to work to tame that.

Luckily, the pedal compensates for this by having very responsive EQ knobs. The “Sweep” knob is best used for fine-tuning the tone of the pedal to your particular amplifier. With the Scoop button disengaged, and some patient EQ-ing, you should be able to get a deep, aggressive, smooth gain structure comparable to perhaps a 5150 amplifier, but with some loss of fidelity.

(Hey, it’s just a pedal, after all, not an amp!) Engaging the Scoop button, to my ears, will not do your tone any favors. If you’re running through a tube amplifier, the added bass frequencies will muddy up your gain when it hits your preamp, while the added treble frequencies will have to be rolled off unless you want your tone to be shrill.

However, you yourself might find a sweet spot with the Scoop engaged and the bass and treble turned down some. The major drawback to the pedal is the fact that the noise gate – which works very well – must be adjusted by removing the back plate.

Overall, this is a very nice-sounding pedal that will give your a great high gain option. Paired with a good amp, this might be the best high gain pedal for the money. I’m pleased with my purchase.

This pedal is a one trick pony – brutal sounding heavy metal. It can run the gauntlet of thrash, modern, nu, and classic metal – everything from old school Dio and 1980s Metallica to Pantera to Trivium to Avenged Sevenfold.

It can scoop the mids out entirely for the dry. And Justice for All sound with the push of a button while the push of another button can enable a nice percussive sound and prevent any bleedthrough of extraneous sound.

Using mids dial on this pedal is not a bad thing. it shouldn’t be turned down unless specifically needed for a certain sound. Mine is actually set around the 1 o’clock position. Where care needs to be used is actually with the low and especially the high (where it can sound like an annoying chain saw if turned up).

Take time and care with dialing in the sound. It is easy to get a brutal sound if used properly and not the high pitched awful whine that you might find on demo videos on YouTube. Definitely recommend using this pedal on the clean channel.

Boosting it with an overdrive pedal isn’t necessary or useful.

THE ML-2 METAL CORE IS. BOSS IN “BEAST MODE!!!” Hands down my favorite “Metal” Distortion pedal by Boss. They got everything right on this one. Deep thundering distortion that’s up in your face. It’s a very modern sound that’s very defined yet clean enough to enjoy.

I’m probably one of just a few who happen to own every distortion and medal pedal made by Boss. Each were designed for specific tones in the search for that perfect sound. While some are lacking to be honest numerous are very good.

The ML-2 “Metalcore” is great. If you like the MT-2 “Metal Zone”, you’ll love this Beast! It’s the sound I always wanted but couldn’t quite dial in. If you’re into Hard & Heavy hitting metal music, it’s certainly worth checking out.

I like it so much I own 3 to have on all my pedal boards. It’ll be the pedal everyone looks back on to purchase years from now when they’re discontinued.

I bought this pedal back in 2014 as a graduation present for myself. I had a cheap Marshall solid state combo and was looking for a way to get heavy high gain tones. I eventually sold this pedal to a neighbor ut for the 2 1/2 years of owning this I would say it’s not too bad.

It has tons of gain you cam get into death metal territory. It wasn’t overly fuzzy sounding as long as you didn’t max out the gain (I had the gain knob a little pass noon)> The low knob adds quite a bit of punch without making your tone muddy.

My only problem was it had so much treble that it was ice picky sharp. I had to basically turn the knob almost all the way off just to get it sounding good. Also this pedal isn’t too versatile IMO, it just has so much gain where its not good as a clean boost, but this is a distortion pedal with the word METALCORE in it so that shouldn’t be much of a surprise.

If you you’re on a budget and cant afford a good high gain valve amp, this wouldn’t be a bad purchase. Just know that you’ll be fighting with the treble knob and for the price you can get a better pedal so I’d suggest getting this used if planning on getting this.

You can get every pedal in the world and BOSS is just going to tear them up and be the ones you want to go back to. The BOSS ml-2 is simply that distortion pedal you are looking for to carry you over the top in sustaining notes feeling like you’re playing on butter, yet ripping that growling crunching chug you want to push thru the mix.

Try using it also with a overdrive pedal and turning the ml2 distortion level down to about 7. 5. Then use the overdrive to kick it back in for your leads. It truly out does the metal zone even thru the effects loop as I run the mt-2.

Buy this bad boy! You will not regret it!.

Great for a pedal into a decent clean. Settings are touchy tho; makes it a little tricky to dial it in at first, but once you get a feel for it, it’s not so bad. Go against your intuition to crank it; it seems to prefer being restrained.

Otherwise, lots of different tones; very versatile. Seems to prefer passive pickups; my active’s get a little screechy and bring out that “pedal-ly” tone, whereas the passives give a more organic sound.

It’s not as good as plugging straight into a Peavy, Randall or Boogie or something. A pedal never will be. But as far as a pedal into a clean amp goes. you can get some pretty satisfying “high gain but still natural sounding” tones.

Without the price tag of a high gain stack. Basically it’s the sweetest pedal distortion i’ve played. Such a range of sounds that you can dial into nearly any amp, guitar or situation. But yeah, don’t expect it to sound like you’re plugged into a satan.

It’s more for an all purpose rig that you want to get some brutal metal out of. Also, I got some cool stuff out of it by plugging it into my FX loop. but i usually keep it in front of the amp as it’s a more versatile position.

On my H&K you can use it as a boost into the lead channel, but it breaks up pretty easily, gets real noisy, and actually sounds way more brutal into the clean channel. My eq pedal works better as a boost into the amp distortion.

By the way, a noise gate comes in handy. Also a Wah after the pedal. makes things interesting.

Well it’s been 10 years since I bought this pedal, I haven’t replaced it because I can’t find anything else out there that provides the tone, versatility, and value of this pedal! The three band EQ is helpful in separating and sculpting your distorted tone, gives plenty of gain headroom to cover a variety of tones, and the top boost is great for an nailing those big solos and searing rhythm surges.

Admittedly the distortion on it’s own sounds a bit muddy, however this seems to be the case with every distortion pedal I’ve personally come across. My theory is the only way to get truly clear distortion is through a good tube amp with enough headroom to suit your needs pushing through speakers that push the amp to the right level for you.

I use the MetalMuff alongside my overdrive (Voodoo Lab Sparkle Drive Mod) consistently and adjust them in tandem to achieve a responsive and concise distorted tone and it works great! Also this one’s extremely tough, mine’s been dropped, thrown, drowned, and utterly abused and still works great.

(just had to open it up and let it dry when wet) What else can I say, if you need great distortion on a budget buy this pedal!.

I was a little skeptical of these cheaper Fender pedals, since I own alot of high end boutique pedals. But I was looking for something simple to use and at a great price. Fender knocked it out of the park with the Hammerone line.

Don’t let the price fool you they are a high quality good sounding addition to your board. And they actually look pretty cool. For the price and quality you will not be disappointed, I highly recommend them as a matter of fact I got 3 of them.

I’ve been playing electric guitar for a year and have a Marshall amp with an overdive button but I wanted a pedal so I can switch on the overdrive mid way through a song. This pedal is an affordable price for someone like me that has a fairly inexpensive guitar.

I did not want to pay more for a pedal than I did the guitar. The overdrive sound that it creates is much fuller and richer than the one that my amp generates with it. Very pleased all round.

This is a first class piece of kit at a very competitive price. It would have been nice to have the type mini switch labelled with kind of reverb being selected, but really is not a problem. quality build will stand a lot of punishment for a long time.

Well done Fender, a good comprehensive range of stomp boxes.

I guess I’m more of a roady/studio guy than I am an artist, as I’ve always got more out of turning knobs then actually playing music lol. I bought this pedal for one reason and one sound only. The Swedish “chainsaw” guitar tone of the 90’s that came out of Sunlight Studios that was popularized by bands like Entombed and Dismembered.

I think it sounds incredibly good considering I bought it NEW for 25 bones plus shipping! The distortion is sometimes a bit over the top, but cleans up when you roll back the volume knobs on the guitar.

I imagine you could really get some interesting tones going if you paired this pedal with a compressor and eq both before and after it in the signal chain (and with Behringer that’s actually an affordable option), and of course, a tube amp, as most of the bands with that sound supposedly used Peavey 5150 tube heads.

Very nasty distortion pedal, if you could travel back in time to the 90’s you could probably sell this to a metal head for absolutely ridiculous amounts of money. If you are not buying this pedal for a certain “Swedish death metal” sound or just metal in general, I would not recommend this pedal, as there are probably much better pedals out there for what you need.

Its made out of plastic which I personally don’t mind, as I’m not a touring or gigging musician. If I stomped on it several times a night for half a year I dunno how that would work out. Not a big fan of the color, but then again, I didn’t buy this pedal for aesthetic value.

Behringer makes great stuff for less, I plan on buying a lot more Behringer pedals in the future!.

This pedal and the Megalith Delta are The 2 most hi gain pedals on the planet, period. I bought the heavy for the built in gate, which works perfectly, and the fact that these are more available in the USA, and have a 4 year warranty.

can’t say enough good things about this pedal, if you want high gain in a stomp, this is it,but keep in mind for this to sound optimal, you need to plug it into a decent amp, small weak amps will never be more than what they are.

I have used and compared it on Peavey 6505, Laney irt60 and orange micro terror. ,all tested with V30 cabs. In the 6505 it gives it a run for the money, just a tick less gain, a tick less articulate, but still spongy, and more adjustable.

The irt60 is where this is wicked. Sounds alot like my 6505 but TIGHT. makes the boost in the amp useable. exactly what I was hoping for with this one, as I am disappointed with the dirt channels on this amp.

And finally the orange 20 watt. It doesn’t have enough power for the empress to shine, better luck with this one gain half with a big muff, or clean with a joyo Uzi.

i wanted to compare this to my boss hm-2 pedal but i can’t get to it at this time, so i’ll have to do this by itself. this is a very nice distortion pedal. again the plastic casing is durable and inexpensive ,so you’re getting a good pedal for the money.

the level and distortion controls are sensitive- i consider a plus. i do wish there was more bass in the in the low frequency control. now you might be asking, “why don’t i cut back on the high frequency control?”.

here’s why : the high frequency control appears to be a combination high frequency/gain control! the more you turn it up, the more gain. combined with the sensitive dist/level controls this is a nice feature if you want that.

i like it. i can always boost the bass on the amp/EQ/whatever. i like to use different dimensions of distortions and if you are like me ,i recommend this.

This thing is unbelievably excellent. I’m down with serious chunk and couldn’t find a pedal anywhere that tickled my fancy of fatness of tones and clean as a whistle chugging. If you want metal, this will give you the sound you want, the thing has six knobs and they all do great differences in tone and distortion.

My mate is a full blown metaller gtar ist and scoffed at me buying this thing. He came round and I said that I wanted to hear him thru this pedal so he did after I dialed him in to my liking amd he blew himself away with me alongside him He now has one too!!!! Hahaha.

I had been looking for a good pedal to play along with early Metallica, Iron Maiden, Rage Against the Machine and Tool. I put it in my chain an it took literally two seconds to get a ‘perfect’ tone that retained its clarity and tightness even when I pushed the Drive to its peak.

The versatility and range of tone colors is insane and the quality of the distortion is miraculous. I also own the Behringer Heavy Metal HM300, the Swedish death metal pedal, and this one easily blows it out of the water, for the same price! You can get the same tones and beyond with the UM300, but with greater clarity and firmness.

This pedal feels like it comes with a compressor compared to the HM300. I was going to get the Behringer Heavy Distortion and the other variations of metal/distortion pedals but I think Ive found the holy grail, and its gonna keep me busy and satisfied for a long time.

Sounds amazing on its own, I haven’t stacked it yet and already I know for sure its a keeper and a mainstay along with the TO800 and the EQ700. Good job Behringer.

It is what it says on the tin – a mega distortion! It is, however, quite a versatile pedal and goes from crunchy to distortion to full-on Biffy Clyro (my primary influence for this!). Far better than some so-called ‘metal’ pedals that I’ve tried.

As is usual with Boss pedals, it’ll also survive the apocalypse, along with cockroaches and the Nokia 100, such is the solid build. I’ve used scan for computer builds, so it was a surprise that they popped up when looking for this pedal.

Ordered at 7:45pm and it arrived at 8:45 the next day, so it seems that they also employ Superman as part of their delivery team!.

I produce post punk, hardcore and PV by myself using this pedal, a guitar and I program drums via FL. So how does it sound? Perfect for what I need. I like how you can set it to classic distortion or in my case I crank everything to eleven and then turn my highs up on my amplifier to get that feedback screech I owe so love.

In comparison to some other pedals this one is my favorite for the time being and I see myself producing a few demos and an album with this guy. As for durability, I could drop this thing out a window and I doubt it would damage it.

The seller was very open in communication and the package did arrive a couple days early plus there was a tracking number so I could see when it would arrive. Just plugged a 9V in and got to work. I would reccomend unplugging the battery when you arent using the pedal to save power.

I’m not 100 percent but I think even on passive mode it uses some battery so either get a cord for it to power it, or simply buy a good quality 9v and simply unplug the battery itself if you dont plan on playing for a while.

Overall a great buy for the price and I love it. My favorite pedal I’ve ever owned; though there are most certainly better ones out there this guy is a lot of fun and has the old school heavy sound I was going for.

If you want a super clean distortion it can handle that with adjustments. If you want screeching static nonsense like I do, it can do that too! Would buy more from this seller again overall good exp.

For some reason this pedal gets a lot of criticism on YouTube. It’s completely undeserved. This works perfectly for that modern metal chug sound. But surprisingly works equally well as a Blues Overdrive.

Best of all is the price which is very reasonable considering the build quality. The pedal will probably outlast me!.

Don’t know what the other guy’s problem is. Maybe he just wanted a real particular heavy metal machine sound. Super Rock would be a better name for the pedal as the Ibanez Super Metal really nails classic rock tones!!! And it’s three band EQ ( punch =bass, edge =treble, and attack = mids) is very versatile.

It can get fuzzy to the lower end of the Ibanez mini fuzz or dialed down for some overdrive. I bought the whole Ibanez mini line as the basis for a miniboard of minis. They are all great!!!.

PEDAL CAME , PEDAL HAS BEEN USED SOME, As soon as you get close to a tone that has even a little meat to it the bass and mid controls turn everything to mudd. About noonish so its not like your pushing it.

The volume of the pedal doesn’t matter. Nothing does. If you like very thin trebley boost and care less about mids and bass , and want a cute little blue pedal, go for it. It started out ok when I plugged it in and I was like , hey this may turn out pretty cool.

Then I started to dial in my tone. And it took little to no tweaking to know it was *%#%**&*. Why they would take the pedal so far in way of being pretty decent , just to let what was probably an easy fix for Ibanez , ruin it totally is beyond me.

It is on its way back. Stay away.

This thing is mean. If you are into the super heavy, bassy, mid scooped sound, you’ll live this pedal. Tons of gain, yet still retains excellent note to note clarity. Internal switch to toggle between running it at 9v or 18v.

You definitely want to run it at 18v. Even at lowest gain settings it is still heavy. This is not a blues dad overdrive pedal. Great for swallowing up your bass players spot in the tonal spectrum.

I bought this pedal because I really wanted a nice tubescreamer with a lot of drive that would exceed expectations of other tubescreamers. This pedal did it. I put it on my pedal board with about 7 other pedals, I use it in frount of my distortion pedal which sits in frount of a compressor, an equallizer, and a ISP G String Decimator, all of which are turned and left on throughout the songs that I rehearse with my band.

It really beefed up my over all tone and made a lot of my heavy tremolo picking riffs more articulate. And as far as usage for distinct solo sounds, it’s wonderful. I love this pedal, i don’t see myself gettig rid of it any time soon.

I use it in my death metal band and use it for alot of death metal writing, but im sure this pedal would be great to add to anyones rig because of its versitility.

This overdrive is the best that Ive ever tried. I mostly play metal and this thing rips!! I was using an electric eye audio mud killer pedal before, but the ST9Pro+ blew it out of the water. The price may be hefty, but its damn worth it!.

1) works great to give a turned down amp life! 2) excellent refined distortion quality and some grit darker tone when using 2nd stage. 3) blend function is awesome 4) series function is very useful as well 5) durable 6) innovative 7) classic switching 8) affordable- worth every penny 9) Doesn’t muck up original amp tone and dynamic in bypass 10) bass boost switch is workable and usable.

11) while in distortion, easy to set to not take away from original tone, timber, sound, etc of your amp (tested and used with mosfet and tube amps). Note: if you are looking for a boost, or to hit alittle on the front in, or looking for some grit, or looking for sweet refined distortions then this may be what you are looking for.

I looked for years and years. I feel if I am going some where and they say they have an amp; I will just take this and guitar and be confident I’ll be in a creative and confident zone!.

I’m very picky on distortion pedals and just love the tone of this. It sounds great through my solid state VOX pathfinder amp. Very tube like. A nice crunch but not overly so. I’d prefer it to have channel switching but you can always buy two since they’re fairly inexpensive.

I prefer ‘series’ (one stage pushing the other) over ‘blend’ (you decide how much of each gain stage is added to your signal) but great tones can be achieved with either. Bass boost seems useless. Love the battery cover, the option to turn the knob lights off.

Not crazy about their choice of the main power light jewel color but that’s nit picking I suppose. Not for metal but can do just about anything else and great string separation on chords.

I’m a new guitarist just starting my guitar journey at 65, I have a Tele. and a Strat. I wanted a new pedal that was reliable and robust to add to my ever increasing pedal lineup. After seeing this pedal on the Andertons YT channel I decided to buy one.

The pedal is Chinese so I guess Fender cannot make these pedals in the States which is sad and just the way things are these days. Anyway, the pedal is well made and looks the part, the range of distortion it can produce through the two distortion engines is brilliant.

The battery door is spring loaded, which makes it easy to change dud batteries for new ones. I also like the led lit control knobs (which can be turned off if needs be), the main problem with the pedal is the jewel on/off lights are a little too bright, which makes it very difficult to see the main controls.

Overal, I’m glad I bought this pedal and have also purchased the Marine Layer Reverb pedal to go with it. From the Fender instruction booklet: “Thanks for purchasing the Pugilist Distortion, a flexible distortion pedal with a wealth of tones.

The Pugilist is somewhat unusual in that it features two separate distortion engines A&B that can be blended together or stacked in series for extreme gain. Each distortion engine can be adjusted with its own gain and tone settings, so that a cleaner tone can be blended with a much more distorted sound (the benefit being that the cleaner tone adds clarity and articulation to the overall sound).

Also, blending two high gain tones can increase richness and complexity compared to a single-only-distortion sound. The pugilist features simple wide-ranging tone controls that let it work well with a variety of amp types”.

Up to now everything seems to be as claimed for this pedal from Chinese Fender. Pete.

The compression from the pedal depends on which guitar you use, with higher output pickups compressing more. This hasn’t replaced my main compressor, but it’s a very useful boost/mild compressor and the sweep of the eq is very useful.

It’s kind of a leave it on all the time sort of pedal and it’s found a place on my chain, so it must be doing something I like!.

Despite its price and tiny footprint, this thing is the real deal. It should go down as a classic. I bought one of these on a whim a couple months back because I was looking for a cheap, small, high-gain pedal.

When I plugged it in, I was so impressed that I ordered three more. One of these is now on each of my boards. I’m getting great EVH-like tones (IMO, better than the MXR EVH 5150 Distortion pedal, which I also own) — “Eruption” might be a better name than “Rage Machine,” but regardless, this one is well worth the price.

This is a fantastic transparent compressor. I was looking for something to rein in the peaks, and this does it very smoothly with very little, if any, coloration. On low settings, it does the job invisibly.

If you turn it way up, you can still get that bluesy attack for leads. You can adjust the EQ for balance or effect. And its very quiet.

If using for direct recording highly suggested you use a cabinet emulator. I use the coral cab with it and got some great tones for recording. I’ve grown attached to using the mesa cab sim and the marshall with this.

They sound fantastic. The pedal is fun to play with but the controls can be sensitive. The delay is fun to play with and the chorus sounds fantastic. Not much use for the boost feature. Overall nice pedal and great if you use it with a cam sim and take the time to punch a sound in.

Amazing pedal! These are the four main “guitar hero” effects. Pros. Clean Boost. Crunchy Distortion! Shimmery Chorus ~ A perfect Delay! Included Power Supply!!! Cons. Honestly I can’t think of any. Get this pedal!!!.

I tried out the chorus first on a few settings, very nice! Then the same with the delay, great full range there, too! Then the gain control with noise gate for a variety of quiet lead work and crunching rhythm.

Then hit the boost and it was out of the ball park. I went through the effects loop of my Hot Tone Heart Attack into a 1×12 greenback closed back angle cab. I kept its gain low like the directions say and on hi gain it was much quieter than straight out amp gain.

My HSH neck thru was quieter than my L-5 style big hollow body, although I had fun with moving around with the feedback. This unit is really nice sounding and easy to use, with those added features that make all the difference!.

This is a great pedal. It is one of those pedals that you keep on in most cases. It does not kill your tone but at the same time it enhances your sound. One useful application is when you are trying to play quietly at night.

You can turn down the amp volume and turn on the Pressurizer. You do not totally lose the experience. I really like the ability to tweak the compressor characteristics. I would definitely recommend this for anyone who is thinking about it.

I decided to grab this because I have the Amptweaker Tight Metal Jr (for bass), and it serves up incredible tone. As it turns out, that’s just what they do at Amptweaker. incredible tone! Had this for a few weeks now, and love how widely you can vary the way the distortion is represented across the frequency spectrum.

Need more or less lows- no problem. need more or less mids/high-mids- no problem. She’s got something for every track!.

This is one of the best distortion pedals Ive ever tried in almost 25 years of playing. It can go from very smooth overdrive/distortion sound to extremely tight high gain metal distortion. Its got an internal boost so, theres no need to use an additional overdrive pedal to boost it.

Extremely versatile pedal!! Highly recommended!!.

First off I dropped pedals a long time ago. They were simply too noisy and, with regard to distortion, too fuzzy or buzzy. I did once own an Ibanez SM-9 that I’d consider an exception and that I’d wished I had kept.

All that aside I just didn’t like mucking up the chain with battery hungry devices anymore especially considering that software and modeling technology can do all of that and more. I was using PODS up until recently and decided to ditch those for plugins exclusively because I was able to get pretty good tones from them but I noticed that I needed a boost.

That’s where this pedal came in. I probably tried one at some time or another but never actually had one. I love this pedal! Not only am I getting the boost I need but I see they have improved the signal to noise ratio.

It also seems to get a lot more usage per battery than the old pedals of back in the day. I am very pleased with the output of this pedal, I can get my tone through and not have it lost in the gain. Also very simple settings, Tone, Level, Distortion.

Nothing that will take a long time to dial in. Very happy with this little pedal!.

This is the amazing Boss DS-1 distortion pedal, loved by all who use it. Amazing value at just £55. I won’t bore you with stories about how robust it is, because we all know Boss equipment lasts forever.

It looks and feels great, but most importantly, sounds incredible. I play punk rock, and with my Gibson SG Special, plugged into my Marshall JCM 900 this delivers exactly the sound I want. I loved that in the manual it gives example sound setting, one of which was British Punk.

That just made me smile. I knew instantly it was right up my street. Oh, and if you’re into electronics, this thing is made of pin-through-hole components, so it leaves it open for a good bit of modding.

There are plenty of guides for that online. Sitting in my Boss BCB-30 pedal board this never fails to make me smile.

I have a 60w Fender Deville amp. Lovely clean sounds straight from the amp but couldn’t really use the overdrive channel without the volume getting to an inconsiderate level at home. This pedal has addressed that issue really well.

This pedal now provides me really raunchy distortion while providing a greater control for volume. The pedal also provides a nice boost in changing between a clean channel directly from the amp and then through the pedal.

Very pleased with this investment, particularly for the price. Very easy to use.

Man joyo are bringing out some top quality gear, this baby goes from a bluesy gain or boost to an ear shattering metal experience. I love it Thanks artist

It’s almost perfect but on full it starts to crack. A copy of metal muff but sounds harsher which i like. Black metal approved product.

Great sound and only 30 squid even if ure not sure its worth a punt for that price classic metal sound doubled up with amp distortion get those classic metal licks down on tape or on stage or just practicing in ure bedroom solid and rugged runs off battery or mains has loads of twiddly knobs to keep u busy and texture the fuzzy noise love it bin looking and buying pedals for years in search of that sqealey heavy metal sound and this pedal has it!!!!!!!!.

This recreation of a iconic pedal is amazing. They have captured the original hm2 perfectly but with modern clarity and custom settings. It’s getting increasingly harder to obtain a original in great condition and with reliability.

I highly recommend this pedal it’s a great addition to anybody’s board. I use this pedal to nail the David Gilmour tone to boost a fuzz but is highly versatile. I give this pedal 5 stars.

This company was one of the few that actually had them in stock, no cheaper or more expensive than a lot of other companies. Brand new, complete with box and full instructions (and a battery!) and works perfectly.

Gives me exactly the sound I was needing, almost straight out of the box – very little tweaking required. Perfect.

As guitar players, we find ourselves constantly buying accessories. Some of them are simply switches that add ease and functionality. For example: I needed a two-button foot switch to control a looper pedal.

After shopping for the best price, I found that I could build a unit for 1/3 the price and a couple hours of time. This enclosure was the perfect size for the foot switch. There were some manufacturing defects that were very minor which is why I gave it a 4 star, but the price easily made up for it.

The fit and finish is decent although i needed to sand the minor imperfections since I wanted to paint it for a professional look.

Simply brushed aluminum body. Designed for the final primer and painting. I use the cases of this seller for several years, everything is fine. If desired, the body can be sanded and polished. It will not be perfect, but satisfactory.

The walls are thicker than those of Gainta.

The sound is what I was looking for. Great on the high end for lead parts. Chords are a little deep, still sounds great. The gate for only works when it’s turned up all the way. If I turn it down it kills everything.

I don’t use the gate anyway so no big deal for me. I use the Boss noise suppressor which is awesome.