solid Distortion, not a Muff, not a Rat..it’s not fuzzy, it’s more of a high gain, modern distortion. It does that string separation thing, where you can go higher gain without it sounding like a one big,muddy chunk. You can distinguish the notes in your chords when you crank the gain.
I’m more of a classic rock, bluesy influenced guitarist, and I can identify this as more of a high gain pedal that will access more modern tones like Petrucci, Abasi.. etc ..but the real magic happened when u ride the Volume control, and eased off the level on my guitar..
I was able to access this great zone, where the pedal just felt like a wall of cranked Marshall stacks.. like a good, arena rock sound.. Ozzy, Def Leppard, Tesla..heavy 80’s and 90’s rock, like a hotrodded Marshall.
Similar to the Soldano sound or whatever you choose to call it.
My point is, play w your guitar volume, ease it back a bit, crank it for screaming leads..then ease it back again.
This pedal is great to keep in your gigbag in case the club backline isnt giving you good quality drive… it’ll access overdrive and distortion tones for most rock genres, not just metal. It isn't a chain saw in a pedal..it’s actually a very elegantly designed distortion. It sounds massive, and most of the points around the EQ curve are all useable and sound heavy AH.
Very impressed.. for the price, it’s very good. It did have a little hiss near the highest gain settings, which is inevitable unless you have a noise gate.. but I’d never feel a need to crank it that high.. it had a lot more headroom for single coil guitars, but for my LP, i felt no need to crank it passed 3/4 gain..
The Pantera marketing thing aside. This is just a good drive pedal. It would be great for anyone into shredding, it does that violin-like sustain thing. Good all around pedal from medium gain to high gain, and the EQ is very strong, you can access all kinds of scooped tones and the opposite too. those badass mid heavy tones. Obviously, don’t crank the bass control super high if you’re playing guitar, unless you’re playing extended range or something, That’s all super obvious stuff though.
Another great pedal. Versatile too. I didn’t expect this pedal to be so useful, but it’s great when I want a massive sound..and it still feels as heavy as the Matribox Pro 2’s heavier patches.
It is slightly nicer looking than their other mini pedals,which are basically solid black or white
..although I’d love to see Sonicake doing some cool graphics…w more focus on the artwork,
cuter looking pedals always sell, many younger people like their pedalboards to look colorful & trendy. (a tip from a HUGE sonicake fan)
but we can’t have everything and also keep it super affordable, so I’d rather have the good sound and quality, and skip the trendy artwork