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Welcome to Adobe GoLive 6
ZVEX: Supper-Duper 2-in-1
Gentlemen/women, start your engines. This pedal is so dangerous that I'm sure I'll be getting a lot of complaint emails that people have blown up their amps using it. So let's just start this off by saying I WARNED YOU TO BE CAREFUL. When using this pedal, start off slow, and monitor your amp for potential damage. Don't have too much fun! OK, have too much fun, but don't blow up your amp in the process. Unless that's what you want, of course, and well, gosh darn it, it's your right. Good ol' Pete Townsend did it. Well, at least he poked his speakers out. All right, I'll try to stay on track here.
Ahem. The SUPER-DUPER 2-IN-1 (TM) has two of my infamous but rather delightful Super Hard-On(TM) pedals in one small box, with two switches and LED indicators. HEY! I responded to your multitude of complaints that I don't put in LED's! Gosh, what's next? Power supply jacks? (As a matter of fact, coming in ROctober '01...) Also, in this SUPER-DUPER 2-IN-1 (TM) (gosh I love saying that) is a Master volume control that lets you use it as an overdrive/distortion with any output volume. My my! How conventional, you say! Well, suffice to say, if it weren't there, you'd go deaf with both of those channels cranked up. This pedal is dangerously loud. Don't do what I did, and lean over in front of your speaker cabinet while turning it up. Ouch. Dang.
What Does This Pedal Sound Like?
You might wonder just how insane this pedal sounds when you crank up both channels and turn them both on. Well, I'll tell you. I can't get my Les Paul to stop feeding back at any audible volume level on my Marshall when both channels are wide open, and that's with the amp set at 1. I'm happy about that. Of course, this is not the only setting on the pedal. I don't think there's a musician around who wouldn't be happy to have multiple clean boost pedals set to predictable levels available on stage. This pedal gives you a total of four volume levels, ranging, at your choice, anywhere from perfectly clean to ragingly overdriven. Level 1, your guitar is true-bypassed with both channels off. Level 2, you turn on Channel 1. Level 3, you turn off Channel 1 and turn on Channel 2. This is easy because you can put your foot on both switches at once and alternate between the two channels if you want. Level 4, you turn on both channels.
There is no tone shaping in this pedal. It's two perfectly linear high-gain high input-impedance preamps that can be cascaded, with a total gain that ranges from unity to 3600. That's right, the maximum gain with both channels wide open is a whopping 3600, which is so completely distorted, hissy, feedbacky, and insane, that you'll never ever have a steady relationship again. Or a lease. Or a pet. Luckily, with the Master Volume, you can listen to what it would sound like to lose everything you love at a reasonable volume. Naturally, because there is no tone-shaping, your guitar just sounds like a really loud version of your guitar, and your amp sounds like a really big version of your amp, and if your normal tone is somewhat bloated, it will get very very bloated when you use this pedal set to high gains. It does best if you are close to getting the tone you want out of your gear already, but just need a boost to make it go over the top. Keep in mind that you can set up the two channels to give you any amount of gain, from a soft bluesy boost in two stages to a crunchy rock level, to a wild sustaining beast.
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