crusherdestroyer's Reviews

A classic

I love this pedal, by my only gripe is it sounds fizzy at low volumes.

Loud and unruly -- exactly what you want in a fuzz pedal

I bought this pedal to put in front of my Rockerverb for playing stoner/doom/sludge. The fuzz knob changes the tone from an overdrive (at 8 o'clock) to distortion (noon) to all out unruly fuzz (dimed). The tone knob has a HUGE sweep, and is capable of producing a ton of different EQ settings.

The Fuzz War sound best with the pedal volume pretty high, so this isn't a great pedal if you like to play at home with other people around. The volume also plays a big role in the tone, so dialing this pedal in takes a little bit or work, but if you like big, sludgy fuzz, this pedal is perfect. It does everything I wish my Big Muff did.

Preferred Settings + Usage:

Amazing modern metal tone

I bought this pedal to add another dimension to my Rockerverb MkIII, and to be honest, with that amp it fell flat. The tones just weren't compatible. Before giving up I tried it with my JCM800 2204, and it was the complete opposite -- the G4 really thickened up the Marshall's overdrive, giving it (to my ears anyway) absolutely perfect modern metal tone.

Great when paired with a JCM800

I bought this pedal to boost the dirty channel of my Marshall JCM800 2204, and it did exactly what I hoped it would: boost the gain without changing the tone characteristics of the amp. I'm not a fan of Zakk Wylde's music, but I'm a huge fan of this pedal.

A cool, though slightly dated, guitar

These guitars were only made for a short time in the early 90's, just in time for grunge to take over popular music and make shred guitars -- and Ibanez, by extension -- extremely undesirable to most new guitarists at the time. (Until nu-metal made 7 string guitars popular, at least.)

I bought my 442R in 1994, and while a lot of my attachment to it is sentimental, it plays amazingly well, especially when you consider its price point. It has a small, contoured body, almost identical to the Joe Satriani signature models that came out the same year, and features a HSS pickup configuration. The stock pickups sound good enough, though I swapped my bridge pickup out for a Dimarzio Super Distortion and it really brought the guitar to life. It has an alder body, a maple neck, and locking tuners, and is a great guitar for its price.

Amazing amp, but not a good fit for players who want a high gain sound out of the box

I've had my 2204 for over a decade now, and while I'll always loved its tone, it's a relationship that takes a little bit of work. Putting aside the fact that it's a single channel amp without reverb, the problem with this amp is what most people think of as the classic JCM800 sound is usually a boosted JCM800 played at 10; to get this amp to sound good at a reasonable volume you almost certainly need some sort of boost, a noise gate, and an attenuator.

That said, if you do have this amped dimed (or boosted), its tone is pretty much unparalleled.

Amazing return to peak Gibson quality

After spending close to a year researching and playing Les Paul Standards in different configurations from various eras, in the end a modern (2021) Les Paul Standard ended up being the best sounding and playing I found. I couldn't be happier with this guitar!