@@doofwopit’s clear he doesn’t care about the fit of his shirt. Or anything about how he looks. Clearly. By the way, how’s that ratio hitting you two butt buddies?
My 2 worst pedals are both Behringer. First is a bass D I that makes its own noise. 2nd is a Vintage Tube O D. Didn't like the sound so I Bitmo modded it. 1st pedal I ever did my own modding to. Still don't like the sound. Changed the tube to a 12au7. It's not horrible but not for me. Maybe it's cause I got 2 Butler Tube drivers. Both with bias knobs. Kinda spoiled by great sounds. Still own both and if these are the worst then I can live with some junk. Gotta have some filler for my own JHS pedal wall. L O L
You were right about everything except the Fuzz Factory. To me that’s one of the greatest fuzzes out there. All the harmonic feedback with the pedal is what turns me on the most to it. Most people hated the original Whammy pedal until Tom Morello showed everyone how to use it. I believe the same is true with the fuzz factory
I got to get a Metal Muff! I definitely want that “thousand bees trapped in a tin can” sound!!! A plus is that the audience will scratch their own eyes out!?!?! Freakin how metal is that! 🤘🏻
Black metal. I said that with a thick Scandinavian accent. While sipping wine in a dark room, lol. Seen LORDS OF CHAOS? check it out. Those wacko's actually want and try to sound like crap, spooky.
TheHunterTeen we know that. Would just have been good to hear him demo them, to show _his_ reasons. Some people WILL like these pedals. That's how it is. People don't like stuff that other people do
Well this is a completely subjective matter. Golden cello for example is meant for playing those lead lines in the style of Eric Johnson etc. so no wonder if it gets muddy with chords. IMO its wonderful sounding pedal with the right setup. A really cool mix of fuzz and distorion. And so is the fuzz factory, one of the most versatile, crazy and innovative fuzz pedals of all time WITH the right setup. It is a very hard pedal to use indeed. But as you mentioned not being fan of fuzzes I get why you're not liking these pedals.
Woah... I love my metal muff... I don't ever bring the top boost over 9 o clock. It does sound like ass over that 9 o clock point I will agree. It has an active EQ which gives you a lot of tweakability. It was my first real distortion pedal and I still have it. Putting a tube screamer in front of it also helps. It won't be replacing my 6505+ or 3120 anytime soon. But it was a bargan at 50$ to get my metal on. I still have ancient vids of me on my channel getting decent tones out of it. I heard it was based off the metal zone (I could be wrong) which is another pedal that gets a lot of beatings online. I would also argue that the MXR fullbore metal is far worse than the metal muff. Give one of those a shot if you want a good laugh. Love the vid btw. Hope I don't come across as a bitchy internet troll.
@@CC-8891 www.backtrails.net/next/index.php/s/dQ4GDpBfpgMFXF6 that is my Metal muff when I first got it. I have it's tuned in a little bit now. It's running through a fender frontman 212r the mic is a Shure sm57
I'm proud owner of one of the original Fuzz Factory pedals. I believe this pedal is intended to be a quirky character pedal, not for every situation. It sounds the way it sounds by design, that doesn't make it *bad*. Lame that it's on this list.
I expect if you asked Zackary, he'd say it was never intended to be practical. I know I didn't buy mine for any sort of "go-to" use. I bought it as a wacko sound to have in the studio.
@@mvyper The Metal Muff is a great pedal but I believe it is way too muddy and fuzzy for people who play metal. If you choose to release a high pedal for metal, it should not be fuzzy at all. I believe one would expect a metal pedal to sound like a MI Audo Megalith, Empress Heavy, Wampler Triple Wreck, Amptweaker Tight Metal... Even the new Boss Metal Zone Wazza. But it is a good pedal for sure !
@@MCHiphopotamus well, if you dial it just a lil crunchy and boost it with a ts, it can sound a lot better. You don't need to get all your distortion from it.
Haha @ the Metal Muff! I love that pedal but yes it can sound absolutely garbage with the wrong amp/guitar combo. I bought one last year for nostalgia effect and it sounds absolutely horrendous through my Marshall Valvestate but it was amazing through my hybrid-Randall. Any fuzz pedal is garbage to me as it the Boss DS-1 is garbage but that's my personal opinion (doesn't mean they are garbage). Entertaining video cheers :D
YOU MEAN A COMPANY CALLED DIGITECH AND CLAPTON DON'T MIX? HAHAHA, THAT'S LIKE TRYING TO NAIL ERIC JOHNSON'S TONE OR DAVID GILMORE'S TONE WITH A LINE6 SPIDER PRACTICE AMP.
I actually LOVE and USE the Digitech Crossroads Clapton pedal. The trick, to me, is that I use the (mixer) out instead of the amp out (while plugged into an amp, not a mixer). I tend to use the Sunshine of Your Love Tone and am able to get a nice approximation via my Claptonized strats (partscasters with the EC midboost kit). It is definitely something you need to spend time tweaking and arranging on your board. But, I have been able, to my ears, to get a nice tone and much use out of it. I've found some on Guitar Center's website and considered getting another one so I can use it in tandem and use it for the Badge (rotary speaker) sound while keeping my other one set on the Sunshine of Your Love mode. I will admit, you probably need to be a Clapton diehard to find this pedal useful. To each their own I guess!
But I will mention two pedals that I loathe and won't EVER buy/buy again. 1.) Digitech Metal Factory. They had a used one at a Guitar Center I frequent. It sounded like shit and, despite endless hassling by the sales guy, I couldn't find any reason to buy this. I found ONE decent/okay tone but when I kept tweaking it, I lost that one good setting. The guy kept trying to get me to buy it, but he ended up pissing me off more than anything, and I was ready to chuck at him after 10 minutes! 2.) Ibanez TS9DX. I bought this after seeing my Guitar Teacher use one. I even found some not so bad tones, but once I put it in my pedalboard/set up, I found those tones that were pleasing became muddy and "fluffy" in the pedalboard mix. I spent hours trying to find a better place for it and ended up selling it, ironically, to my guitar teacher (after he sold his). I have since bought the 40th Anniversary TS808 (the sparkly red one) and love it! I use it with my Les Paul, which sounds great!
Daniel Stephenson that Digi Clapton is used in studio by arguably some of the best players in the world. I have pictures to prove it. " of them use in a rig. $ ain't the problem for them, soooo i have no clue why people spit on hat pedal. IMHO someone say something on forums or YT and other repeat it aka don't give a chance to pedal at all.
Funnily enough, the sound at the start of Plug in Baby by Muse are Matt just fucking with the ‘Stab’ feature lol. He used it all throughout Origin of Symmetry and later albums and it sounds pretty good to me. I think his guitar has the pedal built into it, along with a phase 90.
99.9% of the time it's the guitarist and not the pedal. I spent years with bad tone. Even with acoustic guitars that sounded horrible. Then I sat down and started studying effects. Trouble shooting, Night after night video after video. I can get the amp sounding great but now recording it is another hurdle. My worst pedal .. boss metal zone maybe one sweet spot for guitar. Made any tube amp sound like solid state hell. Probably because the volume gain on it was so loud you could probably hear it with a pair of headphones connected to it.
Have to disagree with you on the Metal Muff. I love mine. I’ve had to fiddle with the settings, changing a little with what guitar I’m using (usually Fenders). I’ve learned you have to dial it back, particularly the boost setting, but it has worked for me. Again, it’s generally working with a Fender Mustang or Tele and to a crappy amp. I’ll say this- when I’ve run it into a Marshall, I needed to adjust the amp settings, and the pedal settings, which is a pain but doable. I think it can hang with my classic Big Muff, and is much better than other distortion pedals I’ve had (the DOD Grunge, BOSS Metal Zone).
Metal zone sucks and is nothing but a noise box compared to the metal muff.nothing but unwanted feedback and in th recording studio it gets lost in the mix to where u can't hear anything of the technicality of th guitars...very shitty..a modded metal zone I agree with but not the stock metal zone.
The Metal Zone is a better pedal than people think. There’s the camp that loves it in the effects loop, but I use it on my regular board, and can get some decent sounds out of it, especially stacked with an OD or a Muff. Right now I have it set to where the distortion dial is almost all the way down. I pair it with my TC Tube Pilot (a poor man’s Tube Driver, with no EQ), and I get a tone that’s similar to the one found on the middle solo of “Money” live from the “PULSE” album. Speaking of that album, using the same settings, paired with my old Sovtek Big Muff, and I get that awesome guitar tone you hear on “Sorrow”. It just takes quite a bit of patience to dial that thing in, and it’s one of those pedals that, depending on your amp, your guitar and pickups, might not ever work well. I’ve found that with some other really good pedals- even the Big Muff and Boss DS-1 sometimes just go better with some amps better than others.
Owned a ShimVerb briefly. Played one gig where the sound-guy was having a helluva time finding a strange hum coming out of the FOH - Kind of like feedback but under the mix. The next gig I played a musician friend came up and told me that there was a weird hum that was coming out of my rig. Did some troubleshooting. Yep ShimVerb. Garbage pedal.
Digitech forgot too say that the Eric Clapton that this pedal was paying homage to was actually Mr Eric Clapton from Surrey, England, a painter and decorator !!!
Maybe it’s because you could of called your shop anything and went with Roberts guitar Dungeon (what the hell were you thinking) or Maybe it’s because the guys who’ve commented like a product which some people can get screaming and you kind of shit on it by calling it one of the worst pedals ever but hey I’m not an expert.
I hav the Z-Vex Fuzz factory and with the right settings it delivers very usable sounds. However some of the knobs are extremely sensitive and a one or two degree durn on one of those gets the pedal completely out of control. So you can get really cool fuzz sounds and some very experimental weird shit.
Sämi Moor it does a pretty good approximation of a Fuzz Face if you know what you're doing. This guy gives away his bias when he admits he doesn't like fuzz pedals to begin with.
Personally I think that EHX Metal Muff has a good sound in terms of rhythm, but the high frequencies used in the "boost" sound bad in the solos. I understand that you do not like it, it is difficult to find the correct configuration on that pedal (with so much configuration knob). I have never used the Whamy IV.
The worst I've had was Metal Zone. Absolute garbage. Almost as bad is Marshall Jackhammer in distortion mode. O/D mode is still somewhat usable but not worth the time spent adjusting it.
Try running the Metal Zone into the Return jack of the effect loop instead of through the front, like I did in this video. You’ll be shocked. Ola Englund just did a video on the same topic and he was shocked, as well. ua-cam.com/video/C7m0DNsvQxI/v-deo.html
I agree most of it, but the Golden Cello. That pedal was not made to play chords. It is made to play solos, where a cello sound wanted. It does it so amazingly man! I have about 30 pedals, including some high end ones, but the Golden Cello is among the first 3 favourite overdrive pedals!
I personally have to disagree with the Metal Muff on the list. Although the fuzz element in its tone may not appeal to everyone, but the gain and the EQ overall is nicely controllable. It has a nice amount of mids. I must albeit admit that the top boost is voer-sensitive, and definitely not the best boost for solos, but I find it good fora dding upper mids if dialed in correctly in moderation.
I owned one for about three years when they first came out. I tried it in every amp that I owned during that time period and tried every setting that I could think of, and it was completely unusable. Finally I gave up and sold it.
You had me laughing for almost the whole video. It was priceless. Some of your dead-pan looks still have me laughing as I type. Special thanks for this one.
What a friendly comment section. Funny thing about Danelectro... I had a FabTone distortion pedal. Ordered it before I heard it. Since it was called a FabTone, and had tail fins, I thought it would be a nice vintage OD kind of pedal. It was like a freight train of gain stages. Only usable for the heaviest tones, but actually pretty good in that regard. Always thought it might have caught on if they called it something heavy metal. Like Black Licorice LMAO...
Just want to clarify something since you were quick on the comment and it may confuse newer Pedal heads, True Bypass isn't necessarily a good thing -it depends on the type of effect, where it sits in the signal chain and the over all pedal chain sequence of the artist and where quality buffers are located in the chain -and avoiding noisy and tone sucking buffers or using switching to keep them out of the normalized chain. A pedal board of all true bypass pedals will be have a host of tone thieves to contend with -you don't want all true bypass pedals in most scenarios -so it's not really an argument of this pedals good because it has true bypass or not -it's case by case
The Krank distortus maximus. God I hate this thing. Got it new when I was a teenager. Plugged it in and all was well, really cool groove/black/death metal kinda sound....then I palm mutated and oh my god, I can't describe the noise it made. Was kinda like a bird being squashed by a super computer. That's the best I can come up with. I got another one, thinking the first was broken and it did the exact same thing. Awful pedal and it cost like £170 ($200ish) too.
So glad the Digitech fixed the whammy pedal in latest version. I love my Digitech DT Whammy gen 5 pedal and with true bypass zero lag and sounds amazing!
Robert's Guitar Dungeon Digitech’s new stuff is pretty nice, in my opinion. Great performance to value. I own the Polara reverb and the Cab DryVR and both do what they do very well and the pedals themselves feel like quality pieces of gear. The silent switches are awesome too. I also plan on getting the Obscura delay in the near future. For what it’s worth, the Cab DryVR tames the headphone out of an Orange Micro Terror very well, turning it into a DI recording beast!
If you're someone that isn't into gated fuzz and oddball fuzzes, i can see not liking Fuzz Factory. I'm not a huge fuzz fan. I use a fuzz face, but i use that more of less to get that Eric Johnson glassy, sparkling clean by keeping the FF on and rolling my guitar volume back to clean it up.* I use an old triangle muff too, but i use that exclusively with an EQ or TS808 into the front of it as a lead tone for my Strat. It sounds nothing like a Big Muff (or any fuzz for that matter) the way i use it. I'm not into the sputtering and spitting fuzz thing, but a lot of people do. *I can't use the Fuzz Face this way since i dropped a set of Fishman Fluence single coil into my Strat. If you use a buffered signal into a fuzz face and roll the guitar volume back, it cleans up more gradually like an amp or OD pedal. Id wager the majority of players would prefer that, I'm just not one of them.
That Danelectro black coffee was only awesome because I was 16 and only had 14.75 and this pedal was 13.99 It did the job on a shitty Randall solid state practice amp But once I tried plugging it into a big amp. Goodnight
Arion Metal Master was so bad I gave it to a friend decades ago. But I now realise many distortion pedals are better off in a low gain setting of the gain channel, rather than the clean channel. Never tried the former option. It was tinny and bright I recall.
LOLL- At some point below nearly ever pedal you named is claimed by someone' as their favorite- unreal how subjective this stuff is. That's why I learned a long time ago- never say an effect is "unusable"- it's just unusable to you, it's not your thing. The reason I say that is that I had many of the effects used throughout the 80s and 90s before the artists that used them did so- and I remember thinking "How silly, no one can use that..." then hearing guys like Vai, Satriani, and Tom Merello do just that and make them sound amazing. It really caught me and made me realize how different everyone was when it came to making music, how a sound or tone that was completely useless to me could be exactly what someone else is looking for or- could inspire someone who doesn't know they're looking for it until they hear it to write a whole song or album. Not only that-0 the gear you use to play it makes a massive difference. I own several different amps- I have pedals that sound amazing on one amp- and horrible on the next. Same for guitars- I have pedals that work great with single coils and some that only work good with higher output humbuckers. And now- ppl have even more options because we have all these "amp in a box" style pedals and audio interfaces with plugins and all that stuff- I'm sure pedals sound really different when used in this context as well.
6/7 I agree with, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with the ZVex Fuzz Factory- you just have to know what you're doing with it. It's INCREDIBLY sensitive, so even the slightest tweak can completely alter your sound. Just takes some practice- you can get some very good sounds out of it.
I agree on all but the Golden Cello . I’ve used it for lead tone many times It was basically built for that use . You really have to dial both effects back to get a good rhythm tone .
Worst pedal I ever had is that Digitech Distortion Pedal in the background (the dual switch yellow piece of sheet). i.imgur.com/ym68Mp7.png PDS1550 or POS1550 as I called it. Horrible quality control from the bad old days of Digitech. img.audiofanzine.com/images/u/product/normal/digitech-pds-1550-double-distortion-26478.jpg
"right out of the box, it's a noisy, gnarly beast." I know. I still love mine too. FX69 4 life. Edit to add: I was hoping to hear the "American Metal" dod pedal. EVERYONE I know who played hard thrash ditched the AM for the Grunge. NOBODY turns up the grunge all the way and lives...
I think the title should go to any of the Carlsbro minifex series. Cheap plastic casing, appalling controls with no range. The dial pulled when using them, not proper knobs. Doubt you could even find a working one now.
Worst pedal I ever bought? Wow... probably the DOD FX80 compressor back in the 80s. PS, I still have it -- yet I sold my old Electric Mistress? What a maroon.
Thanks! I can’t speak for everybody else on UA-cam, but I enjoy doing “Best of” videos because they’re fun and easy to do, and people do enjoy watching them, so it makes it easier for viewers to want to engage with me as a creator. I did this video partially because I thought it would be kind of funny, and partially because like you said there’s not too many videos like this one out there. And I believe in just shooting straight from time to time. Thanks again for the kind words!
EHX Next Step Wah volume pedals? Not the actual sound, but the design? My local store has DOZENs of them now in the second hand bin. A pedal with no moving parts? Well, all cables moves up and down very quickly. You can't set anything to half cocked wah, or leave the volume pedal in the middle position, and you can't have them on any pedalboard. An optional cradle was made later to have it on the pedalboard taking up huge space. If there ever was a "desert island pedal" or a flood or volcano eruption this would be the first pedal I deliberately left behind, if I ever owned one. Totally moot idea, and everyone I know of that bought it, initially thought it was brilliant, until it slowly dawned on them. And the sound? regular wah, nothing less nothing more... If they should have SOME merit to it, it was a sensor that felt whenever your foot was on it and turned it on. Foot sensor, if you leave your foot from it its bypassed. If it costs 10 bucks it would be no big deal, but it doesn't. AFAIK Accelerometers DO WEAR over time, albeit at much slower pace than any mechanical moving parts as that of a regular wah. Magnetic/Opto wears as much as accelerometer, and they can fit pedalboards and has as many moving parts too (none), and you don't move any cables while operating it. What have EHX guys been smoking? Novelty pedal, just because you can, you shouldn't...
I've played or owned some bad pedals. EHX QTron, XO Polychorus, Clone Theory and Cockfight are pretty awful. Boss Xtortion....In general I really don't like the sound of digital pedals as well. Was the Fuzz Factory in a warm room for a long time when you tried it? Germanium transistors sound like a wet fart if they get too warm. It's just the nature of the beast if you want that really good sound. Then again, my main drive pedals are modern versions of the Univox Super-Fuzz and Foxx Tone Machine, so maybe I just like really dirty 60's fuzz and octave fuzz.
A couple points. I know this list is subjective, because there are some popular pedals that I don't think sound very good also, but the metal muff sounds good when you turn the top boost under 9 o clock. For the fuzz factory, you have to turn the stab all of the way up and use the gate and compressor to get rid of those squeals. It's a difficult pedal to figure out how to use, but once you spend some good amount of time with it I think you'll find that it can get some of the best fuzz tones...however, it does kind of stink that if you turn a knob a little bit off of where you want it, it can mess up your whole sound.
SA2BRK1993 couldn't agree more about the fuzz factory. It's kind of easy to get rid of the squeals, though, so I'm not sure why he couldn't. Definitely not a user friendly pedal, but once you find your tone it's just about the best fuzz on the market.
Couldn’t disagree more re the fuzz factory and the whammy 4. It’s all about subjectivity, context and creativity when it comes to coaxing sounds with pedals. Especially with glitchy weird effects. One man’s shit is another man’s gold etc...
Also mooers pitch algorithms just suck the pitch box wasnt just bad but wasn't in tune who wants a 7th up if it sounds like you have a string out of tune.
DoD death metal, man in my times I put it behind a zoom 505 , so the chorus and slight delay softened the distortion and that sounded reasonable. Otherwise it sucked.
I use shimverb for a years, i realize the only problem is the excessiveness of the wet signal, especially in spring mode. Just use it Dry in level at 9'o clock And all the problem much perish.
Great list! I have one to add. The DOD Gonkulator ring modulator. This fucking thing is *WORTHLESS* There was one at Sam Ash used for like $20. I was like "what the hell, for that cheap you can't go wrong" I am not even sure what it is supposed to do, let alone what it does. It makes weird sci-fi noises and that is it. It is the least musical pedal ever. I took it back and they told me to keep it. It had been sold and returned 11 times! They gave me my $20 back and gave it to me. I then walked over and put it in their trashcan. Worthless
And only one carrier wave set to e or a..Update..so unpopular that they became rare..then sought after..300$ on ebay..so they have reissued it with one more knob.300$ in the bin.
I have to say all those mooer reverbs kinda suck really bad like it sounds like the signal is being rained on by dirty pennies I wanted to add a question if anyone else ever notice how some cheap pedals might be alright but there's this like aluminum or plastic coating to the signal I know tha mKes no sense but idk how else to say it its like the signal gets wrapped in aluminum foil. For example I actually liked the caline pure sky like how it reacts dynamically n how it breaks up but floating over all that is this extra undesirable layer that I only notice with cheaper Chinese pedals
Well, to be fair, neither one of them are exactly going down in the Pedal Hall of Fame. But the Metal Zone has at least proven useful as a preamp. (I did a video on that awhile back. Here it is if you haven’t seen it. ua-cam.com/video/C7m0DNsvQxI/v-deo.html) The Metal Muff isn’t even good for that. I owned a Metal Muff for several years when they first came out, and I tried it in every amp I owned on every setting I could think of. Never could get a good tone out of it.
The Danelectro black licorice is not a great pedal, however, I picked one up yesterday for $20 just for fun. If I could disconnect the distortion, it would be a cheap and unadjustable Poly Octave Generator.
I know many will disagree.... but MXR Carbon Copy drives me nuts. As soon as someone kicks it in, I cringe. It has a distinctive voice or timbre no other delay has. I don't even have to look at the pedalboard to know it is being used. To me, voices are everything... why I can stand many singers in spite of their popularity and legendary status, I can't stand Dylan, Van Morrison, Springsteen... and a few others. A local player who I highly admire recommended the Carbon Copy... he had just ordered it and was excitedly awaiting it's arrival. Since I admire this guy so, I ordered one too... I did 3 gigs with it, and kicked it off shortly after kicking it on... I thought my settings were way off.. I got back to the studio, and messed with it... nothing I did changed or eliminated that awful timbre. One problem I had right away, it was way too deep even with the setting merely cracked. In perusing vids of celebrity's gear, I saw that Jeff Beck had one. When I saw the knob positions, all were at bare minimum... When I saw my buddy, he was loving his. But every time he used it, I'd throw up in my mouth... yes, to me, it's that bad... I just found a very cheap, off brand mini delay for less than $30... amazing... I went to the nearby country, mom n pop music store, chock full of crappy guitars, traded the pedal for a harmonica case, a generic strap, and $50... I felt I made out. Good riddance.
I can honestly say I had a pedal addiction especially overdrives worse than any woman has with shoes. From the 70s till a few years ago I accumulated 250 or so. The thing is HALF sound the same. Also you have a tone in your brain and subliminally you are trying to copy it. What ends up happening is you adjust the pedal so it sound like that tone. If not its trash. Repeat this over and over and,.........
Funnily enough... an original Ibanez tube screamer. Now before you crucify me.. i was young and had no idea how to 'properly' use one.. it was 2nd hand and had power issues. I understand now why it sounded awesome with certian amps but crap in others.. but back then it was the biggest most unreliable pos id ever seen... I'd give my left nut to have it back though.
My Katana 50 has a metal zone patch. With careful, low settings it can sound brilliant, a unique distortion is useable. It is not identical to the pedal, mind you. I used to have the pedal and it was shit.
I have a modelled one in my Helix, and I can actually get some decent 80's rock/metal tones with it. Use the subtler side of the settings and it can sound quite good.
I remember when I first got my Fuzz Factory... It was so SHIT, a huge disappointment tbh. However I kept working on it! The beast is now tamed, and I'm proud to say it's my favorite pedal in my current set up. I use it with or without compressor, wah, stacked fuzz, and even a phaser. I wouldn't change it for any other pedal in the world!
I didn't play with the whammy 4 so I can't judge but there are way way worse pedals out there. Rocktek distortion, the boss splicer, the boss's ac2 and ac3, the gravebane reverb thing Sam ash came out with, first act had a few abortions, tons of crap out there.
i have a metal muff running into my digitech rp 500. it sound great the one he had must have been broken,,,turn the top boost on turn the top boost dial to 4 or 5 sounds great iv notice if the top boost dial is too high you will get a bad tone
Who the hell are YOU to determine if I’m a metal guy or not? Seriously? Just because I hate your shitty distortion pedal? This is the dumbest comment I’ve seen yet.
I agree with this list, except the Zvex. The Fuzz Factory, admittedly, is difficult as heck but if you dial it in *just right* it can be a beast. Best for studio use, not tamable for live applications. But dude, that Crossroads pedal is total trash. Spot on.
I’m into old style distortion like the MXR distortion plus, and for all the crap it gets the Smashbox is an excellent pedal, with most of my distortion pedals they’re just turned up all the way so the knobs don’t really mean anything to me, but that pedal I actually get some use out of them, I’ve got the regular big muff,, the old one, and it’s a unique sound, and I think that’s the problem and the benefit with a lot of these, unless you’re in a cover band and want to sound exactly like someone else’s rig you want to make your own sound, so one persons crap is another ones gold.
Chris fromIowa Very true Chris. Sadly I am a bedroom guitarist. (Yes I know... It's very similar to someone admitting one uses auto tune. Or like Glenn Fricker hates... Someone cupping the mic) All I can play is covers so I would like to get close to sound like what the band sounds like.
I agree on the ZVEX Fuzz .. I returned mine because of that noise .. if you people want to " think" you have a great pedal with personality to justify you just paid 199 for that pedal .. what ever makes you feel happy . sorry but my opion is it is NOT worth the price and all the feed back in it is P O I N T L E S S not the worst pedal ever just not worth the price
me and couple of my friend too..seem not bad..but never very happy in real situation..it's hard to find good metal pedal..the metal muff have good power, pure tone but not enough bottom..the mxr fullbore have just mid and gain..no bottom..too much power on the gain and not enough on the frequency ..metal zone have bottom and power but no purity.. it's razord and plastic...the only one i find with all the frequency, the bottom, the gain and the pure analog scratchy tone is the amptweakr tight metal
I like the comment on the metal muff- "Paid $88 for it, don't think it's worth half that." It's worth zero if you can't use it. I like these posts though, at least he's honest about his thoughts.
Robert's Guitar Dungeon Yeah it's like were just hanging out talkin gear,which is what I like to do, especially accessories which modify your sound.Thanks man.
Hahaha I own that whammy pedal! It sucks! The DOD red distortion pedal from the early 80's is still the worse one I ever owned. Probably didn't help that I was running it through a peavey bandit, it just sounded horrible! Even when I ran it through a Marshall it sucked! Like nails on a chalkboard!
Bought it in 1985, just said distortion on the pedal, it prob was the one before they started putting the fx55 on it? All I know is that it was tough to get anything good sounding out of it.
I'd love to get every one of these pedals & put them on a board just to see what horrible monstrosity it would make. Also, oddly enough it's a good thing that you didn't include the BOSS Metal Zone. That one has a horrible rep, but sounds pretty badass when hooked up to the correct gear (preamp).
I actually love the Metal Zone. I still have mine that I bought in 1991 when they came out, and that was really my only distortion for about the next 10 years or so. I geeked out like a Boss fan girl when they came out with the Waza Craft version. LOL
I was just playing my MT2 the other day, dont understand the hate. I take the time, dial a good tone and run it right into my 1989's Peavy VTM60. Sounds great. I dont get the hate.good rockin pedal.
me too! I play synth-like sounds with it (in addition with a protostar filter) I find it very easy to control when you discovered the trick. I put it on a table in front of me, so I can quickly change the sounds "on the Fly". It´s not a usual fuzz sound, especially people who don´t like fuzzes hate it. But if somebody tells the world which pedals are bad, one should keep an eye on quality, not on personal taste....
Definitely agree with the Whammy IV. I found one used at GC for $70, & I wouldn’t have paid 75 cents for it; just sucked tone out of my amp like a vampire 🧛I resold it & got the Whammy V instead, so I can concur Digitech rectified the issues of the IV.
I think pedals being good or bad is subjective and I agree with your review on some of the pedals but certainly not the Zvex and mooer. I have never really been a fan of the fuzz except using it on the bass but over the last few years it has crept into my pedal board and I like the zvex and again it's not a sound for everyone. I think hands down the worst pedal to ever be made was the BOSS metal zone, I despise this pedal and never understood why anyone used it but then again it was a sound that my ears hated, I have never been a fan of super high gain distortion anyway, my sound is what everyone has termed transparent OD and that's a sound my ears like and you are absolutely right about Danelectro, the black licorice sucks but aside from that I'd use Danelectro pedals anytime, especially their pride of Texas pedal.
None of these pedals are as bad as the fit of that shirt.
Unc thought he’d discourage or flog me by pinning my comment 😂
@@Redhotshawntexas you thought he cared about the fit of his shirt I'd say joke's on you then
@@doofwopit’s clear he doesn’t care about the fit of his shirt. Or anything about how he looks. Clearly. By the way, how’s that ratio hitting you two butt buddies?
@@doofwop eat the ratio and keep glazing shmeat, cuck
If you played demos of each it would have been more entertaining and laughable.
I would have, but I don’t own any of these pedals anymore. LOL
The worst pedal I’ve ever had was the Behringer noise gate, even with an isolated power supply it still generated white noise.....
Dead on brother. Bought that same pedal trying by to save money and it is utter trash! Glad I’m not the only one. Peace.
Mine doesn't generate noise and helps alot
Maybe it's a n issue with the power supply? Weird how some don't have that problem.
My 2 worst pedals are both Behringer. First is a bass D I that makes its own noise. 2nd is a Vintage Tube O D. Didn't like the sound so I Bitmo modded it. 1st pedal I ever did my own modding to. Still don't like the sound. Changed the tube to a 12au7. It's not horrible but not for me. Maybe it's cause I got 2 Butler Tube drivers. Both with bias knobs. Kinda spoiled by great sounds. Still own both and if these are the worst then I can live with some junk. Gotta have some filler for my own JHS pedal wall. L O L
But no instead it works
Actually the noise gate is opened
You were right about everything except the Fuzz Factory. To me that’s one of the greatest fuzzes out there. All the harmonic feedback with the pedal is what turns me on the most to it. Most people hated the original Whammy pedal until Tom Morello showed everyone how to use it. I believe the same is true with the fuzz factory
You misspelled "Dimebag Darrell".
I got to get a Metal Muff! I definitely want that “thousand bees trapped in a tin can” sound!!! A plus is that the audience will scratch their own eyes out!?!?! Freakin how metal is that! 🤘🏻
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Black metal. I said that with a thick Scandinavian accent. While sipping wine in a dark room, lol. Seen LORDS OF CHAOS? check it out. Those wacko's actually want and try to sound like crap, spooky.
Cringed so hard over this comment
Chase off the audience, great idea!
@@saltpeter7429 Well it all sucks anyway. Why waste your one and only life playing negative hate filled garbage? Not me!
I would have liked to have heard examples of the pedals. I'm sure you're right in your assessments, but hearing them might have been better.
I thought the same thing but then I remembered that he probably shit-canned them all ASAP. lol
That’s EXACTLY why I didn’t demo any of them. I don’t own them anymore! 🤣🤣🤣
Too bad. Would have been cool to hear.
Search up the pedals on YT lol
TheHunterTeen we know that. Would just have been good to hear him demo them, to show _his_ reasons. Some people WILL like these pedals. That's how it is. People don't like stuff that other people do
Well this is a completely subjective matter. Golden cello for example is meant for playing those lead lines in the style of Eric Johnson etc. so no wonder if it gets muddy with chords. IMO its wonderful sounding pedal with the right setup. A really cool mix of fuzz and distorion. And so is the fuzz factory, one of the most versatile, crazy and innovative fuzz pedals of all time WITH the right setup. It is a very hard pedal to use indeed. But as you mentioned not being fan of fuzzes I get why you're not liking these pedals.
Yeah, maybe with the golden cello, but you should be able to play chords and not just lead lines.
@@drkaplin98 Well I have to disagree. Many great lead tones are not usable as a rhythm tone. And not every pedal has to be a ”do-it-all” solution.
The fuzz box I built in high school was Absolutely shit
Captain Nostromo x)
Captain Nostromo same here man, same here.
Know wot u mean. Same here.
Bet it still sounded better than a Rat.
I guess I was lucky. I built jack orman's fet muff. Sounded killer.
Woah... I love my metal muff... I don't ever bring the top boost over 9 o clock. It does sound like ass over that 9 o clock point I will agree. It has an active EQ which gives you a lot of tweakability. It was my first real distortion pedal and I still have it. Putting a tube screamer in front of it also helps. It won't be replacing my 6505+ or 3120 anytime soon. But it was a bargan at 50$ to get my metal on. I still have ancient vids of me on my channel getting decent tones out of it.
I heard it was based off the metal zone (I could be wrong) which is another pedal that gets a lot of beatings online.
I would also argue that the MXR fullbore metal is far worse than the metal muff. Give one of those a shot if you want a good laugh.
Love the vid btw. Hope I don't come across as a bitchy internet troll.
Mxr fullbore is way worse. The mt2 and metal muff are at least usable...
@@CC-8891 www.backtrails.net/next/index.php/s/dQ4GDpBfpgMFXF6 that is my Metal muff when I first got it. I have it's tuned in a little bit now. It's running through a fender frontman 212r the mic is a Shure sm57
I love my metal muff as well. It's like wtaf man ...lol!! I will never get rid of it. I also have a metal zone and like it too.
@@John-qj2lj metal muff is great for the price compared to other pedals doing the same thing.
it blows friend,you haven't heard good metal tones obviously
I'm proud owner of one of the original Fuzz Factory pedals. I believe this pedal is intended to be a quirky character pedal, not for every situation. It sounds the way it sounds by design, that doesn't make it *bad*. Lame that it's on this list.
nolatone yeah, usualy it’s people who can’t think of playing outside the blues or generic rock box that can’t find any use for it.
Sebastian Matejko I dunno that's a weird pedal, it's hard to find a real practical use for it
it sounds like total shit.
I expect if you asked Zackary, he'd say it was never intended to be practical. I know I didn't buy mine for any sort of "go-to" use. I bought it as a wacko sound to have in the studio.
nolatone I agree,it's a niche pedal board not a stand alone main fuzz
"...a fax machine being bludgeoned to death by a dial-up modem" I am still laughing and will be for quite some time.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
I’ll see what I can do. LOL
The fuzz factory is extremely versatile once you work with it. Same with the metal muff. I just disagree with you completely on those.
The metal muff is better as a preamp.
Most of the pedals mentioned are.
@@mvyper The Metal Muff is a great pedal but I believe it is way too muddy and fuzzy for people who play metal. If you choose to release a high pedal for metal, it should not be fuzzy at all. I believe one would expect a metal pedal to sound like a MI Audo Megalith, Empress Heavy, Wampler Triple Wreck, Amptweaker Tight Metal... Even the new Boss Metal Zone Wazza. But it is a good pedal for sure !
@@MCHiphopotamus well, if you dial it just a lil crunchy and boost it with a ts, it can sound a lot better. You don't need to get all your distortion from it.
@@mvyper Very true. Anyway, I have the MI Audio Megalith Delta and am very satisfied with it :)
Haha @ the Metal Muff! I love that pedal but yes it can sound absolutely garbage with the wrong amp/guitar combo. I bought one last year for nostalgia effect and it sounds absolutely horrendous through my Marshall Valvestate but it was amazing through my hybrid-Randall. Any fuzz pedal is garbage to me as it the Boss DS-1 is garbage but that's my personal opinion (doesn't mean they are garbage). Entertaining video cheers :D
The ds2 is even worse. Weakest distortion pedal I've ever owned.
YOU MEAN A COMPANY CALLED DIGITECH AND CLAPTON DON'T MIX? HAHAHA, THAT'S LIKE TRYING TO NAIL ERIC JOHNSON'S TONE OR DAVID GILMORE'S TONE WITH A LINE6 SPIDER PRACTICE AMP.
I actually LOVE and USE the Digitech Crossroads Clapton pedal. The trick, to me, is that I use the (mixer) out instead of the amp out (while plugged into an amp, not a mixer). I tend to use the Sunshine of Your Love Tone and am able to get a nice approximation via my Claptonized strats (partscasters with the EC midboost kit). It is definitely something you need to spend time tweaking and arranging on your board. But, I have been able, to my ears, to get a nice tone and much use out of it. I've found some on Guitar Center's website and considered getting another one so I can use it in tandem and use it for the Badge (rotary speaker) sound while keeping my other one set on the Sunshine of Your Love mode. I will admit, you probably need to be a Clapton diehard to find this pedal useful. To each their own I guess!
But I will mention two pedals that I loathe and won't EVER buy/buy again.
1.) Digitech Metal Factory. They had a used one at a Guitar Center I frequent. It sounded like shit and, despite endless hassling by the sales guy, I couldn't find any reason to buy this. I found ONE decent/okay tone but when I kept tweaking it, I lost that one good setting. The guy kept trying to get me to buy it, but he ended up pissing me off more than anything, and I was ready to chuck at him after 10 minutes!
2.) Ibanez TS9DX. I bought this after seeing my Guitar Teacher use one. I even found some not so bad tones, but once I put it in my pedalboard/set up, I found those tones that were pleasing became muddy and "fluffy" in the pedalboard mix. I spent hours trying to find a better place for it and ended up selling it, ironically, to my guitar teacher (after he sold his). I have since bought the 40th Anniversary TS808 (the sparkly red one) and love it! I use it with my Les Paul, which sounds great!
Daniel Stephenson that Digi Clapton is used in studio by arguably some of the best players in the world. I have pictures to prove it. " of them use in a rig. $ ain't the problem for them, soooo i have no clue why people spit on hat pedal. IMHO someone say something on forums or YT and other repeat it aka don't give a chance to pedal at all.
Funnily enough, the sound at the start of Plug in Baby by Muse are Matt just fucking with the ‘Stab’ feature lol. He used it all throughout Origin of Symmetry and later albums and it sounds pretty good to me. I think his guitar has the pedal built into it, along with a phase 90.
99.9% of the time it's the guitarist and not the pedal. I spent years with bad tone. Even with acoustic guitars that sounded horrible. Then I sat down and started studying effects. Trouble shooting, Night after night video after video. I can get the amp sounding great but now recording it is another hurdle. My worst pedal .. boss metal zone maybe one sweet spot for guitar. Made any tube amp sound like solid state hell. Probably because the volume gain on it was so loud you could probably hear it with a pair of headphones connected to it.
Mr Mr Youyou fuck you
@@pablodmdp stay mad lol
Have to disagree with you on the Metal Muff. I love mine. I’ve had to fiddle with the settings, changing a little with what guitar I’m using (usually Fenders). I’ve learned you have to dial it back, particularly the boost setting, but it has worked for me. Again, it’s generally working with a Fender Mustang or Tele and to a crappy amp. I’ll say this- when I’ve run it into a Marshall, I needed to adjust the amp settings, and the pedal settings, which is a pain but doable. I think it can hang with my classic Big Muff, and is much better than other distortion pedals I’ve had (the DOD Grunge, BOSS Metal Zone).
its horrible,the metal zone shits all over it and is useable and can dial in great metal tones
I love my metal muff too.very badass thrash distortion.
Metal zone sucks and is nothing but a noise box compared to the metal muff.nothing but unwanted feedback and in th recording studio it gets lost in the mix to where u can't hear anything of the technicality of th guitars...very shitty..a modded metal zone I agree with but not the stock metal zone.
I don't use the boost but it's usable if you add more bass
The Metal Zone is a better pedal than people think. There’s the camp that loves it in the effects loop, but I use it on my regular board, and can get some decent sounds out of it, especially stacked with an OD or a Muff. Right now I have it set to where the distortion dial is almost all the way down. I pair it with my TC Tube Pilot (a poor man’s Tube Driver, with no EQ), and I get a tone that’s similar to the one found on the middle solo of “Money” live from the “PULSE” album. Speaking of that album, using the same settings, paired with my old Sovtek Big Muff, and I get that awesome guitar tone you hear on “Sorrow”. It just takes quite a bit of patience to dial that thing in, and it’s one of those pedals that, depending on your amp, your guitar and pickups, might not ever work well. I’ve found that with some other really good pedals- even the Big Muff and Boss DS-1 sometimes just go better with some amps better than others.
“1000 bees trapped in a tin can” 😂 😂 😂 Lol!
Lol. That boost! So bad they made a mini version.
Owned a ShimVerb briefly. Played one gig where the sound-guy was having a helluva time finding a strange hum coming out of the FOH - Kind of like feedback but under the mix.
The next gig I played a musician friend came up and told me that there was a weird hum that was coming out of my rig. Did some troubleshooting. Yep ShimVerb. Garbage pedal.
Digitech forgot too say that the Eric Clapton that this pedal was paying homage to was actually Mr Eric Clapton from Surrey, England, a painter and decorator !!!
I sound exactly like Eric Clapton with the crossroads pedal.... I don't know what your talking about man.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Whammy IV and Fuzz Factory hahahahahaha
Enough internet for today
This dude couldn’t use it. And if he couldn’t, no one can. FACT
agree ;)
Alejandro Soler Lajarin I was honestly hoping both of those would show up, as they're both some of my favorites. 😂
This dude's a dummy.
Why am I a dummy?
Maybe it’s because you could of called your shop anything and went with Roberts guitar Dungeon (what the hell were you thinking) or Maybe it’s because the guys who’ve commented like a product which some people can get screaming and you kind of shit on it by calling it one of the worst pedals ever but hey I’m not an expert.
The blue DOD Octave was crap. It couldn't even track single notes,
I hav the Z-Vex Fuzz factory and with the right settings it delivers very usable sounds. However some of the knobs are extremely sensitive and a one or two degree durn on one of those gets the pedal completely out of control. So you can get really cool fuzz sounds and some very experimental weird shit.
Sämi Moor it does a pretty good approximation of a Fuzz Face if you know what you're doing. This guy gives away his bias when he admits he doesn't like fuzz pedals to begin with.
Personally I think that EHX Metal Muff has a good sound in terms of rhythm, but the high frequencies used in the "boost" sound bad in the solos. I understand that you do not like it, it is difficult to find the correct configuration on that pedal (with so much configuration knob). I have never used the Whamy IV.
Never had any issues with my golden Chello just keep all the controls below half way and it’s very useable
The worst I've had was Metal Zone. Absolute garbage. Almost as bad is Marshall Jackhammer in distortion mode. O/D mode is still somewhat usable but not worth the time spent adjusting it.
Try running the Metal Zone into the Return jack of the effect loop instead of through the front, like I did in this video. You’ll be shocked. Ola Englund just did a video on the same topic and he was shocked, as well. ua-cam.com/video/C7m0DNsvQxI/v-deo.html
I agree most of it, but the Golden Cello. That pedal was not made to play chords. It is made to play solos, where a cello sound wanted. It does it so amazingly man! I have about 30 pedals, including some high end ones, but the Golden Cello is among the first 3 favourite overdrive pedals!
Big Boss user, borderline on the brand fidelity side, self admittedly.
I wonder what would be their top worse pedals..
No, it's not the Metal Zone.
I personally have to disagree with the Metal Muff on the list. Although the fuzz element in its tone may not appeal to everyone, but the gain and the EQ overall is nicely controllable. It has a nice amount of mids. I must albeit admit that the top boost is voer-sensitive, and definitely not the best boost for solos, but I find it good fora dding upper mids if dialed in correctly in moderation.
I owned one for about three years when they first came out. I tried it in every amp that I owned during that time period and tried every setting that I could think of, and it was completely unusable. Finally I gave up and sold it.
I have it and it works great with the over all tone and the Eq lets you deal a pretty good tone
Ungvárszki Szabolcs I have it and I can say that it gives a good effect, what configuration do you use?
The metal muff is a great pedal. Very tweak able. Surprised to see it here.
I’ve owned three of them. They all sounded horrible. Here is the last one that I had. ua-cam.com/video/_cfGaheyYcU/v-deo.html
Robert I happen to like the Distortron, the Fuzz Factory, and the Back Talk! Robert how could you. Agree with you on the Clapton though. Go Patriots
You had me laughing for almost the whole video. It was priceless. Some of your dead-pan looks still have me laughing as I type. Special thanks for this one.
LOL Good, glad you enjoyed it!
Mooer S#!+verb! That was unbelievably hilarious! New subscriber here. I just watched three of your videos. All informative and all entertaining.
Thanks man! Welcome to the family! 🤘🏼🤘🏼🤘🏼🤘🏼🤘🏼
DOD American Metal. From elephant farts to Yoko Ono screeching. The first pedal I ever bought, I've learned a lot since then.
What a friendly comment section. Funny thing about Danelectro... I had a FabTone distortion pedal. Ordered it before I heard it. Since it was called a FabTone, and had tail fins, I thought it would be a nice vintage OD kind of pedal. It was like a freight train of gain stages. Only usable for the heaviest tones, but actually pretty good in that regard. Always thought it might have caught on if they called it something heavy metal. Like Black Licorice LMAO...
Just want to clarify something since you were quick on the comment and it may confuse newer Pedal heads, True Bypass isn't necessarily a good thing -it depends on the type of effect, where it sits in the signal chain and the over all pedal chain sequence of the artist and where quality buffers are located in the chain -and avoiding noisy and tone sucking buffers or using switching to keep them out of the normalized chain. A pedal board of all true bypass pedals will be have a host of tone thieves to contend with -you don't want all true bypass pedals in most scenarios -so it's not really an argument of this pedals good because it has true bypass or not -it's case by case
The Krank distortus maximus.
God I hate this thing. Got it new when I was a teenager. Plugged it in and all was well, really cool groove/black/death metal kinda sound....then I palm mutated and oh my god, I can't describe the noise it made. Was kinda like a bird being squashed by a super computer. That's the best I can come up with. I got another one, thinking the first was broken and it did the exact same thing.
Awful pedal and it cost like £170 ($200ish) too.
So glad the Digitech fixed the whammy pedal in latest version. I love my Digitech DT Whammy gen 5 pedal and with true bypass zero lag and sounds amazing!
I've been very happy with my Whammy V, as well. Digitech has definitely upped their game!
it makes drop tuning way easier just click or turn a knob
Robert's Guitar Dungeon
Digitech’s new stuff is pretty nice, in my opinion. Great performance to value. I own the Polara reverb and the Cab DryVR and both do what they do very well and the pedals themselves feel like quality pieces of gear. The silent switches are awesome too. I also plan on getting the Obscura delay in the near future.
For what it’s worth, the Cab DryVR tames the headphone out of an Orange Micro Terror very well, turning it into a DI recording beast!
Renaissance Man I use the digitech drop pedal that I can't live without, he should try playing the tone sucking donnor one of these days.
If you're someone that isn't into gated fuzz and oddball fuzzes, i can see not liking Fuzz Factory. I'm not a huge fuzz fan. I use a fuzz face, but i use that more of less to get that Eric Johnson glassy, sparkling clean by keeping the FF on and rolling my guitar volume back to clean it up.*
I use an old triangle muff too, but i use that exclusively with an EQ or TS808 into the front of it as a lead tone for my Strat. It sounds nothing like a Big Muff (or any fuzz for that matter) the way i use it. I'm not into the sputtering and spitting fuzz thing, but a lot of people do.
*I can't use the Fuzz Face this way since i dropped a set of Fishman Fluence single coil into my Strat. If you use a buffered signal into a fuzz face and roll the guitar volume back, it cleans up more gradually like an amp or OD pedal. Id wager the majority of players would prefer that, I'm just not one of them.
You've now got me wanting to check out the Fuzz Factory
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
That Danelectro black coffee was only awesome because I was 16 and only had 14.75 and this pedal was 13.99
It did the job on a shitty Randall solid state practice amp
But once I tried plugging it into a big amp. Goodnight
The Metal muff is very good as a preamp, metal zone style.
I’ll take your word for it. LOL
@@RobertWJackson yes you should.
Arion Metal Master was so bad I gave it to a friend decades ago. But I now realise many distortion pedals are better off in a low gain setting of the gain channel, rather than the clean channel. Never tried the former option. It was tinny and bright I recall.
I like your video but it needs demonstrations.
LOLL- At some point below nearly ever pedal you named is claimed by someone' as their favorite- unreal how subjective this stuff is. That's why I learned a long time ago- never say an effect is "unusable"- it's just unusable to you, it's not your thing. The reason I say that is that I had many of the effects used throughout the 80s and 90s before the artists that used them did so- and I remember thinking "How silly, no one can use that..." then hearing guys like Vai, Satriani, and Tom Merello do just that and make them sound amazing. It really caught me and made me realize how different everyone was when it came to making music, how a sound or tone that was completely useless to me could be exactly what someone else is looking for or- could inspire someone who doesn't know they're looking for it until they hear it to write a whole song or album. Not only that-0 the gear you use to play it makes a massive difference. I own several different amps- I have pedals that sound amazing on one amp- and horrible on the next. Same for guitars- I have pedals that work great with single coils and some that only work good with higher output humbuckers. And now- ppl have even more options because we have all these "amp in a box" style pedals and audio interfaces with plugins and all that stuff- I'm sure pedals sound really different when used in this context as well.
6/7 I agree with, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with the ZVex Fuzz Factory- you just have to know what you're doing with it. It's INCREDIBLY sensitive, so even the slightest tweak can completely alter your sound. Just takes some practice- you can get some very good sounds out of it.
Good topic, backuped by some of the worst amps ever 😅
ZVex is really crap, you are just right
I agree on all but the Golden Cello . I’ve used it for lead tone many times It was basically built for that use . You really have to dial both effects back to get a good rhythm tone .
Worst pedal I ever had is that Digitech Distortion Pedal in the background (the dual switch yellow piece of sheet).
i.imgur.com/ym68Mp7.png
PDS1550 or POS1550 as I called it. Horrible quality control from the bad old days of Digitech.
img.audiofanzine.com/images/u/product/normal/digitech-pds-1550-double-distortion-26478.jpg
What? No DOD Grunge?
At least the Grunge can be modded to sound good.
But, right out of the box, it's a noisy, gnarly beast.
I wanted to keep this video under 10 minutes. LOL
I heard that. Plus, like I said, the FX69 can be modded to sound great.
"right out of the box, it's a noisy, gnarly beast." I know. I still love mine too. FX69 4 life. Edit to add: I was hoping to hear the "American Metal" dod pedal. EVERYONE I know who played hard thrash ditched the AM for the Grunge. NOBODY turns up the grunge all the way and lives...
Dude, that's why the DOD Grunge is rad. It's Noisy, Gnarly and Beastly. Sometimes you just need to get dirty.
Agreed. It feedbacks way too easily. Got another a few years ago & definitely not as good of a sound as I remember it having in high school.
I think the title should go to any of the Carlsbro minifex series. Cheap plastic casing, appalling controls with no range. The dial pulled when using them, not proper knobs. Doubt you could even find a working one now.
I actually like the EH Metal Muff. Good for black and/or tighter sounding metal.
I use it for black metal and shoegazy sounds, so it's a pretty versatile pedal.
Danelectro pedal looks like an Owl 🦉. Whoo's Idea was that? Guess they didn't give a hoot about the tone.😅
Share the music people ,donated a bcrich and a 2x10 line6 combo. Give a kid a guitar not a video game.
Awesome man! Thank you so much!!!
Worst pedal I ever bought? Wow... probably the DOD FX80 compressor back in the 80s. PS, I still have it -- yet I sold my old Electric Mistress? What a maroon.
Great topic. UA-camrs like putting up "best of" pedals but they sure try to stay away from the "worst of" pedals lists.
Thanks! I can’t speak for everybody else on UA-cam, but I enjoy doing “Best of” videos because they’re fun and easy to do, and people do enjoy watching them, so it makes it easier for viewers to want to engage with me as a creator. I did this video partially because I thought it would be kind of funny, and partially because like you said there’s not too many videos like this one out there. And I believe in just shooting straight from time to time. Thanks again for the kind words!
EHX Next Step Wah volume pedals? Not the actual sound, but the design? My local store has DOZENs of them now in the second hand bin. A pedal with no moving parts? Well, all cables moves up and down very quickly. You can't set anything to half cocked wah, or leave the volume pedal in the middle position, and you can't have them on any pedalboard. An optional cradle was made later to have it on the pedalboard taking up huge space. If there ever was a "desert island pedal" or a flood or volcano eruption this would be the first pedal I deliberately left behind, if I ever owned one. Totally moot idea, and everyone I know of that bought it, initially thought it was brilliant, until it slowly dawned on them. And the sound? regular wah, nothing less nothing more...
If they should have SOME merit to it, it was a sensor that felt whenever your foot was on it and turned it on. Foot sensor, if you leave your foot from it its bypassed. If it costs 10 bucks it would be no big deal, but it doesn't. AFAIK Accelerometers DO WEAR over time, albeit at much slower pace than any mechanical moving parts as that of a regular wah. Magnetic/Opto wears as much as accelerometer, and they can fit pedalboards and has as many moving parts too (none), and you don't move any cables while operating it. What have EHX guys been smoking? Novelty pedal, just because you can, you shouldn't...
Only 7? I can think of about 50
Yeah, Behringer's entire lineup except for that one digital delay that kind of works
I've played or owned some bad pedals. EHX QTron, XO Polychorus, Clone Theory and Cockfight are pretty awful. Boss Xtortion....In general I really don't like the sound of digital pedals as well. Was the Fuzz Factory in a warm room for a long time when you tried it? Germanium transistors sound like a wet fart if they get too warm. It's just the nature of the beast if you want that really good sound. Then again, my main drive pedals are modern versions of the Univox Super-Fuzz and Foxx Tone Machine, so maybe I just like really dirty 60's fuzz and octave fuzz.
A couple points. I know this list is subjective, because there are some popular pedals that I don't think sound very good also, but the metal muff sounds good when you turn the top boost under 9 o clock. For the fuzz factory, you have to turn the stab all of the way up and use the gate and compressor to get rid of those squeals. It's a difficult pedal to figure out how to use, but once you spend some good amount of time with it I think you'll find that it can get some of the best fuzz tones...however, it does kind of stink that if you turn a knob a little bit off of where you want it, it can mess up your whole sound.
SA2BRK1993 couldn't agree more about the fuzz factory. It's kind of easy to get rid of the squeals, though, so I'm not sure why he couldn't. Definitely not a user friendly pedal, but once you find your tone it's just about the best fuzz on the market.
But who wants a pedal that you have to mess about with so much? They are so over rated and belong in this list!
Darren Turner It's a tweaker 's pedal. You can get pretty much every fuzz sound you'd need.
Couldn’t disagree more re the fuzz factory and the whammy 4. It’s all about subjectivity, context and creativity when it comes to coaxing sounds with pedals. Especially with glitchy weird effects. One man’s shit is another man’s gold etc...
Haha you obviously haven't played some DOD pedals if these are the worst.
Also mooers pitch algorithms just suck the pitch box wasnt just bad but wasn't in tune who wants a 7th up if it sounds like you have a string out of tune.
I actually like DOD pedals. I’ve played and owned several, including currently.
Don’t disagree there at all.
Exactly! Back in the day DOD were known for some of the worst gear out there. I still have a Metal Maniac - it's so bad it's actually cool. lol
DoD death metal, man in my times I put it behind a zoom 505 , so the chorus and slight delay softened the distortion and that sounded reasonable. Otherwise it sucked.
I use shimverb for a years, i realize the only problem is the excessiveness of the wet signal, especially in spring mode. Just use it Dry in level at 9'o clock And all the problem much perish.
Great list! I have one to add. The DOD Gonkulator ring modulator. This fucking thing is *WORTHLESS* There was one at Sam Ash used for like $20. I was like "what the hell, for that cheap you can't go wrong" I am not even sure what it is supposed to do, let alone what it does. It makes weird sci-fi noises and that is it. It is the least musical pedal ever. I took it back and they told me to keep it. It had been sold and returned 11 times! They gave me my $20 back and gave it to me. I then walked over and put it in their trashcan. Worthless
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
And only one carrier wave set to e or a..Update..so unpopular that they became rare..then sought after..300$ on ebay..so they have reissued it with one more knob.300$ in the bin.
I have to say all those mooer reverbs kinda suck really bad like it sounds like the signal is being rained on by dirty pennies
I wanted to add a question if anyone else ever notice how some cheap pedals might be alright but there's this like aluminum or plastic coating to the signal I know tha mKes no sense but idk how else to say it its like the signal gets wrapped in aluminum foil. For example I actually liked the caline pure sky like how it reacts dynamically n how it breaks up but floating over all that is this extra undesirable layer that I only notice with cheaper Chinese pedals
Do you really think the Metal Muff is worse than the Boss Metal Zone?
Yup. LOL
why Robert?
Well, to be fair, neither one of them are exactly going down in the Pedal Hall of Fame. But the Metal Zone has at least proven useful as a preamp. (I did a video on that awhile back. Here it is if you haven’t seen it. ua-cam.com/video/C7m0DNsvQxI/v-deo.html) The Metal Muff isn’t even good for that. I owned a Metal Muff for several years when they first came out, and I tried it in every amp I owned on every setting I could think of. Never could get a good tone out of it.
absofuckinglootly,metal zone all day compared to that steaming pile of dogshit "metalmuff"
The Danelectro black licorice is not a great pedal, however, I picked one up yesterday for $20 just for fun. If I could disconnect the distortion, it would be a cheap and unadjustable Poly Octave Generator.
I like youre honesty.
Thanks man!
I know many will disagree.... but MXR Carbon Copy drives me nuts. As soon as someone kicks it in, I cringe. It has a distinctive voice or timbre no other delay has. I don't even have to look at the pedalboard to know it is being used.
To me, voices are everything... why I can stand many singers in spite of their popularity and legendary status, I can't stand Dylan, Van Morrison, Springsteen... and a few others.
A local player who I highly admire recommended the Carbon Copy... he had just ordered it and was excitedly awaiting it's arrival. Since I admire this guy so, I ordered one too... I did 3 gigs with it, and kicked it off shortly after kicking it on... I thought my settings were way off..
I got back to the studio, and messed with it... nothing I did changed or eliminated that awful timbre.
One problem I had right away, it was way too deep even with the setting merely cracked. In perusing vids of celebrity's gear, I saw that Jeff Beck had one. When I saw the knob positions, all were at bare minimum...
When I saw my buddy, he was loving his. But every time he used it, I'd throw up in my mouth... yes, to me, it's that bad...
I just found a very cheap, off brand mini delay for less than $30... amazing...
I went to the nearby country, mom n pop music store, chock full of crappy guitars, traded the pedal for a harmonica case, a generic strap, and $50... I felt I made out. Good riddance.
Boss V wah....I could not have returned it any quicker!!
LOL Was that the little grey plastic one?
It was black n silver. had some OD circuits in there n univibe effects....Marshall jackhammer wasnt flash either
Ah yes, now I remember that one. Yep; it was pretty horrible. LOL
moved about 1cm either way
yeah that is a very very shit wah..and jackhammer too haha..no presence, not scratchy at all..bubble gum sound
I can honestly say I had a pedal addiction especially overdrives worse than any woman has with shoes. From the 70s till a few years ago I accumulated 250 or so. The thing is HALF sound the same. Also you have a tone in your brain and subliminally you are trying to copy it. What ends up happening is you adjust the pedal so it sound like that tone. If not its trash. Repeat this over and over and,.........
Digitech Death Metal 😂 my first pedal aswell
Funnily enough... an original Ibanez tube screamer. Now before you crucify me.. i was young and had no idea how to 'properly' use one.. it was 2nd hand and had power issues. I understand now why it sounded awesome with certian amps but crap in others.. but back then it was the biggest most unreliable pos id ever seen... I'd give my left nut to have it back though.
*cough cough* Metal Zone
My Katana 50 has a metal zone patch. With careful, low settings it can sound brilliant, a unique distortion is useable. It is not identical to the pedal, mind you. I used to have the pedal and it was shit.
It’s actually not that bad. It’s harsh in the most settings, but if you understand how the eq works it’s actually usable.
Metalzone can be tricky to setup but if you take the time to find the right eq mix between the pedal and the amp, it's actually pretty ok.
One day I sat down with mine and tweaked everything I could be an I like the sound i get out of mine
I have a modelled one in my Helix, and I can actually get some decent 80's rock/metal tones with it. Use the subtler side of the settings and it can sound quite good.
Soundtank Phaser. Would go well with Raven amp Krokus cd and mullet
I remember when I first got my Fuzz Factory... It was so SHIT, a huge disappointment tbh. However I kept working on it! The beast is now tamed, and I'm proud to say it's my favorite pedal in my current set up. I use it with or without compressor, wah, stacked fuzz, and even a phaser. I wouldn't change it for any other pedal in the world!
I didn't play with the whammy 4 so I can't judge but there are way way worse pedals out there. Rocktek distortion, the boss splicer, the boss's ac2 and ac3, the gravebane reverb thing Sam ash came out with, first act had a few abortions, tons of crap out there.
Metal muff is one of the best metal distortions out there, if you can't get metal out of your existing amp voicing. Not sure what you're smoking.
You’ve obviously never played an Amptweaker. ;)
i have a metal muff running into my digitech rp 500. it sound great the one he had must have been broken,,,turn the top boost on turn the top boost dial to 4 or 5 sounds great iv notice if the top boost dial is too high you will get a bad tone
The best tone I got out of that pedal was when the whole thing was in bypass mode. LOL
i agree this guy is not metal guy metal muff is one of my favorite pedals
Who the hell are YOU to determine if I’m a metal guy or not? Seriously? Just because I hate your shitty distortion pedal? This is the dumbest comment I’ve seen yet.
I agree with this list, except the Zvex. The Fuzz Factory, admittedly, is difficult as heck but if you dial it in *just right* it can be a beast. Best for studio use, not tamable for live applications. But dude, that Crossroads pedal is total trash. Spot on.
The MXR Dime Distortion also sucks!!
Nah I have it and I like it
heythereFuckyou It is missing something. I also have an Ibanez Smash Box and an Electro-harmonix Metal Muff and they both kick the MXR Dime Distortion
I’m into old style distortion like the MXR distortion plus, and for all the crap it gets the Smashbox is an excellent pedal, with most of my distortion pedals they’re just turned up all the way so the knobs don’t really mean anything to me, but that pedal I actually get some use out of them, I’ve got the regular big muff,, the old one, and it’s a unique sound, and I think that’s the problem and the benefit with a lot of these, unless you’re in a cover band and want to sound exactly like someone else’s rig you want to make your own sound, so one persons crap is another ones gold.
Chris fromIowa Very true Chris. Sadly I am a bedroom guitarist. (Yes I know... It's very similar to someone admitting one uses auto tune. Or like Glenn Fricker hates... Someone cupping the mic) All I can play is covers so I would like to get close to sound like what the band sounds like.
I agree on the ZVEX Fuzz .. I returned mine because of that noise .. if you people want to " think" you have a great pedal with personality to justify you just paid 199 for that pedal .. what ever makes you feel happy . sorry but my opion is it is NOT worth the price and all the feed back in it is P O I N T L E S S not the worst pedal ever just not worth the price
interesting, I've never personally played the Metal Muff, but I've seen youtubers use it to great effect.
I have too, but I never had any luck with it. And I owned one for a long time and gave it fair chance.
me and couple of my friend too..seem not bad..but never very happy in real situation..it's hard to find good metal pedal..the metal muff have good power, pure tone but not enough bottom..the mxr fullbore have just mid and gain..no bottom..too much power on the gain and not enough on the frequency ..metal zone have bottom and power but no purity.. it's razord and plastic...the only one i find with all the frequency, the bottom, the gain and the pure analog scratchy tone is the amptweakr tight metal
Amptweaker Tight Metal Pro ALL THE WAY!!! 🤘🏼🤘🏼🤘🏼🤘🏼🤘🏼
Worse pedal I ever bought was a Morely Wah/Vol mini. The Wah sucked and the volume made noise, , yea, like a lot.
DOD FX69 Grunge - noisy, electronic, old hippie fuzz sound - not metal
Yep. I hated that pedal too. LOL
oh yeah..that is shit..like the metal maniac and the trash master
70's big muff... I could get radio in on mine. AM radio of the 70's but terrible.... worst pedal for me ever.
The worst I own was the digitech death metal pedal.
I like the comment on the metal muff- "Paid $88 for it, don't think it's worth half that." It's worth zero if you can't use it. I like these posts though, at least he's honest about his thoughts.
Hi Robert, this is exactly why I like your channel no bull .Just straight talk.Thanks bro.
Thanks Bob, as always! Glad to hear you enjoy my channel as much as you do. ;)
Robert's Guitar Dungeon Yeah it's like were just hanging out talkin gear,which is what I like to do, especially accessories which modify your sound.Thanks man.
in 1976 i had an Electroharmonix 'Muff Fuzz'..it was horrible & the older boys laughed at me
Hahaha I own that whammy pedal! It sucks! The DOD red distortion pedal from the early 80's is still the worse one I ever owned. Probably didn't help that I was running it through a peavey bandit, it just sounded horrible! Even when I ran it through a Marshall it sucked! Like nails on a chalkboard!
hmmm red DOD -- was it the FX55 or something?
Bought it in 1985, just said distortion on the pedal, it prob was the one before they started putting the fx55 on it? All I know is that it was tough to get anything good sounding out of it.
I loved my Peavey Bandit....
Eight years ago I bought an Ibonez pedal for $20 at a pawn shop.It was toast within' a month. Went back to a Fender Stargazer right that very second.
That's why I stay with BOSS pedals only period. W Percival.
I agree metal muff sucks all the way around metal zone sounds like a klon to that piece of junk
I'd love to get every one of these pedals & put them on a board just to see what horrible monstrosity it would make.
Also, oddly enough it's a good thing that you didn't include the BOSS Metal Zone. That one has a horrible rep, but sounds pretty badass when hooked up to the correct gear (preamp).
I actually love the Metal Zone. I still have mine that I bought in 1991 when they came out, and that was really my only distortion for about the next 10 years or so. I geeked out like a Boss fan girl when they came out with the Waza Craft version. LOL
I was just playing my MT2 the other day, dont understand the hate. I take the time, dial a good tone and run it right into my 1989's Peavy VTM60. Sounds great. I dont get the hate.good rockin pedal.
How did the incredibly shitty Digitech Grunge Distortion Effect Pedal not make this list? Shitty for so many reasons.
I love the Fuzz factory, and I did use it in a song. It can work it is really cool, buy it is weird and quirky.
me too! I play synth-like sounds with it (in addition with a protostar filter) I find it very easy to control when you discovered the trick. I put it on a table in front of me, so I can quickly change the sounds "on the Fly". It´s not a usual fuzz sound, especially people who don´t like fuzzes hate it. But if somebody tells the world which pedals are bad, one should keep an eye on quality, not on personal taste....
Definitely agree with the Whammy IV. I found one used at GC for $70, & I wouldn’t have paid 75 cents for it; just sucked tone out of my amp like a vampire 🧛I resold it & got the Whammy V instead, so I can concur Digitech rectified the issues of the IV.
I did the same thing.
Whammy IV = 💩
Whammy V = 🤘🏼
I think pedals being good or bad is subjective and I agree with your review on some of the pedals but certainly not the Zvex and mooer. I have never really been a fan of the fuzz except using it on the bass but over the last few years it has crept into my pedal board and I like the zvex and again it's not a sound for everyone. I think hands down the worst pedal to ever be made was the BOSS metal zone, I despise this pedal and never understood why anyone used it but then again it was a sound that my ears hated, I have never been a fan of super high gain distortion anyway, my sound is what everyone has termed transparent OD and that's a sound my ears like and you are absolutely right about Danelectro, the black licorice sucks but aside from that I'd use Danelectro pedals anytime, especially their pride of Texas pedal.
DOD made a "integrated tube even harmonic overdrive". Had one. The longest name for the worst sounding pedal.
Wow,that is a mouth full, I never heard of that pedal, was it as bad as a metal zone or worse?
My worst pedal was a T Rex Dr Swamp. Couldn't get a good sound out of it.