2022 Best New Distortion Pedals of the Year

Controls - Low, High, Drive 1, Volume, Auxiliary High (Sizzle), Drive 2.

The Maple Leaf 80's style Liquid Distortion has long been my favourite Aleks K distortion - the nature of its clipping and compression - which renders that glorious silky lead tone means that the pedal takes a hit on its output volume. Aleks K largely updated this pedal based on my earlier input - in terms of not really having enough volume on tap. This version is much improved, but much like my friend Brooks Blackhawk and his Uruk-hai distortion - it's proving a difficult task to raise the volume to 11 without impacting the nature of the distortion character. The new version is much better - while I still feel the need to use the occasional boost. It's core tonality is glorious though!

Controls - Gain, Presence, Level, Rectification : [T]ube / [B]ridge / [D]iode, Bass, Mids, Treble.

One of two Aura Amps pedals I had the pleasure of reviewing this year. The Diamond came about as a recommendation from one of my readers with regard to the most authentic sounding MESA/Boogie Dual Rectifier style Amp emulator. And the Diamond totally fits that bill with its 3-way Full Wave Rectification Type switch and 4-Band EQ. Delivers wonderful distortion character and texture - with enough volume and gain onboard to serve its purpose. Pretty easy to dial in too.

Controls - Bass, Middle, Treble, Volume, Power (Boost), Gain.

I was hugely impressed with the White Sugar MIAB Overdrive / Distortion too - a real livelier of a preamp / distortion which works out as a sort of 3-Channel Beast with the independent Power Boost on its own, the Drive on its own, and both together. Quite a distinct breakup texture - with a significant amount of sizzle onboard too. Great sounding Marshall-style box which is more versatile than most of its ilk!

Controls - Gain, Master Volume, Clipping : Symmetric / Off / Asymmetric, EQ : Low | Mid | Hi, White Noise : W/N Level | Tone | Envelope Sensitivity.

This is in effect the last distortion featured this year, where I and quite a few of my readers were hugely impressed. It cleverly combines a  cool textured distortion with white noise - for a sort of solar burst / sunburst effect as you might imagine it - all those solar radiation atoms fizzing about - that it to say the imagined sound of! It almost looks like a Death by Audio pedals but is very clever in its own right. I had hoped to have one already - but am still waiting on my friend Andy to receive some for his Break the Machine shop - meaning I likely won't get hands on mine until the new year - especially with the ongoing postage strikes and mailing delays!

 

 

 

 

 

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Controls - Volume, Valhalla Gain, Treble, Valkyrie Gain, Gate, Mids.

The V5 edition no less of trying to combine the Valkyrie Drive and Valhalla Fuzz circuits to best effect. You really get fantastic texture here, while the nature of that clipping means that you don't get a huge amount of output. Sort of fine for most, and particularly when you have both Gain controls maxed, but at subtler mixes of the 2 gain circuits you do er a noticeable drop in volume. Brooks has tried for years to get still more output level - which always seems to compromise the character of the breakup - so in some ways this is still a work in progress. With a typically little boost assistance this one sounds immense!

Controls - Tone, Mode : Standard / Custom (Thicker & +Mids), Distortion, Level.

As predicted by yours truly - Boss finally got around to releasing a special Waza Craft edition of their best-selling all-time pedals the DS-1 - which has been in continuous production since 1978 and has sold in excess of 1.5 million units. I was expecting this to be similar to the Keeley Ultra / Seeing Eye Mod - which does Roberts' usual beefing up of body and low-end exercise. While Boss engineers followed a different path with their Custom Mode being more of Modern Mids-punch. Both approaches are eminently worthy and create something even more special than the original stock circuit. This is one of those legendary circuits that everyone should own - Indeed as used by Kurt Cobain as one of the voices of the Grunge Generation!

Controls - Bass, Mid, Treble, Master, Bright Switch, Gain.

This cool follow up to the more mids-punchy Trainer TS-15 Preamp is quite a different beast - with way more gain and low end thump onboard. A favoured Canadian solid-state amp, particularly popular among garage punks, and particularly so in Eastern Europe - where it kind of remains a cult classic to a degree - while amp snobs typically give it a wide birth. As a Preamp Pedal hough it's properly chunky and full-fat - with just a really pleasurable textured output!

Controls - Presence, Bass, Mids, Treble, Bass Boost : On/Off, Mids Boost : On/Off, Treble Boost : On/Off, AOR Volume (Ch2), Master Volume (Ch1), Preamp Gain (Ch1 mainly + Ch2 Blend), AOR Gain (Ch2), Channel Footswitch, Engage/Bypass Footswitch. Channel 1 is Red, Channel 2 is Green.

One of my very favourite Distortions of the year - based on the legendary Laney AOR 100 which was Birmingham Amp Specialist Laney showing Marshall how it's JCM800 could be improved - with a significantly extended range Hot-Rodded-Modded sort of variant of that. This distortion has beautiful breakup texture - and a real percussive punch to its output. I was very lucky to get this in the limited White Snowblind Edition - as only 25 were made. Just a really clever dual channel high gain preamp - sounds really distinct!

Controls - DOD250 Side } Volume, Gain, Distortion+ Side, Volume, Gain.

I'm a sucker for special editions of DOD250 pedals - and this is just one such unit which combines a beatifully authentic vintage DOD250 channel with an equivalent MXR Distortion+ circuit - for really cool dual-overdrive / distortion action. The two sides together sound phenomenal - would have been nice to have had a 3rd tone knob on each site, but pretty much fine as it is. Quite simple really - but potent!

Controls - Volume, Voicing : HM-2, Both, KMA, Terror (Gain), Highs, Hi-Mids, Low-Mids, Lows. Internal Frequency Trimmers for : Lows, Low Mids, High Mids, and Highs.

One of Enrico Preuß's finest is not better still - having been shrunk down to compact dimensions and additionally with the formerly internal 3-way Mode / Voicing switch not externalised on the front facia too. It's much more than just a HM-2 Heavy Metal clone - and with its different voicings and 4-band EQ (With frequency trimpots for each on the inside) - this is just one of the most formidable High Gain Metal style distortion ever. Such clever engineering - and with that cool Wurm artwork and 5 x LED eyes. Just a must-have for any fan of this style of circuit, and metal distortion fans in general.

Controls - Bypass Mode : Clean / True Bypass / Buffer, CLEAN Channel } Tone, Level, RHYTHM Channel } Gain, Bright On/Off, Bass, Feel : Fat / Tight / Thick, Middle, Mode : Classic Crunch / Saturated / Vintage, Treble, Level, LEAD Channel } Gain, Bright On/Off, Bass, Feel : Fat / Tight / Thick, Middle, Mode : Classic Crunch / Saturated / Vintage, Treble, Level, Bypass Footswitch, Rhythm / Lead Channel Footswitch.

This sister preamp to the Ceres is the beefier, chunkier more Vintage-leaning Vesta. It has the exact same form-factor and topology of its forerunner sibling, but that was more of a Mids-Forward Modern take of a High Gain Preamp - while the Vesta concentrates its focus on the lower-end of its output profile. In truth that's were I'm at my happiest - as a home-player there is nothing that I love more than creating a bassy / brassy wall of sound! This is pricy, but reasonably priced for what you get, and of course the footprint is on the larger side - there are significantly more compact takes on the same sort of thing - while you can't argue about how good this unit sounds - I prefer it to the already killer KSR Ceres. It won't be going into the reference collection particularly - but it will for sure happen eventually no doubt!

Controls - Master, Presence, Treble, Bass, Volume, 4-position Drive, 6-position Depth.

I had been pestering Giulo for quite some years to shrink down his brilliant but somewhat over-sized Matamp 100 style preamp. It wasn't until he had gained further confidence from his equally brilliant Exegol Model-T style preamp pedal that he felt up to shrinking down his flagship classic. And it's everything we had hoped for - now in much more pedalboard-friendly vertical BB-size enclosure this incredibly even improves on he already benchmark pedal. To the extent that this is the only available format of his pedal now - just superbly visceral and potent - a real joy to deploy! Delightfully Giulio just happened to be in London attending a concert with his good friend Davide (of Short Circuit Audio) - and they are only some of a handful that have dropped in on Guitar Pedal X EQ - really nice to meet both in person!

Controls - Volume, Treble, Gain.

Caleb Holmes's take on just the distortion part of Boss's DF-2 Super Feedbacker & Distortion is a really cool very slightly modded and ever so more modern take on that discontinued Boss classic - minus the Overtone / Feedback portion of that Boss circuit. This is a beautifully textured distortion - which is pretty much equally brilliant on the original and the more recent replica. The 4 x orange LED stars nicely reference back to the source Boss pedal. I also have Caleb's full-fate modded edition of the FB-2 - which really beefs up that one's output and adds some cool bells and whilstles.

Controls - Volume, Base (Depth + Girth), Gain, Top, Middle, Bottom.

Andrew McNicholas latest V3 edition of his cool Dual Rec style Peaks High Gain Distortion adds in a Boost (with second footswitch), and a Base control (More depth & Girth) to make an already impressive high gain classic even more punchy and percussive. The profile here leads slightly more towards the modern side of things - and while say the Aura Diamond's rendering is more strictly authentic to the accepted M/B Dual Rec sound - this nevertheless gives you a really interesting and distinct take on that amp model. Really potent, punchy and articulate.

Controls - Volume, Tone, Gain.

A superb and really smart and simple signature Brothers Angus and Malcolm Young style overdrive / distortion pedal built on that core AC/DC Marshall Plexi sound. Plenty of range on all 3 dials - while a lot of the magic is in the superbly calibrated tone stack - which takes you from Fat and Juicy through to Bright and Searing - all courtesy of a single control.

Controls - Gain, Level, Treble, Mid, Bass, Save/Select, Channel A Footswitch, Channel B Footswitch.

Mooer's Model X X2 Preamp gathers a number of its Micro Preamp Voices and marshals them into a single pedal with 14 Amp Emulations - each with 2 lower / higher gain Channels and 3-Band EQ for tone-shaping. I of course particularly like the higher gain distortions - which is why this essentially Multi-Drive pedal appears in the Distortion section. For a wholly digital pedal I am genuinely somewhat surprised as to just how good this sounds. Most of the time you can't tell it's digital at all.

Controls - Distortion Volume, Distortion Tone, Gain, Modulation Volume, Time / Rate, Depth / Feedback, Modulation Type : Fifth / Chorus / Delay, Stacking : Mod First / Parallel / Distortion First, Engage Distortion Footswitch, Engage Modulation Footswitch.

Initially I wasn't that excited by this modulated distortion, but it has really grown on me, and somewhat reminds me of why I love my Boss MZ-2 Digital Metalizer so much. This is not exactly the same as that, but is on very similar lines - and I look forward to finally adding it to the reference collection some time next year. OBNE have really been on a roll this year with a consistently killer release schedule.

Controls - Volume, Tone, Gain, Scratch Pitch / Speed, Chorus Speed, On/Off Footswitch, Scratch Pad (Igor XL), Trigger Sensitivity : Hi / Lo (on top edge).

All of David Rainger's releases are exhilarating events and the Break Box is no different - being an ingenious coming together of seemingly 3 different ideas - a beefed up and improved version of David's Distorto distortion, a delayed active sustaining chorus, and a Vinyl Scratch effect which serendipitously evolved from the Snare Trap's white noise circuit. This pedal sorts of reminds me of some of the core sounds and textures of favourite band Portishead - where the slightly fuzzy distortion tone is reminiscent of Adrian Utley's gritty guitar tone - and of course his own use of the vinyl scratch effect.

Controls - Volume, Top End : Modern / Off / Vintage, Low End : Full / Tight / Medium, Gain, Destity (Clean Character) : Dark Clean, Poweramp (Neutral), Bight Clean, Gain Structure : Low / Medium / High, Presence, Mid Range : High / Low / Mid, Gain Stage ± : Crunch <> OD1 <> OD2, Treble, Mid, Gain Saturation OD1 : Most + / 0 / More *, Gain Saturation OD2 : Most + / 0 / More *, Bass.

I've already waxed plenty lyrical on this stupendous Hyper Preamp - which takes you from sparkly clean through to the most brutal extreme. This is the most impressive distortion pedal I have ever encountered - and the very best Marshall-in-a-box to boot - taking you though 19 levels of gain - through JTM, SLP, JCM and JVM amp profile varieties with the most incredible textural detail and authenticity. It's also nowhere near as complex as all those 14 controls look - but allows you to elegantly step up or down via some truly smartly progressive controls. All this crammed into these tiny dimensions - it will take a lot to unseat this wonder - it's more potent than pretty much any other pedal of its ilk - and nothing comes anywhere close really - certainly not in a similarly 1590B style enclosure!

Controls - Bass, Depth, Middle, Treble, Presence, Output, Noise Gate, Gain, Low Frequency Input Gain, High Frequency Input Gain.

Finally we have an Ola Englund Signature Chug / Djenty pedal - which perfectly encapsulates that super tight gated modern palm-muted distortion sound. Even with it's 10 controls - it's not as versatile across different types of circuits as many others of this ilk are - instead it seems to be particularly honed to a singular purpose - in delivering that memorable Ola sound to absolutely any type of guitar rig / amp. It has quite a searing and saturated tonality by default - and you can all to easily overload this pedal and cause it to squeal - if you don't apply the higher frequency controls judiciously. So it's a touch fiddlier to dial in that expected - but a little due diligence and patience goes a long way - and as soon as you get used to the nature of each of those controls then there are plenty of sweet-spots to be found onboard. While it never really get to that classic more saggy vintage style metal voicing - it seems highly anchored to Ola's preferred profile of output!

Controls - Volume, Presence, Gain, Treble, Middle, Bass, Deep (right-side).

This one was another grower for me - where it took me a little longer than I expected to get the full measure of this pedal - so I understand how Andertons kind of went wrong with their first demo of this pedal. While again like Ola's Chug pedal - this one is a real grower once you get the measure of the nature of how best to tweak the circuit - and in no time at all you are producing superior sounds. This is mostly a High Gain pedal for me - while I'm aware that many deploy it at more moderate levels of gain - for me you dong't get the best of this one's output texture unless you crank it a touch!

Controls - Bass (Active), Mid (Framus Cobra-like Mid-Cut), Treble (Active), Gain, Punch (Input Gain and EQ) : Less Lows / More Defined Lows / More Body / Mid-Punch - for Solos, Bite (Clipping and Mids / Mid-Cut Profile) : Rect (MESA/Boogie Dual Rectifier), B.Red (Bogner Ecstasy Red) / 515 (Peavey 5150), Gain, Volume.

This is another one that genuinely surprised me - and deploying it at 18V was a huge revelation into just how massive these kinds of high gain distortions can sound - surely the high watermark for really heavy / extreme / brute distortions. I particularly like the Bogner Ecstasy Red voicing - but its Dual Rec and Peavey 5150 voicings are super too. All the controls also work together in a most ingenious manner - and this really sounds tremendous as peak prowess - certainly one of my very favourite high gain pedal to-date.

Controls - Volume, Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble.

All 5 of the new Victory Amps V1 Preamps are fantastic - while The Jack still stands out among all its celebrated siblings. The Jack delivers the most sublime of smooth Liquid Distortions. It's very much key design engineer Thorpy's favourite of the 5, and mine too - not that The Kraken is any lesser really - just that The Jack is extra special.

Controls - Volume, Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble

The Kraken is pretty much everything you would hope it would be - sort of an extended range take on the core EVH 5150 sound and of course part of Rabea Massage's signature tone. It's not as dark as default as Rabea's amp tends to be and it's actually really versatile - I guess it's largely the same EQ deployed on each of these Victory V1  - plenty of range on every dial and it covers a wide variety of styles - just a great all-rounder Metal Distortion pedal - really easy to dial in too!

Controls - Volume, Gain, Bass, Middle, Treble.

This is the only one of these 3 Victory V1's in this selection I've yet to acquire - it's still very much on the cards - but early next year now. Thorpy tells me it's not a typical Plexi style pedal at all - more like one of those modded and hot-rodded editions with a little more punch an aggressions to it. It's not like I need another Marshall style / MIAB pedal but this one sounds pretty distinct - and I'm a sucker for great sounding Marshall style distortions!

Controls - Bass, Mids, Treble, Volume, Voicing : Bright / Classic, Gain.

One of Wampler's 2 recent budget pedals alongside the Triumph Ovedrive - this one is obviously Marshall-voiced and really sounds very decent indeed. I have 4 of Brian's Marshall style boxes - the Pinnacle, Plexi-Drive, Plextortion and Sovereign compacts, and I've got no qualms about getting a fifth - particularly at these prices. Of the pair of Collective Series pedals I probably lean more into this one.

Controls - Gain, Presence, Volume, Bass, Middle, Treble.

This was another one of my favourites from the recent Metal Distortion Pedal roundup - it has a really smart and interactive 4-Band EQ, and has a somewhat instant appeal. One of the easiest pedals to dial in too and has plenty of range on each dial - in particularly Volume and Gain. There's a number of recent M/B Dual Rec pedals - also in the recent Full Metal Racket selection - and this is one of my very favourite of those. In character it's a little more raspy than the MidValleyFX Peaks V3 but has a similar kind of percussive punch to it - great for palm-muted tones!

Controls - SD-1 Side } Drive, Tone, Volume, Gain : High Gain / Stock, Clipping Selection : SD / Boost / LED / TS, Drive Footswitch; BMP Side } Fuzz, Tone, Volume, Tone Bypass / Stock, Fuzz Footswitch.

A really cool tribute to the 20th Anniversary of Coheed and Cambria's debut studio album. This combines frontman Claudio Sanchez's favourite combination of Boss SD-1 with Opamp Big Muff - with a few extra mods on the SD-1 side. This ranks as a distortion when you mix those two voicings together - obviously which are a mid-hump overdrive and fuzz. This was a really limited run which arrived too late one month for me - when I was already over-committed. I was hoping there would be another batch, but as far as I'm aware none materialised. I'll hope to pick up one second hand at some time in the future when the hype dies down. Currently only one second-hand one on Reverb.com going for $600.

Controls - Gain, Tone (High + Low Pass), Shift (Low Pass Cut Off), Body (High Pass Cut Off), Blast Level (Max Gain Level), 8-way Clipping), Level, Engage Distortion Footswitch, Blast Footswitch (Max Gain).

One of the two final Medium-to-compact pedal revisions from Zander Circuitry - this is a fantastic extended-range take on the Sunn O))) Model-T Amp. Has all that potential visceral flavour with extensive clipping section and really smart tone-stack - one of the best of this kind for sure.