9 of the Best Extended-Range Medium Vertical Enclosure Analog Overdrives
After the Compact size enclosure - the Medium-Vertical sort of 1590-BB size of enclosure is my second favourite format - and often a go-to for more extended range pedals. This is a far more practical format than those typically horizontal BB types - like so many of the dual overdrive units - a la King of Tone etc.
This article was prompted by my recent acquisition of the KMA Machines Logan which I kind of missed out on the first time around. In fact it emerged very soon after I had received my Chase Bliss Automatone Preamp MKII pedal - so all other overdrives at that time were pretty insignificant to me - while I always liked the look and sound of the KMA Logan - particularly in that white / sandy limited edition Desert Edition colourway - which I somewhat prefer to the standard Green edition.
That arrival prompted me to consider which were my favourite extended-range overdrive pedals of the same sort of format - where these following 9 came quickest to mind. I decided to add the ’Analog’ qualifier at the end - to underline the nature of these pedals - which somewhat excludes the hybrid Boss OD-200 and Strymon Sunset - which would otherwise have featured.
- Colortone Pedals Parasite JFET Overdrive - AUS $299
- DSM & Humboldt Silver Linings Drive / Preamp - $249
- Keeley Electronics Altered History Ninazu Purple D&M Drive - $259
- KMA Machines Logan Transcend Drive Desert Edition - €219
- Poly Effects Josh Smith Signature Flat V Dual Channel Overdrive - $399
- Pete Cornish GC-1 3-Stage Overdrive / Distortion - £548
- PRS Guitars Horsemeat Transparent Overdrive - $249
- Shnobel Tone Daily Driver - $279
- Toneczar Dove Low/Medium Gain Distortion - $395
I own all bar the PRS Horsemeat, and Toneczar Dove - which I’m still very much aiming to add to this capsule collection sooner rather than later - while the Toneczar Dove is somewhat overdue as I was doing a sort of Toneczar phase a couple of years ago. I will need to see how friendly Ed Rembold still is towards me - hopefully he will appreciate the coverage I have given him to date.
For the PRS Horesemeat Overdrive - that’s going to be a somewhat more opportunistic buy most likely - waiting to see if I can get one at a reasonable discount. When you acquire as many pedals as I do - there is quite a lot of price sensitivity as part of the consideration as to which project to approach next. The Toneczar Dove as mentioned has long been on the cards - and hopefully I can add the two missing pieces within the next few months.
Each of these is pretty special for me and typically goes well beyond the range of most other overdrives in having a significant amount of killer flavours onboard!
Here follow the individual details :
Colortone Pedals Parasite JFET Overdrive - AUS $299 (c $210 USD)
Controls - Drive, Bass Boost, Bright Boost, Level, Low, High.
A really fantastic sounding overdrive with pretty simple, but incredibly potent controls. The interaction of the 2-Band EQ with the Bass Boost and Bright Boost switches is magical - and takes you up through the gears from subtle, soft, smooth lilting overdrive through to full-throated richly textured rock tones. This one's just a delight to deploy - and so easy to dial in. My first two settings were a really smooth elegant voicing, and then a fantastically zingy Dumble ODS Rock style voicing - that range and contrast alone is worth the price of admission. Colortone is a new brand - but which is doing incredibly things with amazing levels of attention to detail - these are devices which sound every bit as good as they look!
DSM & Humboldt Silver Linings Drive / Preamp - $249
Controls - Master Boost (Clean Boost +20dB), Level (Output), Gain (Variable Gain Bandwidth), Pre Boost (Gain Boost / Compression + 30dB), Mode : Normal (Transparent) / Preamp (Insert) / Mid Boost (+800Hz Mid-Hump Drive), Style : Soft (Soft Symmetrical Clipping), Vintage (Fat Asymmetrical Clipping), Hard (Tight, Amp-Like Hard Clipping), Treble [>2kHz ±15dB], Mid [300Hz > 2kHz ±12dB], Bass [<300Hz ±10dB], Pre Tone (Tilt / Balancing Input EQ). Engage Boost Footswitch (also independent), Engage Drive Footswitch.
This is an incredible Multi-Drive - which has been largely rooted to the board since it first emerged early last year. The range and combination of controls - including the Pre / Input Tilt EQ, Pre and Post Boosts, 3-Band EQ, and 3x Modes and Drive Styles is a step up in cleverness compared to everything else. The Dual action Boost here really allows you to carve out an extraordinary amount of killer tones - right across the gain scale - and right up to High Gain Distortion and a a couple of cool Fuzz voicings even. I'm genuinely surprised that this pedal hasn't gained the traction it so deserves - it deserves to be a first choice on so many more pedalboards out there, but is bizarrely still being somewhat weirdly overlooked!
Keeley Electronics Altered History Ninazu Purple D&M Drive - $259
Controls - 2 x Volume, Drive, Tone, Channel Order Switch, Independent Footswitch per Channel.
When this first came out I had only recently taken delivery of my Analog.Man King of Tone - which this unit was supposedly inspired by - while it has enough differences about it to consider separate consideration. I was never very keen on the original orange enclosure - and I was obviously focused on something else when the stealthy black limited editions came out - so I bided my time until we had something fairly significant evolved. Where the Purple and Red Altered History Editions of the D&M came with a couple of modification, as well as entirely new Mesopotamian inspired artwork. The Mods are really just tiny refinements on the output tapers of the two sides - while the artwork and different knobs really set these apart in what I feel is significantly more appealing format. Deep down though you have a mix of Klon and Blues Breaker (some say OCD) - in any case both sides sound superb individually and combine beautifully. I own quite a number of sort of KOT inspired pedals - while this is the only one in this more practical and more pedalboard-friendly format!
KMA Machines Logan Transcend Drive Desert Edition - €219
Controls - Level, Drive, Mid Frequencies Cut / Boost, Mid Frequency Focus, Lows, Highs, Mids Mode : Post / Pre, Internal Q-Bandwidth trimpot, Expression Jack, Engage Overdrive Footswitch, Engage Mids Footswitch.
Ad mentioned in the intro - at the time of release I had really only just gotten to grips with my Chase Bliss Automatone Preamp MKII and any other Multidrive around at the time was somewhat understandably overlooked. I really loved the look of the limited Desert Edition Logan in particular - but dithered at the time and missed out. Meaning I was always on the look to grab a pristine one of these second-hand - which actually just happened recently. It's everything you would expect of a KMA pedal and delivers a broad range of fantastic overdrive tones. I've always felt it a touch odd to have switchable mids - which occurs on a few of my pedals - including the Origin Effects RevivalDrive Custom. I basically like having mids on pretty much all the time - so I can make use of the full 3-band EQ. I know some people like to punch them in as a sort of solo boost - while I have other pedals for that particular duty within the chain. This is a really great sounding all-rounder overdrive with plenty of sweet-spots.
Poly Effects Josh Smith Signature Flat V Dual Channel Overdrive - $399
Controls - Presets / Banks [Hold], Signature Ident : Toggle B-Sides / Activate VU Mode / Activate Battery Mode / Save Preset [Hold], HPF / High Q, Volume / Sense. Gain / Speed, LPF / Low Q [Tap header to toggle btw Primary & Secondary Params], Diodes : Schottky / Germanium / Silicon / LED, Waveshape / Blend : Sine, Triangle, Square, Envelope Follower, A > B / B > A Channel Order, Footswitch A / Previous Preset [Hold], Footswitch B / Next Preset [Hold].
A really cool and distinct overdrive that I can now mostly operate wit my toes! Combining a cool digital touch-screen interface with very much analog tone generation circuit - including 3 different clipping diode options - where I kind of mostly live on the Schottky Diode with some Amplitude Tremolo Modulation on the second channel. This has the tiniest of learning curves - it's mostly entirely intuitive - while I would kind of prefer more more conventional EQ's versus the synth-style resonant filters onboard. Those though do enable you to do a sort of pseudo vibe-y / harmonic tremolo style resonant LFO modulation. It's a really smart and clever pedal for sure with very unique controls - but most importantly some really killer flavours onboard. I was up and running with fairly complex presets in no time at all!
Pete Cornish GC-1 3-Stage Overdrive / Distortion - £548
Controls - Active Bass (±50Hz), Active Mids (±950Hz), Active Treble (±4kHz), Volume (+20dB), Gain (+56dB - at max volume).
My first and only Pete Cornish pedal to date - I still intend to pick up a CC-1 Overdrive and NG-2 Fuzz at some stage - while for now I can just luxuriate in this 3-in-1 3-Stage unit which combines the SS-3, G-2 and P-2 Pete Cornish pedals all in one unit. Allowing you to really elegantly ramp up through the gears from a a soft sustaining overdrive through to a sort of Civil War style Big Muff voicing. The Pete Cornish EQ controls carve out your frequencies in a pretty unique way - and take a little getting used to - while there are of course some incredibly tones onboard - right up through the range.
PRS Guitars Horsemeat Transparent Overdrive - $249
Controls - Gain, Level, Voice (High-Mids), Treble, Bass.
This was the most appealing of Paul Reed Smith's recent and unexpected pedal launch. Supposedly an entirely new Klon-killer circuit with a heavy emphasis on it not being Klon/e. While that's inevitably exactly the space it sails into. Its circuit topology may be somewhat different and distinct - while I see this as very much a Klone style pedal - or at the very least Klon-ajacent. Obviously the Klon has just a single conventional Tone EQ knob - while here we get a sort of 3-band style EQ - with the Voice knob being a High-Mids control. If you like Klons / Klones - then this is most closely an extended range Klon/e as far as I'm concerned - and it sounds very decent indeed!
Shnobel Tone Daily Driver - $279
Controls - Volume, High-Cut : 2 / 0 / 1, Gain, Low, High.
This overdrive pedal seems to have bizarrely ended up as another secret weapon pedal - which not many seem to be properly aware of. I was initially attracted to it by how well it captured that magical aspect of the Pete Conrnish CC-1 which tone I so like - a really chimey and elegant overdrive with incredible range that belies its fairly simple controls. In a similar fashion to the Colortone Parasite above which really has an incredibly range of tones onboard and you can dial in most of those classic / classy low and mid-gain overdrives with this very finely calibrated circuit. This is the only pedal that I've heard come as close to the Pete Cornish CC-1 as this one does - thee's just a very distinctive character and timbre there. While this has added versatility to it which is not really apparent from the simple controls.
Toneczar Dove Low/Medium Gain Distortion - $395
Controls - Treble, Middle, Bass, Gain Mode : X (Xtra Gain) / C (Cleanup Dynamic) / T (Upper Treble Boost), Deep : On (Fat) / Off (Tight), Gain, Sizzle (Upper Frequency Harmonics), Volume.
This has been on the cards for so long - in fact I first intended to include it in the 2020 sequence which featured the Toneczar OTP and Vault Fuzzes, and Openhaus 6-Band EQ High Gain Distortion. For whatever reason it never happened quite yet - where I still really want to add this mostly Marshall style flavour extended range Overdrive - which Ed Rembold actually rather classifies as a Low to Medium Gain Distortion! I'm a huge fan of Ed Rembold's output - and in particular his killer gain pedals. He is of course cerlebrated for this amazing analog delays and modulations too - while those units are just a touch too large for my preferences really - while everything Ed makes sounds superb. The most recent iteration of 6 knobs and 2 toggle-switches is the most refined version of this pedal to date. I'm really looking forward to getting this onboard in the not too distant future!
Final Thoughts
Each one of these has pretty much a killer output on its own merits, while it also weirdly makes sense to own them all - as they all have their own distinct characters and nuances and as I like to say - prompt and inspire different styles of playing. And while there is some degree of overlap between pedals - there is plenty that each of those pedals does that is pretty much distinct and unique to them alone.
I have used the DSM & Humboldt quite a lot recently as its combination of Gain and Dual Boosts is so clever and incredibly versatile. While I often have as many as 3 or 4 of these on the board at the same time. With current rotation front-runners being the Colortone Parasite, DSM & Humboldt Silver Linings, Poly Flat V, and the Shnobel Tone Daily Driver.
I'm really looking forward to picking up the Horesemeat and Dove overdrives before too long - and those can get in on the rotation too.
It's all a little bit like being a wine connoisseur in that the typical mainstream players and enthusiasts don't necessarily have a particular appreciation for those really intricate nuances and characters that form the foundation of a certain flavour profile. For those of us that can appreciate and sense those intricate variances it is all about the enjoyment of that extra detail - the onset, feel, texture and residual sustain. Some of us for sure have a higher appreciation for depth of detail and the organic bloom, ebb and flow of a pedal's clipping and breakup.
I will forever seek out the most effervescent and most nuanced of tones - where a lot of that can be found on these exceptional overdrives - and of course on those wonderful fuzzes and distortions too. The detail of the harmonics and the core density and timbre of those tones is all important. For others it can render more as much the same sort of thing - hence Anderton's NAFOD pejorative!
I don't think you can go wrong with any of these - to me they are all wonderfully unique and individual!
Which are your own favourites in this particular format?
12 Degrees of Saturation 2023 Compact Edition
