Tone Report Weekly Issue 118 | Page 31

I f there were an overdrive solar system, there is little doubt in my mind that the Ibanez TS808 would be the sun and the Klon Centaur would be the moon. The lives of guitarists revolve around the hallowed Tube Screamer. And at night, we gaze longingly upon the Centaur. Both pedals have achieved mythical status in our collective, transistorized folklore. And wholly unrealistic properties have been ascribed to both. When a few of Tone Report Weekly’s writers discussed dream pedalboards recently, neither the Centaur nor the TS808 made the list. And the list was pretty damned definitive. At first, I was surprised. The TS808 and Centaur are both fantastic pedals. Are they not as great as the masses claim? And if they are, why didn’t even one out of eight to 10 full-on guitar nerds put one on his “dream board?” The answer is obvious. The Centaur and the TS808 are both freaking awesome and excel at what they do. But they’ve risen to the top of the heap based on a combination of design, myth, usage by famous players, scarcity, and a fair amount of navel gazing. This got me thinking about some of the overdrive pedals that I would consider to be equally great. Here are a few of them. ToneReport.com 31