Brian Wampler loves a drive pedal. He’s made signature overdrive pedals for the likes of Brent Mason, Tom Quayle and Andy Wood, distortion pedals inspired by YouTube’s – and the Haunted’s – metal guitar tone guru Ola Englund. And he made one of our favourite Klon-inspired drives, like, ever .
But has he just topped the lot of them? Well, maybe, but quite possibly if your tastes in electric guitar were shaped by hot-rodded Plexis and Mesa/Boogie amps, because the Golden Jubilee is both of those vibes in one amp-in-a-box overdrive-cum-distortion.
It looks the part. It looks expensive, all sparkle metallic green with gold anodized knobs. And the Golden Jubilee passes the first test of any guitar effects pedal inspired by an actual guitar amplifier – the controls are simple, no fuss.
There are two channels, each with their own footswitch, both of which can be active at the same time, and you can switch the order so that the overdrive channel feeds into the distortion and vice-versa.
Each channel has a set of dials for Level, Gain and Tone – and a toggle-switch for Character. This operates as a Bright switch on the distortion side, and a gain boost on the overdrive side.
And there you go, have at it. Overdrive is… well, in Wampler’s words, it is “that saturated, muscular British crunch that’s all over the records you love”.
Engage the overdrive for the “tight, percussive chug” for palm-muted riffs, or for juicy harmonics. The distortion of the side is inspired by mid ‘80s Mesa amps, that high-end tube amp saturation that somehow remains articulate enough to give you note separation even when it you’re diming the gain.
It’s effectively two dirt pedals in one, or maybe three if you decide to run both overdrive and distortion at the same time, with Wampler promising a “massive, exceptionally full tone – perfect for high-energy solos, fast shred runs, and smooth, fusion-style legato playing”.
The pedal might be inspired by two styles of tube amp but it was explicitly designed to complement the amp in your life, real or digitally modelled.
Run it into a clean channel of a tube amp and it can handle all your gain needs. Run it with an amp modeller and Wampler says it will give it some “ life, warmth, and dimension”.
You can run it at 9V or 19V from a pedalboard power supply. Each Golden Jubilee is made in the USA and covered by a five-year limited warranty. They are priced £/$239.
Head over to Wampler Pedals to find out more.
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