So I had the chance to spend some time with the rare (it is a waiting list pedal) Hermida Audio Zendrive 2 Tube Overdrive Distortion pedal courtesy of my brother, a guitar player. Check it out at
http://www.hermidaaudio.com/.
Controls are Gain, Voice, Tone, and Volume. The Voice is a midrange control. You know what the rest do.
First off, it is an excellent pedal. I found it similar to the Zendrive, but obviously more tube-like. I rather preferred it's tonal characteristics to the Bass-Drive Mosfet that I'm using (Comp Cut mode), although in the grand scheme of things the sound I get out of the Bass-Drive is quite similar to what I got out of the Zendrive, for reference, the Bass-Drive is mainly more controlled sounding. The Zendrive is meant to be more smooth and less gnarly, but I found it less smooth than and more gnarly than the Bass-Drive by a good measure. The pedal doesn't get too gainy, I think calling it a distortion is a little misleading as it's really an overdrive in my book. Below a gain setting of 9 o'clock the pedal loses volume, and it starts to work there or above. A bit above 9 o'clock I got an awesome tube grit sound. Increasing the gain does exactly what you'd expect it to do, you get more harmonics and singing sustain, and more distorted bite. Unlike some tube pedals I've tried though, the bottom end stays relatively the same throughout the gain sweep, although it's never equal to that of the clean signal. The Zendrive isn't the worst pedal as far as bottom cutting, but enough bottom is lost that I will stick with my Bass-Drive, which seems to hold the bottom a little bit better. I imagine the pedal could be modded more bottom friendly, in which case I think it would be a real monster. One thing about it I like is that it is extremely convenient to power; it has a relatively low current draw for a tube pedal, at 9 volts, and can easily be powered with my Dunlop DC Brick. It also has a much smaller footprint than most tube pedals. I didn't try different tubes with it, but I don't imagine a bassier tube will completely solve the low end loss issue as I think it originates in the pedals solid state circuitry, based on the original Zendrive. Overall it's a great pedal, though not 100% bass friendly. I think I'll give the EBS Valve Drive a go when I can get over the inconvenience of powering it and it's larger-than-I'd-like footprint.
