TL/DR: I confess... I have a sick fascination with pedals that have incredible amounts of hype with Guitar players (specifically on Invalid Link Removed) and always ask myself "I wonder what that sounds like on bass..." and inevitably I come over here, search for anything on the pedal and either find nothing at all or a curious soul like me that posted a thread with little to no response.
Today is one of those days I'm glad I decided to bite the bullet and actually try one of those curiosities out - the 1981 DRV pedal made by Matthew Hoopes (of Relient K fame) and his wife. My little bit of knowledge about the pedal was that it was a glorified RAT with an added buffer/preamp stage but it kind of stopped there, turns out it's the best sounding RAT from the dozen or so I've tried.
On it's own it sounds fantastic, like a Turbo RAT and the Mantic Vitriol had a baby with a big(ger) bottom end. Dead silent but super touch responsive with a lot of headroom to breathe, the best qualities of a great RAT without the added compression, it's very articulate and sounds even better being driven by a clean boost. Chords and a muddy B note still come through clear and aggressively.
The biggest surprise for me is that it's the only dirt pedal to date I've been able to stack into the distortion side of my Alpha Omega Ultra without the AOU phase canceling it and making it sound like neutered garbage (I really, really, really need a better preamp with a cab sim - suggestions?)
Are they overpriced? Absolutely. Worth the extra $50 over market to give it a run? No question.
Try one if you can!
Today is one of those days I'm glad I decided to bite the bullet and actually try one of those curiosities out - the 1981 DRV pedal made by Matthew Hoopes (of Relient K fame) and his wife. My little bit of knowledge about the pedal was that it was a glorified RAT with an added buffer/preamp stage but it kind of stopped there, turns out it's the best sounding RAT from the dozen or so I've tried.
On it's own it sounds fantastic, like a Turbo RAT and the Mantic Vitriol had a baby with a big(ger) bottom end. Dead silent but super touch responsive with a lot of headroom to breathe, the best qualities of a great RAT without the added compression, it's very articulate and sounds even better being driven by a clean boost. Chords and a muddy B note still come through clear and aggressively.
The biggest surprise for me is that it's the only dirt pedal to date I've been able to stack into the distortion side of my Alpha Omega Ultra without the AOU phase canceling it and making it sound like neutered garbage (I really, really, really need a better preamp with a cab sim - suggestions?)
Are they overpriced? Absolutely. Worth the extra $50 over market to give it a run? No question.
Try one if you can!
Someone even has one up for $800!! HAHAHAHA
