DigiTech Grunge

Its pedal with 4 knobs: output, high, low, and level. If you're familiar with distortion pedals, this should be a cinch.

If you're looking for a grungy tone, this may not be the pedal you're looking for. It takes a lot of messing with the EQ to get a decent grunge sound. I run a Boss Super Overdrive in front of it and I'm able to get a much better sound.

However, this makes for a GREAT black metal pedal. If you want to sound like Mayhem, later Darkthrone, and Burzum, this is the pedal for you. The EQ is fairly responsive. This pedal is LOUD.

I'm giving this thing a 7/10 in this category only because it isn't very flexible

This thing is pretty durable. I've had it for about 5 years and this thing is in great shape. The paint is shipping a bit, but thats only a minor cosmetic flaw. The knobs seem pretty sturdy. This thing has been stomped on pretty hard over the years; I don't think i'll need a backup.

Never dealt with DigiTech, and based on the experience I've had with their pedals (this, the Hot Head, and the death metal), I won't be needing to deal with them any time soon.

For what I need it for, this thing does its job very well. If it got stolen, I'd totally pay the $40 to get a new one.

It's pretty easy to use if you know how pedals work in general. But it can be a little hard to get the best sound out of it because like most distortion pedals it can be very noisy if the amp you play through has no noise gate.

I used mostly Deans and Ibanez with it, through either a Marshall halfstack, Crate Halfstack or a Line 6 combo amp. It can be very noisy if your amp is on a high gain/distortion setting. But when I used it on a Clean, or low gain setting it wasn't noisy at all. Also it is very powerful, on a half stack, I can put the clean volume on 1 and it is louder going through the pedal than me playing on 5 on a normal distortion setting with no pedal. Overral sound is pretty good, but a $100+ distortion pedal is obviously better, this is a great pedal for those who've the economy has hit hard being only 40 something dollars

Very Reliable, like another reviewer said, you could drop this out of a building and it would still work.

I haven't called customer support, but when I bought it from guitar center the guys there were very helpful with getting me insurance on it and yadda yadda yadda

For me, I play metal and it's pretty awesome for the low growls and high gains of metal and chugging guitars. For someone actually playing grunge style music, it might be too heavy for you unless you can find a style that you like the most.
I compared it to a digitech metal pedal and a boss metal pedal, forgot the names, but it seemed to be as heavy as them, but once you get a heavy sound with it, thats it, unlike other metal pedals that allow you to change up the sound alot while keeping it very distorted.

This pedal has 4 knobs - one for volume, two EQ and a distortion level. Very easy. I bought a DOD grunge when I was 15 and had it figured out in 5 minutes, even when I had no experience of such things.

I bought a DOD grunge as one of my first distortion pedals years ago. I sooned learnt that over the top distortion pedals don't cut through with a band. They are designed for kids to make a racket in their bedroom - and indeed they sound good at bedroom levels. With a band you just get covered in fuzz and squealing feedback and it sounds awful.

After I got into noise I discovered that I liked the DOD grunge again. You can make squealing feedback and out of control sounds and I remain convinced that if it cost $200 and was called a "noise swash destroyer" then people would kill theirselves to get one. The other day I saw this pedal (the digitech reissue) in the shop and decided to try it out.

The sound is nasty and over the top. It sounds very poor, thin and noisy, but isn't nearly as extreme as the DOD grunge was. Shame. It's a decent noise pedal, but there are better ones out there. It sounds nice and heavy at home into a small amp, but a mush with a full band.

The two outputs are handy because you can create feedback loops easily.

The digitech cases are solid and have a good switch. They appear reliable. I took my pedal apart to rehouse it in a box as a feedback loop as a synth tone generator. When you take it out of the box you see that the knobs and pots are cheap plastic, the circuit board is floppy and the jacks are mounted onto the board. It is uncanily similar to the design of a a rockteck pedal put into a metal case. Deceptive appearences. I feel very sad that the old DOD pedals (with their flakiness and much hated plastic switches) seem very reliable compared to this cheap rubbish. Poor show digitech.

Never tired, but DOD never replied to me ever. They are the same company.

This is a decent pedal for anyone who plays at home into a practice amp. It will give you a heavy rock, grunge or metal tone at a cheap price. Don't expect it to sound good with a band. I found it to be a Disappointing pedal, but it's alright I guess.

This is a pretty simple pedal, it got 4 knobs: Loud, Low, High and Grunge. The "manual" comes with som suggestions, how you can turn the knobs, to get different sounds.

I have tested it with my Fender Jaguar HH with dragster humbucker, into a Peavay 25 watt combo, and a Marshall JCM800.

Let me say, that first of all I bought this pedal some years ago, and it's my first stompbox. At that time, it sounded so ******* cool to me, but as the years have past my opionien have went from "WOW"!! too "ehw".
Right now I'm using it as a boost, and it sucks at that too.
I think the tone of it is sounding very thin and digital. Well then, it isn't analog I know. But for me, this is just sounding to fake, to be real.

I think I could knock out my sister for good, with this pedal. The only thing is the plastic knobs, but I haven't had a problem with it.

Haven't had any complains or stuff like that, so haven't been in touch with them. Therefor, no opinion.

I play lots of styles, but basically blues, funk, rock. And for a beginner, this is a good distortion pedal, but not for a more experience player.
But as I said, right now it's on my board, trying to act like a boost pedal. Along with my Rat2 (modded), Carl Martin Red Repeat and my Crybaby GCB95 (modded as hell!).

The Digitech Grunge is easy to use just like any other distortion stompbox. It is special in one way though. It has both an amp output and a mixer output which has some cab emulation. The cab simulation is more of a bandpass filter or 2 which cuts some low end and kills all the highs (15KHz).
For only having low and high tone controls, it offers a good deal of tonal control.

This pedal is misnamed and should be called crunch or something to that effect. It is not for guitarists who like to "work" the distortion by adjusting the guitar's volume knob. For best results this pedal should be used with passive pickups into a "guitar" amp using 12" speakers.
Smaller speakers tend to exaggerate the highs too much and active pickups drive the pedal too hard and it gets a little muddy.
I also tried it on a Crate AC125 amp which has 2x 6" spkrs and a piezo horn. It sounded horrible until I tried the Grunge's "mixer" output. Awesome tone through an Ibanez Talman. Try the "mixer" out when running into a small practice amp to tame the crispies.

The pedal is well built. Very rugged. Stomp boxes tend to be very reliable from Digitech so a backup isn't an issue.

I've never needed customer support from this company in over 20 years.

For hard rock or metal, this is a nice pedal. The "mixer" output is a nice feature that helps it to sound good on several different types of amps. Great pedal for the money.
Put an eq pedal next to this for more tones.

pretty straight forward. volume, highs, lows, and amount of grunge. as long as your not a complete idiot you'll be able to use it properly. The presets in the tiny manual pretty much show all you can actually do with this pedal, which isn't much. it doesn't take long to figure that it doesn't have great sound. although it is usable. I currently use it as a distortion for my bassist bass. it works surprisingly well with the right amp

I used this pedal though a esp m-200 and the tone was horrible. that i blame on the guitar though. I also put it though my ibanez sz prestige which has emg 81/85. That produced a "usable" tone, and by all means is it good. its good enough to play with but tone wise horrible. one good thing about it is that it is pretty much noise free. since there are cheaper pedals similar to this on the market i wouldn't really buy this one for its tone... or its anything.

Man you could do anything to this thing and it would survive. seriously id be interested to know if anyone has thrown this off a 20 story building just to see if it would survive cos i think it would

Never delt with Digitech and don't intend to. i can imagine them being horrible in this department though

I play alot of everything. Stuff from muse to slipknot. You wouldnt be able to get anything like that on it. i bourght this just so i had a distortion and at the time i thought it was good. ive come to realise it isnt good at all. you may be able to get tones like.... nivana, but tones like that arnt very good in the first place. i have since given this pedal to my bassist to use as a distortion and purchsed a digitech rp350. mainly because it is really versitile but im still not happy with the mediocre tones of digitech

Four knobs, for volume, low, high, and gain...it couldn't get much easier. I like it for a solo sound with the Loud knob at 1 o'clock, Low at 10, High at 2, and Grunge at 2...that gives it a thin sound if it's alone, but if you have a distortion pedal before it in the signal path it still stays rich (if fuzzy). That said, it works on its own for Mudhoney covers.

I use a Squier Strat with hot rails, a Schecter Black Hawk, and a B.C. Rich Bronze Series Warlock in drop-B into a Fender G-DEC. My effects (from the guitar to the amp) are a Morley Pro Wah, a Danelectro Chili Dog, Ibanez TS-7, Ibanez DS-7, Digitech Hot Head, and then this baby. Now first off, the thing's noisy as hell, especially with another distortion before it, but you know what, if you don't want noise you probably shouldn't use a pedal called "grunge". I play grunge-influenced noise shred, and I love using this pedal and the DS-7 for the feedback and harmonics I can get with it. I can get a thin harmonic over every fret with this thing on. Now, this pedal's not for everyone. It doesn't sound good with the gain turned down, and it really can't get, say, a classic rock or thrash metal sound, and it sounds like **** if you turn down the high, but for what it is, it's amazing.
I don't know about other people, but I haven't been able to find a use for the Mixer Out except running to two amps. It sounds flat to me.

Well...it's built like a tank, all solid metal, and I've never had it fail on me. On the other hand, it goes through batteries fast, and when the battery gets low switching gets unreliable. So I'd recommend either using a wall plug or having a backup.

Never dealt with them. Mind you, I got it from a pawn shop.

Well, I've only been playing for about two years, but I've used a lot of different effects and this is one of my personal favorites. I've used it live five or six times, and it's sounded good every time. Everybody I know who's heard it loved this thing on my solos, and for controlled feedback. I really only got it because I'm a sucker for cheap things in pawn shops, but I'm glad I did. I'd recommend it to anyone playing grunge, noise, or punk music.

This thing could not be easier to use. It even comes with a manual which gives you suggestions for types of "Grunge" that you can use. And the suggestions that it comes with sound superb, especially when you filter it through a clean setting (filtering through a distorted setting doesn't go far).

I play this through a Fender G-DEC Jr. (go ahead and laugh) or a Hartke half-cabinet bass amp with a guitar head of some off-brand sort (my Youth Group can't afford a guitar amp). I play usually 2 different guitars; a Fender MIM Stratocaster, or a Gibson 1961 Melody Maker (with no modifications). And there IS a problem. For those of you who have EVER owned a Melody Maker, old or new, you know it only has one piddly pickup. A good one, but it only has one. And when you play through the Grunge with only one pickup/humbucker, the noise sets in. Its not that squealing feedback you hear, its just a crapload of humming and all sorts. Although it does sound more dense and heavy.

But then there's the Stratocaster. Everybody knows they have 3 pickups, weather it be a S/S/S or a S/S/H. I play just a standard with a S/S/S configuration (usually through the bridge and middle) and thats where this pedal really shows its stuff. The sound gets clear and you find you get just the amount of distortion and what kind of distortion you want. Thus you really exploit the tone you're looking for, even that good ol' Dimebag tone (or at least close to it).

So in short, if you're going to buy this pedal, buy it for a guitar that at least has two humbuckers. If you don't, you're in for a world of humming and agitation. But played through something like a Fender Stratocaster, you get a very wonderful bunch of crunch that would make Dimebag Darrell cry.

I'd give it a 10, but the fact that it has to be played through a double-pickup configuration to get a desirable tone just is a bit of a setback.

Its got a metal casing on it, so it'll hold up very very well, naturally. Although the "loud" knob has become slightly loose but not loose enough to where if you move it it'll pop off or move the setting (or just not work at all). I think you could probably hurl this little booger at your little brother/sister and it could stand up to the impact fairly well.

The people at the music store I went to were nice enough to let me diddle with this and several other pedals before I decided. They even provided a free battery. But I guess this part of the review is more or less directed toward Digitech. I didn't pay too terribly much for this [wonderful] pedal, I think I would rather have my father fix it (he's handy with electronics) or just buy a new one at the shop.

I have been playing for about half a year, and I like to play metal (I can play some things despite my short period of *ehm* rocking). I would much rather choose this over a Boss Metal Zone or a Digitech Metal Master/Death Metal pedal, it just has a better feel of overdrive as a whole. If you turn it off, it doesn't screw over your preset so thats really nice. If it were stolen or lost, I would be rushing to the store to get a new one ASAP!! I would DEFINITELY recommend this pedal to ANYONE who had an interest in metal/hard rock/grunge (most particularly Nirvana. Ol' Cobain liked to go heavy on the overdrive).

And they're cheap enough. $60-$70. Way cheaper if you can find one used.

the sound quality was very good for harmonics and for power cords and solos i use it with a squier tele costom (p90 humbuckers)and a squier tele thineline through dunlop crybaby,marshall blues breaker 2, marshall regenerator and a orange crush 10 it gives out a very beafy sound good for metal,punk and obviusly grunge not for everyone.

the hard metal cassing pretects it but the but when/if you use baterys they dont last very long

never used it

it is very hard to find fault with this pedal but it is hard to turn the nobes and fiddly to change the batery but over all this is a very good pedal

There is four knobs. Loud (volume), High (treble), Low (bass) and Grunge (distortion). It also has two outputs: Amp and Mixer. There is nothing that makes grunge too hard to use.

I use this little beast with my Marshall 4023. The guitar I mainly use is Fender 60's telecaster with hot rails on the bridge.

Grunge gets noisy if you turn the loud knob too much. There is a lots of bass and treble! The grunge knob has very little effect on the sound (except it adds sustain the more you crank it).

If you use the amp output it sounds like metal zone, which i don't like that much. I use the mixer output. It sounds close to the Lee Jackson GP-1000 for me and it was the sound I was looking for. Alexi Laiho and Roope Latvala are using the GP-1000.

Only annoying thing is the little noise you get but that's not a big deal.

Grunge has metal core. I would absolutely depend on it!

This thing is made for metal and that's that. I can't even think doing anything else with this. It's a great pedal for it's price. If it were lost, I would absolutely buy another one!