Fulltone Distortion Pro

An inexperienced effect user or player may have a little trouble. Not instant gratification. One needs work with it in order to find all the great sounds.

I get a chuckle when I read the reviews on this pedal. Some talk about how the mass-produced Distortion pedals can be unnatural and lacking in good sound, and now that some one has produced a boutique Distortion pedal that delivers, people wonder why its not like a DS-1.
I think this is because there are a whole lot of use 30 somethings and younger that were weened on high gain distortion from solid state devices. Its one thing if you dont like the tone, but to say that its not what Fuller says it is, is just not true and clearly from the ill-informed. I think many of us just dont understand or havent heard what high volume tube distortion sounds like. I learned this myself trying to cop the George Lynch sound. I finally figured it out when I plugged my tube head, clean boosted, into a Greenback cab. There was the sound. A loud Marshall, clean boosted and into the greenbacks. Thats kinda what this pedal sounds like. I real thick, old Marshall, higher on the rock distortion side, than on the overdive side. If you want a bit more gain, or an edgier bass side, just run a TS into it. Also one thing to remember, its more important how you sound in the mix than in your bedroom! Thats where this baby delivers!

Very reliable....would not worry!

Mike Fuller is a great guy, answered my emails in minutes. But he is busy and he make top of the line stuff, so he going to expect educated questions

If you want a distortion sound that gives you an old Marshall sound, only a little heavier then this is your pedal. It also great because you can boost it with a tube screamer to get a more modern sound, i.e. tighter, edgier bottom, that still has a lot of the vintage Marshall qualities. But before you buy, make sure you understand that its a Marshall sound, its not going to be like a newer high gain amp, that has that pre-amp distortion sound, it sounds like power amp distortion. I personally love it, cause I can get all the classic 80's metal like George Lynch, Warren DeMartini...I can get sort of a late 60's hard rock sound, 70's.....and with my Maxon TS and Fulldrive i can get a a slightly different take on modern heavy sounds.

I felt compelled to write about this pedal. I bought it on a whim, like some other writers, and was hugely disappointed at first...yes it can be a fuzz pedal...but...tinker with it a little...don't just write it off! I was just about to bring it back to where ever, then I found a good setting. Turn the "highs" knob all the way down then crank the other little knobs and find a level of gain you like. Mine fuzzed and hissed until I turned the highs down.....lots of potential features though

Once the highs was turned down I get this great woman tone kind of sound...thick & robust with enough juice to use often enough to keep. With my strat it doesn't sound like a les paul but definitely gives it a more humbuck like tone...with emphasis on the lows and mids. Ive come to like it alot.

I can't imagine this ever having problems.

n/a

My board is: e-ball mono volume>buddwah>homebrew germania>barber burn unit>OCD>Distortion pro>Keeley fuzz head>(all through a true bypass box) out through a barber launch pad...using a strat, les paul & first act sheena into a matchless clubman 35 and fargen blackbird. I keep the darker tone pedals toward the back and cascade them with the higher toned...all in all I have alot of different tones at my feet and the d-pro is a valid portion that makes awesome creamy tones that are functional in my pop rock band. Don't write it off so fast...give it a chance.

It's impossible to get a good sound out of it - until you discover the secret (duh!). It only sounds good when driving a tube amp that's already clipping. All of the criticisms you'll read here about it being a fuzz box are true until you get your amp good and hot (loud).

It takes a lot of tweaking even when you've found the secret. Don't be afraid to turn the mini-pots on the front through their full sweep. There are interesting sounds everywhere.

Also, the box is super sensitive to the amp: try plugging into a Deluxe Reverb's reverb channel in the higher gain input. Ouch. Then try plugging it into the non-reverb channel: much smoother.

When driving a tube amp with its power output stage saturated the Distortion Pro has that Marshall snarl without sounding fuzzy. The pedal responds really well to changing pick dynamics and attack, with the amp smoothing out the spikey-ness(?) of the pedal's inherent sound.

Fulltone's site suggests that the DP will get you to the sound of Eric Johnson or Allan Holdsworth: a lead tone that is pretty smooth. The Saturation control does a great job of smoothing out the dynamics but I would say the DP is not the most direct route to the Holdsworth/Johnson tones. If you stack your Tubescreamer in front of the DP with the DP set to a low distortion level things start to get interesting yield that smooth, sustaining tone the fusion players love.

Lastly, this is a gigging pedal, not a bedroom jamming pedal. It's voiced to cut through a rock band and will sound like crap until you play it loud.

Fulltone has a well deserved reputation for building road worthy gear, with the exception of mini-pots on the Distortion Pro. The first run seemed to be made of Play Doh and deteriorated rapidly. This is fixed on new versions.

I would gig without a backup as it's unlikely to fail and I carry a TS-808 clone that would cover the territory if it did fail (not to say that a Tube Screamer sounds anything like the Distortion Pro).

I play baby boomer music (blues, rock, jazz, fusion) on a Godin xtSA (high output strat sound), Godin Montreal (335 sound), and a Les Paul (like a Godin LGX ;-). I only use a Deluxe Reverb as I haven't found a clean tone to compare after several other Fenders, Boogies, Marshalls, Traynors ... you get the picture.

I've been playing thirty years as a performing amateur (I get paid now and then but not enough to feed the dog).

I would buy the pedal again, although I would try the GT-500 from Fulltone before buying as I use the DP with a Tubescreamer a lot ( the basic architecture of the GT-500 is overdrive into distortion).

There are 6 knobs - not including the internal trimmers. You can be at this thing for days tweaking. That being said, this is not a "set and forget" pedal. Long ago, when the ADA Mp-1 was the rage everyone was saying how great it was to be able to fine tune the distortion to each and every room you played in. But that was a pain to do with the MP-1 but that benefit is derived in this pedal. You can easily adjust the overall tone from the pedal. I have to admit it does take some time with this pedal. This isnt really a pedal for amatuers.

I use this pedal with either a H&K Puretone head or a Hiwatt DR504 with a 4x12 Celestion cab. I also use on my board a Keeley Compressor, a Boss GE-7 e.q. a Fulltone OCD and a Keeley Modded Ad-9.
This pedal has the plexi Marshall thing cold. Simply put, that's what it does. The website does not lie. If you have a good tube amp with responsive tone controls than this thing will give you the great Marshall tone of yesteryear. Think AC/DC, Sex Pistols, some VH ( early ),Slash even some Allman Bros . I think this pedal gets a real bum rap on this site. It is a great pedal for what it does and that is it "Marshallizes" a loud , good tube amp. I think this part of the problem, most people dont know the open powerful sound of a good Ol' Marshall. It isnt a modern sound so fans of modern sounds probably are many of the disappointed. You can get Overdrive sounds and semi-Fuzz tones. This is not a holy grail do-it all distortion, but a good player with good equipment will tell you that this is a great pedal.

Built like a tank - No problem here.

I have 2 Fulltone pedals - I have had them both for a couple of years. I have had no problem with them so no reason for customer support. I know well enough to realize that Mike Fuller has plenty of friends & I am a customer.

I have been playing hard rock for 28 years. I went into a high end music store in NYC and asked " I got a great amp, what is the best distortion pedal to give me that classic Marshall plexi sound ? " I was sold this pedal and I can't complain. It is a great pedal for slide playing because of all the voicings that the controls provide. I have tried this pedal through a 6l6 amp and it seems more geared toward EL-34 type amps. So to recap - it does one thing ( plexi Marshall sound ) really well. It needs to be used with a good tube amp with responsive tone controls, and it needs to be played loud.
If stolen - I would get another one w/o question. Keep in mind it is a well made if not the best made Distortion pedal availiable.

The pedal has two normal sized knobs for Volume and Distortion, and four tiny knobs marked by Resonance, Voicing, Highs, and Saturation. It should be simple to use, but it turned out that whatever effort I put into tweaking, the sound was really sub-standard. I can only conclude that it was not easy to use.

I bought the pedal after it received the Editor's Pick in Guitar Player a few years ago. That taught me a lesson about the reliability of so called "bench tests" in magazines: don't believe what you read!

The sound produced by this pedal was really, really bad. I tested it on a large number of high quality tube amps of various sorts, and on hybrid amps, and on transistor amps. The pedal consistently produced a sound of unacceptably poor quality. In fact, even the absolutely best tube amps in my arsenal sounded like cheapo transistor amps when engaging the Distortion Pro pedal. That was really unexpected, regarding the raving review in Guitar Player. This makes one think: what are the factors warranting a good review written by one of the journalists in a magazine? And what implications does an Editor's Pick have for the sales of a product? I bought my Distortion Pro solely on the basis of the review, but that was a huge mistake. After this, I have become really, really skeptical to any conclusion drawn in the magazine reviews, as they seem not to be objective at all.

The four small knobs were flimsy and vulnerable. Otherwise, it looked sturdy.

Never dealt with the company.

I have been playing the electric guitar for 28 years. I play mostly rock based improvisational music, and I own a motherload of seriously good equipment. My experimental duo plays a few gigs a year (alternative festivals, and some club gigs), and I perform solo about a handful of times a year. I am extremely critical when it comes to sound, and it soon became clear that the Fulltone Distortion Pro was a total miss from a sonic point of view. Therefore, I sold it, and I was glad I got rid of that hunk of junk. Instead, I spent some time testing alternatives, and I ended up with the fabulous BJF Dyna Red Distortion as my main distortion pedal. For lower distortion level (actually, more in the overdrive domain) I use a Klon Centaur.

This pedal is pretty difficult to get a good sound out off, all of the knobs are labled, but that doesnt seem to make it any eaiser. The manual is legit, contains three sample settings and blank spaces on the back for you to fill in your own settings. I even adjusted the trim pots turning them clockwise (less gain, mids, what have you) and it didnt seem to improve clarity or anything.

My rig is pretty straight forward, 90s tele standard(little 59 bridge pu), planet waves stompbox tuner, voodoo labs sparkle drive, holy grail reverb, phase 90, and a micro amp. All of that runs into my peavey classic 50. I purchased the pedal because fuller said it would make my tele "compete" with humbucker equipped guitars. Well it does a lot less than that. It seems as soon as you turn the gain up it is too much. And along with it comes this high end fuzz whenever you play. Ive tried and tried and cannot get rid of it. If youve read any other reviews that say fullers crazy this is a fuzzbox, well there right.. IT IS A FUZZBOX. The other guitar player in my band uses a full drive 2 and it sounds pretty good but i dont think ill ever give my business to fulltone again. This pedal is a very large letdown. Come on fulltone...honestly.

This thing is built like a tank, We should send these to iraq.. I would use a digitech deathmetal distortion before i used this at a gig...

I didnt even bother trying to contact fulltone, ive heard way to many bad things. People, please take your business elswhere. Places like robert keeley, radial, zvex...anything!

Im still really young (17), and ive only been playing guitar for like 4 years, but living in nashville with a band that plays out you have to know, and have, good tone. People, this isnt good tone. I think im going to go back to gc, get a tonebone, and then go out to lunch.

FYI, one of the knobs in the back is an input gain knob. If you're using high output pickups, the key is to turn this trim pot down to clean up the input stage of the clipping. Otherwise, you got Fuzz-central.

All those here saying they get a Fuzz-tone need to lower the trim pot down and then start tweaking the knobs in the front to dial in the ideal distortion sound.

Will always sound vintage, because that is what the pedal is. Designed to have a "tube-like" personality. It is quite frankly ironic, because tubes usually = warmth which is something those pedals coming out with the preamp tubes in them do not have.

Stop complaining that it doesn't sound "modern." Go buy a modern distortion box for that. If you want an all-in-one distortion pedal good luck. Personally, the all-in-one approach is a lost cause. No two people want the same things in their overdrive and distortion. So to make an all-in-one is setting yourself up for disappointment.

But I digress, the distortion pro is very toneful: fat distortion like you've never heard in a Boss, Ibanez, or what have you. You can go from fatter overdrives that the Fulldrive (TS808) really can't touch to a saturated Marshall distortion.

Will not break unless you submerge with lighter fluid and torch.

Try it out before you let any of the reviewers here pre-judge what this pedal does and what it doesn't. We all know that you have folks that really know what their talking about and folks that don't know squat. Folks here that gig regularly with huge amps and folks here that play in front of a mirror with a tine 15-watter.

For both folks and all in between, you're going to get subjective reviews. No single piece of equipment is good for all. Try it out!

Tweakable yes, but not in the right ways. For instance: I want to dial out the mids, how the heck do you do that? None of the knobs really can be used to scoop out frequencies. I want to make the distortion tighter with more of a Proco Rat like attack. How do I do this? Fiddled with the "Highs" knob and the Distortion knob that is supposed to control the first clipping stage. No luck. Messed with the trim pots in the back while sending a looped signal into the pedal thru the amp. Tweakability is a very sad thing on this pedal. Boss pedals are tweakable like an EQ pedal. The Distortion Pro's infinite knobs do not.

If you like the sound out of the box, then no problem.

"Not a FUZZ!" was the description on the Fulltone website. Mike Fuller needs to call me because we need to have a little discussion on what a Fuzz is and what Distortion is. Proco Rat = Distortion. Metal Zone = Distortion. DS-1 Distortion. Distortion Pro = FUZZ!

You gotta be kidding me. This is a Marshall Plexi classic 60's Fuzz-Crunch in a box. It is thick and has gobs and gobs of gain layered on top of gain. Think about a Proco Rat gain set at 3 o'clock where it starts to Fuzz out. The tweakability is all centered around this tone. The only palm muting you get with this is by putting a wah pedal in front and rocking it all the way forward.

Your treble strings will sound huge. Very thick and with lots of fat gain. However, the unmistakeble nature of the Fuzz gets very fat crunchy and loose on the bass strings - think 60s Cream, "Woman" tone. When you play chords all that thick fat gain intersects producing that classic Fuzz crunch. Your chords more or less sound like Hendrix "Purple Haze." You can absolutely nail this tone with this pedal.

Very good pedal for Solos; not so good for rhythm work. This is 60s Marshall NOT Mesa Boogie. Vintage not Modern. Eric Johnson not System of a Down. Sorry dudes, anyone that says modern distortion has got no tone - you all need get out of the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Music is progressive and evolving - learn to embrace it.

Like a tank in munchkinland.

It's not a bad pedal, but I'm giving it an 8 because the title and description don't fit the tone. I wish the knobs were straight forward like an EQ. But it is what it is and it does what Mike Fuller created it to do. You can definitely tell it's a quality tone that comes through. Anyone that says that you can get better distortion at a third the price is a moran. Let's face it, distortion pedals are cheap little gadgets to produce compared to this beast. Use it for what it is and get your $60 distortion boxes to play side-by-side.

It's a labor of love with this pedal. Read the manuel it will gey you started buy showing you some starting points and what the knobs do. From there I found it easy to get great sounds and every time I what something a little differant a tweak or 2 and another great tone is there. I believe this is a 2001 version.

I have gottin SRV, Santana, Hendrix, and several great tones
from thi pedal. I play a SRV strat with Van zandt pickups mostly
and have used it with a Reverend Roco with humbuckers. No Hiss at all. Every knob works and they enteract with each other so you can always get that little extra you want or don't want. I play though a black face super and use this pedal occasionally at the gig for distortion at lower volumes.

This is indestructable. I'ts been strong for 3 years now.

Haven't dealt with them and probly won't have to.

I can't believe I don't see people useing these or hear anything about them. IN the 30 years i've been playing This is the first dist. pedal i've kept over a year. I've had them all.

Very easy to use - More options than your standard OD/Distortion pedal. Manual is very useful and explains each function in detail.

This is my first Fulltone pedal. I took the shiny red pedal out of the box in amazement like Ralphie on Christmas Story with his new RR BB Gun. Like Ralphie I was Excited at first but left dissappointed - OK Enough you all know the story - The pedal is solid - I plugged it into the clean channel of a 100W Marshall JCM900 with 6L6 Sylvania Power Tubes and Mullard 12AX7 Preamp Tubes. I have a custom Mahogany Hamer with Dimarzio Fred Pups. The pedal is Quiet. Strong Volume and works great in bypass mode. I read the Manual and understand all the functions. I'M into Vai, Satriani, Rhoads and VH type tones - Couldn't even get close with this pedal. The word Distortion pedal really through me - more like Fuzz Distortion. The Gain in my opinion is not smooth - no matter what I did it made my humbuckers sound like single coils - very vintage tone - It's a great pedal but not for me - I'M into more modern tone - like a modded Boss SD-1 or Kelley TS9 Baked - Like I said the word Distortion through me + I figured with all the tone shaping knobs I could get my tone - couldn't get rid of that 60s "Spirit in the sky" or something like that tone - I checked the internal settings just to make sure they were factory set - they were not touched - I put the pedal back together and back in the box it went

The Pedal is Fulltone Quality and I'M sure it could survive livn' outside in a Florida Modbile Home Park next to a Gator Pool in the middle of Hurricane Season. I wouldn't use this in a gig unless it was 1969

I have never dealt with Fulltone - I'M sure their a Top Notch Company - It's made in USA and not Mass Produced - well maybe medium produced

Very Expensive - I can't even play it - I had to check the internal switches to make sure it was working properly - It' just not my type of tone - that doesn't mean it's a bad pedal - it just didn't work for me - The price should be lower and the name should be changed to Fuzz Drive 69 or something like that - I have a Fulltone Fulldrive 2 on the way - I hope that's better - I have been paying for 20 yrs. I own mostly Marshall amplifiers. If It were stolen I would be mad - only because I paid over $150.00 for this pedal - I would not buy it again - I'M mad because I bought it the 1st time. I love nothing about this pedal - I would love someone to buy it - my favorite feature would be to get my $$ back. I bought this pedal because it has the word Distortion in it + has a lot of tone shaping and it's a fulltone - I wish with all these knowbs you could make the tone Vintage or modern - It's just vintage - Fuzzy not smooth - very single coil sounding - not solid even on my low strings.