Marshall Blues Breaker

When I first got this pedal, I didn't much like it because it really didn't give the amount of kick that I was expecting. It took a long time for me to get the controls set for the sound I wanted, but now the damn thing wails!

Unbelievable! I play a Les Paul DC through a 65 Twin Reverb, and all of my friends think I'm a moron for playing a Gibson through something other than a Marshall amp. That's where this pedal comes in. I can get a fantastic lead sound without being noisy and offensive. When used in conjunction with a Wah, you can get a much stronger sound though.

Don't bother with a backup. It doesn't kill batteries either.

My favorite guitarists are Garcia, Allman, and Hendrix. Duane can be almost perfectly emulated (but only if you can play a mean slide), Jerry doesn't really count because he usually sounds best with a clean sound, and if you use a Wah, then when you play Voodoo Child everyone will think that they're really listening to Electric Ladyland. I'll never use another overdrive pedal.

three knobs no waiting....

does exactly what it promises an affordable approximation
of a mid 60's bluesbreaker amp

has never broken in the years i've used it
and i use it from gigs where i just plug into a pa head
to using it as a pre amp for my 65 fender deluxe reverb
or 65 fender twin

never needed it

i have a hi end digital recording studio and this device
is quiet, efficient and versatile, the range of tone goes
from squeaky clean to distorted and allows a great deal of
tonal purity, i prefer it to the tube screamer and other
such devices

Marshall have made two series of pedals. To get technical series 1 is black, series 2 is silver. Which is better? dont know, dont care. This pedal is called an overdrive(hope the trade descriptions people don't see one) There are 3 knobs to control gain tone and volume.

I am using a Strat and Vox setup which has a great cleaninsh sound but not much dirt. I bought this to dirty the sound. I thought this pedal would give instant Marshallisation .Wrong.I was weaned on Boss. Boss make great pedals and every one I have tried or owned sounded great at 12 o clock . This marshall does not. The gain has to be on max to get od and the tone has to be in the last quarter. Re-think time. I have found that if you set the amp for slight OD and then set the Marshall to make that sound slightly more dirty with a slight treble boost and medium volume boost.... whoah! what a lead sound.

Never broken down

n/a I used to work near the factory so I went next door to get a free calender as advertised. There was no one in reception so I asked the first person I saw he got me a copy and as he was Jim Marshall he signed it next to his picture. What a bloke!

I have toyed with electric guitar for 18 years and have recently collected equipement so I can record at home. I thought that one pedal would give me all od sounds, another distortion etc. No No NO. This box gives me blues lead. It doesnt do what it said on the tin but it does supply a useful sound. The advantages of pedals over multi-stuff is that you can mix manufacturers products and choose various pedals for various uses. If someone was desperate enough to ask me to play at a blues gig I would take this pedal, no problem.It didnt cost me much so I will expand my meager collection. moral of the story always try to use your rig when buying pedals I know it's a pain but I learnt the hard way.

Ease of use is somewhat subjective. As others have said, this is not an all-in-one pedal. It does a fairly specific bluesy thing very well. 3 knobs- Gain, Tone, & Volume. I got mine cheap, used, & beat-up. It sounded good as soon as I plugged it in.

Great unobtrusive gain, without artificial midrange additions. Placed between my Strat & Twin Reverb, it doesn't seem to color the tone perceptibly. Also, this might be the only overdrive pedal I've owned which I didn't have to turn down the tone-knob almost all the way to match my clean sound. If anything, the opposite seems true.
My Twin (a '68 or '69 SF, no master volume) Is a gorgeous-sounding clean amp. But I like a little fur on my sound, as if I was playing thru a Deluxe instead. Honestly, amongst all my OD pedals, this is the most natural-sounding in this combination. I would probably drive the front end of it with my TS-9 if I wanted a thicker more distorted sound. But for most rhythms it's perfect.
Better solo sustain can be achieved with a compressor in front of it too.
This does that Stevie Ray Vaughan-a-bee thing very well, especially with a compressor or another OD pedal in front of it, but that's not really what I'm after. It gives a real sweet gain thickness to single-coil pickups, which is great for melodic passages. It DOESN'T add a lot of fuzzy distortion. It DOESN'T add a lot of treble. It DOESN'T add a ton of volume boost. Some adjustment between gain and volume is necessary. I think someone mentioned that previously, too.
Even though it has a mechanical footswitch, it doesn't make any noticeable noise when being engaged or disengaged.

Seems reliable. It's missing the battery cover (this was so when I bought it), so I guess these can get lost or broken. Otherwise, it's solid- a nice metal case.

I went to the Marshall website about a year ago to try to get a replacement battery cover. The site was too multimedia oriented to be tolerated on even a 56k modem, and required some browser plug-ins to enter. Even on my office's T-1, it was dismally slow. I didn't find any way of contacting customer support. Maybe this has changed since then.
I suggested that they "dumb down" their site a bit, and left a message which was never answered.

The style of music I play is constantly changing. I'm mostly influenced by the late 60's, and prefer to think in terms of arrangement than technique. Been playing 19 years now.
I compare this to the OD/distortions of my Boss ME-5 (OD-1, OD-2, Metal Zone), TS-9, Daddy-O, and Original SansAmp. I had a Boss Blues Driver until I got the Bluesbreaker. I sold the BD soon afterward. I would definitely replace it. It definitely lets you get right to work, without hunching over to twist knows or flip switches for hours on end.

It has the traditional 3 control layout (gain, tone, volume) as you find it on many other overdrive pedals. The handling is straight forward and you don't really need a manual for it.

This pedal was designed to simulate the sound of an overdriven 1962 "Bluesbreaker" Combo as the young Clapton made it famous back in 1966, when recording the "Beano" album with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers. And it does this very well. I use it together with my Heritage H150 SD (Les Paul with two Seymour Duncan '59 SH1) and an old "silverface" Twin, which is equipped with original old "Greenbacks" (...like the Bluesbreaker Combo...). I use the pedal to boost the lightly overdriven tubes and this works very well. You can control the overdrive with the volume control of the guitar, this allows you to go from clean to fat warm crunch. Clapton Gibbons, Perry and Allman...you can realize all these trademark sounds with this pedal.
Together with my ESP Series 400 Vinatge Strat (Fender Texas Special PUs) the sound is more like SRV.
This pedal is something for Blues- or Vintage Rock players. It's nothing for the Heavy Metal axeman.
It's not noisy. Although it's a solid state pedal it doesn't spoil the tube sound. I never used it together with an solid state amp, so I don't really know how this will be, but I would recommend to use this pedal together with an tube amplifier.

It's absolutely dependable and its construction is solid as a rock. It has a jack to plug in a 9V DC power supply to make you independent from the battery.

I had no problem with it and never needed any support.

I play Blues, Rock'n Roll and Vintage Rock and for this style it's perfect. Except of my Crybaby Wah it's the only effect I own!!! Before I bought it I tried out many other overdrive pedals (Boss Bluesdriver, Ibanez Tubescreamer, Vintage Rat...) but this one I liked best. I would buy it again. As I mentioned before it's no allround distortion pedal, so you should consider this before you buy it.

This is an update of my previous review (see below). It's always a breeze to dial in a good sound. Just be careful how you set the amount of distortion if you are using an already distorted tube amp. If ya don't watch it, it'll get too muddy.

The reason for this update is because I've used this thing in bizarre circumstances and it always sounds good, at worst - usable. I plugged it into an old Kasino 4-10 cabinet with a built in 100 watt transistor power amp. Since the Kasino has no controls, I also plugged in a cheapo 6-band EQ. I managed to get a real good sound out of it! I recently went to a jam session and was too lazy to pull my amp out of the trunk. So, I just plugged the Bluesbreaker straight into the PA (a Peavey six channel powered mixer) and with a little tweaking it sounded OK. Not great, but pretty good. I've also tried it out through various transistor amps set clean. It sounds almost like a good tube amp cranked. I used to go to the jam nights with my amp in the trunk because you never know what you'll wind up playing through. Now I just take this pedal. I think it would sound great even if I plugged into the refridgerator!

I've had it for several months now with no problems. The battery compartment door keeps falling off, but that's it. I've since sold off my backup - a Tube Works Real Tube. So, obviously I have alot of faith in this thing.

I'm still using it with my old Rat pedal in front of it if I need a little more gain. I recently tried the Drivemaster and was not thrilled by it. My ear tells me that the Bluesbreaker sounds better with something else in front to boost it as opposed to just getting the Drivemaster for the extra gain. I'm using this setup for Blues right now but would feel comfortable using it with any kind of music.

The only thing that stops me from giving this no-brainer pedal a 10 in this category is that you have to be VERY careful how you set the pedal volume and amp volume as this will make a HUGE difference in tone. Otherwise plug in and put the gain on 10 and control it from the guitar volume.

Sounds great with all of my guitars. I'm running through a Sovtek Mig-50 head and a 4-10 cab. I'm playing a Telecaster and G&L Legacy. Seems to be very touch sensitive like a good tube amp should. Just for kicks I ran it into the worst transistor amp in the shop and it STILL sounded good.

I've been using it for several months now with no problems. I've since retired my old Tube Works Real Tube II. Anybody wanna buy it???

Haven't had to deal with them

I use this pedal for every gig I play. Mostly blues but, when the blues gigs get slow I'll occasionally take a country or top-40 gig to pay the bills. I just leave the pedal on full time and control it from the guitar. If I need more gain, I'll stick my old Rat pedal in front of it with it's volume maxed, tone about half way, and distortion about a quarter the way up just to boost it a little. Sounds very smooth and natural that way. The Rat usually stays off though.

Very easy to use. Only 3 knobs: gain, tone, & volume.

My main guitar is a Fender Foto-flame Strat (which has great tone) and my amp is a Fender Vibro King. I needed an overdrive/bluesy box that would not change the tone of my guitar when I kick it in (so I could play the Vibro King at lower volume) and, the Blues Breaker is the only box I could find that would fit that bill. When set properly there is no tone coloration. I previously used an Ibanez TS-9 reissue and it always seemed to thin out a little when I kicked it in but it was the best I could find at the time. The Blues Breaker is definitly not a "heavy metal" box but it works very well for it's intended purpose. A great blues tone seems like it's the most difficult to find and the Blues Breaker nails that sound and it also seems to react to your touch, depending on how you "lean into" the guitar. SRV & Albert would love this. Great for rock also.

I have only had the box for a short time but it is a heavy box and seems well made. Electonics can be unpredictable so I always have a backup. The best laid plans of mice and men . . . . . . .

No problems yet.

I have been playing guitar since I saw the boys on the Ed Sullivan Show. I guess I'm giving away my age but I play mainly for a hobby now, in a trio that does a wide variety of music. I think we all have a tone in our head that we are always trying to recreate with our gear and, 30 years later, I think I finally found that sound I kept hearing in my head. The Blues Breaker pedal with its sweet, uncolored, touch sensitive tone has my vote as the best overdrive I have ever heard. This is also why I have been playing a $450 Japanese Fender Foto-flame Strat through a $1700 Vibro King for the past 3 years. This is the sound I hear in my head and the Blues Breaker pedal was the last peice to my 30 year puzzle.

This is very straightforward and the controls operate over a fairly narrow range. Basically, a natural sounding overdrive 'crunch' box. The manual is superficial, but there really isn't much to it, gain, tone and volume.

I have used this into 3 amps I have owned, Peavey Classic 30, Peavey Duel Classic 120 and now Fender Custom Vibrosonic.In each case, into a clean channel, this gives a modicum of drive, i.e. Stones type sounds, blues. It works in harmony with the amp and used to add extra drive to the dirty channel of the Peavey Classic 30. It is not noisy. This is a basic, but very good sound.

Built like a tank - unlikely to fail. Seems easy on batteries.

Never needed it.

I have used this in blues and general rock. I am always glad it is there, but it is not a spectacular sound.I have far more exotic things available, but this is the one which always gets used. I might go for something like a tube driven box if I was looking for something now, but this has to be an excellent buy and I'll probably never get rid of it.

It takes a bit of tinkering to get the precise sound you might be looking for, but I wouldn't go so far as to liken it to brain surgery. I mean, it's not like a 1968 model guitar synth or anything.

This unit ultimately does a terrific job of emulating a tube amp driven at different levels. To date, it's the only pedal I've found that can achieve one of my favorite sounds, the late-period Beatles John Lennon tone, as from "Come Together" or "Don't Let Me Down".

I've had this one for about five years, and have yet to see a problem with it.

Definitely a winner for home use; I feel the Blues Breaker is terrific for recording a "big" sound in a little apartment.