Product: Maxon SM-9 Super Metal Distortion
Price Paid: US $168 on eBay (I was jonsing for it....) used
Submitted
04/28/2005
at
08:31pm
by
Anonymous
Ease of Use
:
8
Five knobs, just like the US version released under the Ibanez name. Basically, they are level, distortion, treble, mids, and bass, though they don't say that. Two points off for semantics.
Sound Quality
:
8
Tried with Gibson Les Paul Standard into Crate tube amp, etc. This is not a "super" powerful distortion. As everyone says, it's like "a tube screamer on steroids", though you can get rid of that mid-range hump with the "attack" (treble) and "punch" (bass) knobs. Isn't a punch a kind of attack? At high settings, there is some noise.
I AB'd this with a new Maxon SD-9. The SM-9 is much more vintage sounding. It doesn't color your tone as much. The overall tone is muddier, but there is less intermodulation distortion than with the SD-9. The SD-9 has a greater range, sounds clearer and more colorful. After a while of switching back and forth, I noticed that the SM-9 has less sustain and still favors the mids. It's got tube screamer guts (uhm, JRC4558 op-amps) after all. This would sound great for Zep. But I wanted something more versatile, so I stuck with the SD-9. Still, for a 21-year old pedal, it sounds good, and if this was my only distortion, I would not complain, as long as I had a good amp. You need a good amp with this. The SD-9, on the other hand, even makes my practice amp sound good.
Reliability
:
10
This pedal is 21 years old and works fine....
Customer Support
:
10
This product is no longer supported, but Kevin at Godlyke (Maxon's US distributor for their current line) is great.
Overall Rating
:
9
One nice thing is that it's a cool metallic sparkley blue. But I guess I'm more of a puke-green kind of guy after all. This pedal does have a good vibe to it, so I'm bumping up the overall quality. I wanted one of these for a long time, and I'm glad I got it out of my system. As soon as I got it from eBay, I walked around the house yelling "Supah!!! Supah!!! Metal!!!" in a bad Anime voice. But it's more of a bluesy overdrive than anything else. Imagine a Boss Blues Driver that didn't suck, and you'd get this. Who knows, maybe Maxon will rework this one and clean it up. Until then, this may still be the right thing for you. It just wasn't what I was looking for.
