Rocktron Austin Gold

It has the traditional set of controls, but the pre bass control is a bit different from a traditional tone control (the name is different too): it adds only bass frequencies to the sound (and in a good way). Drive works a normal gain control and Level is the (loud) output control

The guitar sound comes out ringing as a bell. Very clean and dinamic. The prebass, as I just said, only adds basses, so the tone of the pedal stays always wonderful on the mid and highs.
Dinamics are very good, even at maximum gain it cleans up very well both from guitar volume and picking strenght changes.
Gain may seem limited, and it is actually; anyway pushing a tube amp's clean channel, with max gain and some basses, gives a modern and articulated distortion (maybe not metal, but mean).
As a booster it works great, but I don't use it much for that.
With prebass set to zero it can substitute a Tube screamer perfectly - but a bit more articulated and shiny - whith prebass up it starts to change caracter and becomes something on his own.

It seems built quite strong, but it is not the truth.
I have it from six month and the output jack got loose. It has bad plastic jacks.

I am a bit scared in playing out with it (but it sounds good, so I have to be strong and have faith).

It sound very good.I wish it was built better. Anyway it changed the way I hear my sonud and other overdrive/distortion pedals.
It may seem strange to say it about this pedal, but it is very flexible in some ways. Only if you don't need high gain sounds.
The prebass is probably the best "tone" control I ever found in a drive pedal.
I use it with two fender guitars (single coils and (neck) humbukers) in an octave pedal and a delay. amps are a tube marshall jubilee combo, a valve junior, and some transistor amps at reharsals.

I bought this over five years ago hoping for a light distortion pedal. For that, it sucks. Most recently I put the AG in front of the chain to give a clean boost (drive set at about nine or ten o'clock). Used this way, it really punches up echo, trem and fender reverb tank signals nicely.

I leave it "on" all the time.

As a siganl booster, I detect no coloration.

nice, cheap boost box.
oops, its OOP.

Rather simple chicken beak knobs.

I don't like TS sound, for some reason. I can see why people may like it, and I'll play it for about 30 seconds and start to get a feel for what is good about it, then I'm done.. This pedal is a TS with cahones. I use it through a Marshall Lead 12 fed into a Crate 33 W V series Class A. Favorite artists, not sure? My sound is my sound.

I like this line of products, except for the Heart attack pedal which is also advertised for guitar and I tried to return it and MF wouldn't take it back and just returned my $ and I kept the pedal. The Nitro is my go-to must have pedal.

nope. nada. none

After 25 years of playing, I have settled on a TS. I like OD, but not distortion. Or actually OD fed into DS. I have Boss OD Super which is the original and is just that. TS tried to perfect the sound. Then I have DigiTech Bad Monkey which is TS perfected. The Austin Gold is the next in line, which is all of the former perfected. I would imagine that it is similar to the likes of a boutique pedal at rock bottom cost.

It's an overdrive pedal not much easier then that to use. The pre bass knob is a Godsend.

I use this with my Rivera Clubster, and Rivera Fandango. There is no noise with this on the clean channel. If I use it to push the high gain side there may be noise but it is coming from the amp. This get go from smooth to raunchy twangy texas crunch. This is not a distortion pedal, it is an overdrive pedal and it does a great job at that. I love it with my strat and my tele.

Never had one problem. My voodoo labs pedals have all had switches go out, my grean screamer has had a switch go out but this thing is rock solid.

Never needed it so I would say that is the best support you can get.

I play everything from Jazz to Metal. My guitars range from Ibanez S Prestige, PRS Tremonti, US Strat, to US Tele. I like warm sounding cleans to creamy overdrives. I like nice Marshal Crunch to heavy K-Tre thunder. This pedal is perfect for the creamy overdrive, and the raunchy lite crunch. If it could have anything else it would be a distortion button to push it into the searing lead tone. This is the best overdrive pedal I have used this side of my OCD.

easy to use if you aren't to picky about getting just the right tone. The tone control is VERY limited and there is no control of the treble.

I agree with raygun a few reviews down. The tone is brittle and bright. I play mostly fender jazzmasters, teles, strats, les paul specials. I don't like humbuckers and this pedal doesn't like single coils.

I had been wanting to try this unit for a few years and jumped on one that was being clearanced.

I really didn't like it at all. I would call it more of a treble booster than an overdrive. If you looking for an overdrive for a very dark amp or use only the neck humbucker on a les paul this might do the trick.

The pedal is cheap so worth a try but I would take a run of the mill tubescreamer clone over this any day.

I have had mostly good luck with rocktron pedals but have had one develop a short on me with light use.

For the price it's not garbage but there are so many overdrive pedals out there and this one doesn't stack up in my opinion. For my money the cusack screamer is a much better overdrive. Granted it costs a lot more. In this price range I would just get a ts10, ts7 or sd-1.

Simple operation. 3 Knobs: Level, Drive, Pre bass

First, this is not a distortion pedal, its an overdrive. My effects chain is thus: Dunlop Crybaby>> Tube Works RealTube>> Autin Gold>> Ts-808>> Boss chorus>> Boss TU-2>> MXR micro amp>> MXR EQ>> 1967 Sears Silvertone Twin Twelve. I play a 1952 telecaster reissue with too many mods to list, a DeArmond M75 (great guitar), and a Gibson SG Classic. My band plays everthing from classic rock, to classic country/rock-a-billy. The tone of this pedal is very useful to add a slight boost and a sparkley, gritty overdrive. It nails the "TomPetty" type of sound as well as being perfectly suited for the classic rock-a-billy tones of the old days. This pedal is a gem. The pre bass is great for fattening or thinning out your tone. You can get the Who's " I can't Explain" type of honk, or roll the pre bass up and you have the early Rolling Stones " It's All Over Now". I don't have much luck combining it with my other overdrives. It gets too muddy. If you play texas blues or country twang, this may be all you need.

Built tuff, never had a problem with it.

N/A

Great pedal. You have to fiddle with it to find the sound you want.

easy to use, i perfer battery over adaptor ps.3 knobs to adjust level,gain.bass cut.foot switch turns it on or bypass,unsure if its true bypass but i didn't notice a loss of tone when off?

got this used just to check it out hear it, im a curious player schooled on real tube tone and wondered if it was a tube emulator type over drive or a boost type pedal to push more gain out of the amp.well i turned up the gain all the way and it was pathetic?.it did color the sound a bit in a tubey way.sorta a classic marshall clean head getting pushed a little hard to a soft clip.ok i guess its a clean boost type for pushing an amp without coloring the sound too much also the bass cut knob comes in handy to mod your heads low end gain responce and tighten up the sound.but wait before i decided to try it as a tube head overdriver i grabed my ts-9 to see what it could do getting a boost.as useual the ts-9 drove it into the next level of gain,now it was crunchy and warm,had a nice grawl and i was able to blend alot of tube scremer gain into it without it getting too fuzzy as long as i kept the ts-9 tone on the low side this sound was great,cleaned up well from the guitar volume and i can get from a classic overdrive distortion to even a heavy metal tone with a little eq'ing from the amp.nice grawl and thight even with the bass cut off.great for rythum but still not dripping with harmonics on muted notes but very quiet and articulate.so i found a good combo a ts-9 into this was a great tubey crunch machine to classic rock depending on the controls,2 gains and a pre level(ts-9 volume).alot of variations available.so i have to ask all these manufacturers out there why don't they build pedals like this with a ts-9 type circuit built in there already to give it a lead channel boost channnel;.seems logical to me.well i will keep pluging pedals together to find combos that really kick.i hardly find any that dont sound better combined with others.if you know how to use a ts-9 correctly-meaning volume pegged 100%,gain low to 30% and tone 0-40%max its perfect at enhancing gain without changing the character of pedal its feeding.i love the austin gold while its shacking hands with my ts-9 but alone its ok for that mild colored soft clipped guitar stuff like blues to china grove type rythum sounds.tap away and you have 3 different channels of tones to boot as this combo goes.i'll give it a 10 for not farting out or buzzing away under alot of ts-9 boost and morphing into a really good tubey heavey tone machine with guts and attack that i found unique but familiar with warmth and ability to clean up from the guitar volume which is one of my must have features for a 10 any day.

i give it a 9 for the sturdy modern looking chassis with recessed/protected control knobs,your typical push botton foot switch and hey when i bought this used i was told its not working so i thought i would have to fix it?.put in a batt and it worked fine?.oh i get it the last owner could not get any gain/distortion out of it or what he expected so he thought it was broke?.heehee,not a 10 becouse i hate the plastic nuts and the input and output jacks.the nuts always seem to get loose and wonder off when you least expect it?DAAAA where did that nut go?i bought a bunch of plastic nuts of digitech on line parts to never worrie about them.

no opinion i fix these things my self pedals are simple dont need customer service.

overall i give it a 8,for mislabeling it an overdrive?.maybe things like this should be called overdriver pedal not a really useful pedal on its own for creating a sound but works great in combo with a tube screemer or as an amp booster(overdriver pedal).capesh?

Three knobs, pretty easy stuff.

Occassionally I would see someone saying how great the Austin Gold was, so I had a credit at Musician's Friend and figured I'd give it a try. This is absolutely one of the worst overdrives I've ever heard. It made my tone extremely brittle sounding. There is a significant amount of boost available, but to get the maximum you have to turn up the gain. The gain sounds extremely fake and fizzy. The lack of a tone control is a problem. The pre-bass allows you just to take low frequencies out before it hits the clipping stage, but doesn't allow you to turn down the brightness.

Rocktron seems to make pretty solid products, I wouldn't be concerned about it breaking.

If you need a boost that makes you sound like crap, this is the pedal for you. If you need really terrible sounding drive, pick up this pedal. I'm giving it a 4 because I'm sure there's even worse junk out there.

Childsplay! Simply 3 knobs with very noticable results when one is turned...Level - Drive and PreBass. And of course the footswitch to make it happen. It comes with a good manual but then...who needs it :)

If you play old R & R, blues and Country, this pedal becomes precious immediately after you try it. It was the missing link in my tone. The overdrive give me the perfect sound of bands like BTO (Taking Care of Business) and new Country simply ROCKS! And it also provides an ever so sweet blues tone. I use a Fender Deluxe 1977 with a TRUE BLUE 1969 Thinline Tele. I have a humbucker at the neck and this pedal brings out such a sweet tone. And no noise at all AND better stil...my Tele still sounds like a Tele.WOWOWOWO. I have been playing for over 40 years and just can't believe I was missing such a great sound. Can't wait to use it at our next gig here in Moncton, Canada. I play lead with County Line and our website is countylineband.ca

Just got it but it's built like a tank!

Again...just got it.

Overall I will give it a 10+ .. highly recommend this pedal. soon as I plugged it in I was amazed at the tone. I would buy it again if stolen or lost. Try it and your playing will improve. Bought it on ebay for $57USD..this was a bargin as I believe it's worth twice as much. As we say here in canada "Gotta have one EH?"

It's simple, only three knobs, it's easy to get exactly the tone you want, the one thing that really does bug me about it is the fact that you have to unscrew the battery case to change batteries.

Perfect. It's exactly the subtle overdrive I was looking for as a nice boost for playing lead. I find that the Boss Blues Driver and the Tube Screamer are great for a bit more drive, but tend to degrade the sound quality when you have the drive turned down. This one enhances it perfectly without adding too much drive so you're still playing almost clean, but with a much hotter tone.

I've never used it at a gig, just once at an open jam. It seems pretty solid, but I've only had it for a few weeks.