Visual Sound Jekyl & Hyde Ultimate Overdrive Red

As long as you understand the difference between the "overdrive" and "distortion" sides of the pedal, this is a very easy device to use. I found a decent sound at most settings and some absolutely superb sounds at certain combinations. The manual provides some very nice presets, but I had no problem going off the beaten path and playing around with the settings on my own. The knobs are intuitive and, essentially, do what you would expect. Things can get complicated when you use both the Jeckyll and Hyde side at the same time, but that's part of the fun. It's not as much of a no-brainer as most distortion pedals, but the increased complexity is well worth the increased flexibility.

I bought this pedal because the bult-in sound of my Mesa Rect-O-Verb 50 was simply not fitting the bill for me. It was simply not flexible enough to get the tones I wanted, although it did the mid-rangey Mesa thing very well. The Jeckyll and Hyde pedal has given my amp a new lease on life, because it allows me to get the sweet tones I'm looking while preserving the fundamental quality of the amp.

First of all, I absolutely love the "Jeckyll" side. It does what the "pushed" channel on the Recto does, but I have more control over the volume and its a bit less boxy. It beefs up the "clean" channel of the Recto very nicely and, when you push the gain, breaks up into a great bluesy overdrive tone. I've never used a tube-screamer, but this is what the Jeckyll side of the pedal is supposed to emulate. It comes with a bass-boost feature but, with the Mesa amp, I have plenty of bottom end without it.

The Hyde part of the pedal is a distortion unit. I don't use it very much by itself, but it can get enough crunch to satisfy pretty much anybody.

The real value of this pedal, beyond as an overdrive unit, is when you use both sides at the same time. The warmth of the overdrive combined with the crunch of the distortion, when properly balanced, can give you some tremendous tones. They play off each other a bit strangely at times, and you have to go through a lot of trial and error, but I absolutely love the sounds I've been getting. This pedal has been described as a steal because you get two pedals in one and I can't disagree.

For a distortion/overdrive pedal, this thing is very quiet. Crank the gains and you get a lot of hiss and feedback, but that's par for the course.

Very sturdy metal case. Switches seem fine, although I don't actually "stomp" on them when I use it in the studio. I can't see any reliability issues here.

Never tried.

This is a great pedal. I can't see it working nearly as well on a solid-state amp, but it really does wonders for a good tube amplifier. It does everything it advertises and still manages to surprise. A wonderful value!

Honestly? You will have great sounds no matter where the knobs are set, and the first time you hear it you will understand what I mean. It has more knobs than most standard overdrive/distortion boxes, but once you get used to thier funtions then iy's a simple task to find the different sounds in your head. The pedal comes with a list of settings, they are all good and they show you just how versatile this pedal really is (like I said earlier)

This is the first overdrive/distortion pedal I've ever given a 9 rating, and I'm sure it will be the only pedal. I usually don't like using effect-pedal distortion - it always has alot of dry and thin sounds to me, even though there may be 1 or 2 good settings for them with decent sounds.

I had given up ever wanting to use a distortion from a pedal, I am an amp guy - but damn it this thing proved me wrong! From the first day I got it, even now I am amazed at the sound quality and just how many different sounds you can get with the different settings. From mild (but thick) overdrive to screaming metal - and everything in between.

My only letdown is the way the pedal is setup. The distortion is on the right side (by the input jack) and the overdrive is on the left side (by the output jack). So if you try to engage both drives, the sounds are limited because the overdrive is not in front of the distortion, its after it. But you can find good sounds....actually a few really great sounds so I forgive them. I just thought an opposite layout would haver been more benificial.

This thing is built like an army tank. It has good quality switches, and feels like its going to last forever

Don't know, I hope I never have to find out - because I don't want to be without this pedal (even for a few days!)

This is one great sounding pedal, and this opinion is coming from a guy who used to think tube amps were the only way to get great distortion tones. I knew you could get some good sounds out of stompboxes, but I alsi knew most of them only have 1 or 2 good settings.

Not this one, it has lots of great sounds. Just start twisting knobs, there are so many options for recording.

also, the distortion is fairly quiet, even with high ngain settings (unless you engage both sides at the same time). My single coil strat is alot more quiet with this using extreme settings on the hyde side, than the guitar is when plugged straight into my marshall using just moderate overdrive.

I dont know how they got this pedal to sound so good, but I am very impressed, and I usually am not impressed with pedals. I like it so much I may check out Visual Sounds other pedals, to see if they are this good. If you are looking for a distortion or overdrive, check this thing out.

The overdrive is very warm and articulate, almost just like a good hot tube amp. The hyde side (distortion) is pretty much the same thing, only its on fire!!!!!!

i had this pedal out of the box for 30 seconds and i had an amazing sound for either side. when i combined em, that took me a good 25-30 minutes to find a GOOD tone, but it sounded decent right off the bat. if you dont know what your doing with tone and EQ knobs, USE THE PRESETS THE GIVE YOU ON THE PAPER! they give you a bunch of really awsome presets, and they all sound like they say they are supposed to sound like. i play jazz and blues to contemporary rock to all out dropped B metal. this pedal covers it all. 9, only because when u combine both sides, it can be a trick to dial something that you like up.

i use the JH,>ts9 tube screamer> morley bad horsie> digital delay> digital delay> anolog chorus> boss Phase shifter> earnie ball mono volume, through a fender hot rod delux (as seems to be a common amp throughout this section of reviews). i use a fender custom tele (the carved top model with dual humbucks, coil splitting, etc) and a heavily modded schecter 006 (seymore duncan JB, and alnico II pro. i recomend both pickups if ur looking to upgrade)

They jekyll side sounds like a tubescreamer with more options. sounds like any standard overdrive unit, with a bass boost. really cool upgrade there.

the hyde side is what makes this pedal worth buying. you can get anything from this side. gobs of gain and a rock crunch. whatever. it sounds AMAZING. its not a very noisy pedal like your metal master would be, but its not silent. EXCELLENT

no problems yet. built like a friggen tank.

n/a

overall, this thing gets a 10. its a well built, durrable, rugged, great sounding pedal. it can not be classified simply as a distortion pedal. this will turn any 2 channel amp into a 5-6 channel amp. you can achieve all kinds of tone. i have been complemented many times after gigs on my tone. i have spent hours perfecting it before this pedal, after i bought it, i was completly satisfied after 30 minutes. this pedal makes you want to keep playing.

i work in a music store, so i have used all kinds of pedals. this will not be beat for distortion unless u look at spending over 250$ for the EH's hot tobes, or the hughes and kettner tube distoriton pedal. soldanos is so-so. not worth the money. this is best bang for buck, hands down, and should be the hottest selling distortion pedal on the market right now. 10 all the way across. BUY IT NOW

Its a really great sounding distortion/s. Ive built a ton of them and bought a million others so i wasnt expecting to be suprised by this one, but it really is pretty cool. tons of knobs.. 2 foot switches..Simple enough.

I use with with a Peavey XXX and a C-1 Stealth Schecter and it really has a lot you can do with it. You can really get a variety of sounds from it..I play so many different types of music that although I'll probably shelf it in a month or two with all the others in search of a better one--its a lota fun. ONe side is like a Tubescreamer but with more options and the 2nd end--the hyde reminds me of a metal-ish -almost Boss metal zone.

I think you can depend on it, as it comes in a strong metal housing..I bought mine and it turned out to be non working. Of course i fixed it and got it sounding great. It turned out to be a bad output jack--a cheap one..Replaced it with a switchcraft jack. The board seems professional enough and sturdy. Cheaper dpdt jacks were used for the foot switches. I guess its ok considering what your getting for the price. If i really paid full price msrp or sale..id have been dissapointed. But as it stands its probably going to last a while without anymore work--and if so ill fix it..Hell, i might even build something like it.

Unlike the other reviews, I was expecting some great Customer Service. I wanted to know what a few common problems to chk for before i ripped into this thing and tried to fix it. Three days after i emailed them i was told that they were unsure and that i could send it in for repair-25.00 plus shipping or 50.00 for a new board. I didnt want that info--what i wanted was a direction to start looking before i began testing and pulling/changing parts. I build pedals--generally i dont fix them (the commercial ones) unless i have to.

So I guess i was disappointed. Ive bought from a lot of folks that would either send me a free part or give me a few clues. Cause I did state a lot of what the pedal was doing (or not doing).

Thanks for nothing guys..Ill just buy a different brand next time ..no biggie..Im sure one bad CS review wont mean a lot to them..But Im not mad.. Good luck Visualsound..

Overall rating--Id give this great rating for the sound and uniqueness of it--the Hyde side of it anyway. The only things I really dont like are the cheap foot switches. Shoulda sprung for some 3pdt's and metal film resistors. But, like i said ealier, its still great for the price.

This is my second J/H, the first being the original silver model which I still have and will keep as a backup. The Jekkyl side is very straightforward and allows for the classic Ts sound easily. The Hyde side requires some tweaking especially if you are using in conjunction with the Jekkyl. You can have gobs of gain or just a boost...up to you!

I have used the J/H for several years. During that time I have owned Fulltone FD2, Barber tone pump, Distortion pro, MXR, Boss Ds--1...most of them in fact. This one always stays on the board. The others are great in their own right, but the J/H covers my bases. I am using this with with Les Paul's and Strats, 335's into a hot Rod Deluxe (clean channel only). My pedalboard changes some, but generally a Boss tuner, Dunlop crybaby, guyatone compressor, J/H, Distortion pro, H2O, and Voodoo Labs Trem.

Built like a tank...Never a problem!

The best in the business. Send them an e-mail and you'll see what I mean

Try it and buy it! I play Classic Rock, Blues and Praise music at a church. It just covers it all

You basically have to drives, an overdrive and distortion, that interact or can be used separately. The Jekyll side is like an Ibanez TS-808 tube screamer with a bass-boost. It gets wonderful tube-like overdrive through my Fender '65 Twin Custom. The Hyde side is a beast ? you've really got to work at it to get a nice distortion. Then, you work at it some more to cooperate with the Jekyll side. Once I get it dialed, that it, I'll leave it be!

I use this with a Fender Jazzmaster, a cheap Strat clone, a custom Danelector/Jaguar/Strat design, all through a '85 watt Fender '65 Twin Custom. I'm of the school that you get a good clean tone, then work your pedals to get overdrive and distortion. This pedal works perfectly for that. And, it quiets all the pedals in my chain with no need for a noise gate!

I'd use it with no backup. It seems really brute.

It's a small company ? hands on owner. I don't anticipate repair hassles.

I bought this for Garage-style rock, from 60s surf to punk to grunge. It seems to provide all the distortion and overdrive you could ever need, short of maybe heavy metal. Even that seems possible, but doesn't interest me.

Although there are plenty of good tones available from this pedal, there are also plenty of bad ones if you don't know what you're doing with it. That may sound like a stupid reason to mark a pedal down but there are plenty of other pedals out there that sound great no matter how they're set, how much easier to use can you get than that? I also took an extra point off because the dual tone controls of the Hyde side take some getting used to, although I do dig them now that I'm used to them.

The Jeckyl side with the bass boost off sounds exactly like my modded TS9. The bass boost provides a whole range of sounds that the TS9 should have had since it allows you to open the tone control up more with thinning the sound out terribly the way a TS9 does.

The Hyde side has more gain available than most people would need & can get some cheezy scooped-mid metal tones (think 80's solid state Crate amps or Boss Tone Zone, not Mesa Boogie Mk III or Recto). With the gain & midrange set more conservatively, though, there are some good rock tones available.

Where the Hyde side shines, IMO, is when it's cascaded on top of the Jeckyl side. When using the pedal this way, I usually keep the gain on the Hyde side very low & instead use it mostly for the extra tone controls or for a solo boost. It's in no way a clean boost, obviously, but I like the coloration it adds for lead work.

I'd replace the J&H if anything happened to it simply because it's a cheap way to get a legit TS9 sound & even expands upon it. It would be even better if the Hyde side could capture a proper Marshall or Recto tone, but then that's probably asking for too much.

Switches and Nobs are straight forward. Got a good sound in seconds. The manual has great settings that sound like what they say. This gets a 10.

Usinga Fender Standard Strat Through Jeckyll & Hyde > Boss DD-6 > Morley Wah > Boss TR-2, to a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. The sound on both channels is absolutley wonderful. Rich and full of harmonics with the tube amp. It is noisy with the volume above 10 o'clock and the Drive up above 12, but you dont need it above there anyways. Gets a great Eddie Van Halen "Brown Sound," not exatly, but pretty darn close.

The pedal is built like a tank, but I don't like the battery compartment, it took me at east 30 minutes to figure out how to get it in there properly. Also the battery lies righ on a curcuit board so this is of concern. I would gig this without a backup.

Very quick and helpful responces from the company trough Email. And from the inventor iof the pedal no less!! This gets a 10.

I play everything from jazz to hard rock , to primus style freakouts. This pedal suits all these applications. I have been playing for 3 years, I also own 2 basses, two acoustic guitars and another electric. If it were stolen I would get another right away. I love the ease of use and great sound, I DARE you to try and get a bad sound out of this pedal. This pedal helps me make music and helps me learn new music as well. If you are in the market for a distortion, MAKE SURE YOU TRY THIS PEDAL, YOU WONT REGRET IT.

I am using the effect to add more drive to an already overdriven amp, so it took me a little longer to find the sweet spot than if I was using it through the clean channel of my amp. Even so, a quick look in the manual helped me find a good reference. The manual was good for this, but not a lot of other information or troubleshooting.

I have my Ibanez S470DXQM going from a Boss V-Wah into the Jekyll And Hyde to a Carvin Legacy..and with a Korg AX30G in the effects loop. I like the transparency of the Jekyll channel, because my amp already has the sound I want..I'm just using this as a sort of boost, so that I can set my amp up for less distortion to get more bluesy stuff..and switch in the pedal to get a more metal sound.
The Jekyll channel is EXTREMELY dynamic..it really made the harmonics of my amp shine through. The Hyde channel sounds really cool too, with a fat and beefy sound; which I thought was impossible with my mid-heavy setup. The only reason I don't give this amazing-sounding pedal a 10, is because I get massive feedback under certain conditions; mainly because I have my amp set up for a distortion already. If you're a conscientious player, the feedback isn't a problem. Turned my 2 channel amp into something resembling a 5 channel amp!! (I found that you could get a good setting on either the clean channel or the lead channel, but not both..so I use to clean as a strictly clean channel without the pedal).
The drive channel can now go from a near-clean blues to a ZZ Top kind of thing, kick in the Jekyll channel and play some 80's metal..switch to the Hyde channel and get nu metal and Zack Wylde stuff...switch both of them on for some really tight-sounding high gain soloing (feedback is pretty bad with both on, so be careful when you do this).

Only had the thing a little while, but it looks like it's built to last.

Never had to deal with them, I've heard they're really helpful

One word: WOW!
Aside from the feedback, it's as close to perfect as an owner of a tube amp could ask for.

Jekyll side is just like every overdrive out there with the addition of a bass boost switch. Super easy and a 10 for ease of use. The Hyde side is a bit harder to deal with due to the relation ship between the tone knob, the eq knob and the sharp/blunt switch. More like a 6 for ease of use. Took me 30 seconds to get a good sound with the jekyll. A few weeks of experimenting to get a good sound with the Hyde.

10 once you know what you're doing. I bought this thing so I could have more variety with my overdrive sound. I was using a pair of VOX valvetones which are amazing pedals. I started having some problems with the switch on one of them (and the other seems to be going) so I needed an overdrive that could take the place of one of them until I got it fixed. I also wanted a heavier overdrive sound that I could get with one switch for heavier rock, as opposed to just switching both my overdrives on at the same time. And I was also looking for a slightly different sound. The Valvetone is a great sound, but sometimes you just want to have that tubescreamer thing available.

The jekyll side is basically a tube screamer, but it sounds a lot better than any TS9 that I've ever heard. I've used a TS808 but not recently enough to compare. Its basically the tube screamer thing with more clarity and less buzziness. Also a little less mid-humpy than TS9's which I think sound kind of ugly through midrangy amps. Since I like midrangy amps, thats a problem. But the Jekyll sounds smooth and warm and good. I use it for a very slight overdrive (gain around 9:00, and boost with the tone pretty muetral. There is an unbeleivable amount of volume on tap for boosting, especially compared to the Valvetone which doesn't really boost all that much.

The Hyde side is a tricky beast, that people don't seem to go into that much around here. So here goes. The most logical thing to do at first glance is to throw the switch on sharp, put the tone nuetral, crank the gain, and set the EQ to scoop out all the mids.

This is wrong. It sounds like absolute ass.

The EQ, tone, and sharp/blunt all seem to interact with each other in odd ways. If Tone all the way up and EQ all the way down boosts all the highs and cuts everything else out. The sharp switch boosts things around 10k, so what it really does is ad sizzle, and uncompress the sound a bit. The eq is a mid boost/cut and frequency shifter kind of like the Ultra-mid knob on an Ampeg bass amp. And tone is a boost/cut around 4k which is pretty standard really. So you have to take all these into acount when you set them. Its not really a thrash pedal, so don't try to treat it like one because you'll just think it sucks. However, set it right into a almost overdriven scooped amp and you'll get a great thrash sound. My setting: gain at 4:00, Tone at 3:00, EQ at 1:00, volume slightly boosted from my regular signal and switch to Blunt. This has a sort of Trey Anastasio meets Angus Young kind of thing going on, and sound awesome for a lead tone all by itself. Also makes a great early 80's metal sound. But it took me a while to get there. Its an interesting heavy overdrive. I would compare it to a Sonic Distortion with more options.

A word on combining the two channels. Usually when you combine overdrives the theory is to put the lowest gain one first and boost the gain in steps. Unfortunatly this is not what the pedal does. Your signal hits the Hyde part first, follwed by the Jekyll side. This means you get a really thick sound that has the Jekyll character. I don't like this tone ery much so I have to deduct a point. If I could use the Jekyll side to boost the hyde side it would be perfect. This is an oversight that I really can't believe they would make. So to get the stacked overdrive sound I have to run the Jekyll into my Valvetone which is set for a medium gain overdrive. It sounds great (though I think I might prefer two valvetones at the same time ) but I would like to get that tone out of one pedal.

Also, this pedal is ubelievably quiet. Even with the Hyde side on. Much qieter than any other pedal I own. Also, the buffer really works. My whole chain sounds better. For the record I use: MXR Supercomp-->J&H-->Crybaby-->Valvetone-->Vintage Small Stone-->CE2 Chorus-->Akai Headrush-->various EL84 based amps.

Seems pretty solid. Run it off DC brick. Seems good.

I've heard they are good, but I've never called them.

Great pedal. Better than a tube screamer for less money plus comes with a whole other pedal. Increasingly becoming the pedal I step on for my overdrive sound. Great versitility. Great price. Great sound.