Way Huge Swollen Pickle MKII Reissue

Getting a good sound is a job in itself.In hindsight I prefer a simpler approach to effects essentially the more knobs the more of a pain in the butt it is to work with.The manual is vague at best.Wish it would of provided some sample settings to build off of.

My setup consist of a homebuilt thinline tele crate vintageclub 30 amp or an old roland jc-77 amp through a sonicstomp,fish n chips eq,stereo memoryman with hazarai,small clone,bbe greescreamer,swollen pickle,hbe cpr compressor, and a bypassed thoas crybaby.This pedal can make your ears bleed if your not careful with the gain.Being that there are so many knobs you can tweak this thing to infinity.Basically the pedal has 5 knobs on the outside and 2 internal trimpots I have not and won't fiddle with.You have your basic gain filter and sustain tthen a scoop and crunch.As I said in the opening I'm an advocate of simple and I definitely gotta away from that concept with this pedal.But in reading previous reviews I have to defend this pedal the bottom line in using it is patience.Fuzz pedals are supposed to be noisy thats's a givin.The bottom line being sound it is very possible to get tones you can work with.You can get that Neil Young my my hey hey grundgey tone to a blue oyster cult godzilla.This thing is for heavy rock for sure.It shines running with chorus or phase or both at the same time you can get that Robin Trower thunderous tone.bottom line I like this pedal it just takes some work to make it work.

I've had this pedal for seven months now and have had no problems with it.I would gig with it because it's one of those pedals that should be used in moderation.For the time I've had this pedal it has low hours on it.

no problems never dealt with em.

I play jammy experimental music.I've been playing fifteen years now and I'm still broke.Like many home studio musicians I could open a pawn shop with the stuff I have acquired over the years.If it were lost or stolen I would probably find something else simpler to use.I like the tone but I hate the process of finding it in a live situation you better have how you like it.I wish at the time I bought this I would have shown patience and did my homework to find something I was really happy with.I traded some pain in the but pedals to acquire this one to acquire another one.

Easy to set up (like most ODs, fuzzes, whatever). Manual has cool graphics, but nothing that you NEED to know. It explains the layout of the internal trim pots, but, like most pedal, just tweaking them will teach you all you need to know.

Played on humbuckers and single coils it has a different feel...same is true on an American vs. British style amp. Go try it on both if you can and hear the difference. Not noisy at all (true bypass, I believe) and I really like the smoothness of the switch. I got this to get a saturated, somewhat chunky/choppy fuzz sound that I could use to play some Sabbath-influenced-blues-rock and it can do that until the cows come home. To me, it sounds best when used on top of a semi-dirty amp tone (moreso than a pure clean or 'natural' tube crunch).

Nice housing...doesn't seem cheaply made.

NA

Great for greasy rock (sounds good on C# tuned SGs) which is a lot of what I like to play. I was so impressed by the pedal that I got their Pork Loin too for a more punchy and clean boost overdrive. I looked at the regular Dunlop/MXR stuff (because for me most everything else is either cheap or sounds like a toy) and this had way more character. Don't read this review and then decide to buy the pedal...read this review then go play it and compare. Cheers

yes there are more knobs than is necessary but it's not hard to get decent sound out of it.Manuals who needs em for sound based pedals turn the knobs til you find something to your liking.

I'm playing most of the time on an old roland jc-77 amp or an old crate vc-30 through a sonicstomp,danelectro fish n chips,ehx with hazarai,ehx smallclone,bbe greenscreamer,wayhuge swollenpickle,hbe cpr compressor,pt-9 phaser,vox bypassed wah pedal so there is a lot of variables Ican use this pedal with.This pedal can be quite noisy with the gain turned up and a little free advice is to start this thing at 3 on the loudness side.The gain is sick it will blow speakers if your not careful especially when you run eq's or compressors for leads.It's not bad running with chorus or phaser but doesn't really work with a wah pedal well kinda gets to muddy which this pedal already it is after all it is a fuzz pedal.As for who you can emulate on this pedal when I first bought it I gotta killer godzilla jam going you can definitely do a lot of that seattle grunge like the melvins or the jesus lizard.All that being said if thats the music you play you'll dig this pedal it is not the summerbreeze seals and whocares pedal the previous reviewer states.It's the summerbreeze typonegative style which I would rather hear anyway.

seems pretty strong I play everyday and never had problems it's not a signature sound more of a moderation thing so it should be fine.

no problems bought brand new hopefully I won't have to deal with them

I like to play pretty much everything, like I said this is the poop for that over the top grungy sound.I've been playing fifteen years and listed my pedalboard in the sound quality section as for my guitars I play a custom thinline homebuild with a jh-1n humbucker on the neck with a higher output kent armstrong single coil on the bridge and an old casio pg-380 midi guitar don't laugh had a lot of high end guitars and this plays better than any I've had.This pedal works for me if it were lost I would probably look a vintage big muff and probably be cheaper too.I traded some good pedals for this thing.

This pedal has 5 knobs, tone, volume, sustain (just like a big muff) and two more...'crunch' which controls the amount of compression, and a mid-scoop dial.

There are two more dials, which are only accessible by unscrewing the 4 rubber feet and taking the back panel off. 'Clip' takes you from a smooth fuzz to a more open, rough sounding fuzz. 'Voice' further controls the mid scoop, which seemed pointless and unecessary. Just over complicating things.

The controls are easy to use if you dont mind tweaking... but therein lies the problem...

I used this with a USA standard Strat, and a Peavey Wolfgang EVH Archtop, into a Peavey Classic 30 (made in USA).

Okay, I tweaked the crapola out of this pedal for almost 4 hours in total, and couldnt get one decent sound out of it. The fact that you have to take off the back panel makes this process even more annoying and tedious... and I'm a very patient guy.

I love both classic retro fuzz and brutal, heavy, nasty sounding fuzz, but even brutal tones need to have a pleasing quality to them, this pedal doesnt.

There's a hard, harsh almost 'dead' tone to this pedal which I just could not dial out. Lacks that 'juicy' tone. Seven knobs, and not one sweet spot. Shame because I was really looking forward to this pedal, and gave it a chance like no other.

I tried to get Isley Bros 'Summer Breeze' tone.. nope. I tried to get Smashing Pumpkins 'Rocket' and 'Hummer' sound...nope. I can approximate both of those tones just using a ??45 Black Russian Big Muff, which is cheap as f**k.

Nailing the sound on a famous song isnt a big issue for me, and I was prepared to embrace a unique sounding fuzz. But like I say, no decent sounds.

The ONLY way I got this pedal to sound badass was to step on my Marshall Bluesbreaker II pedal. But for a pedal which costs ??130, this is not acceptable.

The build quality was excellent.

I took this pedal back to the store and got store credit. no problems.

I listen to and play all types of rock/pop/funk/jazz/Rnb from 60s, stuff through to today. This pedal doesnt fit into any of it.

VERY COOL looking pedal, but no decent tones.

I recall reading that Noodles from The Offspring used the original Way Huge Pickle pedal, and his tone is complete and utter sh*t. I thought maybe the mark II version was an improvement, alas not.

DONT BELIEVE ALL THE HYPE ABOUT THIS PEDAL. It sounds like ass.

Cheers!

Swollen Pickle
This is the reissue MKII. Not the easiest pedal to set up and immediately get a good sound. The manual really should include sample settings. Did not play with the internal trim pots.
Hard to get a smooth sound at high volumes.

Using this first in my chain of FX with a PRS McCarty and Carr Slant 6V. Behind this I bypassed my FX chain to run straight into the amp. This is an extremely loud beast. It hit the front end of my amp really hard. Could not get a very balanced lead sound. Also the switch was defective and would not turn on or off with a single tap to the footswitch. After I hit like 5 times it worked. This thing seems to have one kind of sound and its not a very creamy fuzz. More hard edge and brutal. Maybe this is what you want. If you want Bass and midrange look no further. I think I'll try another brand like Fulltone or Barber.

Seems to be cheaply made. Cheap footswitches and plastic knobs.

Not used.

I kinda hated this pedal. I was expecting a lot. I was really excited to get it, Way Huge !!! everyone on here raves about. But I'm no expert on Fuzz. Just seemed brutal with one kind of hard edged sound. I need something smoother. Really easy to get out of control. Perhaps others will have better luck but this didn't do nuthin for me,

Ever notice how everything from Guitar Center is FU in some way?

The pedal has more knobs than your average distortion pedal, plus 2 more that are inside the unit, but still, distortion is pretty easy to dial in. The manual is a bit light on content, but really, you don't need a massive book to operate this thing.

Unlike most distortion pedals I've used, the knobs allow you to dial in settings that are so extreme that they don't sound that great. But I'd rather have that than wish the knob would go a bit further. The range of sounds is quite staggering.

Unlike the Big Muff, which is my weapon of choice and my yardstick for this review, the pickle has true bypass, input/outputs in the correct place, and the inputs are durable metal. Oh and it's not as big as a friggin microwave, like the Muff is. One of my beefs with the Muff is that the on/off switch turns the effect ON with a downstroke of the button, but it turns OFF on the upstroke. So if you want some rapid loud-soft dynamics, you'll have to time your foot correctly, which makes my brain hurt. The switch on the pickle is the much more typical and logical sort where for both on and off it's the downstroke.

I'm trying the pedal with both a Les Paul and a Strat, currently through a tiny little Roland Microcube. The pickle is fairly quiet for a distortion pedal. Like the other reviewer, I think the sound falls somewhere between a big muff and a more vintage fuzz tone. You can almost get the big muff sound (I have a Russian made one btw, which sounds smoother than the American version) by turning the 'crunch' and 'mid cut' or whatever it's called knobs all the way to the left. The muff still is a smoother roaring sound, while the pickle retains a lot of grit.

The pickle sounds good on both the Les Paul and the Strat, with differences you'd expect from the 2 guitars. However, the Muff sounds better (at least to me) trying to get a Siamese Dream sort of sound, while the pickle more closely approximates Hendrix. Be careful not to over tweak the settings, or you generate so much fuzz that the notes 'fuzz out', especially on the 6th string. Also, though palm muting and fuzz pedals are often mutually exclusive, I palm mute stuff all the time with the Muff, but couldn't do it with the pickle without creating an unpleasant farting sound.

I love the big muff, but I admit it destroys any attempt you make to play open, ringing chords. The notes simply get too fuzzy to articulate clearly, even with sustain minimized. The pickle is much better at this.

The swollen pickle II is an extremely well built pedal, just looking at it. I've only had it a whopping 2 days, but I don't expect it to break. Big Muffs are supposed to be sort of fragile, but I've had mine for about 10 years with no issues, so I expect the pickle to be at least as reliable.

Never dealt with them, and don't expect to.

OK, I confess, part of the reason I got this was because having a Big Muff and a Swollen Pickle was too great of a joke to pass up on. But in all seriousness I wanted something that would address some of the Muff's shortcomings. Does the pickle succeed at this? For me, no, not really. The sound is too different from the muff to simply replace it. Yes, it's a better made pedal, and more versatile, but doesn't exactly do what I was hoping. Still a great pedal, though the price is ridiculous ($150).

Another item of interest: The blue LED light on the pickle is so bright I have a hard time seeing what the knobs are set to. Seriously, it's like a mag-lite in your face.

For a pedal with a lot of options, it is easy to get a good sound quickly. There are Loudness, Filter (EQ), and Sustain (distortion) knobs, as well as newly added Scoop (mid cut) and Crunch (compression) mini knobs. Inside are two tone controls. The Clip give a smooth or more opened fuzz. Voice controls how extreme the Scoop is. It takes some time for figure out, but it is not rocket science.

This has to be the biggest sounding pedal I have ever played. Think of cranking the bass of a BOSS Metal Zone. I bought this knowing of its legacy. The pedal is famous, and when I saw that it was reissued, I had to have one. People were paying $500 + for the original. Do I believe that the sound is worth over five hundred dollars, no, but is completely worth its current price.

It seems obvious to me that Way Huge had the Big Muff in their sights when they made this thing. The original had three controls housed in a green box, just like the Muff. The new version up the antae with scoop and crunch knobs. So, is the Swollen Pickle a Big Muff clone? Nope. It is its own beast. It does have Muff like qualities, but it is way more versatile. The first thing I did was hook it up next to my 10 year old Russian Big Muff and tried to get the Muff sound. I came close, but the Muff (at least mine) had smoother, fuzzier tone. The fuzz has similarities, but the Pickle was more square wave like. Once I realized that this was not a Muff, I compared it to my two favorite fuzzes, my Fulltone Tone-Bender and my Analogman Peppermint Fuzz. Between the two the Tone-Bender sounds the closest. Square wave, but the Fulltone had a buzzier fuzz to it. The Analogman is fuzzier with a more smooth midrange. In other words, the SP is unique.

I am giving this pedal a 10 even though it is too bass heavy for my amp. I have a heavily modified Fender Hot Rod Deluxe 1x12 and I had to put the bright switch on. I ended up putting a Ibanez TS-9 in front with the tone way up and that did the trick. I just bought an Ibanez EQ-9 with will take the TS-9???s place. With this mod, it is perfect.

It is way more solid than a Big Muff and smaller as well.

Dunlop owns Way Huge now, so I am sure there are going to be no issues.

I play fuzzy, heavy, pretty alternative rock and I own over twenty distortion pedals. I have playing this pedal for over a week and still love it. I played it with my strats (single coil and HSS) as well as my Gibson Explorer. I would put the fuzz sound somewhere between my Big Muff, Vintage Rat, and a quality Fuzz Face. It will actually be handling all the live sounds that were recorded by the Muff, Rat, and now dead Fender Fuzz Way. Even though the pedal is bass heavy, so is my amp. Going through a Marshall with 4x10's may be a different story. This will hold a treasured place on my pedal board and yes, I would get it again.