Maxon OD-820 Overdrive Pro pedal review

A Tube Screamer with a little bit extra

  • £179
  • $290
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MusicRadar Verdict

Quality clean boost and responsive, transparent overdrive in a single box.

Pros

  • +

    Drive goes from clean to full-on overdrive.

Cons

  • -

    Does a three-knob overdrive pedal really need to be this big?

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Maxon was responsible for the design and manufacture of many Ibanez products until early 2002, including the original TS-808 and TS-9 Tube Screamers.

The Overdrive Pro features a similar overdrive circuit, but can also be used as a clean boost, outputting clean signal only when the drive knob set is at zero.

Sounds

Featuring very smooth valve amp style overdrive, the OD-820 will drive your amp and dirty up your sound without changing your tone unless you want it to - the tone control giving you ample variation in presence and top- end to help solos cut through.

Trevor Curwen

Trevor Curwen has played guitar for several decades – he's also mimed it on the UK's Top of the Pops. Much of his working life, though, has been spent behind the mixing desk, during which time he has built up a solid collection of the guitars, amps and pedals needed to cover just about any studio session. He writes pedal reviews for Guitarist and has contributed to Total Guitar, MusicRadar and Future Music among others.