Name: SSAudio Distortion Shout
Brand: SSAudio

MusicRadar Verdict

Silver dirt machine with useful attributes that could suit some players' dirtbox requirements.

Pros

+
Easy-to-use. Tonally flexible.

Cons

-
Not a pedal for volume boosting.

MusicRadar's got your back Our team of expert musicians and producers spends hours testing products to help you choose the best music-making gear for you. Find out more about how we test.

Although it still has no official UK distributor, SSAudio has whipped another stompbox for our perusal, in the form of the Distortion Shout.

Boasting an attractive brushed silver finish, it's battery or adaptor-powered and sports a bright-blue LED indicator.

Sounds

"Those tone knobs can make things real nasty"

The Distortion Shout offers a dual concentric knob to adjust the gain and level for a rock distortion sound that has plenty of tonal variability, courtesy of the pedal's main selling point - separate knobs for the high, mid and low frequencies.

Those tone knobs can make things real nasty, particularly the high knob that can dial in a crackling buzz-saw tone that could slice bacon. If you're a noise merchant who likes more extreme distortion sounds, this may be for you.

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.

“He always had like this contemptuous smirk on his face whenever he was dealing with me like he thought I was a chimp or something”: White Lotus creator Mike White responds to the show’s composer’s claim that he’s quitting