big time changes. It’s certainly a
chameleon boost. It acts as a buffer as
well as a clean booster, and it does color
the tone slightly, but it sounds so good
that you probably won’t care. This is
another one of those “always on” type
boost pedals, but once you hear one,
you probably won’t care.
WREN AND CUFF PHAT PHUK/
PHAT PHUK B
Wren and Cuff’s Phat Phuk pedals are
germanium-equipped boosts that lend a
wonderful warmth to your tone as well
as a powerful boost. Though they’re not
explicitly billed as such, the PP pedals
are excellent preamps that you may
never want to turn off. Personally, I
found that the pink bass version was just
as well suited to electric guitar, and I
actually preferred the low-end kick in the
pants that it offered. Both versions push
out the same amount of gain, but the
PPB seems to be more of a fullfrequency enhancement.
KORG SDD-3000 PREAMP
Made famous by The Edge, the Korg
SDD-3000 is actually a rackmount digital
delay with an incredible sounding
preamp that The Edge gets a lot of
mileage from. The tone is very warm and
full, and the preamp is capable of
getting extremely loud. It’s not exactly
sparklingly transparent, but it certainly
knows how to make your guitar sound
like a million bucks. We know it’s not
exactly practical to go out and purchase
a rack delay and use it as a boost, but
some companies make clones of this
preamp, like DTS’s SDD-3KP.
PHARAOH AMPLIFIERS
CLASS-A BOOST
One of the original boutique boost
pedals, the Pharaoh Class-A Boost is a
very versatile boost that can be as
transparent or as full and powerful as
you could ever want due to its clever
Contour knob. This knob changes the
character of the Class-A from clean and
transparent to huge and powerful with
the turn of a knob. While these are
discontinued and