New Pedal Day: Biyang Overdrive

Lately, I have been buying Biyang Pedals direct from Hong Kong.  I have found they are amazing pedals, and the price can't be beat.

Here are some previous reviews I have done

The Reverb Pedal:

http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2015/03/new-pedal-day-biyang-reverb.html

The Blue Pedal:

http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2015/02/new-pedal-day-blue.html


I always wanted a good Tubescreamer pedal.  However, the real ones cost a good chunk of change.  And the cheap copies tend to sound just awful.  A long time ago, I bought the Bad Monkey Overdrive pedal used, and it just sounded cheap to me.  Since the Biyang pedals have really surprised me so far, I decided to take another chance on their Tubescreamer copy.

First off, I had to decide between the OD-7 and the newer OD-8.  The OD-8 is kind of neat in that it comes with multiple chips that you can change out to adjust your sound.  I honestly want to plug and play so I decided on the OD-7. 

I have to say, it nails that Stevie Ray Vaughn sound.  I had a Danelectro Wasabi Overdrive that I used as a bright boost, and this does that sound, only better.  I've found that I tend to put all my controls straight up at 12 o'clock, and that is a perfect sound for me. 

The OD-7 has an interesting feature.  It has a switch so that you can flip it to, TS, Bright, or Warm.  I run it at Bright all the time.  I kind of found the other settings were not needed.  You can get the same sound from the bright switch, just adjust the tone and drive settings.  I guess if you needed to change the sound on the fly it would be good for live settings, but otherwise, I think they could have skipped the switch, and left it on the bright setting all the time.

One thing I think is cool is that the "on" light is a brilliant shade of green.  Like classic Tubescreamer green.  In the darkness, it is very bright so you know whether it is on or not.  I really like running the OD-7 along side the reverb pedal.  It's like they were made for each other.

Like other Biyang pedals is has true bypass, and can be plugged right into your pedalboard.  So you can either run a battery or an adaptor for it to work.  I also love the hard metal casing.  This thing could survive the end of times. 

Something I really like is that this pedal pretty much adds another amp to my collection without me having to buy another amp.  Right now, I am playing a Laney GH-100-L through Warehouse Guitar Speakers Veteran 30 speakers.  My Laney head is equipped with the British sounding EL-34 tubes.  So my whole set-up is very British sounding. 

But when I put my amp to a clean setting, and engage this pedal, I get a very Fender/American type of sound.  It's like I changed rigs with just the step of a pedal. 

But here's the great question, what does it really sound like?  Well, here's a review of the pedal on Youtube.

Most Tubescreamers start around $100 and go up to over $200.  This pedal is as good and maybe better, and I paid $45, and that includes shipping.  I would completely recommend this pedal to any player needing a Tubescreamer pedal.  Again, I would put this pedal up against any other Tubescreamer type pedal, as well as other Overdrive pedals.  It's really just that good.