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Tech 21 US Steel
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Tech 21 US Steel
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Published on 08/31/11 at 03:11
Knobs: level, low, mid, high, character, Drive and the speaker sim.

This is a new character series pedal from tech 21 called US steel. It's modeled after an american type of overdrive/distortion.

100% pure analog circuitry apparently.

For a pedal, there are quite a few options which is always good for the tweakers.

This pedal is supposed to excel as a straight, direct in sort of pedal, right through to the PA or even better as a preamp into another amp.




UTILIZATION

pretty simple to use, just tweak all the knobs till you get something decent and then tweak again. Depends on how you set it up however, you'd probably get better sounding results if you plug into a tube amp of some sort into the clean channel.

Otherwise, you can hook it up direct to the board/PA/your DAW whatever it is and use the speaker simulation and try to get some workable sounds.

SOUND QUALITY

The one thing I like about it, is the switch, it's quite and smooth. It doesn't pop or click.

Everything else, I hate. It sounds nothing like the "US" amp it's supposed to mimic. Rather it just sounds like a distortion pedal with lots of tweakability. There's nothing tube-sounding about this pedal whatsoever. The speaker sim is actually quite bad. It sounds better when it's off, whether that's plugged in to a tube amp or not.

It doesn't even sound like a good solidstate amp. It just sounds horrible. I've heard many clips and some people have been able to make it sound decent at MOST. But that's it. I really think this one's overhyped. The rhythm sounds are probably the best sounding thing, you play leads with this and you'll notice right away how the notes decay is so inorganic and unnatural sounding.

There's this artificial high end that just can't be dialed out with this pedal no matter what you do and if you go to the extreme settings it just muddies up completely. Not to mention it's quite noisy with the gain higher up too.

The distortion is just unclear, or too brittle, and synthetic sounding. Doesn't sound tubey whatsoever, doesn't sound like amp distortion, nor does it sound like any american high gain amp.





OVERALL OPINION

Overrated. Sounds nothing like what they claim it to sound like. Sounds like a distortion pedal, with an annoying high end frequency that can't be gotten rid of. Doesn't sound like amp distortion either, and the speaker sim is completely unusable. The only good thing about this pedal is the build quality and the switch is not noisy. I like tech 21 effects pedals, I think some of their stuff is really good. This is not one of them. Definitely look elsewhere for your boogie in a box.