Updated Sep. 8, 2022 | by Paolo De Gregorio

Best New Pedal Releases | August 2022

Our appointment with the best pedals released in August 2022 is a little late this month due to the Labor Day festivities, but it’s here nonetheless!

Pedal releases by major builders picked up a little bit last month after a very slow July. The supply chain issues still affecting the chip market were probably still at play, since most of the released pedals were analog or featured not very sophisticated digital components.

By far the most buzzworthy new announcement was Analog Man first collaboration with a “mainstream” pedal builder, which produced the MXR Duke of Tone. Worthy of note were also the studio-grade releases by Walrus Audio and Spaceman FX, respectively inspired by classic rack compression and EQ units.

Check out the full list of releases in the interactive galleries below, and when you are ready to buy, please don’t forget to use the affiliate links, that’s what is allowing us to publish this blog!

(Older monthly articles like this one can be found here).

Best New Pedal Releases | August 2022: Gain Pedals

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MXR / Analogman Duke of Tone
$149 | a mini descendant of the Analogman Prince of Tone, a Tube Screamer-style overdrive with more drive and a much wider sonic range, thanks to its three-way toggle that delivers Boost, OD, and Dist Voices. The three knobs of the original are also replicated here. All components were personally tested by Analog Mike. It can run at 18v.
Zzounds | Sweetwater |
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Jackson Audio 1484 Twin Twelve Pedal
$249 | a collaborative amp-in-a-box that recreates the tone of the legendary, glassy sounding Silvertone amp from the ’60s. It features two gain knobs at the two ends of the chain (Volume and Gain) and a 2-band EQ in the middle (Bass and Treble). It can be used as a studio-grade preamp, booster, or overdrive.
Zzounds | Sweetwater |
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Wampler Moxie Overdrive
$149 | A TS10-voiced mini-drive that goes beyond the Tube Screamer's classic tones thanks to two toggle switches. The Fat toggle adds a custom MOSFET clipping stage, delivering an overdriven tone reminiscent of high-end boutique amps. The Voice toggle drastically changes the circuit's EQ by actually scooping the mids, for a more transparent but also warmer tone.
Zzounds | Sweetwater |
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Mad Professor The Green Wonder
$199 | an updated version of the Little Green Wonder, this high-output overdrive/boost is optimized to sound great with any pickups and amps. Uncompressed and touch-sensitive, it adds Bass and Treble controls requested by players. The Bass knob’s range goes from a slight low-frequency cut to a significant low-end boost, while Treble can make your tone warm/smooth or bright/cutting.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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LPD Pedals Sixty8 Deluxe
$290 | Designed to sound like a 1968 Plexi 12000 series, it delivers that dynamic Plexi tone, with the vintage Marshall amps’ signature sustain, plus an extra switchable higher gain channel and a separate (pre-drive) 24dB boost circuit with its own footswitch. The center footswitch alternates between the two drive channels, which cannot be stacked.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Valco KGB DIST
$299 | designed to work with both instrument and line inputs this is a tone-sculpting device that uses Impedance to affect the signal’s color and dynamics (even when the distortion is off). A more traditional Tone knob tweaks the color of the signal, while the Blend fader reintroduces the clean signal. A Multi-diode Distortion control allows access to four separate circuits/voices: Op-Amp, LED, Silicon or Germanium diodes.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Daredevil Aces Hybrid Amp
$169 | a two-gain stages preamp with just one knob and a on/off footswitch. Inspired by an RCA data sheet from the ’50s, the Aces’ circuit uses both Germanium and Silicon components to deliver a saturated tone that’s at once dynamic, articulate, and edgy, with the warm sustain of germanium and the biting quality of silicon. Two internal trim pots set the bias for each gain stage.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Dunn Effects Pvrifier V2
$175 | a take on the circuit of the Ibanez LF7, a lo-fi analog filter overdrive. A lot more flexible than the original unit, it boasts a Hi- and Lo-pass filters followed by an overdrive and a Mix knob, and it behaves like a quintessential character box, producing a range of dirty/saturated tones from telephone-style grittiness to smooth overdrive and crunchy chords.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Malaise Forever Iron Fistula
$175 | a Plexi-style OD that uses JFET transistors to emulate tube amp saturation, adding an EQ with an active bass control (Body) before the GAIN control, which can add a hefty amount of lower frequencies and therefore “stimulate” extra clipping, with fuzzier results compared to other Plexi circuits. The Peak knob is a low-pass filter placed between the two gain stages.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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3rd Power Love Drive pedal
$279 | an overdrive pedal built by the Nashville-based amp company owned and run by guitarist Dylana Nova Scott of San Francisco’s ’80s glam-metal band Vain. It features a unique wave shaping 3-way EQ, which produces an entire range of usable controls.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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AMI Effects Rough Cast
~$230 | a boost pedal hailing from France that does both clean and colored. An ultra-transparent studio quality Boost with up to 20db of clean gain works together with the Pre knob, which, progressively adds compression and warmth (therefore color) to the signal. A tone knob named B • T allows you to sculpt your sound further, adding body or shine.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon

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Best New Pedal Releases | August 2022: Fuzz Pedals

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Catalinbread Germanium Fuzzrite
$152 | a take on the early, Germanium version of the Mosrite Fuzzrite, voiced after an original unit owned by the company. Just like the original, this pedal includes two NOS PNP germanium semiconductors with a polarity inverter IC. An added toggle switch offers a modern mode, which increases the low-end content to suit more contemporary styles.
Zzounds | Sweetwater |
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Otis Audio LOVE BEAMS Cosmic Echo
~$280 | An 8 mode pedal that does not do "normal." 5 out of 8 modes feature a delay in them, mixed with varying combinations of filter, modulation, fuzz, reverb and pitch-shifting, with the two large knobs on the top controlling mode-specific parameters. The overall vibe of each effect mode is otherworldy.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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BLAMMO! Electronics Total Garbage Fuzz
$159 | a synthy fuzz inspired by Tim Escobedo’s Ugly Face, it features an envelop filter and an octave-down circuits. The Splatter footswitch opens up the filter, whose resonant intensity can be controlled via the Stank knob. Spoil controls the stability of the oscillations, ranging from smooth to randomly bleeping/gated, while Freak selects the frequency boosted by the Stank effect.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Mask Audio Electronics Yes
$135 | a thunderous fuzz that delivers dynamic gated tones, something difficult to achieve since the gating effect removes dynamics. The result is a fuzz that can deliver a range of tones from synth-like to gated to… insane. The toggle switch gives you two EQ voices, with the down position sounding more traditional and the up one more edgy.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Coffee Shop Pedals Affogato
$194 | a fuzz with the handy feature of allowing players to save up to 3 presets. It also features a 3-band EQ and a wide-ranging Fuzz knob that open up a variety of tone possibilities thanks to the circuit’s natural sounding asymmetrical clipping, including overdriven tones at lower gain settings.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Cat Box Customs Bean Machine V2
$175 | a “deluxe version” of the company's Percolator evolution with knobs for Volume and Fuzz, a 3-way diode clipping selector (Ge/none/Si0 and two toggles for “pseudo octave up/down” and more/less intensity. A Feedback footswitch activates a feedback loop with crazy results. A Volts knob allows you to produce gated tones. Germ subtly affects the tone in Germanium mode.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Mask Audio Electronics NO
$135 | a chaotic fuzz based using cascaded octave generators. Equally grating on bass or guitar, it delivers octave-rich, thick fuzz. The intensity of the octave can be changed through the toggle switch, which increases the intensity of the second octave generator. The two knobs set the amount of bass going into the first octave generator (“Thud” knob) and the overall output (“Loud” knob).
eBay | Reverb | Amazon

Best New Pedal Releases | August 2022: Non-Gain Pedals

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Spaceman Equinox
$399 | a reinterpretation of the Pulteq EQp-1a optimized for electric guitar, it's a multi-band, high-headroom semi-parametric EQ with interactive frequency bands with interdependent cut and boost sections. It adds frequency selection for the high frequency controls. An output Level compensates for volume changes due to the EQ.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Walrus Audio Mira
$249 | a studio-grade optical compressor inspired by analog rack units like the Teletronix LA2A, a classic two-knob unit lacking attack and release knobs. The Mira corrects that by providing those controls, very useful for clean guitar tones. A High Pass Filter in the side-chain, activated through a push button, prevents bass frequencies 120Hz or below from engaging the compressor, keeping low-frequency dynamics intact.
Zzounds | Sweetwater |
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Pigtronix Gloamer
$279 | it makes volume swells easier and smoother through the Attack knob, which sets the fade-in time after a note is struck. The Compression knob prolongs the sustain of the note, while the Decay function, activated by a momentary footswitch, lets you fade out the signal at the chosen speed, dialed in through the Decay knob. Sensitivity sets the amount of signal necessary to reset the attack and decay cycle.
Sweetwater | Reverb | Amazon
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FLAMMA FC17 ANALOG DELAY
$59 | a super-affordable mini analog delay. Super-competitively priced at around $50, the FC17 offers classic analog repeats ranging from 25ms to 600ms, adjustable through three knobs (Time, Echo and Feedback) and also Tap Tempo functionality, in a true bypass circuit.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Kittycaster FX Tremdriver
$399 | a high headroom preamp + harmonic tremolo combo offering a combination of vintage all-discrete circuit blocks and delivering the sound of the classic ’70s big wall-powered preamps. It employs three EP-3 style JFET preamps running at 24 volts on the preamp side of the circuit and specially voiced Univibe LFO circuits for the harmonic tremolo. Notwisthading its name, it doesn't overdrive.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Discomfort Designs Riemann's Grave
$245 | it combines three filters with a sample rate crusher and 4 toggles that modify the way the signal is handled, generating original tones with plenty of gnarl. The SWP filter is controlled by the right footswitch (press to close it). The two other filters (Theorem 1 and 2) in combination with the toggles, provide several ways to affect the signal following various LFO options.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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Leyland Head Full
~$165 | A PT2399-based circuit that can deliver from classic to spacey tones through a combination of tape-style echo, modulation and distortion, with a Tone knob to darken the repeats to taste and an Inf(inity) footswitch for self-oscillation.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon
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flamma FC15 Analog Flanger
$39 | With controls for Color, Range and a large Rate adjustment knob, this simple mini flanger allows for quick customization and tone tweaking on the fly. Color controls the effect’s feedback and Range the width of the sweeping’s range. A Filter mode switch adds a low pass filter that makes the sound warmer and more watery. In this mode, the Range control will set the filter’s cutoff frequency.
eBay | Reverb | Amazon

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See you next month!

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