STRYMON Sunset

If you've come across the Strymon brand, you'll know that its products boast great workmanship, and even better sound. This is also the case with the Sunset pedal overdrive. This is designed as two separate overdrive pedals, each with three different types of distortion.

The combination of an analog JFET transistor and a high-quality digital signal processor (DSP) allows for a plethora of settings and a wide variety of sounds. Both channels (A, B) feature two overdrives and one boost. In the case of channel A, it's a germanium-diaode based overdrive that densifies the single-coil pickups and boosts the humbuckers. The Texas-type overdrive produces dynamic and subtle distortion with an emphasis on mids, ideal for blues. The A-channel boost takes away the lower frequencies and adds concreteness. Channel B's first distortion, called 2stage, has a range from light clipping to really thick saturation, and the second type of overdrive, Hard, achieves a massive fuzz distortion when the Drive control is turned up to maximum. The JFET boost gently kicks your signal up a notch and adds roundness and warmth. Both channels are equipped with the usual Level, Drive, Tone controls and two three-position switches are used to select the specific type of distortion.

But it wouldn't be a true Strymon without the extra features and extras. You can save and recall your specific settings using an external switch for which there is a rear-panel input. Greater freedom of control is also provided by the expression pedal input to which you can assign control of one or all front panel knobs simultaneously, and in Volume mode the pedal serves as a separate volume control. In addition, one of the Level knobs is equipped with a secondary noise reduction function.

With effects chains in general, the order of the effects also affects the final sound. Strymon hasn't forgotten this element either, and has therefore fitted the rear panel with a Config switch for serial, reverse or parallel wiring. The last element that can be used to influence the character of the end signal is the Bright switch. Its Minus, Neutral and Plus modes are configured for additional tweaking of the highest frequencies.