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Review | Donner "Giant Metal" Distortion Pedal

Insane sound from a mini pedal

After years of scaling back to just my amp tone, I've started getting back into guitar pedals. 20 years ago, if you couldn't afford the Boss or DOD pedals, you were forced to go with the only budget brand out there: Rocktek. Those things were awful, but affordable.

These days, the budget brands are king, in my opinion, and the compact size of the circuitry makes it possible to grab anything you want and try it out for less than fifty bucks.

I wanted to start out with a good distortion, and after playing around with online reviews I decided to take the leap to the Donner Giant Metal. This little powerhouse lives up to its name! Super solid aluminum construction, easy to use controls, a fairly wide gain profile, and surprisingly flexible tonal control.

It just has the one tone control, and the switch boosts highs or lows (top or bottom), or runs right down the middle. I won't say that this can replace a high-end Boss distortion, but if you put the time into dialling in your amp's clean channel this little guy can absolutely demolish your metal playing. It's super crunchy (chase it with a tight gate for djent tones), has a high dynamic output, great response to harmonics, and is just cute as a button.

I have it rigged through my Peavey Bandit 112, and a very little bit of knob-work got this thing to draw out either a nice scooped metal tone, a midsy Metallica crunch, or (my favourite so far) that classic Zakk Wylde "Miracle Man" tone.

If you need crunch and scream for a fairly tight budget, this one. This is the one you want.


Affiliate link: Get the Donner Giant Metal Distortion Pedal on Amazon.

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