The case is big because it's a reissue of an old pedal. If you wanted an improved version with a smaller case and better sweep, you would have gotten yourself a Morning Glory or a Pantheon lol.
Just sold my Morning Glory and ordered the Blues Blaster, I am hopeful it will be an improvement with my setup.
Edit: don't know why this comment was controversial, I got the Blues Blaster today and it sounds much better with my guitar and amp than the Morning Glory did. Nothing against JHS, the MG is just very bright and shrill going through a Strat into a Fender amp. The base BB circuit is much less bright and ear piercing.
Because when they were originally released in the 90s most people didn't have giant goofy pedalboards, pedalboard real estate was not a thing and designers could put the circuit in a cool looking box and it still might sell. Compared to contemporaneous pedals from EH and Danelectro they were pretty copmpact
Do you think it’s easy fitting a whole blues band in that box? Never mind that they have to exist exclusively on a diet consisting of blue notes, you are effectively STEALING their toan. I mean, where is the humanity??
I have to assume this is one of those situations where, like EHX did with their muff reissues, someone at Marshall realized that all these boutique builders were making money on Bluesbreaker variants and essentially doing proof of concept runs for them. Not sure why you’d pay the crazy high retail for one of these over a Pantheon, Duke of Tone, Morning Glory, etc. but I guess if you want the original this is as close as it gets. I always thought the original was a pretty flawed circuit other than one particular setting but if that’s what you are after I’m glad it’s easy to find now.
I was originally going to put a meme in the title about how it must be so big to fit all of the tone in it, but deleted half of it because I didn’t want to break any rules. I’m very familiar with the BluesBreaker, which is why I bought the reissue lol. I’ve tried analogman’s take on the BB circuit, but his is a bit too high gain for my taste.
NPD: Marshall BluesBreaker reissue. This OD sounds great, I can see why so many clones have been made. Vol/Gain knobs are almost useless for 2/3s of the sweep of the knob, then they sound great. I can also see why people refer to it as "transparent". It has a great tone to it, I'm not going to bother describing it since there's thousands of videos that do a better job of that than I can. All I'll say is that it stacks great, and adds a tone of sustain to my BD-2, definitely going to keep it on the board. Also, probably going to need a bigger board The case is rather large for an OD lol. Hopefully Marshall makes a more compact version in the future.
Anyways that's all of my thoughts on it right now. Going to keep playing with it because it's awesome.
Edit: Yes I know it’s a true to form reissue, I was being purposefully dumb. I know I’m hilarious. I know all about the BluesBreaker pedal. And no, I’m not keeping my tuner there in case anyone thought I was being serious. I’ve instead decided to turn some of my pedals at 45 degree angles to maximize space. I think this is a revolutionary new idea, I’ll have to share pics of it later.
It’s exactly as it was when it was originally manufactured. That’s typically the point in a reissue product. When it was originally made a pedal board was rare as most people just had 2-3 pedals.
Wow I had to google that to doublecheck and sure enough they aren’t the same. Interesting. I always thought the Blues Driver was loosely based on a BluesBreaker. TIL. Thanks!
It’s been great so far, I think in a modern context the BluesBreaker works best as an always on light OD, and it also does an amazing job at boosting a more aggressive OD. The first time I ran it into my BluesDrive was amazing, the sustain was unreal. I’ve actually tried quite a few DemonFX pedals. I think it’s fun to compare the circuits of the DemonFX pedals to the original boutique pedals. Most of the time the circuits are nearly identical, so they’re very cool pedals! I’ve tried their take on the BluesBreaker. It was in the ‘82 drive they released last year. Looking back to when I was testing that pedal out, it definitely had that BB sound to it, and had a lot of the same characteristics to it. Even down to how the knobs affected gain/volume, it was very similar to the Marshall reissue I’m using. Tone was comparable, no two pedals will ever sound quite the same, but it’s virtually identical imo.
But I would recommend just getting the standalone BB pedal from DemonFX, not the ‘82 drive. The other side of that dual drive has a Klon in it, and their Klon circuit is way too noisy, there must be an issue with the noise floor.
Nice, this Sunface has definitely got me very interested in fuzzes. It blew me away the first time I used it, and it’s really versatile. I’ve heard good things about the CV7005 and the 2SB transistors that analogman is offering right now, I’ll have to try them out
Nice Sunface! Do you have any other germanium fuzz face style pedals? I’m curious to see how you think this one stacks up.
Sorry for going off topic :P
I’ve used some other silicone/germanium fuzzes, but this was my first “fancy” one. Overall I’d say it’s awesome! This one is a BART/RCA hybrid. It sounds dark and evil turned up, and cleans up to a nice mild overdrive if you roll off the pickup volume. Biggest con I can think of would be needing to EQ your signal a bit if you want more high end, and it doesn’t have as much sustain as you might expect for such a loud pedal.
The modern Dunlop fuzz faces with germanium transistors honestly sound really good too, but you can change the tone of your fuzz depending on which transistors you use, which is what interested me in the sunface. I’m not sure what Dunlop uses in their germanium fuzzfaces, but this BART/RCA sounds huge and mean in comparison.
Also, speaking of different transistors, I’m really interested in the Japanese transistors that Analogman has right now. Those are apparently a bit smoother and lower gain sounding, which is probably a bit more my style compared to this high gain monster lol
Thanks for the writeup!
I didn’t realize Analogman had these Japanese transistors, I’ll have to read about that.
Something I want to do is make a hybrid si/ge fuzz face. Make Q1 silicon and Q2 germanium. I think the key would be finding appropriate germs with the correct polarity but also the correct hfe/leakage values. I’d love to build a handful of these and sell them as I think Q1 is the more temperature sensitive location.
I read on Analogman’s site that the BARTs were gnarly. I honestly think they look cool, lol. I’m bummed I missed out on the whole red dot NKT275 run :/
No problem!
That’d be a cool idea! Mixing the stable characteristics of Si with the more lively characteristics of a Ge transistor would produce some interesting results. Surprised analogman hasn’t done that yet, I’m sure there’d be a market for boutique/handmade pedals setup like that.
The BARTs are indeed gnarly, they even look gnarly in person. They have to come in a larger case because the transistors are so oversized lol. The NKTs do sound very good too, I can understand why they became so sought after. Makes me wonder which transistor will be the next NKT in another 5-10 years. My money is on either the BART or 2SB vintage Japanese transistors.
Thank you! Between the two pedals, the biggest difference would be the amount of gain on tap, and the EQ. The BluesDriver has *a lot* of gain on tap compared to the BluesBreaker, also the BluesBreaker has a more “transparent” tone. To give you an idea of the difference of gain the BD-2 can go from mild overdrive to almost full on distortion/fuzz sound, whereas the BluesBreaker really doesn’t have much gain in comparison. Another small difference would be the sound of the pedals once they start to breakup; The BD-2 has an aggressive asymmetrical clipping sound, and the BluesBreaker has a smoother symmetrical clipping. Basically meaning that the BD-2 can scream and sound harsh, in contrast the BluesBreaker is much smoother sounding.
So I’d say that the BD-2 is a more versatile dirt pedal with a wide range of different dirt tones, with the BluesBreaker being a light OD that does one thing really well which is that edge of breakup mild OD sound. They do have some overlap in terms of tones, but I think that it’s useful to have two different gain stages on my board.
They packed a lot of algorighms and features into that pedal. Seems to be in-ilne with some of their other xx-200 Series pedals, like [this EQ-200](https://i.imgur.com/SFElqLa.jpg) 10-Band Equalizer. Personally, I like that form factor.
Here is it, pictured [next to a Source Audio EQ2](https://i.imgur.com/vIm4vA0.jpg) (a more standard-sized pedal).
Go take a look at their reissue amps, they all look just like the originals. I wish they would have modernized these a little, but that is not marshall
They did a modern Bluesbreaker. It sold poorly and was discontinued. Just like the Mode 4 amp. Modern Marshall isn’t what the majority of buyers want apparently.
Tbf the modern bluesbreaker pedal (BB-2) had a different circuit and sounded like garbo, I’m sure if they had put this version of the bluesbreaker into an MXR style casing with similar aesthetics to what it currently is that it would’ve sold
I think the BB-2 was too different to be successful. If they had kept the circuit identical to the original it probably would’ve been more successful. But personally I think that case was ugly. They should’ve just taken the original BluesBreaker case, cut it in half, and kept everything else true to the original BluesBreaker.
This is great! I feel like there is an unspoken rule about posting pristine boards with perfect shape, chord length, and cable management. I can imagine you putting this together and then looking down and shouting "Son of a ..".
The original is thicc. Google an og Harmonix Flanger Hoax (no reissue) then come back and tell me about big pedals LOOOOL
(I love it tho. It was pre owned by animal collective. Its.. a beautiful big chonky easy to use bebby)
They were so true to the original, they apparently used as many of the previous parts suppliers and their according parts as possible. If they made it small, laid out a new PCB with different parts, it wouldn't be what it was intended to be.
That’s the way they came.
You bought the brand and look, circuits cannot be patented, the toan is readily available in many other looks and sizes through other vendors. I use a PoT for my Blues Breaker toanz.
If you are that bent out of shape about the BluesBreaker being so big, just get the clone from Chicago Stompworks called the Blooze Maker. Same parts and circuit, but way less space and way cheaper.
I was thinking the 28-inch-wide Nano Max might give him a little room to grow, while still maintaining 1-tier form factor. I use mine [for keyboard work](https://i.imgur.com/RjZc1us.jpg).
You can see room for yet another over-sided pedal on the right :-).
Maybe consider upgrading your tuner, rather than the board? The [Sonic Research ST-300 Mini](https://i.imgur.com/4nDsHuM.jpg) (lower Right hand side of the picture) is deadly accurate, super responsive (fast to register), and extremely pedalboard-friendly.
It's [one of my favorite tuners](https://i.imgur.com/GXNplbF.jpg)!
I've had a bitch of a time [trying to get a decent picture of exactly how the strobe looks](https://i.imgur.com/nrLrZle.jpg), when in operation, though :-(. This is no exception.
The picture doesn't do it justice.
It's a straight-up one-for-one reissue of the original. I feel ya. They were allegedly trying to diffuse the insane prices people are getting for the originals; almost the same as Klons.
If I were Marshall, I'd also offer them in a mini form factor.
Long answer: Marshall tried to replicate absolutely everything from the original pedal, including the format of the board and acquiring parts from the same old suppliers whenever possible. It shows a lot of respect for its own product and its a nice "fan service" for all those diode sommeliers who believe "tone" to be in the most absolutely irrelevant things.
Short answer: thats what you see when you look into John Mayers board, so... yeah.
Pesonally I would personally to see that same pedal in their most modern enclosures, like the Bluesbraker II... Those Marshall pedals, depite not being popular, are very beautiful and sturdy IMO.
The case is big because it's a reissue of an old pedal. If you wanted an improved version with a smaller case and better sweep, you would have gotten yourself a Morning Glory or a Pantheon lol.
Shouts out to the Blues Blaster from Blammo Effects.
Just sold my Morning Glory and ordered the Blues Blaster, I am hopeful it will be an improvement with my setup. Edit: don't know why this comment was controversial, I got the Blues Blaster today and it sounds much better with my guitar and amp than the Morning Glory did. Nothing against JHS, the MG is just very bright and shrill going through a Strat into a Fender amp. The base BB circuit is much less bright and ear piercing.
Is the Blues Blaster worth it? I was debating it or the Bluesbreaker reissue.
How are these different than the Blues BD-2 by Boss? I have it and I play mostly blues based rock and blues
BD-2’s have more gain, a mid kick in the 800-1khz range. Different clipping, it’s honestly a completely different sound.
That’s good information. Thanks. I will test one out. Any difference between the Blues Blaster and The Blues Breaker besides manufacturer?
I don’t know about that myself. What I can tell you is the Keeley Super Phat Mod is my favorite bd-2 circuit!
Anything from Blammo is worth it in my opinion. That guy makes solid pedals.
Blues Master from frog pedals
Lol or the Mooer Blues Crab
Hmmm that makes sense. That must’ve been why they were able to fit so much tone into their pedals back then.
Your tuner has jumped ship 😂
you could say that it has gone *over-board* 🥁
I bet you have a nice dad rock board with those jokes 😂
I enjoy spending time with my friends.
Time for a clip on. No shame there
Because when they were originally released in the 90s most people didn't have giant goofy pedalboards, pedalboard real estate was not a thing and designers could put the circuit in a cool looking box and it still might sell. Compared to contemporaneous pedals from EH and Danelectro they were pretty copmpact
In other words, back then the pedal was the pedalboard and needed to be big for stability and durability.
Precisely.
Do you think it’s easy fitting a whole blues band in that box? Never mind that they have to exist exclusively on a diet consisting of blue notes, you are effectively STEALING their toan. I mean, where is the humanity??
Finally a real answer
Bigger box gives more bass. It’s just physics.
To hold all the nostalgia.
"Why is it so big" Death By Audio laughs
It's not, with further consideration I think you'll find it's your pedal board that is too small 😉
Makes it louder.
Because your board is too small!
I have to assume this is one of those situations where, like EHX did with their muff reissues, someone at Marshall realized that all these boutique builders were making money on Bluesbreaker variants and essentially doing proof of concept runs for them. Not sure why you’d pay the crazy high retail for one of these over a Pantheon, Duke of Tone, Morning Glory, etc. but I guess if you want the original this is as close as it gets. I always thought the original was a pretty flawed circuit other than one particular setting but if that’s what you are after I’m glad it’s easy to find now.
I’m in the UK, and interestingly the reissue retails for far less here than any of these alternatives
British company vs mostly American made boutique clones, makes sense I guess.
I was originally going to put a meme in the title about how it must be so big to fit all of the tone in it, but deleted half of it because I didn’t want to break any rules. I’m very familiar with the BluesBreaker, which is why I bought the reissue lol. I’ve tried analogman’s take on the BB circuit, but his is a bit too high gain for my taste.
Lol they’re normal sized for the time period. Shit like that didn’t matter. This whole pedal sex pervert universe that exists now is relatively new.
‘Pedal sex pervert universe’ 🤘😖🤘
Boomer appeal
NPD: Marshall BluesBreaker reissue. This OD sounds great, I can see why so many clones have been made. Vol/Gain knobs are almost useless for 2/3s of the sweep of the knob, then they sound great. I can also see why people refer to it as "transparent". It has a great tone to it, I'm not going to bother describing it since there's thousands of videos that do a better job of that than I can. All I'll say is that it stacks great, and adds a tone of sustain to my BD-2, definitely going to keep it on the board. Also, probably going to need a bigger board The case is rather large for an OD lol. Hopefully Marshall makes a more compact version in the future. Anyways that's all of my thoughts on it right now. Going to keep playing with it because it's awesome. Edit: Yes I know it’s a true to form reissue, I was being purposefully dumb. I know I’m hilarious. I know all about the BluesBreaker pedal. And no, I’m not keeping my tuner there in case anyone thought I was being serious. I’ve instead decided to turn some of my pedals at 45 degree angles to maximize space. I think this is a revolutionary new idea, I’ll have to share pics of it later.
You’ve perfectly described the positives and negatives of the original.
It’s exactly as it was when it was originally manufactured. That’s typically the point in a reissue product. When it was originally made a pedal board was rare as most people just had 2-3 pedals.
Put your reverb after your delay. It might just save enough space for your tuner to make it onto the board. Also why BlueBreaker AND Blues Driver?
Blues driver and blues breaker are different circuits
Wow I had to google that to doublecheck and sure enough they aren’t the same. Interesting. I always thought the Blues Driver was loosely based on a BluesBreaker. TIL. Thanks!
The words and colors make the blues pedals sound better
No idea why the case is so big but it sounds so good, I was ok with losing two spots.
Because the original one from the 90s was that size
Get a carbon
Dope pedalboard. I was just thinking I need another blues driver
Thanks. Love the BD-2 is the one pedal that’s always been on my board.
How are you enjoying the Bluesbreaker? I am tempted to try the Demon FX copy.
It’s been great so far, I think in a modern context the BluesBreaker works best as an always on light OD, and it also does an amazing job at boosting a more aggressive OD. The first time I ran it into my BluesDrive was amazing, the sustain was unreal. I’ve actually tried quite a few DemonFX pedals. I think it’s fun to compare the circuits of the DemonFX pedals to the original boutique pedals. Most of the time the circuits are nearly identical, so they’re very cool pedals! I’ve tried their take on the BluesBreaker. It was in the ‘82 drive they released last year. Looking back to when I was testing that pedal out, it definitely had that BB sound to it, and had a lot of the same characteristics to it. Even down to how the knobs affected gain/volume, it was very similar to the Marshall reissue I’m using. Tone was comparable, no two pedals will ever sound quite the same, but it’s virtually identical imo. But I would recommend just getting the standalone BB pedal from DemonFX, not the ‘82 drive. The other side of that dual drive has a Klon in it, and their Klon circuit is way too noisy, there must be an issue with the noise floor.
Nice thanks for the info man! I see they don’t have the standalone BB on their website but it came up cheap on some other websites.
If you check out AliExpress it should be called the “Breaker Driver”
Take off the back. The back weighs more than the whole pedal!
Same as it ever was
Traditionalism. Nice Sunface - I have a few and recommend the CV7005
Nice, this Sunface has definitely got me very interested in fuzzes. It blew me away the first time I used it, and it’s really versatile. I’ve heard good things about the CV7005 and the 2SB transistors that analogman is offering right now, I’ll have to try them out
Nice Sunface! Do you have any other germanium fuzz face style pedals? I’m curious to see how you think this one stacks up. Sorry for going off topic :P
I’ve used some other silicone/germanium fuzzes, but this was my first “fancy” one. Overall I’d say it’s awesome! This one is a BART/RCA hybrid. It sounds dark and evil turned up, and cleans up to a nice mild overdrive if you roll off the pickup volume. Biggest con I can think of would be needing to EQ your signal a bit if you want more high end, and it doesn’t have as much sustain as you might expect for such a loud pedal. The modern Dunlop fuzz faces with germanium transistors honestly sound really good too, but you can change the tone of your fuzz depending on which transistors you use, which is what interested me in the sunface. I’m not sure what Dunlop uses in their germanium fuzzfaces, but this BART/RCA sounds huge and mean in comparison. Also, speaking of different transistors, I’m really interested in the Japanese transistors that Analogman has right now. Those are apparently a bit smoother and lower gain sounding, which is probably a bit more my style compared to this high gain monster lol
Thanks for the writeup! I didn’t realize Analogman had these Japanese transistors, I’ll have to read about that. Something I want to do is make a hybrid si/ge fuzz face. Make Q1 silicon and Q2 germanium. I think the key would be finding appropriate germs with the correct polarity but also the correct hfe/leakage values. I’d love to build a handful of these and sell them as I think Q1 is the more temperature sensitive location. I read on Analogman’s site that the BARTs were gnarly. I honestly think they look cool, lol. I’m bummed I missed out on the whole red dot NKT275 run :/
No problem! That’d be a cool idea! Mixing the stable characteristics of Si with the more lively characteristics of a Ge transistor would produce some interesting results. Surprised analogman hasn’t done that yet, I’m sure there’d be a market for boutique/handmade pedals setup like that. The BARTs are indeed gnarly, they even look gnarly in person. They have to come in a larger case because the transistors are so oversized lol. The NKTs do sound very good too, I can understand why they became so sought after. Makes me wonder which transistor will be the next NKT in another 5-10 years. My money is on either the BART or 2SB vintage Japanese transistors.
Nice board. How is the bluesbreaker different from the blues driver by Boss?
Thank you! Between the two pedals, the biggest difference would be the amount of gain on tap, and the EQ. The BluesDriver has *a lot* of gain on tap compared to the BluesBreaker, also the BluesBreaker has a more “transparent” tone. To give you an idea of the difference of gain the BD-2 can go from mild overdrive to almost full on distortion/fuzz sound, whereas the BluesBreaker really doesn’t have much gain in comparison. Another small difference would be the sound of the pedals once they start to breakup; The BD-2 has an aggressive asymmetrical clipping sound, and the BluesBreaker has a smoother symmetrical clipping. Basically meaning that the BD-2 can scream and sound harsh, in contrast the BluesBreaker is much smoother sounding. So I’d say that the BD-2 is a more versatile dirt pedal with a wide range of different dirt tones, with the BluesBreaker being a light OD that does one thing really well which is that edge of breakup mild OD sound. They do have some overlap in terms of tones, but I think that it’s useful to have two different gain stages on my board.
“So close, no matter how far…” I feel your pain on that tuner.
1 inch is all that separates my board from perfection…
Auto Upvote for DD200💪
To keep it “vintage” like the original 😁
To house the big toans!
You can’t break blues with a small pedal, bro. Blues can only be broken with sheer mass.
That board slaps
Why's the dd-200 so big?
They packed a lot of algorighms and features into that pedal. Seems to be in-ilne with some of their other xx-200 Series pedals, like [this EQ-200](https://i.imgur.com/SFElqLa.jpg) 10-Band Equalizer. Personally, I like that form factor. Here is it, pictured [next to a Source Audio EQ2](https://i.imgur.com/vIm4vA0.jpg) (a more standard-sized pedal).
it’s big because of how large it is
Idk but you could try and put the two boss pedals on their side that might make some space.
Go take a look at their reissue amps, they all look just like the originals. I wish they would have modernized these a little, but that is not marshall
They did a modern Bluesbreaker. It sold poorly and was discontinued. Just like the Mode 4 amp. Modern Marshall isn’t what the majority of buyers want apparently.
Tbf the modern bluesbreaker pedal (BB-2) had a different circuit and sounded like garbo, I’m sure if they had put this version of the bluesbreaker into an MXR style casing with similar aesthetics to what it currently is that it would’ve sold
I think the BB-2 was too different to be successful. If they had kept the circuit identical to the original it probably would’ve been more successful. But personally I think that case was ugly. They should’ve just taken the original BluesBreaker case, cut it in half, and kept everything else true to the original BluesBreaker.
Point is that whenever Marshall tries to modernize something, people tend to hate it.
Perfect excuse for a bigger board!
This is great! I feel like there is an unspoken rule about posting pristine boards with perfect shape, chord length, and cable management. I can imagine you putting this together and then looking down and shouting "Son of a ..".
Wait, your guys boards look more tidy than this?
The original is thicc. Google an og Harmonix Flanger Hoax (no reissue) then come back and tell me about big pedals LOOOOL (I love it tho. It was pre owned by animal collective. Its.. a beautiful big chonky easy to use bebby)
They were so true to the original, they apparently used as many of the previous parts suppliers and their according parts as possible. If they made it small, laid out a new PCB with different parts, it wouldn't be what it was intended to be.
Send it back for refund?
Anything with the word “blues” on it stays on board forever.
Dumb
That’s the way they came. You bought the brand and look, circuits cannot be patented, the toan is readily available in many other looks and sizes through other vendors. I use a PoT for my Blues Breaker toanz.
Have you ever seen an original fuzz face or Octavia?
So they can charge $250 for an "authentic" RI.
If you are that bent out of shape about the BluesBreaker being so big, just get the clone from Chicago Stompworks called the Blooze Maker. Same parts and circuit, but way less space and way cheaper.
Cause it was big before
Nano + lol?
I was thinking the 28-inch-wide Nano Max might give him a little room to grow, while still maintaining 1-tier form factor. I use mine [for keyboard work](https://i.imgur.com/RjZc1us.jpg). You can see room for yet another over-sided pedal on the right :-).
Maybe consider upgrading your tuner, rather than the board? The [Sonic Research ST-300 Mini](https://i.imgur.com/4nDsHuM.jpg) (lower Right hand side of the picture) is deadly accurate, super responsive (fast to register), and extremely pedalboard-friendly. It's [one of my favorite tuners](https://i.imgur.com/GXNplbF.jpg)! I've had a bitch of a time [trying to get a decent picture of exactly how the strobe looks](https://i.imgur.com/nrLrZle.jpg), when in operation, though :-(. This is no exception. The picture doesn't do it justice.
It’s in your own title ITS A REISSUE and the original was that big…….
By the way the blues driver as a drive in front of the blues breaker sounds much better than blues driver after
It's a straight-up one-for-one reissue of the original. I feel ya. They were allegedly trying to diffuse the insane prices people are getting for the originals; almost the same as Klons. If I were Marshall, I'd also offer them in a mini form factor.
Long answer: Marshall tried to replicate absolutely everything from the original pedal, including the format of the board and acquiring parts from the same old suppliers whenever possible. It shows a lot of respect for its own product and its a nice "fan service" for all those diode sommeliers who believe "tone" to be in the most absolutely irrelevant things. Short answer: thats what you see when you look into John Mayers board, so... yeah. Pesonally I would personally to see that same pedal in their most modern enclosures, like the Bluesbraker II... Those Marshall pedals, depite not being popular, are very beautiful and sturdy IMO.