 Hello Oscillator sync here. A few weeks ago I put out a video all about distortion on synths and drum machines and samplers and other electronic instruments and towards the end of that video I lamented the fact that although there are lots and lots of demos out there with distortion pedals for guitars, basses even We are kind of thin on the ground when it comes to electronic instruments and distortion pedal demos Well almost as if the universe was listening a couple of days after posting that video Valko FX got in touch with me and told me they had this new distortion pedal coming out and asked me whether I'd like to demo it I've of course said yes because it's great to be the change that you want to see in the world Here's a sneak peek of some of the sounds you're going to hear in this demo Oh, yeah, yeah, that's the stuff love that The Valko KGB DIST is a distortion pedal which is inspired by the wrapped distortion Which is an iconic distortion pedal from the late 70s But they have tweaked and enhanced this pedal to add a bunch of features In particular features which make it uniquely suited to a range of different Instruments whether they are guitars. That's the G basses, which is the B or keyboards Which is the K which includes synths Drum machines and other electronic instruments in terms of the features that we have here along the bottom here with our controls We have the output, which is the volume control which has a higher headroom to accommodate Electronic instruments. We have the distortion control which adds more distortion It's essentially a gain control and we have a filter control here Which is a basic tone circuit a one pole filter I think it is which just allows us to roll off some of the top end if things get a little bit harsh Moving up to this top row then we have a switch here which allows us to go between instrument level and line level So it's kind of built into this pedal that we can accommodate higher output line level instruments like synths and drum machines But there's no reason that we can't run a drum machine or a synth through it on instrument We might just find that it clips a little bit harder If we are set to instrument, then we also have access to this impedance select switch here, which is going to change the input impedance We'll have to see if that has any real effect on our electronic instruments But certainly on basses and guitars, especially those with passive pickups. This can be a really interesting way to shape the tone of the initial sound We also have a phase switch here, which allows us to put the distortion out of phase Which is going to be interesting if we are spoiler alert blending in the dry signal So here on this rather lovely fader We have a wet dry control So at the bottom here We're just hearing the dry signal the undistorted signal and at the top here We have fully distorted and we have of course any point in between as a blend This is going to be I think a really big deal when it comes to drum machines in particular allowing us to do Parallel distortion, so that's going to allow us to smash the sound with the distortion But still maintain the impact of the original dry sounds by finding a nice blend in the middle there Yeah excited to try that out at the top here as well We have as well as our standard input and output. We have a separate dry output So that allows us to tap the dry signal without having to use a mixer or anything in our door So if we want to process the dry sound separately to the distorted sound or just record it separately We can do that really really easily Finally, we have this voice knob here as I mentioned the rat is a iconic pedal It's been around for a long time and seen many iterations and many mods have been done to it over the years and the voice control here allows us to choose essentially four different types of Clipping circuits inside the pedal which is going to give us different characters of clipping So at the bottom here. We have clipping achieved by Germanium diodes, which was what was used in the original rap pedal this Germanium tends to be a little bit darker a little bit spongier and characterful Interesting the way it reacts to the dynamics of the sound Moving up here. We have silicon diodes. So these will tend to be a bit brighter and a little bit quicker to react to the dynamics of the sound Potentially a little bit brasher in some cases We want to roll off some of the top end with a filter We'll see how we go with that and next here we have clipping which is achieved by using LEDs instead This will generally be the lowest gain or what we hear is the lowest game because it will clip less Tends to have a roar or more open brighter sound and literally brighter as well because the LEDs will flash on and off inside there as we feed in the signal and Finally the one I'm most excited to explore is this last setting here, which is clipping achieved solely by using the op-amp chip Which is in here. I've owned a number of rap pedals with these Options here. I've never owned a rap pedal where the clipping is done just with the op-amp I don't know what that's going to sound like. So I'm really excited to find out So the rest of this video is going to be demos I will try and keep chat to a minimum But I will occasionally pipe up to highlight what I'm doing or if I spot something that's particularly cool We'll have a look at Some sort of acid type baseline stuff. We'll have a look at some synthy pads We'll look at some drum machines and we'll also run some samples through it as well to see how We can use the KGB distortion to find new sounds Let's get going. Okay. Let's start with some 303 style vibes So that's just the noramono Just a single oscillator, and I've set the filter quite dark so that the distortion has something to generate harmonics with Rather than start too bright Okay, so the pad was turned on I'm currently on Germanium mode and the blender is turning down So just hearing the dry sound distortion is fairly high filter is turned down Which means that it's at its brightest So let's just hear what each of the different voice modes do and you'll notice as I go through them They're going to get louder. So we just need to accommodate with the album a little bit So let's go to full distortion on the Germanium Silicon It's a little bit brighter and a bit more sort of bitey Very cool though. Okay, LEDs Yeah, that's really cool So not as of clipped but it's got a lovely sort of raw scrunch to it Yeah, that's awesome. Okay, and finally this op-amp mode here That's really pulling out the mid-range and it's kind of a bit almost gated and fuzzy That's really cool that in the LED on this 303 stuff It's correct distortion Okay, that's with As I dry sound That's cool So that's with the dry and distortion sort of nicely balanced there So full distortion is And you can hear we lose some of the impact a little bit Having that dry control is key Let's just try it with the op-amp one again That's so cool Let's just try the filter so it should take some of the top end out as we turn it up Let's try the silicon again And we'll take some of that top end out with the wet dry engage as well Yes, you can kind of emphasize that lower mid but still have some of that sort of aggressive fizz to it Germanium Cool, I love these top two though. That one especially. Yes So we've also got this phase invert here. Let's just give that a go while we've got them blended That's gonna take up the bottom end as we phase cancel a little bit so You could legitimately use that as kind of a transition thing probably the same with the Filter there as well basic high cut but effective You know that that's what does the upper mids there Let's try this slightly brighter cut off maybe with both oscillators in Germanium Silicon LED Op-amp mode Yeah, you always want to give it something a little bit dark and then you would have done maybe otherwise So has more to do Yeah Crunch Just picking up those accent in notes See have a bit more nuance in the attack with these last two modes, I think Okay, let's try something with this dry out shall we So I've gone and grabbed the Zoya and what I've done is I've taken the dry output from the KGB dist and brought it into the Zoya and this has got a stereo delay Patch just set up just simple stereo delay with a high pass before the delay just to take some of the low end out So what this allows me to do is have the main sound Nice and distorted on my favorite op-amp mode when I've decided it's my favorite And if I bring up the gain on the Zoya now we should hear we have a delay signal Which is the original dry sound so this So we have that nice clean sound out to the side, but we can get filthy Even make it dark in the middle and keep the delay nice and bright on the outside Almost like we've got kind of two different vibes going on at the same time Yeah Very cool very nice utility to have here for sure Let's try it with some pads shall we right I've grabbed old reliable Korg Minilog and I've just set up this really simple Dark pat-patch just triangle wave single oscillator just so that the pedal has something again to grab on to so we can hear what it's doing and I've started with the distortion quite low here and up on the op-amp mode Because as I was setting up for this I discovered something quite lovely. So this with the distortion quite low We can go from this dark kind of sound and Just rather than obviously distorting just blend in this Exciting top-end There's a bit of fizz to it, but it's almost like I've opened up the filter Love that and finding that point in the middle where we have both the hind and the low end I think that's quite quite magic from this to this So just using it like an excite almost But of course we can bring that distortion up a little bit as well But let's just leave the distortion low just for a second and try the other modes here So back to full Distortion LED Quite similar at this gain level just a bit more fizz Which is interesting because on the bass it these two had very different mid-range characteristics. So Lower gains. I guess that's less prominent down to silicon more obviously distorting Still very lovely at this lower gain setting and this is the dry sound kind of like a low-fibre Brightening if that makes sense and Germanium Hello Even at this low gain level we're starting to introduce those additional harmonics on the top there when we play chords. Oh Yeah, yeah, that's the stuff love that That's beautiful half and half pseudo feedback sounds Gorgeous, let's go a bit more drive throaty and definitely emphasizing the higher notes Let's try silicon immediately more bottom end Cool add some reverb to that and we are done lovely. Okay. So high gain with the LED So lower gain so we can play more notes without it starting to introduce those additional harmonics It's so much more open. So that's the silicon The LED is so much more open And the distortion up at the top is more sort of crunchy Great and the op amp high gain So it's the darkest of the lot and that distortion is a lot. Um, the crunch at the top is a lot more sort of um coming on suddenly So I want to take some out with the filter Like that one with the lower gain more though, I think let's just try high gain with that germanium which introduced all those mid-range square wavy stuff going on there But let's try inverting the phase Interestingly more bottom end Which just goes to show if you're blending wet dry definitely check out that phase control Just put a little bit of reverb on here synth shoe guys Let's uh, let's give a drum machine a go shall we? Right for drums. I have grabbed the drum brute impact and I've got this little pattern going here And I thought to begin with let's listen to it with the distortion absolutely cranked So we can hear the pedal sort of Hanging on for dear life to hear the different characteristics of the voices as well So filter wide open distortion absolutely cranked. Let's hear the distortion So that's germanium Next up we've got silicon a little bit harder but more bottom end Individual elements are a little bit more clear even with the kick taken over So that's the led again perceptively less clipping And more bottom end again cool focus in the mid-range show Every time with the led Love what it's doing that little FM jump. Okay, um onto the op amp mode so darker than the leds lower gain again this to me almost sounds like um Like a mixer console channel being over driven a bit more really vibey Not as obviously exciting as the led version But maybe actually A little bit darker is going to fit in the mix a bit better So, um, it's on a drum machine. I think god, doesn't the Clean version sound boring now? It's on a drum machine I think where the wet dry is particularly powerful because it allows us even though we're absolutely mashing the sounds To get some of the attack and clarity from the original sounds back in there So let's give that a go. So I've come back down to the germanium, which was the absolute crushiest of the crushiest so That's the full wet We lose a lot of bottom end there So let's find a nice happy medium where we can get a bit more of the low end and attack in there Parallel distortion on drum machines is so powerful. Let's flip that phase Or the low end of that kick is just absolutely blown up. Let's kind of scoop the sound out of it that's mad in phase and out of phase Yes amazing Okay, same trick with uh silicon. Let's try that So a spitty silicon sound Find that happy medium Cool flip the phase Not quite as pronounced as the germanium, but still that bottom end is a bit more There now great Let's try it with ad That's full wet Somewhere there That's where the phase flipped back in phase a more neutral sound out phase Again that bottom end more pronounced Let's scoop you and the op amp mode So that's full wet again. That's with the phase flipped weirdly. I think the kick drums punch here now Maybe not much bottom end Yeah, the kick drum kind of disappears a bit with the phase flipped it seems to have more bottom end but less punch Again, the op amp mode just Is a really cool way to just get excitement into the sound Let's just whiz background to the germanium for a second. I just want to try uh Filtering it a bit with it blended So you can now because we've got so many different Um aspects of the sound going on we can kind of fine tune what's getting distorted So wide open a lot of that hi-hat fizz But with it filtered at halfway it's much more about that snare Loads of colors we can find there filter knob is especially useful On the drum machines because again, we've got so many different aspects there the hi-hat the crispy hi-hats The boom of the kick drum a thwack of the clap and the snare Silicon to the filter more powerful here. I think then Not more powerful but more um practically useful Then with the other sources we've tried Finally, let's try this friend out with some samples. So I just got a couple of loops Going here, which I can just a couple of different layers just so we have something suitably Complex for it to get a hold of just while I was setting up I just want to start Again with this idea of having the op-amp mode On low gain and using it as a kind of exciter So filter wide open low gain op-amp mode and let's turn the blend a little bit Picks out the detail beautifully Just a tiny bit of coloration and crunch at the top end, but it just feels like we've taken a blanket off the signal I think that's really lovely The way you can hear the um when it goes unnoticed, but there's lovely detail that gets picked up there Let's try some of the other modes with this low gain as well So this is the led mode that little click there is the sample not the kgb there So again, just lovely enhancement of the sound Nice to blend in and again, yeah flipping the phase on Pretty much all the modes apart from the op-amp one gives us a slightly more scooped sound with a bit more behind Same with the drum machine A bit more focus in phase Uh, okay, let's try the silicon with low gain. We're finally hearing some Obvious crunch there and it's just a lovely lo-fi crispy Almost like vinylizer That's nice like it with it half and half Let's try germanium. So finally more overt distortion. It's not overpowering though It's just adding some lovely grit and color Let's just try and approximate those similar levels of grip with one of the other modes. So Silicon here Just give a bit more distortion so you can hear there that silicon again is slightly harder on set Not as pello-y as the germanium was Let's try with the leds try and get that grit in there as well. Yeah, so Again much faster on set with the leds So again Maybe want to filter some of it out. Okay quite crispy Distortion, but I think that's a little handling a little bit more elegantly than the led was but the germanium there blended in was at lower gain was Really rather lovely. It's very As a pillowy. Okay. Let's just crank it Oh first. Let's just try filtering that down a bit. That's really nice Interesting. I've come full circle here with the bass lines. The opamp was my favorite, but now the germanium on the samples Especially with the filter down. Okay. Let's try crunching things up to the max. Shall we? So that's fully distortion It's almost an entirely different signal With the onset still quite gentle silicon led It's more constantly clipping. It's a little bit less Crackly germanium is my favorite spot where the major crack was gone Just sat behind it And that sort of scoopiness Oh, it's almost roaring there favorite on this sample at least so much Interesting color we can coax out there And it sounds good at all different gain levels as well So anyway I hope you enjoy this deep dive into the kgb disc Although this isn't a review one thing I will highlight with it, which Isn't really a downside, but it's just something to be aware of I guess is that The range of output you get on the different modes and again With the balancing of the distortion and the output is quite vast So you do need to be a little bit careful as you switch modes that you're not going to Blow out your speakers or your ears Because the op amp mode is so much louder than the germanium mode And gets so much louder with Distortion than the germanium mode does the germanium kind of tops out Whereas the op amp cubes getting louder so you need to be a little bit careful But having a distortion pedal with these different Voicings with the phase switch to get different colorations And with the dedicated dry out and the blend here Really does make it Very well suited to this World and one thing I didn't mention right at the start, which I will mention now is Goodness me is it a handsome pedal? What a lovely looking thing Anyway Yeah, I hope you enjoyed this deep dive into the kgb distortion if you did Enjoy it and if you want to see more Distortion views with electronic instruments, then please do give the video a like And make sure to subscribe so you don't miss out on any upcoming synth fun and maybe distortion fun too Until next time take care