Boss Metal Zone Distortion pedal

[Imactuallyadrummer]

So... here is the backstory. I have a colleague in my building that collects guitars and I asked him about pedals. He gave me a couple of his personal recommendations for distortion pedals.

I go onto Facebook and I see someone down the street from me selling a BOSS Metal Zone pedal.

I go back and tell my colleague which one is on the market. He just laughs and doesn't say anything other than to YouTube it up and do some research on what sounds I like.

I listen to him and go on YouTube and most of the top hits are about how it's the worst distortion pedal of all time.

Is this true or is this a guitar meme that I've missed out on?


PS. I'll be picking up a Boss DS-1 from a friend of a friend for $45.

 

[Donovan Etue]

It's known as one of the worst guitar pedals of all time due to the stereotypes of how people have used it. A few of the reasons are A. ton of local bands were using them and setting them up to be over the top gained out which sounded awful. B. From the videos I've seen it's capable of a wide range of tunes due to the large amount of adjustable knobs on it which results in a few good tones but it's also capable of a lot of bad tones. C. Ola Englund and CS Guitars did videos on it when rumors were going around that the Metal Zone sounds damn good if it's used in the effects loop but not very good if it's run in front of the amp which a lot of people didn't take into account. So it's not necessarily an amazing pedal but it certainly isn't the worst of all time if you use it how it's supposed to be. I'm going to link the two videos from Ola and CS down below so if you want to check it out you don't have to go searching.

 

[Adin Shepherd]

I owned one in my teens and it sounded pretty good to my ears, and it gave me the high gain sound I wanted.

I am sure there are much better options available now, and it probably wouldn't be my first choice today, but at the time I thought it was the ducks nuts.

 

[Lindsey]

Like Donovan said it doesn't have a good name but there are new versions of the pedal. Look at youtube for whichever pedal you think about getting either way.

 

[Larry Tooley]

I tried one of these in a music store in the 90's and could not get it to sound good. Probably because there were too many knobs. Irony is one of my favorite distortion pedals now has 6 knobs, the Mooer 005 Micro preamp.

 

[Jesse Salmons]

The DS-1 i hear is good. The metal zone? Depends how ya use it like donovan said. Personally, i have a Ehx metal muff, and damn the thing sounds so well rounded it can do damn near any sound you could ever want. I can get anything from low gain led zeppelin style sounds all the way to death metal distortion out of it. Works really good for groove style metal a la metallica’s load and reload stuff which has killer riffs, and yes im a huge fan of a lot of the Load and reload era of ‘tallica

 

[tamagotchigraveyard]

The waza version is hands down the best distortion pedal I have ever used