OVERDRIVE- PROVIDENCE Red Rock OD ...Overdrive heaven for a Strat!!!

$200.00 USD

 PROVIDENCE RED ROCK OD 

Straight off let me tell you that half all Providence pedals are modified Tube Screamers. Nearly every pedal company makes at least one ts wannabe. One big reason in this age of pedal boards is
that the ts is no longer always used as both an OD and a boost. At one time everyone increased the output volume/level high enough to clip the preamp of their amplifier. so These days the best ts style pedals give you a great sound right in the pedal and you can leave the level at unity gain.

The Red Rock is an OD that does an excellent job of keeping a Strat sounding like a Strat. Yes it works great for hummies but it is definitely aimed at single coils of any kind so it loves a Tele or P90.

The guy that designed this pedal used his own vintage Strat to voice this pedal.

Personally I find a Tele or P90 does not suffer with your average OD but if an OD eats away the Strat 'chime' it kills even owning a Strat!!!

This little beauty is great. With the gain barely on it sounds almost dead clean but fattens the sound and pushes enough sustain to fill in until you hit your next note or chord. With other OD's when the gain is set low they choke. You stand there still doing a nice string vibrato but there isn't any sound coming out.
The little volume knob is an input boost for your guitar for single coils. It is great for bringing up the input to match higher gain PU's like most hummies or any hot PU's.

 A BIT OF DIGRESSION
After the 64/65  Strat PU's ...all future Strat PU's are wound hot enough to start killing the chime.
Leo designed the '64 himself before he left Fender.
Hendrix used a 64 Strat any time he felt that it was important to preserve his cleaner tones. It is noticeable especially on the first 2 LP's

My point is any classic single coil PU with such a boost allows you to choose tone over high output.
I feel it is a critical addition to get 'that' tone that a Plexi will give you just before it hits 'crunch'.
The Fat switch boosts the lows and a few lower mids ...just enough to beef up the sound without destroying it.
The tone even pushed up quite high never ever pushes into that shrill range. It has plenty of gain too.

CONCLUSION
Well I like it a lot ....but I have bought and sold a completely stupid amount of OD to get that Marshall Super Lead 100 going thru a Marshall 1960a 4x12 cab with the volume set just shy of break up taking you into crunch. LOL Worse yet most were ts wannabes but the manufacture was not saying that!!!
If you want to hear a great '64 Strat sound listen to Hendrix do  The Wind Cries Mary. To me that is the perfect 'clean' sound.
Something leaning that way would be fine but I either get a very thin sound or a fuzzy sound with low gain. I find that online vids do not show this well. I am using a Love Pedal Super 6 SRV model right now. Not perfect but it squeaks by.

Listen to the first video with Pete Thorn.
Start it at 2:42. Check out a great Strat lead tone.
If you back it off a bit you would get the clean Hendrix tone.

I ordered one so be sure to be back for the 'hands on' follow up.

HANDS ON

So it arrived. The first thing you note is it has a very high quality finish. The outside hardware is the best of the best. Even the d/c jack is all steel. I have a lot of fine pedals with premium jacks but the d/c jack though really well made is always a high tech plastic.

I set the pedal up with the more conventional of Pete Thorn's settings and it did sound very good. I then did the setting that Pete was thrilled with where you kill the tone and push the level high. I was afraid it would cause a unity gain problem. 
It did!!! DAMN!
So it is still best Tube Screamer I have ever owned.

I GET A NEW STRAT WANNABE
I have unintentionally matched a guitar to a pedal instead of a pedal to a guitar. LOL
Having got a '92 Peavey Strat wannabe added to my line up things are looking up.

The Peavey has the same American alder body and Canadian hard rock maple neck as an American Strat. Luck would have it that this guitar ended up being made of a choice piece of tone wood and now with well over 20 years of drying out and aging it is in it's prime. It sounds better then my Fender Custom Shop Strat. No sh@t the sound is just killer!!!

At that time I fell onto a Danelectro Bacon & Eggs. It is years old but NOS. Since it is a dead on clone of the MXR grahic EQ ...it was not hard to bump up some more highs and upper mids to stop my bass heavy humbucker loving Marshall from eating my Strat sound.
So feeding a great sounding Strat to the Red Rock ...then the Red Rock to the Marshall that thinks it's half Fender when my pedal chain is on ...is pure magic.

Bottom line the Providence Red Rock is a modified Tube Screamer tweaked for Strat perfection. If you are a Strat guy if it is not a must have ...it certainly is a must try!
For everyone else it is a great Tube Screamer ...but there are hundreds to choose from
so listen with caution to them all. Even having said that I find all my other single coil PU 
guitars do sound damn good thru this pedal.