OVERDRIVE- CALINE Mellow Drive ...a Dumble? ...a Vertex Ultraphonix for sure!

 CALINE MELLOW DRIVE 

$40.00 USD

Everyone does a Dumble. The original Dumble amp was very much a Fender Deluxe with Tube Screamer built into it. The one he called the Overdrive Special is the one that gets all the focus was more Fender Bassman like. If that is vague than good. The problem is a Dumble amp was like a signature guitar. You picked one of the the basic amps and it was customized for the buyer to the extreme. The buyer would come to the shop once the amp chassis was up and working and any kind of change was made whether it was big or just tweaking. So when you hear that no two Dumbles are alike it is hardly an exaggeration.

On the whole the first Dumble pedals were very smooth sounding with no bass and weak lower mids as well. in short  they were to me wimpy and balzless.

Vertex makes the Ultraphonix. They had the luxury of hearing several Dumbles ...but better still they had one on loan to work from. 

It was finished 3 years ago after which they did a Dumble vs. Pedal video. 

It has a nice chunky organic sound with some punch.

The Caline is in the ballpark. 

The mids are fatter but the basic voice is damn close.

CONCLUSION

I have no complaints. The Vertex has more overall presence. BUT WTF !!! The Vertex is not 5 times better? Then there are other pedals not near as close to the $200 Vertex that are not even close to the Dumble amp that want a lot more.

Check it out!

the Vertex vs. the Dumble amp

Then note the Caline on the first video at 8:15

even with a different guitar and amp

if not an identical twins ...still a twin!!!

HANDS ON

Well my pedal arrived early. After trying it for several tunes and several guitars. I found I like using it best with the gain low at 8 o'clock on my Semi. It it is very full and warm but at the same time a every note in a chord I am playing rings out clean, clear and dined.The harmonics are rich and nearly all even order so nothing ever gets muddy or worse yet sounds out of tune even though it isn't. I found on my Gibson SG Std it gave the guitar a Gibson ES 335 Semi vibe to it. It definitely blew my mind when that happened.

It replaced 2 other OD's and one was stupidly pricey. I have a  Bluesbreaker style OD. that I am reassessing if it could not cover what it does. The Bluesbreaker has a much brighter and assertive sound but it too I only used for flatpicking.

I have zero complaints. The damn thing is big league sounding and incredibly useful for

so many things where one usually gets a Tubes Screamer or a Timmy or some high priced gourmet MIJ offering for. I should know I owned them all only to be totally bummed out over another needless waste of money.