VT999 : Tube Monster

This is a great device. It comes boxed in a huge protective box. Comes with power supply. Yes, it has a Bugera 12AX7 vacuum tube in it. It takes a couple of minutes to warm up.

Its a big device, takes up a lot of room, that is ok by me.

The sound is really fantastic from this pedal. Overdrive - from the blues to hard overdrive. The treble, mid and bass controls are very good at altering the tone. The gain starts at dial setting 1 and goes to extreme very quickly when turning up the dial.

Its best to use a compressor before the Vintage Tube Monster VT999 - then the tone and sustain is really something else. On the higher notes, for me, it shines out clear. Chords are of course very overdriven. It sounds great without using a compressor before it, depends on what sort of sustain & overdrive sound you are wanting.

This VT999 does give that tube sound distortion.

The Noise Gate does work very well, it cuts out the natural overdrive noise between notes/phrases when not playing.

This is great fun to have one of these boxes even if you already have an overdrive, just to try out the vacuum tube sound. This box is really a tube pre-amp that functions as a tube overdrive pedal.

On the web there is info on modifying this box by swapping around the vacuum tube with a different one to get less overdrive or different sounds. I am happy with the present overdrive sound.

The subtle differences around the lower drive settings are very nice, dynamic and responsive to all types of playing.