385 Overdrive MKII

385+ mode has so much gain, I really liked switching between the same drive with a less and more gain setting, so I didn’t change up the fundamental tone but was able to release more gain.

385 MKII is incredible

I've owned the initial 385 for several years. It's been a consistent favorite, truly transparent overdrive (not to be confused with the Klon/Klones, which I've NEVER thought was transparent when it was overdriving). At light gain settings, the 385 is easy to clean up or make dirtier with a change of pick attack, and it is super easy to find the spot where the neck pickup is barely tickling and the bridge pickup has a great rock overdrive sound. Before the MKII, I was tempted to buy a second because I like the quality of both the light overdrive and heavy overdrive sound. The MKII does the exact same thing, except now I can have both sounds in one pedal. Even at very high levels of overdrive, you can clean it up nice with a rollback on the guitar volume easily enough. The + switch is a bonus feature that makes this lovely overdrive into a thick, chewy, distortion ... almost fuzz. It must be a gain boost right at the input because it affects both channels (they aren't really channels, as they appear to share everything, the a/b switch just switches which gain and volume knob is active), which is a shame because it would be cool to have that + mode only in one channel. Also in + mode, I can't turn the gain up beyond 12 oclock because it will squeal like mad when I'm not playing. But it is definitely a "more" switch... what ever sound you have in normal mode is just gained way up in + mode. thick and chewy, but still with clarity of notes - great for leads. Here's looking forward to an MKIII in a few years that is truly dual channel has separate tone controls for the two channels, and the + mode can be assigned to one channel (or even better is on it's own pedal switch - even if the box has to be larger). I play a Duesenberg Paloma (single coil neck and middle, humbucker bridge) through fender-ish amps or the Quad Cortex with the Plini amp clean channel.

Finally, the right pedal for my needs!

As many guitar pedals as I have owned, I've always struggled to find an overdrive that that works with a particular amp / guitar pairing I use for my personal music (as opposed to the setup I use for a cover band). And then along came the 385 MkII. Having two gain stages is really nice, but the way it's voiced - especially for the higher gain setting - perfectly compliments what I'm trying to do. The original 385 was a cool pedal, but for me the upgrade far surpasses it. Thank you, Walrus Audio, for your continued creativity and innovation. Thomas