Customer Reviews

Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi (RUSSIA)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

For years I used Rat distortion boxes for guitar and for bass. Now I play bass a lot more in bands, and find the Rat sound to be weak and one dimensional. I sold off my rat and tried out a number of other distortion boxes at a local shop and settled on the Big Muff Pi. This thing is rich. The complexity of the distortion is incredible compared to what you get with most other pedals--must be the brilliant Russian engineering behind it. It has three knobs: Volume, Sustain, and Tone. The Volume is obvious, the sustain is really the distortion level. For the Bass, I run the sustain very low, and the volume higher and get a great mix of clean and distorted tone. Sometimes I run the sustain knob turned all the way off and this thing still drives the sound nicely. Too much distortion on the bass and you loose your ability to cut through the rest of the band in my opinion. The Tone knob adjusts the center frequency of the distortion. I run mine way over to the left and distort the low end around 200-400 kHz. You can crank it around and get anything from a low grumbly distortion tall the way to a really tinny irritating heavy metal sound. This thing is versatile, and no matter how you like your settings, the distortion it produces is rich in harmonic overtones, multi-dimensional, and unlike any other boxes I've tried. Highly recommended.
My only complaint is that this box is designed to work only on battery power--no AC adapter at all. Fortunately now there's an adapter from One-Spot that can be connected to a battery lead and then to an AC adapter. Hopefully Amazon will start carrying that soon.

Great range with more sensitive controls than the US version. Once dialed in, it sustains for days. No longer comes with the wood box, as pictured.

I first fell in love with the Big Muff after hearing R.E.M.'s album Monster, where it's present on virtually every track. The Smashing Pumpkins, among others, also made extensive use of it. I purchased mine back in '94 and was quickly impressed by its versatility. This Russian built beast has three knobs: volume, tone, and distortion and by playing with these, you can create many different sounds. This pedal can range from a simple overdriven sound to a full out crackling, almost uncontrollable roar. My pedal is now fourteen years old and I've never once had an issue with it cutting out. It's solidly built, so much so you could probably brain someone with it and cause some serious damage. Plus, it's fairly affordable as far as effects go. A solid buy.

Everyone has known for a good while that if you wanted *clean* *distortion* get the Big Muff, no question. It is I'm happy to say the same and really better. I bought my second just a bit ago having heard of the sustain feature for the first time. Not to gild the lily but I'll be dipped. It makes it better.
I think the best and most effective thing I can say is: "get a decent used amp no "EFX" if possible. Use the "simplest" amp with ONLY Big Muff and that will 95% sure find the sound you want

I used to gig with this particular model because it was cheap(Black EHX Russian, 90's el'cheapo). In more ways than one, the case is aweful and the input/ output's are absolute garbage. This is the worst sounding big muff in my opinion, but it is super easy to mod if you are interest in playing with the guts. The shell is so terrible, the first thing I'd do is replace the chasis. Also, the switch is garbage so quick replace. Dead batteries sound really good in this one, so a 9volts current manipulator works wonders. Overall, I chewed up like 4 or 5 of these bad boys in six years, and don't have a single one left. These things got so bad I literally threw them all away. I'm a big muff collector and the older ones are much much better. Gigging now, I'd probably use a clone as they are so much more heavy duty. Although, right now I'm using a big Green Machine/ Civil War Muff right now, my 2nd fav to the triangle, but I'm not gigging with that. I'm going to get a tone wicker because I've seen the little big muff and they are very heavy duty. The reason I'm writting this review is that I bought these for $25 a piece when they were new and some people are paying $100+ for them now. They do sound really nice, but this thing is a piece of crap. If you want this particular model by a clone from stomp under foot because his quality blows this piece of junk out of the water.

I share rhythm and lead tasks in my rock band, and I use a Way huge fat sandwich for leads, a way huge pork loin for rhythm and a russian big muff for different rhythms. I have tried the american big muffs and I think they are more suited for the lead- not as smooth and bulky as the black russian. I highly recommend this pedal to those who are looking for thick creamy sustain, but a generous low end as well.

This pedal is one of my favorites. It has a very strong fuzz effect, but it really shines when combined with other effects like phasers or flangers. I can get an effect with my bass, this pedal and a couple other pedals that really reminds me of a bulldozer. I modded my effect pedal to have external power as it does not normally come with external power. This pedal is also featured in "How to Modify effects" based of Indie Mod guitarist mods. This pedal also sounds great when combined with the Behringer VTM pedal, and the Behringer Hell Babe Optical Wah.

I was looking for a heavy sound and finally I've found it. This pedal has a great sound, good quality/price relationship, excellent construction... I'm so happy with this buy. Highly recommended for the guitar player looking a Metallica-NIN-Rammstein-Nirvana-WhiteZombie sound.

Great pedal, my favorite that I've played thus far.

For one, its VERY STURDY. My friend insists this Russian model is built from parts of decommissioned soviet tanks, and while I think thats an exaggeration, I wouldn't be surprised if he was telling the truth. Its basically a thick black metal box, one that can take all the stomping you can dish out. Throw it through a window, the glass will break, but this pedal sure won't!

The controls have lots of range, its only two knobs to mess with but, wow, the range! The sustain goes from a slight overdrive sound to a fuzzed out roar, and the tone is pretty much a total bass to treble ratio, meaning to can just bury it in deep muddy bass or make it crunchy and crackly too.

Styles of music you can play...? Well, anything garagey or 70's rock-ish in sound, dialed back you can get tones like Cream or Sabbath (GREAT pedal for making the type of tone found on "Sweet Leaf"), and if you start moving the knobs clockwise, you'll find yourself making sounds like Mudhoney and Fu Manchu. Turn everything on full blast and suddenly it sounds like a heavier "Territorial Pissings" by Nirvana!

I mostly use it with a cheap Ibenez and the stock humbuckers make for a thick thick sound. I love it. But when I plug my Standard Strat in with its single coil pickups, I can pull a good, dirty, lo-fi, school of '77 punk rock tone out of it.

What it WON'T do? Well, if you play thrash metal, this is the exact opposite of what you're looking for. It can bring the heavy, no doubt, but the fuzzy, muddy tones blur some of the speedy picking. Absolutely PERFECT for any kind of stoner rock, grungey sludge, garage type stuff, or doom metal, but thrash? No no no...

But hey, one pedal can't do EVERYTHING!

Incidentally, I feel I should mention two other small complaints:

1) No plug for a 9v adapter. It would have been a nice feature, though so far its certainly not a problem, as I've been running this thing off the same 9v battery for probably four months now. Just unplug your cables when you're done, and you shouldn't run out of juice anytime soon.

2) The knobs are too easy to turn. Given the control sensitivity, it'd be nice for the knobs to hold to their positions a little stronger. I've had my instrument cables sweep across the face of this while I was moving around playing and its cut out my volume, tone, whatever knob they touched, it moved. Maybe its just mine that are so loose, I dunno. Either way, the last show I played, I taped my cables down right around the pedal, so I wouldn't risk screwing up the settings in front of my audience.


But all around, this Big Muff is a monster of a pedal, and I want to formally thank Electro-Harmonix for making it. If you've ever wanted to beef up your guitar tone, get a Russian made Big Muff!

I bought the Big Muff to play through my Acoustic B20 with my Bass. I was trying to get a sound similar to the Bass guitar on Muse tracks like Hysteria. It sounds great! I'm no expert so I can't compare it to other effects pedals. It's also hard to describe what something 'sounds' like! I thought I'd try my guitar through the same setup with the Big Muff and I absolutely love the sound as well. I prefer this simple setup to playing my guitar through my Line 6 modeling amp.