Review Demo - Electro-Harmonix Green Russian Big Muff

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I’ve acquired many fuzzes since I bought my Sovtek Big Muff more than two decades ago. And it’s still, hands-down, my favorite. For my purposes it does everything: droning controllable feedback, punky crunch, Valkyrie-wail lead sounds, and psychedelically thuggish buzz that would make a Vox Tone Bender blush. Specialized fuzz units in my collection might do certain things better, or be more appropriate in a specific situation, but I’d feel okay if my old Sovtek was the only pedal I had for a session or show.

Electro-Harmonix’s new-version Green Russian Big Muff slides into each of those roles with ease. Its voices often make it a dead ringer for an original—and those sounds that aren’t exactly original are more than serviceably authentic. At 80 bucks, it’s also one of the great fuzz bargains, since the original sold with its own wooden box for 59 bones.

Unless you’re a candy-colored delight from the 1972 Colorsound catalog, it’s hard to imagine a pedal with more visual presence than an original Sovtek Big Muff. The space-conscious design of the EHX reissue means you won’t experience the writ-large aesthetic virtues of the original (nor its can’t-miss dimensions, as you bounce around a dark stage).

The top end is sizzling hot, surprisingly concise and focused, and both musical and malleable at the fringes of feedback.
But having an authentically enormous sounding Russian Muff in a Nano enclosure is a smart trade for most. And you’ll have extra room to stack other fuzzes, drives, and boosts around the Green Russian—which it excels at accommodating.

Construction is clean, printed-circuit stuff. But despite its assembly line origins, the circuit is recognizably a Big Muff, and four BC547 transistors hover like spindly Martians over the reassuringly simple, ordered PC board. Jacks are board-mounted. Knobs turn with precision and satisfying resistance, and each control has an impressively responsive and nuanced taper. It’s certainly sturdier feeling than its predecessor.

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