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Review: Ibanez TS808 vintage Tube Screamer Reissue

March 23rd, 2008 Guitar Effects/Pedals |

From wines, cigars, guitars, and now effects, everyone is trying to jump into the "vintage" market. I am usually pretty skeptical about marketing techniques and try my best to alert others about them.

Enter the Ibanez Tube Screamer Vintage Reissue... which will set you back $169 bucks. I don't understand the acclaim that this pedal gets. For as long as I can remember people have been telling me how awesome an Ibanez tube screamer is. A few years ago I tried one and it only confirmed my beliefs- I hate this pedal. (review continued below...)

Bid, Buy or Sell on eBay!Live Results:

Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer Reissue Guitar Effects Pedal Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer Reissue Guitar Effects Pedal Paypal 13 Bids US $90.90 2h 15m
Ibanez Tube Screamer TS9 reissue Ibanez Tube Screamer TS9 reissue Paypal 8 Bids US $75.00 22h 34m
Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer Reissue GREAT CONDITION Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer Reissue GREAT CONDITION Paypal 3 Bids US $43.00 1d 2h 2m
Ibanez TS 808 Vintage Tube Screamer Reissue TS808 Ibanez TS 808 Vintage Tube Screamer Reissue TS808 Paypal US $169.00 1d 5h 54m
Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer Reissue Guitar Pedal Ibanez TS808 Tube Screamer Reissue Guitar Pedal Paypal US $169.95 2d 24m
IBANEZ TUBE SCREAMER REISSUE TS 9 EXCELLENT CONDITION IBANEZ TUBE SCREAMER REISSUE TS 9 EXCELLENT CONDITION Paypal 1 Bid US $60.00 3d 15h 35m
Ibanez TS 9 Tube Screamer Reissue Ibanez TS 9 Tube Screamer Reissue Paypal 0 Bid US $10.00 5d 2h 46m
Ibanez TS9 Tube Screamer Pedal Reissue Ibanez TS9 Tube Screamer Pedal Reissue Paypal US $99.99 13d 49m

 

To me there is nothing tube-like about this pedal at all. Instead of warm, rich, and harmonic distortion you get noisy and loud distortion that is more thin than anything else. I've even tried using this pedal for a live show. Unfortunately my solos were so thin that the audience couldn't hear them over the rest of my band.

Perhaps my particular configuration lead to these results ( I was using a Marshall JCM 2000 TSL amp).

As for features the pedal has a very basic setup with a square footswitch, overdrive, tone, and volume control. When you search online you will find countless people proclaiming how this pedal is the key to nailing down Stevie Ray's tone. I messed around for days and couldn't find it. To me this pedal should not have the word tube in it at all- the tone is crunchy, noisy, and overall thin to me.

I compared this sound to the other Tube Screamer models and simply cannot hear a difference. If I am missing something let me know, otherwise I think this pedal is hardly worth $170 bucks!




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