The band Mastodon has been one of our favorites for years, so we were super-stoked to check out a signature pedal from their bass player, Troy Sanders. Working with the crew from Wren and Cuff, the Elephant Skin Distortion was born, and havoc was unleashed on metal fans everywhere. Featuring a well-known Wren and Cuff pedal on one side and a boost on the other, this is one piece of gear that’s sure to find it’s way onto bass and guitar pedalboards worldwide.
The right hand side of the Elephant Skin is the same circuit as their popular Tall Font Russian pedal, a simple fuzzy distortion based on classic Russian Big Muff pedals. The sound is extremely unique, as the originals were, and has been meticulously recreated by Matthew at Wren and Cuff to give the same sonic intensity at those classics, but with better parts and modern upgrades. The low end has some tasty compression, the highs produce beautiful harmonics and the mids are dialed in just right.
The left side of this pedal is a Boost of sorts, an added gain stage that is activated via a second footswitch, for when you really need to go overboard on your distortion. This side can be used independently as well, which a lot of pedals like this do not feature, making is an excellent clean(ish) boost if need be, too. These two side coming together to form this powerful pedal really make it a music staple, with a wide range of tones and volumes available for all your needs.
For this review, we used a guitar in the demo below, and just love how it beefs up the tone and makes the low end sparkle through the humbuckers. If you’d like to hear it on bass, come back tomorrow, as we have demoed it with the PEDALpUNK! Audio Interface, so you’ll get the best of both worlds in that review as well. Thanks so much to Matthew and Troy for coming up with such a rad pedal that sounds so good with both instruments – head over to the Wren and Cuff site for more great gear, and catch Mastodon coming to a town near you soon!
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