Deep Space Devices Golem Distortion

Doom. Sludge. Stoner. Down and dirty, low-tuned and mellowly aggressive music has been around for decades, and has taken on many shapes, forms and monikers. There are certain effects pedal out there that instantly remind you of these types of musical genres, and today’s pedal does just that and more. The Golem Distortion from Deep Space Devices delivers all the low end you could want or need, but also manages to keep things from drowning in a muddy mix with ease. Lots of options and lots of tones are waiting to be discovered and unleashed from this dark monster, let’s see if we can’t find a couple…

None of the control knobs and switches on the Golem have readily identifiable names, so there’s some explaining to do here. Power works as your volume control, Rage sets the density of the gain, Form shapes your tone as a treble/bass EQ sweep and Shift helps you dial in the high mids. These four controls have an unbelievably huge range in each one, and interact together very specifically to form the base for the sounds that this pedal can create.

There are four dipswitches available for even more tone shaping ability, too. Tremble and Quake work in tandem to boost and exaggerate different modes of diode switching, with Silicon, Germanium or no diodes as your mode choices with Tremble, and Quake being a boost and helper to each, pushing the capabilities of what Golem can do. The Evolve toggle lets you switch an internal transistor to create a slightly gated distortion, while Mass acts as a bass/overall volume boost. When both of these are switched to the left, they work together as well, forming a powerful curtain of sound not to be messed with or taken lightly.

With the ability to sound fantastic on both guitar and bass, the Golem Distortion really opens up a slew of tones that your stoner doom band might not have been able to achieve before. Not just because its loaded with control parameters and fun options galore, but because the circuit sounds gooooood, and can be applied to many genres, speeds and types of tunes with ease. Knocking it out of the park again is the crew from Deep Space Devices – be sure to check out our review of their Red Ghost Distortion pedal as well, and they’ve got something new on the horizon that will be unleashed here at Pedal of the Day soon as well….