Holy Fire Overdrive / Distortion Demo
The Holy Fire is a different kind of overdrive/distortion pedal. As someone who spent a lot of time modifying and studying traditional clipping circuits in college, I was instantly intrigued by the Holy Fire when I met up with Sarge from Creation Audio Labs at the Great American Guitar Show back in November.
I’ll talk about it more in the video, but here’s the things I like about the Holy Fire:
Pros:
- Clean Boost is completely transparent
- The Overdrive circuit sounds bigger than most clipping circuits because it’s not clipping, it’s shaping.
- The Overdrive and Fuzz Circuits can work together to create many different levels and flavors of distortion.
- You have to hear it to believe it, but even when running at full blast, rolling back the volume on your guitar makes this pedal clean up like it’s not even there. Unbelievable.
Cons
- Distortion circuit sounded a bit harsh on the highest levels, but it’m not a huge user of tons of distortion so I’m not the best judge of that.
- Because of it’s transparency, it doesn’t sound like traditional pedals that are really midrangy. This can be a downer if that’s the tone you really want. But a good thing if you want more natural sounding overdrive.
- 48v Power supply is a bit more inconvenient than traditional 9V, but does give the pedal a bigger sound.
Personal Note
I wanted to clarify that I like the Holy Fire because it’s unique and on certain settings it’s very useful for my particular style. I am not suggesting that it is a replacement for any other pedal I own because it sounds very different and will be used in a different way. I may post more about this later, but as you watch the video, keep in mind that I’m reviewing it for what it is, not as a comparison to pedal “A” or “B”.
February 10th, 2010 at 4:36 pm
Tony – Is the 48 volt power supply an expensive proprietary item? I’m concerned about replacement if it gets damaged, or if it will cause noise to nearby devices on my cramped pedal board.
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Anthony Stauffer reply on February 10th, 2010 8:55 pm:
That I cannot say for sure. Feel free to contact the guys at CAL, they’re good people and can better explain that.
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February 10th, 2010 at 4:33 pm
Tony – Thanks for the videos and your review of the Holy Fire.
I’m most attracted to this pedal because it doesn’t lose low end, but wonder if that can create problems. Some users have said the pedal’s extra bass is a bit disorienting, but that’s probably due to experience with other pedals that lack bass. As the Holy Fire doesn’t lose bass, I’m curious why Creation Audio chose to add a treble cut knob. Excessive bass may be a problem with neck pickups (especially humbuckers), or with distorted, compressed levels (common for lead solo boosts). I would think a control to tweak (reduce) bass, or add some brightness would work better.
Does the Holy Fire ever lack focus or projection in the mix of a band?
From the videos I’ve seen (here and elsewhere), the distortion circuit seems very fuzzy, garbled and not very amp like. The overdrive circuit seems to sound natural, but a much cleaner amp setting would make it easier to evaluate what the pedal is doing. How the pedal cleans up is impressive, but at the extreme settings in the demo, the cleaned up level is too low to be of any practical use. I suppose it cleans up sooner at lower gain settings, so this could be a great feature.
I’d like to hear the pedal with the other Strat pickup combinations, and humbucker pickups. Most pedals are compatible with single coils, but I suspect the Holy Fire may be rather muddy with humbuckers.
My nit picking aside, your video and review comments are quite helpful. Good job! The concepts behind this pedal is intriguing, and I may give this one a try.
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Anthony Stauffer reply on February 10th, 2010 8:54 pm:
Hi Dave,
The Holy Fire is hard to compare with other pedals. The presence of full low end in the boost does make it a bit less ‘focused’ sounding than a nasaly tube screamer style pedal. But much better for rhythm in my opinion.
The distortion circuit isn’t quite as much down my alley as the OD circuit, but the pedal is used by much more rock oriented players than me. I’m mainly attracted to it because of the concepts behind it. My primary use of it would probably be as a rhythm boost pedal.
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May 12th, 2009 at 4:51 pm
The sound (?!) was choppy oas was the video—on a fast internet connection. Please compress your video. Thanks.
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Anthony Stauffer reply on May 12th, 2009 6:52 pm:
These videos are compressed when uploaded to Vimeo, however, they are available in HD so make sure that HD is turned off if the playback is choppy. There’s a little HD indicator on the right hand side. The longer review is no in HD so I don’t know why that would would not be playing back properly.
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February 7th, 2009 at 7:53 am
Hi Anthony I just bought a Ibanez Turbo Tube screamer TS9DX ,and I compared it to another Tube screamer going thur a Hot rod delux tube amp and I lkie the TS9DX it seems to give me what I’m looking for it has a turbo and a hot mode which works good. Now thw sales person at this guitar shop told me that pepole are buying these and modifying them to sound like the reissue model and then reselling them at a higher price. My questions is have you heard of this and can you get me info on how to modify the TS9DX , I paid 109.00 for it .Or did I get ripped,I see some you have are for 49.00 . Thanks again.
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January 14th, 2009 at 11:53 am
Now we need to find a Wah pedal that doesn’t lose the bottom end and ruin your tone!!
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tatem170 reply on May 4th, 2009 2:37 pm:
it’s called a teese rmc3, give it a try.
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January 9th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
I’v got “the”pedal you could compare this to-Twin Sonic by OKKO from Germany. I purchased one used 5 months ago,and it does absolutely EVERYTHING you just said about the holy fire,has a few more features that make it easier to use,is built like a tank,and uses a 9V power supply. I sold my Ultimate attenuator that I used with my black face ’64 vibroverb because this pedal could achive the same results and more. I also have the same amp you use,and I’ve got to say I sold my Fulltone Fulldrive,analogman TS9 tube screamer,and even bought some other pedals to see if I could find something better,and it just doesn’t exist. You might want to check it out.
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Steve Gill reply on January 9th, 2009 11:53 pm:
Here is the website, no English version though.
http://www.stompbox.de/main_deutsch.html
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Steve Gill reply on January 9th, 2009 11:56 pm:
Just found the same site in English.
http://www.okko-fx.com/main_english.html
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January 7th, 2009 at 5:04 pm
Wow… unbelievable… that pedal is just amazing. I’ve sent an email to Creation Audio Labs in order to buy it (i live in France) and i can tell you that they are really receptive and good guys.
Thanks a lot for showing us such an excellent pedal. Hope that it’ll be quickly mine
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Anthony Stauffer reply on January 7th, 2009 5:07 pm:
Keep in mind that it uses a 48v power supply which may present some problems, make sure to ask them about that.
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Shurk reply on January 8th, 2009 4:46 am:
Ah excellent… i didn’t thought about that. But why will that present some problems ? What kind of ? Noise ?
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Anthony Stauffer reply on January 8th, 2009 8:17 am:
From their website “International customers – We are currently working on the various certifications required to make Creation Audio Labs products available to the EU and worldwide. Please email us if you have questions regarding availability in your country.”
January 7th, 2009 at 2:54 pm
Great review! This pedal solves the main problem I have always had with ANY overdrive/distortion pedal – the bass/bottom end of your tone is removed and the amp no longer retains it’s personality. So I went to their web site today and immediately bought one. Thanks for the perfect timing. I actually came to your website today to buy the 5 boxes licks DVD (which I did) and just happened to see your review of this pedal on your home page.
Thanks again for taking the time to review this pedal!
Cisco
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January 7th, 2009 at 2:17 pm
Anthony,
Great review…thanks. As you know, i own this pedal and love it. I’ve had occasion to talk to the folks at Creation A/L and they just couldn’t be more helpful and generous with their time. i mentioned to their engineer that you were going to do this review and they were very excited about it. I’m sure that they will be more excited once they see how positive it is.
As you say this pedal provides a wide range of tone options because you can mix the Overdrive and Distortion settings. I just haven’t found that perfect combination yet. It would be greatly appreciated if you would share the settings that you feel best matches the style of music you play.
Steve
P.S. Thanks for the new spell check feature!!!
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