Klon Centaur

trancegodz

Fractal Fanatic
I have never tried one or heard one before, but I just watched these two videos that gave me a real good idea of what they do. One is a direct comparison between the gold and silver versions, and the other is a comparison between the silver version and the Soul Food pedal. Pretty good comparison videos.



 
Well... can't say i hear very much if any diff between the Klon and the Soul Food TBH.
 
I have a $20 Klon Clone from Aliexpress. I can't hear much difference with these videos
 
Don't forget those magical 1N34A diodes of a special vintage that Bill claims he managed to grab. And of course the magical Klon buffer that could resurrect dead pharaohs if need be.

There's so much hype regarding the Centaur. In no small part thanks to places like The Gear Page. It was one of the first boutique pedals, it gained a big rep and the limited production run meant there was excessive demand and only limited supplies. Bring in a slightly different production run with the Silver version, or the KTR with surface mounted components and you can fully expect on cue for the tone hounds to appear who maintain that the first version was best. Because just like Red Ones Go Fastah with Orks, First Version is Always Best with guitar players. And while Bill Finnegan always claims he had no role in the hype he was the first to say that the clones weren't as good as they didn't have the magical diodes, thus pouring gasoline on the fire.

In the end you can only do blind tests to determine what sounds better or not. And even then you have to dial them in right because with 5 to 20% tolerance drift on electronic components and potentiometers you can't just dial the knobs all the same. Not even two gold versions of the same production run will sound quite the same like that. Something we all should know as we tried to recreate the amp settings of our favorite guitar heroes on the Axe and not getting the same exact sound either.
 
The magic tone is in the “goop” ;)
Isn’t that something Gwyneth Paltrow is peddling?😄

I have a KTR, a Wampler Tumnus & an MXR Sugar Drive though they don’t stay too long on my board. I guess maybe a real Centaur will do so but ironically if I do own one, it’ll probably be locked away in a vault!
 
I remember when these first came out and were readily available. I thought...too big for my board, pass...boy, I wish I would have bought one.

Similar experience, my favorite guitar store was the first Way Huge Electronics dealer in the Midwest, I was able to get a custom swirly painted Dual Overdrive (Green Rhino & Red Llama). I paid about $300 for it and sold it a couple months ago for $4,250. Don't get me wrong, it was a great sounding pedal but I couldn't pass on that offer.
 
The internet is the biggest radicalization engine ever invented. It allows likeminded people to find each other and encourage each other in each other's crazyness. God forbid is one of those crazies manages to create a very convincing looking website, because it will become a gold standard to the other crazies. Like Kitrae did for the Big Muff. Not that he's crazy, more..... obsessed (?), but it has become the gold standard as far as Big Muffs are concerned.

Anyone who pays $4250 for an effects pedal and that you can probably build yourself for less then a tenth of that money I seriously doubt their judgment. I reckon that person spent way too much time on the wrong parts of the internet. Fools and their money I guess.
 
I had an original Klon Centaur (Silver one) I bought for $400. I don't remember the year but I sold it (early '2000s?) for $1200 to pay for a PRS Custom 22 (the one you see in my avatar picture - still here, still my favorite PRS out of the 40 or so I've ever owned).

I loved the Klon but I was really hard-pressed to justify the $400 I paid for mine used back in the day. Selling it was just a financial choice, I wanted that PRS (and I've never regretted it once).

The prices the Klon goes for now is patently insane.
 
My silver Klon paid for my first MacBook Pro in 2010. I've made so much more money with my laptop than I ever could have made with my Klon. I've never regretted it. Ever.
 
Hype mostly, but also an unusual circuit in terms of filtering and negative feedback loops (which also affect filtering). I doubt very much that the “vintage” of diodes matters at all, unless a batch had a manufacturing defect.

A lot of drive pedals are extremely primitive. Klon is slightly less so. It’s hard to tell if this is an accident or deliberate design choices, but in the end it doesn’t really matter. I’d pay $100 for it if it was a normal sized pedal (50% of which would be the profit margin to the manufacturer). $5K though? Come on now.
 
personally, I think the original klon is a bit hyped but no moreso than original tubescreamers. comparing it to many other pedals -it's easy to see why it was/is so popular. is it going to change your life - not likely... but the result is a pretty nice take on an overdrive. splitting the signal into 3 bands and treating each freq dif is something you don't see done a lot in analog pedals. hard to not like one once you've played one.
 
So many klones out there that are just as good. To my ears, the JJ rocket Archer and the Way Huge Conspiracy Theory are the closest sounding.
 
Or build one yourself for a fraction of the price with the great quality kits from Aion. I use one that is mostly kept on in my analog rig, set on the edge of break up. I made a small modification to restore the low end (and not the misguided tone cap mod usually mentioned on web).
 
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