248 Rock Hill Drive, P.O. Box 760
Rock Hill, NY 12775
Phone/Fax 845-796-3616 Z. Vex
Box of Rock
(Zvex)
Distortion Pedal
Painted by Jason Myrold All pedals are hand painted and
hand assembled, and each is unique. The pedal you purchase may vary in appearance from
this stock photo.
Demo Video
Audio Demo (see Erik's notes at
bottom)*
This pedal has two
effects in one box, a clean boost and a distortion circuit.
For a .pdf version of the hand painted Box of Rock instruction sheet, click
HERE.
OVERVIEW:
The Box of Rock (TM) is Z. Vex Effect's first "distortion" pedal, highly
specialized to simulate the "everything on 10" sound of a classic Marshall JTM45
non-master-volume amplifier. You may use the BOR effectively with many different
amplifiers, but to get the sound anticipated by the designer, try it through a Marshall at
least once. You may use your guitar's volume control to adjust for the exact amount of
distortion you need, all the way down to very clean and clear with most drive settings.
The BOR also
contains an extremely high-headroom, unity-to-50X gain booster with nominal input
impedance and low hiss. It is very similar to the SHO boost circuit, with refinements to
make it sound more like a standard amp input and less glassy. The boost channel can be
used alone or in conjunction with the "distortion engine" channel. The boost channel
follows the distortion channel so that the distortion is able to hit your amp harder (at a
higher volume) when both switches are engaged, for boosting solos and what-not. Look out
when boosting "what-not.")
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CONTROLS:
Drive: Sets the amount of distortion. Start around 1:00 o'clock.
Tone: Adjust for treble content. Start around 2:00 o'clock.
Volume: Adjust for distortion engine volume level. Start around 9:00 o'clock.
Boost: Sets the boost level, which is engaged with the left stomp switch. Start around
11:00 o'clock.
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OPERATION:
Plug your guitar (or any effect’s output) into the right hand input jack. Plug the output
into an amp or other effect’s input. Rock out. Careful with the Boost setting when using a
high-powered amp with lots of headroom. You may be shocked at how loud it can get!
The best way to complete this pedal is to run it through a Marshall amplifier on a warm
clean setting (try strapping the channels, setting the volumes below 3, and setting all
other controls to 6 as a start point), which has the proper voicing to reveal the "rock"
in the Box of Rock.
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BATTERY CHANGE:
If the performance of your pedal seems diminished or the LEDs become very dim, it's time
to change your battery. Remove the four screws on the bottom of the pedal and carefully
remove and replace the old battery, pulling it back exactly in the center of the pedal on
the edge so that it is gripped tightly by the lid when it is screwed back in place.
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SPECIFICATIONS:
Uses 1 9V battery (preferably alkaline, but the unit is shipped with a carbon-zinc
battery.) The low current operation of this pedal's circuit will give you a long battery
life. Current draw is approximately 3mA. A DC power jack (standard BOSS configuration with
center negative - adapter NOT included) is provided on the side of the pedal. Use a
high-quality 9V adaptor for all high-gain effects!
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$329
Includes UPS Ground Shipping
in Continental U.S.
Buy Now
| Questions?
Call or e-mail steve@stevesmusiccenter.com.
Prices quoted are subject to change. Quantities may be limited. If you plan to order more than one of this item, please contact us before
ordering to verify availability. Click HERE for Return Policy. |
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*Erik's notes on the audio demo:
Every guitar
you hear went through the Box Of Rock. All the rhythm tracks are vintage 1971? Marshall Super
Lead (modded by Andy Wolf) through an old greenback Marshall 4X12, the various amounts of gain,
from light clipping to crunch are settings, came from the pedal.
The first solo was a Lectrolab R200B, it's a little class "A" Champ kind of thing, with a 6 inch
Jensen. Volume and tone were cranked. The second solo was a "transitional" Silver Faced Fender
Pro Reverb at about 3 1/2, bright switch on, treble? at 7, bass on 3. The last solo was a Brown
Fender Princeton. The amp was set at about 4 1/2, with the tone on about 5 1/2.
Everything was a 57 up close. I used a multiband compressor to remove some "woof" from the 4X12
during mixdown, a touch of compression over the final mix, and that was it. The whole thing was
a Don Grosh Strat with Lindy Fralin pickups, strung up with GHS 12's. |
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