The Dark Blood from KHDK is one of the best selling and award-winning distortion pedals on the market. The association with the world’s biggest Metal band (Metallica) of course has helped but the pedal holds up very well in its own right.
Aesthetically the pedal looks as metal as is possible, the tactile claret heart holds promises of dirty tones ahead. The chicken head knobs look taken directly from Satan’s own farmyard. The clean side and jacks all up top provide the idea layout for pedalboard real estate too.
MOSFETs are a component within the pedal’s circuit which behave very much like tubes/valves in an amp. As such, pedals featuring MOSFETs sound and feel like you’re playing into a great amplifier. The doom control tally’s up with the MOSFET to produce real amp like low-end thump dynamics. At around 12 O’clock you will have all the gain you’d ever need, moving up from there will certainly cause rips to open in space-time, please use with care. If you’re using this with an already heavy sounding amp, try using the volume as a first gain knob and then the gain to add texture. Treble controls can be very useful for pulling your tone away from the sound of symbols or bringing that feel back in when practising alone.
The noise gate cuts out unwanted noise associated with high gain pedals, when you’re not playing the sound is “gatted”. Turning this control up can give you tight sounding riffs similar to using a compressor but without the squish. Keeping it down low will help keep quiet parts of songs or in between songs nice a quiet.
KHDK recommend utilising the Dark Blood as fly-rig into clean amps when gigging without you’re own amp. This makes the Dark Blood extremely versatile and allows you to get YOUR tone where ever you may roam!
Manufacturer | KHDK |
Series | Kirk Hammett Signature Series |
Made In | USA |
Year | 2020's |
FX | Distortion |
Type | Pedal |
Jacks mounted on | Top |
Bypass | True Bypass |
Battery? | Yes |
Voltage | 9 |
Polarity | Center Negative |
Circuit | Analog |
Tube equipped? | No |
Colour | Black, Red |
Weight (in kg) | 0.4 |
Famous Users | Kirk Hammet |
Width (in cm) | 6.5 |
Height (in cm) | 4 |
Depth (in cm) | 12 |
GTIN 14 | 00866640000141 |