Today, we’re comparing four of the best cheap Plexi pedals in my collection: the Tone City Golden Plexi 2, the NUX Plexi Crunch, the Joyo Uzi, and the NUX Fireman!

Tone City Golden Plexi V2: https://thmn.to/thoprod/539564?offid=...
NUX Plexi Crunch: https://thmn.to/thoprod/526815?offid=...
Joyo R-03 Uzi Distortion: https://thmn.to/thoprod/453169?offid=...
NUX Fireman Distortion: https://www.nuxaudio.com/fireman.html

Now, if you’re anything like me – and you love that classic Marshall rock guitar tone – then you’re probably already into your Plexi pedals. Some people call them Marshall In A Box (or MIAB) pedals, and this is a great description, because these little boxes can turn a clean amp into a snarling rock and roll machine at the press of a footswitch!

That’s exactly what the four pedals in today’s comparison do, and they’re also all similar in that they fall into the affordable side of the spectrum – they’re all seen as being budget Plexi pedals – and they all excel at high gain Plexi tones too.

First up is the Tone City Golden Plexi, which has become an iconic overdrive pedal over the years. A simple three-knob affair – you’ve got Volume, Tone and Gain to tweak here – the Golden Plexi is a mini pedal too, so it’ll fit on to any board, and at around $65/€65 it’s going to fit into anyone’s budget.

Cheaper still (coming in at under $50/€50) is the NUX Plexi Crunch, which doesn’t just sound like a high gain Marshall – it looks like one too! Here you have oodles of gain on tap, and Master, Preamp, Tone and Presence controls with which to tame it.

The other two pedals in today’s shootout are both based on the Friedman BE-OD overdrive pedal, which itself is based on high gain modded Marshall Plexi amps. The Joyo Uzi, which costs around $50/€50, has basically the same control set as the BE-OD: Volume and Gain controls, a three-band EQ – Low, Mid and High – and a Bias knob, which is effectively a tightness control. The more you turn the Bias knob up, the more the pedal cuts out any unwanted flubby bass frequencies, giving you a tighter tone for more clarity and precision riffing.

The NUX Fireman takes its inspiration from the Friedman BE-OD Deluxe pedal, which is a two-channel affair. Here, you get master Bass, Treble, Presence and Tight controls, and Volume and Gain controls for each of the pedal’s two channels. You also have two footswitches: one turns the pedal on and off, while the other cycles between the two channels. For this extra versatility, though, you pay the price, as the Fireman will set you back a little over $100/€100.

So, these are four budget Plexi pedals that all offer that rocking Marshall tone at a great price… but which is best for you? Well, hopefully I can help – and all you need to do is listen in and see which one(s) sound best to your ears.

In the video, I run the four pedals through a hard rock loop played on the bridge single coil pickup of my Fender Telecaster, then a more modern hard rock loop in Drop tuning using the bridge humbucker of my Epiphone Les Paul. The pedals are running into my Hughes & Kettner AmpMan Classic on the clean channel, with no reverb.

Which one do you think sounds best?

Here are some links to the various parts of the video:

00:00 Introduction and what we’re doing today
01:12 Joyo Uzi info
02:06 NUX Plexi Crunch info
02:48 Tone City Golden Plexi 2 info
03:39 NUX Fireman info
05:16 Today’s rig and plan

05:56 Fender Telecaster classic rock loop
15:36 Epiphone Les Paul hard rock loop (in Drop D tuning)

My setup was as follows: I ran the four pedals into the front end of my Hughes & Kettner AmpMan Classic pedal amp, then went from the Red Box DI straight into my Focusrite Scarlett 2i4, which went into Logic Pro X. That’s it. No post-processing on the sounds was done. Oh, and I used my Boss RC-10R to record and play the loops. Here’s some links to those bits of gear:

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Hughes & Kettner AmpMan Classic: https://thmn.to/thoprod/512777?offid=...
Boss RC-10R: https://thmn.to/thoprod/470055?offid=...
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Enjoy!


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Backing music from the YouTube Audio Library: Duck In The Alley – TrackTribe.

#OverdrivePedal #MarshallInABox #ToneCity #ToneCityPedals #NUX #NUXPedals #Joyo #JoyoPedals #Plexi

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