EHX Rams Head Muff reissue

[BlixaFan]

I didn't have a chance to do an A-B comparison of all three, however i did do a comparison of the Triangle and the Ram's Head, and I ended up preferring the Ram's Head.

I didn't buy it as I still want to compare the Ram's Head to the Green Russian, however I found that the Ram's head had more headroom, and a more pleasant tone. I dialed in the exact same settings on both pedals, and it just sounded more pleasant. Much more of that Gilmour-type creamy sound. The Triangle had a little more of that harsh fizzy fuzz sound, which is not what i'm looking for in this case.

That being said, the difference was pretty subtle, and both are quite similar really. I just preferred the Ram's Head.

I will try the Green Russian and compare it to the Ram's head but i liked the Ram's Head.

I played a Strat Standard into a Vox AC30 which is not my standard setup.

[BlixaFan]

and now it's christmas and i'm hoping for some stuff to help fund the Ram's head

[somanytoys]

Good luck to you with that, hope it works out well.

[tune_link]

Bumping this thread nearly a year later with some fun input. I have and really like the EHX Ram’s Head reissue but my curiosity and holiday sales got the best of me and I finally pulled the trigger on the SUF Ram’s Head I mentioned at the beginning of this thread. I spent a bunch of time A/B comparing them this afternoon. If I had a decent place to do a video that didn’t look embarrassing I would def do a video comparison. What follows here are my personal reflections on them.

The SUF Ram’s Head sounds amazing. It seems to have a ton of gain and volume. I’ve owned at least two other SUF Muff clones (the Pumpkin Pi and the Amherst which is supposed to be a direct clone of Mascis’ main muff). The regular SUF Ram’s Head is much louder than both of those and very similar to the Amherst in tone just with a less severe mid scoop and considerably more volume. It has excellent note separation and yet sounds gnarly. I feel like anyone who loves Dinosaur Jr could kick it on and immediately recognize the Mascis sounds it produces. It is glorious. Compared to the EHX Ram’s Head, it is louder and has better note bloom. The top end is def a lot better and fuzzy sounding. That said, it is still scooped but not to a degree that really works against it. The EHX is slightly more mid forward and also more compressed. It isn’t quite as loud as the SUF one but if you were trying to cut through a mix and weren’t using an EQ pedal or some kind of mid forward boost or overdrive in front of either it might pop out more. That said you could def (and in fact I did) put a boost and/or OD pedal in front of the SUF and it sounds better than the EHX version in a noticeable way. The main downside to the EHX is that its top end is kind of flubby in comparison to the articulate and defined SUF one. Some of this may be due to what amp you use or guitar. The two pedals are def sitting at different price ranges and if we made a car comparison here we might say that the EHX one is the Toyota and the SUF is the Lexus version. Some people who are less discerning about big muffs won’t care at all. For me I feel like I’ve entered a place where for what I want these small differences mean a lot to me. I read someone else (maybe on the Kit Rae site) say once that the slightly different versions of muffs are like different brands doing the same flavor of ice cream and your preference is subjective. At any rate I hope one or some of you find this info helpful and if nothing else it’s out there for someone else looking for the kind of info I always am when deciding on pedals.

[Nick and the Noise]

Cool, thanks for the review! I agree on the ice cream flavour, however I do think the Opamp Muff sounds quite different to the others, because of the opamps but also because of the tone stack - it doesn't have the traditional Muff scoop. Of the EHX ones I tried it's one of the few to stay. But most of the time I just use the EQD Hoof.

Not so secret info: J. Mascis used the old 80's Deluxe Muff on the first 2 Dino Jr. albums (the second being my favourite), which uses the opamp schematic.

[tune_link]

Cool, thanks for the review! I agree on the ice cream flavour, however I do think the Opamp Muff sounds quite different to the others, because of the opamps but also because of the tone stack - it doesn't have the traditional Muff scoop. Of the EHX ones I tried it's one of the few to stay. But most of the time I just use the EQD Hoof.

Not so secret info: J. Mascis used the old 80's Deluxe Muff on the first 2 Dino Jr. albums (the second being my favourite), which uses the opamp schematic.

I definitely agree on the OpAmp Muff being its own thing! I ended up buying another of the EHX reissue versions of it again after going through a SUF Pumpkin Pi. The Pumpkin Pi sounds good, don't get me wrong but it had a weird mid scoop that I definitely don't recall hearing in any of the actual OpAmp Muffs I've had the chance to play or see in person. That's a case of EHX fully nailing the reissue version. I too own an EQD Hoof (as noted in my original post). Great fuzz pedal. I don't ever see myself getting rid of it. It's the closest thing to the old Bubble Font Russian Muff I used to own I've heard out of any of the modern muff variants and that mids knob is so useful! My only regret with the Hoof (like a lot of modern pedals) is that I hate its super bright LED and I wish it had some ugly dim red or green light that in my mind would fit the sound of that thing better. But then again, maybe I'm just part gremlin or something LOL.

[beninma]

I have had the Op Amp Big Muff Pi Reissue for a few years now. I'm a huge Smashing Pumpkins fan and bought it shortly after it came out.

It doesn't necessarily jive with what I actually want to play though. I love SP but I've not actually bothered to learn any of the Gish or Siamese Dream era songs.

I have not owned any other Big Muffs.. I would be curious if others clean up better.

That's the big thing that keeps me from totally loving the Op Amp. It just doesn't really clean up much. It's very loud, and very noisy. If you want to be hugely loud it's great. But I don't have space for 2 fuzzes. It basically gets darker with the volume knob, doesn't necessarily get much quieter, and doesn't really clean up.

It just isn't that strong on in-between shades. Maybe I need to fiddle with it a bit more.. it's not supposed to need to be directly plugged into the guitar but maybe it is more responsive.

I basically play with it every once in a while and give up. This year I got the JHS 3-series Fuzz and that one has really fantastic clean-up behavior in comparison, even when it's behind a buffer. It's just not necessarily as cool wide open.

[fuzzjunkie]

I have had the Op Amp Big Muff Pi Reissue for a few years now. I'm a huge Smashing Pumpkins fan and bought it shortly after it came out.

It doesn't necessarily jive with what I actually want to play though. I love SP but I've not actually bothered to learn any of the Gish or Siamese Dream era songs.

I have not owned any other Big Muffs.. I would be curious if others clean up better.

That's the big thing that keeps me from totally loving the Op Amp. It just doesn't really clean up much. It's very loud, and very noisy. If you want to be hugely loud it's great. But I don't have space for 2 fuzzes. It basically gets darker with the volume knob, doesn't necessarily get much quieter, and doesn't really clean up.

It just isn't that strong on in-between shades. Maybe I need to fiddle with it a bit more.. it's not supposed to need to be directly plugged into the guitar but maybe it is more responsive.

I basically play with it every once in a while and give up. This year I got the JHS 3-series Fuzz and that one has really fantastic clean-up behavior in comparison, even when it's behind a buffer. It's just not necessarily as cool wide open.

I have an early Op Amp Big Muff with the on/off switch. It takes over everything. Everything sounds like a Big Muff.

I once shot it out with a bunch of other Muffs in a vintage shop for comparison. It was much louder and higher gain than anything else, including a Russian and a Triangle. The others maxed out were the equivalent of the Op Amp at 75-80%, so I decided to keep it over the others just in case I needed that “extra little bit” but in truth I usually run it around 60-70% and there is some clean up. Not much though and it does get slightly darker as the volume rolls down.

I don’t know how the other vintage Muffs handle volume roll off because I didn’t try that during the shoot out. I imagine it’s about the same. Muffs just aren’t built for that. There’s too much gain. Low gain devices like a Fuzz Face clean up, and a higher gain silicon FF will have less than a lower gain germanium FF.

Having silicon, more gain, and more gain stages means it’s more consistent and forgiving than a FF though, which can be affected by temperatures and impedance.