The Mooer Black Truck

Ever since I repaired my Kalamazoo Model 1, my brother (who is responsible for my interest in guitars) has been debating buying a tube amp for himself. I'm guessing me having a tube amp is why I'm also his tech/demo guy when he makes a purchase. He first purchased a Carvin V3 mini and, when it actually worked, it sounded ok at best. Given Carvin's history I know they can create good amps, but this particular one just wasn't right at all. After returning that my brother wanted a Spider Valve, then a Marshall DSL, but seemingly out of nowhere be bought a Mooer Black Truck.

I'm familiar with Mooer pedals, but I somehow never heard of the black or red truck units. After my brother brought it to my attention I googled a few demo videos to see what they were all about and how they work. After my brother dropped his off for me to test I plugged it into my Kalamazoo Model 1 to see what this thing was all about. The Mooer black truck offers six effects, not to mention a bright and easy to read tuner, all in one sturdy unit. Reverb, delay, Modulation such as phaser, tremolo and flange, a five band EQ, high gain distortion with a mids scoop and noise gate switch as well as a compressor and overdrive. That's an impressive array of effects all stuffed into this little thing.

After playing around with it I fell in love with the overdrive, which I believe is based off their Green Mile pedal, with a little reverb. The only drawback I see is the lack of control you have over the reverb. The control of the delay is perfect for my style of delay, but I did find the control over the reverb to be quite lacking to achieve what I prefer, but that's just me. Stacking the overdrive and high gain pedals yielded some really interesting tones as well. I'm really impressed with how everything sounds, the ease of use and the fact they managed to put so many features in such a small little unit. You can use presets or make your own. If I wasn't building my own pedals I would probably find myself buying the Red Truck and using only that with my Kalamazoo Model 1 and being perfectly happy.