The reason the Rat sounds fuzzier in your demo is because you had the filter cranked. The Rat will cut the highs much sooner than the DRV. Roll back the Rat's filter to about 10 or 11 o'clock, and these two will sound much more similar. In other words, knob placement means nothing. Listen and see where the EQ's match. A Rat filter at 12, might be like a 1981's filter at 2.
i used one first line for almost twenty years. itll get the job done. id recommended trying a big muff and DS-1 too. most guitarist click with one of those instantly and usually predominantly one more than the others and you probably wont need the other two after you find which of those three is you. theyre all priced right too. if you get really crazy though, you should see the fuzz factory. you can sound like any other pedal you want if they were broken. you really dont have to spend over a hundred to get a perfectly usable and not only that, awesome pedal. i got a chase bliss brothers and its stupid expensive but its really unnecessary to go that far. a good amp and a good eq pedal and one of those three i named (rat, muff, ds-1) will get you almost anywhere you need to go.
Legato Modi I’ve used a ds-1, but it was too thin for me and I upgraded to the rat and haven’t looked back. I have a big muff also for my fuzz, a must have
It was widely sold around the 80s and early 90s, so it was easy to get, those alternative bands were booming in those years too that’s why the RAT associated with the genre so much
@@SignificanceOfThePassageOfTimeis the 1981 good for deftones or the rat pedal I need a hard driving sound I own overdrive but I need one if I ever play metal or hard song from deftones
The DRV sound great for lower gain, but gets too grainy for my tastes on higher gain setting. The RAT get very thick, but turn the filter knob counter clockwise, and it'll still be very tight and not fuzzy. The secret to RATs is, that even the "undesirable" OP07 op amp is excellent, and a bit tighter than the LM308, which will crap out if you hit the strings hard.
Yeah, after checking out different comparisons, I still don’t understand the hype. Pay way more for a pedal that has half the range of gain? The fact that it starts out quite distorted at its lowest drive setting is a deal breaker alone, let alone the fact that it also has less gain at its highest setting.
Good thing nobody’s forcing you to buy one. I use it with the gain set low, and it’s almost always on and will never leave my board. I use it like many people use a Klon/klone. I really love the low-gain breakup settings on the 1981. Seems like a lot of people don’t take the time to learn what it can do. They fool with 2 or 3 settings randomly then proclaim it’s ‘so-so’ but give it a 1-star review somewhere because for some reason they’re angry it’s a $250 pedal 🤷♂️ and think they’re being punk rock talking smack about something many other people like.
Would be interesting if you tried to matched each other's volume and gain (not just the knobs positions). I'm guessing the 1981 has a narrower range of gain and more volume
Fairy Tales in Yoghourt - not too much more volume on the DRV, as far as I can tell. Definitely a narrower range of gain. Based on my handful of experiments, the gain is much the same until roughly the halfway point, and then towards the end of the knob’s sweep, they differ so much that there’s really no matching them.
Huh, I confess I prefer the Rat in almost every case here. (And the price sure makes it unbeatable!) Never much liked Reliant K either, maybe I have just have a different set of auditory taste buds. I'll keep using my $90 Rat and stacking it with other drive pedals when I want to make my distortion prettier-sounding or or otherwise different. Interesting pedal and comparison, for sure.
Really appreciated the way you played. I’m looking for a pedal to get a mineral type distorted guitar tone, and your riffs seemed applicable to that kind of 90s emo
The DRV sounds smoother and it seems to have more bottom end and mids. I like it better. The high end of the Rat is not as nice at most settings but the Rat still sounds very good until maxed. The Rat seems unusable at the max gain setting. Its too compressed and it sounds like it is melting down.
Yeah I actually like that about the Rat for very specific cases - sometimes it's fun to have an out of control woolly noise that sounds like your guitar is combusting - but I agree, not usually that useful.
Well, the comparison was not that comparable. The RAT filter is different than the cut on the DRV. Never was a big fan of the RAT, but I like the 1981 a lot better. It think the place for it is to push an amp and to colour the sound as an always on pedal. Great pedal!
I think it sounds very similar, I even slightly prefer the RAT on high gain, but the low gain of the DRV is lovely, it's really hard to choose because you get overdrive and distortion with the DRV, but it costs 250 bucks which seems like a lot to me. How will the RAT sound, stacked with some boost in front, we all have a boost on our pedal board, we could use it to simulate the low gain of the DRV, will it sound the same? It would be an interesting test, I hope you can do it.
With your settings and the gains above noon both sounded "spitty" and very compressed, esp not fitting those metal riffs. Lower gain stuff worked equally great on both, reminded me of some cool Foo Fighters stuff. Cheers!
This is the only demo where the lowest setting on the DRV was that much gain. Several others are here on YT that show the DRV can do low gain sounds/boost sounds. Very odd.
I have both RAT from 1989 apparently, and the 1981DRV, i seriously prefer the RAT which is so easy to dial in a good sound, and i never get the same "taste" on the 1981DRV, i never play them at extreme settings as you do, but i prefer the RAT, sounds so different at same settings...
Should have turned the volume down on the 1981, so it was matched with the rat, or used a JHS modded RAT2 against the 1981. Cheers. Or should I say, Cheese?
The 1981 in the higher gain settings sounds like the rat if you ran a tube screamer and compressor in conjunction with it. Which could be why it cost so much more than the rat.
dude i just saw another review of the 1981 and i was like nahhh this pedal sucks turns out it wasn't the pedal hahah, thanks for the video! you're awesome
Thanks Matt. Have you used the Helix at all? I couldn't afford all separate pedals so I went with the Helix LT. Just curious what your thoughts on it are and whether or not you've considered trying it.
I haven't, it seems like a majority of my peers have gone that direction but I enjoy pedals too much. I've definitely considered getting an HX Stomp at putting it at the end of my board to use only for amps... but I'm more familiar with the Amplifire so I'll stick with that for now. Maybe some day when I have more time to dial it in I'll check out the Stomp. I definitely have nothing bad to say about the Helix, so many players I know are getting fantastic tones out of it.
You should have tried a low-gain setting. The DRV sounds best on a ‘just breaking up’ tone where when you play louder you push into clipping. I never change that setting, it’s the first thing in my chain and it will never leave my board. It’s fantastic for that slight boost at the beginning.
That is pretty much my take. The 1981 looks alot better than the RAT but it's a dirt pedal not a jacket. The 2 pedals with distortion from 9-12 oclock are virtually the same. I would never have the distortion above noon. I'm going to get the JHS Modded Rat for half the price of the 1981 DRV
@@JG-ux7of Not gonna lie, it looks cool AF but I've been around the block and boutique pedals are either stylish clones or impractical toys. For example, the EQD Hummingbird is neat and does some cool stuff, but it is in no way a replacement for a regular tremolo which actually gives you usable tones.
I currently run a Rat (although pretty much my own copy of the BYOC- the vintage rat with clipping diodes switch, and i have a bassier mode on a switch but run it mostly stock settings). The difference between these pedals is like when i turn my boost on before my rat. Somewhat like a buffer, but to me its got more input drive and can't do the really clean things the rat can. I use ernie ball MVP for that. Rat becomes a very different pedal with a buffer placed before it.
I was listening while doing some work. Each time I clicked the tab to look back at which pedal was on, I always seemed to prefer the Rat. It's a tab turner! The only time I liked the 81 more was at the lowest gain setting but that might be due to the volume difference.
@@lexist7 I dunno. This isn't really dialed in to where i set my rat at low gain. Mine seems to act as a kind of treble booster and i like it. The 1981 is already basically a distortion pedal by then so doesn't appeal to me. The rat can get from treble boost, overdrive, distortion, fuzz all on one knob. Even better if its one with different diodes, like germanium+mosfet, or LEDs. I'm told the original circuit is better. I have the BYOC clone, and when that broke, i built a modded copy of that from scratch. The 1981 sounds similar to putting a boost infront of a rat. Even a buffer before and rolling off some tone knob on your guitar might do it. Rats change immensely with a buffer! That's why the buffer is inside the 1981 and it has mods for more low response i guess! Considering how cheap Rats and their numerous clones go it seems overpriced for a modded rat
hey matt just FYI the filter knob on the rat is set backwards, so the reason its sounding darker is because you actually have the opposite settings on each pedal, turn down the rat filter for more treble, up is less. Cool video I thought both pedals sounded great.
Thanks! I think both pedals' Filter/Cut knobs are wired that direction, actually. I find both of them a bit treble-y which is why my default setting for that knob is up near 3 o'clock, and I only back it down when the gain is up really high to bring some clarity and brightness back in.
@@LeFeversAudio Yes, but I think what a lot of us are saying is that you had the filter cranked a little too much on the Rat. Not a direct comparison, since the 1981's filter is a bit less sensitive (cuts less highs).
it kind of sucks that the 1981 costs so much more and can't even do the clean boost/low gain thing. the higher gain setting is cool for vintage metal tho. i like the fuzziness of the Rat at higher gain but there are much more usuable crazy fuzz tones. I used to have a Turbo RAT which was nice for fuzzy distortion/big muff alternative.
@@ThorHall1985 unfortunately for some, we cant buy a RAT new here and only pricier clones. 😥 i guess we should venture to cheaper chinese clones. but i highly doubt their durability.
So I bought it and I don’t regret it at all. It has the same sound as the Rat but dialed at lower gain settings the DRV is much fuller and the gain rolled to Zero with the preamp turned up to 3 o’clock and the cut at 3 o’clock is a perfect always on sound. Where the Rat does nothing, I prefer the lower gain settings because it gets dirty very quickly but at the same time maintains clarity and articulation. I love this pedal and if I played out I would buy 2 one for my always on sound and then another with the DRV set to 9 o’clock
If you play Post Rock, Indie, 90’s Emo, or Worship Music that requires that dirty but articulate breakup with a full sound and sparkle to it then the DRV is a must. I bought the Rat because it sounded the exact same to me from this video but it never fully satisfied me. I am fully satisfied with the DRV, the difference is marginal but it’s a matter of being 90% satisfied or 100% satisfied. The 1981 is a fuller and more articulate sound and the gain at 0 with the cut and volume at 3’oclock is my new always on sound.
I had the chance to do this with a vintage 1985 LM308 RAT and my own personal DRV the other week. I found that the way they distort can be similar but they do sound different. The DRV is much bigger sounding, probably because it has the internal voltage doubler which bumps your 9v power up to 18v giving it more headroom. It's much less compressed than the RAT as well. I found the RAT to be much more "nasty" sounding, like a real rat haha! The RAT was MUCH more saturated and much more higher gain, with it getting more like a fuzz when I cranked it. The DRV does not get anywhere near as fuzzy as the RAT. I personally like the DRV more, I like the less saturated sound and bigness of the DRV way more than the RAT.
I agree with all of that, well put. The RAT can be made to sound smooth and un-harsh, with the right settings on the Filter knob, but many/most of its settings are more 'nasty' or cutting. The DRV sounds smooth all the time, wherever the knobs are.
@@LeFeversAudio I have been a RAT guy since the 80s, i always liked the versatility of them. They are an overdrive/boost, distortion, and fuzz. And the "nastiness"... absolutely tasty. BUT.... I really like the 1981, thanks for an excellent demo.
@@leandrobarrosguitar2633 I have not gotten the chance to play with one, I have heard nothing but good things about it though. It seems that everyone is making their own version of the circuit, and they all RAT.
I agree with you, many of the comments say there the same. But the 1981 is so smooth at every setting. However, for $300 that's crazy. I am not one that's opposed to buying pedals over $200. Most of the pedals I use are higher in the price range but offer a lot more options or have midi capabilities. I really want a 1981 but I am not sure if I could spend 300 dollars on a 3 knob rat clone. I'm torn...
Matt LeFevers Just found a 1981 clone ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-IhUpXRyoljA.html they sound identical for only $150 don't like the graphics as much but more people should check it out
Cool comparison video. Thanks for doing this. One question - you had both pedals set with the volume dimed. Why? Are they low output pedals, or do you just prefer to push you Amplifier really hard?
A bit of both, I guess. For whatever reason if I have the volume very much lower than that, the overdrive/distortion sound is not as much louder than my clean sound as I want it to be. I'm guessing it has to do with my rig - I'm always boosting with my compressor and I often also have a light overdrive just barely on. I've been meaning to sit down and re-balance everything but in the meantime I always kept the Rat volume at max to compensate. (None of that is relevant in this video, where I have pulled them off the board to compare separately, but I didn't lower the volume during this from where I keep it the rest of the time.)
Holy shite. The tone at 3.10 on the 1981. Incredible. Followed by the Rat at 4 Mins virtually identical. I guess with the way boutique pedals are these days people like to pay for what looks cool, new and modern.
Seems some difference might be due to the volume settings. These might not equivalent since the 1981 uses a charge pump it can output 18v which might be overdriving your amp.
I have a pedal that is a hybrid of both of these pedals! It's Guptech's 1982 pedal. I wanted to hear how the 1981 sounded since they stated on their website that it was clone of the Rat and 1981, and here you are demoing both lol
that drv sounds awesome! the rat is awesome but i find the sweet spot is the gain on 9:00, and filter and level at 1:30, everything else is either anemic sounding or just too bassy or fuzzy for me, i bet id really dig the drv but im sure its expensive
So.... this isn't really a pedal comparison. The volume is high enough that it's pushing the front end of the amp into crunch. Most of the tonal character is coming from your amp. After watching this pedal comparison, the only thing I can say conclusively is that your amp sounds pretty decent.
The volume on the DRV could have likely come down a ways. The Rat kind of needs to be up that high to hit unity gain, which is... a frustration to me. If you watch around 2:38 you'll hear that engaging the Rat almost seems to slightly *lower* my volume. I'm not sure what's going on there but it's been like that for a long time.
@@LeFeversAudio The gain and volume knob on the Rat are highly interactive. Yes, at minimum gain, the Rat is below unity. But once you get past about a quarter gain, the Rat has a TON of volume on tap. Try it for yourself. You'll see what I mean. I guarantee that the Rat was hammering your amp's front end something fierce.
@@martinthibodeaux4628 - I'll play around with it more. I haven't plugged the Rat into the most current version of my rig. I just remember in the past struggling to avoid a volume drop when it was engaged. Thanks!
But I think this is a rare rat, these go for crazy money to, but you can get a jhs moded rat that has corrected some of the rats negatives. But ultimately I think the 1981 is a better pedal. It is probably made of better components and at gig levels will prob run more quietly and last longer. A great review, hope to see more.
Yeah, I dunno….my Rat is an ‘85 and quiet as a mouse. Unbelievable power on demand with endless creamy distortion until finally all hell breaks loose! There’s no pedal like it.
Dear Matt, thank you very much for your videos. I have a question. I noticed you have a single coil P90s in your tele. How do deal with the him and noise. I really like to buy Fender Nocaster 51 pickups for my tele but I am afraid of the problems with hum and noise. That's the reason I also consider to by EMG T. Will the noise gate be able to help enough or it will degrade the sound of the Nocasters so it's not worth to buy them? What are your thoughts? Thank you!
I'm not an expert on different pickups (I mostly use Seymour Duncans for everything) but I do definitely use a noise gate, particularly since switching to this P-90 guitar as my main one. I put the noise gate right at the beginning of my pedal chain, so it's clamping down on any pickup noise before the signal goes into drives, reverbs, etc. That works quite well for me with the right noise gate settings, 90% of the time I don't even remember it's there. In answer to your question about degrading the sound, in theory it shouldn't - simple noise gates are either open or closed, so it shouldn't be doing anything to your signal when it's 'open'.
Great sounds and comparison! Could you please tell me what are the chords in 2:58 ? Is it a song so I can look for the tabs or can you reply with the tabs for it? Thanks!
Thanks! It's "One" by my band Map & Compass, I have a tutorial for it here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-IJbQ-vKwRd0.htmlsi=bMajNG2g3FW6dXFH
Biggest issue here with this comparison is the older rat chip. I think the newer op amp Rats are actually better at higher gains and have a more hifi sound that absolutely competes with the 1981, especially for a fraction of the price. Its a no brainer.
It does have the LM308 chip but I think it's a '90s Rat, not super old. It was given to me by a close friend so I'm actually not sure what it would have sold for but it's not the over the counter $60 Rat you can get new right now.
Thanks for actually demoing these pedals doing rhythm and chords and not soloing for 5 minutes. An a-b switcher would be good though, to go seamlessly between pedals. That being said the rat sounds pretty damn good.
I suppose. With both the DRV and the Rat, I had to have the volume up pretty high or else when they were on, it was actually quieter than my bypassed signal. Your mileage may vary, I guess.
Honestly - still making up my mind. The 1981 is cool (and it's obvious that it's extremely well made) but I'm not sure it's fitting in with my own rig very well; I might want to try some other things.
Thanks! There are a few of them, here's the list: The first and last riffs in the video are from "Hunters" by This Glass Embrace The first dirty riff is "One" by Map & Compass Halfway through is "We Spoke" by This Glass Embrace Metal riff is "The Living Walk Among The Dead" by Into Chaos Fuzzy riff near the end is "In So Many Words" by This Glass Embrace
Rat > Everything. ones been first in my line for almost 20 years now. The same exact one actually. :( Its got the old enclosure, feet, and different size to the Proco label on its bottom front like the old Rat2's but lo, it is an OP-amp one. its a late 90s one. I dont think someone took out the LM-whatever and replaced it. Im pretty it was just one of the earlier. i doubt its worth anymore and its priceless to me. Fun fact: other Rat users and myself were placeboed into perceiving a difference between theirs and mine until i found out it actually was an OP-amp like them. smh. we guitarists are not always the smartest folks.
Legato Modi - yeah I only know mine has the lm308 because my friend who gave it to me clued me in on the whole thing. My knowledge of pedals usually does not extend to individual components - and I highly doubt I would hear the difference between this and one of the newer ones 😅 But it’s always fun to know you have the “good one”
I was never actually able to find a current draw for the 1981, I tried reaching out to the maker and didn’t get an answer. The Rat is only like 5 mA though so I’m guessing it’s closer to that 58 number. 580 would be insane for a pedal.
@@LeFeversAudio Thank you very much teacher, I already asked in several forums, and you are absolutely right if it is 58 mA only a current of 9V 100 mA would be perfect 🙌
Ooh, are those P90's on the Tele? My favourite guitar is a Les Paul Junior with a single P90. Anyway, any distortion pedal will sound like crap if you overdo the settings. I thought the Rat produced nicer, more open sounds with realistic settings, just like my 1990 model (I don't know which chip it has). The DRV sounded a bit dark when your settings were producing similar results. My 'on all the time' pedal is a Boss Turbo overdrive with the overdrive off (it's ridiculous) and just enough of everything to give a nice crunch and plenty of headroom, not driving my amp hard at all. The Turbo sounded better to me than the standard Boss overdrive in a side by side comparison with the Turbo off so I paid the extra even though I knew I'd never need the extra Turbo function. I keep the Rat as a boost pedal for solos, again - not overdoing it with the settings, particularly the distortion.
I usually have it up rather high on Rat-style drives. For whatever reason, much lower and I'm below unity gain compared to my clean sound. I don't have my other drives up anywhere near so high, just Rats.
Very true, and kind of where I landed as well. It's a wonderful pedal but I already had the Rat and wasn't ever going to get rid of it, so... it's a lot of money to have tied up in a second Rat.
@@LeFeversAudio I've watched your video several times trying to quantify buying the 1981 because it looks really cool and sounds so good. But honestly you nailed the sweet spots of each pedal (the volume dimed, cut/filter at 3 o'clock and Distortion ranging from 9 to 12 o'clock.) And in those positions; both pedals sounded exactly the same. For that reason, I'm going to get the JHS modded Rat, its 160 bucks which is roughly half of what a 1981 will cost me. Thanks for the great comparison, you saved me $140 at least!
I felt like the fuzziness and ... woolly quality... of the Rat at very high gain was markedly different from the 1981. Really 'medium' gain, drive knob at about 9 or 10 o'clock is where they sounded most similar to me. But to each their own!
@@LeFeversAudio oh I believe you and I think it's really interesting how things can sound and feel so different when you're playing Vs listening, and also recorded Vs live
The 1981 pedal at higher gain setting still has some squash in it. Not as much as the Rat but still. Also you have the outputs of those cranked to maximum which is probably hammering the input of the amp adding to the squashed sound, especially when adding more gain. ??? Yeah don’t care for mush city as it’s not usable 99% of the time unless you’re going for a special effect for a song maybe.
For whatever reason, my Rat needs to be at max volume or it's actually quieter than the bypassed signal. I may have overdone it on the DRV though, not sure.
80 bucks for a RAT or 400 bucks for a boutique copy with enough high end fizzle to prove that the makers didn't get the point of the RAT--that is, to cut highs in a way other distortions simply don't do. Easy choice: get the original.
The 1981 sounds like a RAT with all the magic sucked out. Sounds a lot clearer and more articulate but loses the smooth, underlying chunk and unique character of the RAT in the process
Gojihead1 - not modded as far as I know, though I got it second hand from a friend who got it second hand so it’s not impossible. I’ve spent a number of hours here and there trying to research and see if I can nail down the year but have never found anything conclusive. Only that it’s different from the current generation Rat 2 and newer than the really old ones. 🤷🏻♂️
"Stiff"? LOL. If you mean, Rat EQ had less highs (less treble), it is because the OP had the filter cranked, which cuts a lot if highs. Not a very good comparison, IMO.
