I bought the American Sound a few days ago, it's the first time I've ever plugged into something and had a tone I liked within 10 seconds. It's so good.
I second that sentiment,I'm probably using it not as its intended but I really like it.i was horribly disappointed with my boss katana 50 but the American sound rectified the situation,it works with all of my amps valve or transistor
@@brucehayes7251 I have a American and a Katana 100 2x12, both are brilliant, the Katana needs to be plugged into a computer and setup, does everything I need, but at the beginning, I still gigged my Marshall, as it is easy to dial in, the Katana took a while to get my head into, now I love it.
I agree, same for me. 40$ and amazing tweed and clean sound in less than 10 seconds. One of my favorite pedal and the cheapest in terms of price. It is built like a tank.
@@destroyerofdreams42069 I actually now own both the Iridium and The Princeton is loud at 2-3. The iridium soundss great better thsb the Joyo but the joyo for the money is a good alternative. I have both so I can record at home, have a backup. It often sounds better even depending on the situation.
The nice thing about that voice knob on the Joyo is that it controls the mids before the drive, which massively changes the character of the drive. It then has the tone stack high/mid/low controls after the drive. The Iridium's mid knob is just part of its tone stack so it'll be after the drive.
Really interesting observation 🤔 Could you please elaborate if you can on hy this is very important for shaping the sound? I bought this pedal when it first came out and it's been on my pedalboard since then. Just recently I got the Joyo Cab Box and that cones with a built in Amp power section. So I basically use this pedal as the Preamp section. These two pedal combined have completely become game changers for my pedalboard and for live playing @ church ampless! Thanks for your feedback!
The fact you can even compare the two proves how good the Joyo is. All the guitar tones on my backing tracks were recorded using one. Best sleeper pedal out there imo!
Very useful vid! Thank you so much. I sold my Iridium some time back and bought the Joyo. It serves my purposes well but if I owned a studio or did a ton of recording I would use the Iridium. I personally just need a preamp for going direct when live.
If you have a small PA in your living room, the Joyo is the best thing for price, value, I could gig with this if needed, put a nice reverb after and you have everything you need.
Got mine out last night because i realised that along with top end clarity the bass can sound a bit rubbery and not solid like my tube amp. So i put my old Zoom MS50G after it adding some EQ (boost 3-6k and 100-200hz) plus adding a light compression, basically trying to emulate a speaker. In the end i liked the Level dimed, voice @ about 2, Gain to control level really but still clean, bass and treb at noon and mids about 9-10. Sounded WAY more like my amp :). The Zoom can hold/toggle another 4 effects (reverb, delay, tremolo, fuzz) plus has a tuner, ill put a mini drive and boost pedal in front of the whole setup and i think i might have myself a nice fly/jam rig.
Love my ms50 but im always divided between using it first or last in my pedalboard, the EQs and compressions are great to use as a final touch, and the phasers and pitch shifter work great before gain. almost everything else i can manage to make it sound how I like independent of where in the chain it is (don't use the amp sims)
These line of Joyo pedals are not amp sims. They were originally advertised as preamp pedals. I put my Joyo Oxford into an impulse response pedals and it sounds excellent.
Jasonlee, i have a question : on your pedalchain, where did you place the " American " pedal? As first or as last before connecting to the amplifier? Thank you so much for your kind reply. Patrick from Italy
I’ve used the Joyo for years and it’s a great go to amp sim for the price. But I’ll tell you it’s a headache when it comes to patching it with other drive pedals. It will compress every drive pedal to the extent they lose all their personality. Simply cannot compare their tones based on their sound alone, remember they are amp sims, they are supposed to be used with other pedals, mostly drive pedals. Then you’ll realise there’s no point comparing these two pedals. However, good review
@@losangulos Thanks, i bought the Joyo back then. But soon after bought a 65 Princeton Reverb RI. After trying a Tonemaster Delux beside a Real Delux there was no comparison. They are worlds apart! The Delux was too much power for my bedroom, so got its sister instead. Now only use my SD1 OD, MIAB OD for when i want more gain, GE7 EQ, and a Chorus & Delay ....thats me done. As for the Tonemaster, they are good sounding in what they are, but definately NOT at that insane price range. Theres better solid state or modelling amps out there alot cheaper. And theyre getting better all the time. Apparently theres a processing unit nowdays, think its in the form of a pedal?? And it analyzes any sound you feed into it, the replicates that sound extremely close. I think theyre about $3k ...hopefully the way of the future.
Really good video MAGJ - and thats coming from an OAGJ but still 15 at heart...I have the Joyo American and agree about the fizzy...but keep it clean and it's excellent and a bargain to boot. Thanks mate!
Owned the Iridium for a year and it's... okay. Don't love it, but the room effect is really nice. Ended up getting a Milkman Amp 100 pedal and, whoa... it's been one of the best pieces of gear I've ever owned.
Your go-to sound on the Joyo is almost identical to the sound I used to use when going into the front-of-house. Low: 1 o'clock, Mid: 12 o'clock; High 11 o'clock, level all the way up, voice: 10 o'clock; drive 9 o'clock. Whilst it's a bit of pain due to the extra weight to carry, I changed to just using the emulated speaker out from my Blackstar HT-5. I could never quite get the highs to sound good with the Joyo with my overdrive pedals for some reason. The Iridium certainly peaked my interest, but it's very expensive here in the UK.
I played the Iridium and loved it. It's on my list. :) The other amps are great. You can practice with it without an amp as well - headphone jack. It also takes pedals well. I've tried a Tube Screamer and a few ODs. It's really nice.
This video only shows the "round" (cleanest) channel of the Iridium, so it doesn't have any more drive than a clean Fender, because yes, "it's more amp like". Once you get to the "chime" and "punch" channels you get the rest of the versatility of the Iridium...this is where you find the Vox's, Marshall's, and more. To get all the sounds of the Iridium, you'd need all the other Joyo "Sound" pedals. With the Iridium you can add the Multiswitch foot switching option. This will give you 3 presets you can call up, as well as the faceplace and FAV sound to give you 5 amps at your feet. So, you can buy all the Joyo "Sound" pedals to compete with the Iridium, but you'll find the Iridium will be more "amp like" in all cases. And, you can buy more IRs to plug into the Iridium to get more options. But if you want 5 "amp like" sounds in one amp pedal, at your feet, the Iridium with the Multiswitch pedal is hard to beat right out of the box.
Just depends on what you need. I record and do new wave style stuff. Joyo is amazing running through my Apollo and gives good amp tones. For my style, it's all i need
The greatest compliment I can give the American Sound is that it makes playing direct to PA acceptable. I loathe playing direct. But the Joyo works great direct to board.
@@JasonAyalaSpare Hi, thx for the video. Where in your pedal chain are you putting the Joyo when going direct to mixer? I take it as the last pedal which feeds into DI box? I have Guitar > Overdrive > distortion > Chrous > Delay > Joyo (always on)> DI > Mixer. Is this the type of order you'd use or would you put the Joyo at the beginning? I basically put it last as I pretend the Joyo is my amp...
@@number1Don I treat it like I would a clean amp, with everything in front. If I was using it for drive I would place chorus, trem, delay and reverb after.
As a newbie who wants to play in my bedroom, the Joyo looks good. Sorry for what might a silly question, can I plug a set of Sennheiser HD280 headphones straight into the pedals output?
Is it possible your signal with the iridium was clipping? To me it sounded way too crackly, almost like a bonfire lol... If that's the real tone of the pedal, no thanks. The Joyo is great tho.
@@mr.d.572 Before. It's like when you put your pedalboard into your amp input. I don't like the joyo american sound drive either. I use it all clean with my pedals too.
How can you post an audio comparison that clips that much? Are your ears working? Wouldn't trust your pedal banter if you can't even hear clipping but to be fair, about half of the guitar youtubers clip horribly. Elementary stuff.
I bought a simplifier. Yet the joyo sounds better. Simplifier is good but just doesn't jive with my drive pedals. The American sound is great with just a blues driver clean ish boost into it I've found.
@@OrangutanTradeSalesmen Yeah the simplifer sounded like a bag of pissed of bumblebees with my drives pedals. The UAFX Ruby and Dream are the best modelers in the market right now though. They destroy everything else I've tried.
There is some subtle differences that make the iridium better. It has a more rounded, sweeter tone. There is more body to the overall sound. It helps a lot to have cab options, to suit the guitar you are using
Now that is exactly my finding too. Most of those cheap pedals have great possibilities, but they take away or add something I don't really like. I can pick them out blind folded by now. So many reviews. So hey, for a few coins great toying around. Long term...hmmm not so sure.
I have the American sound as my live backup. I have other pre amps such Boss IR. Sorry boss, while I love your stuff, for a nice clean fender sound the American wins out. Oh and it takes my drive pedals just lovely.
You need to take the back off' inside there will be a switch to take cab sim in and out/bypass the circuit. Don't know why they don't include this in the instructions???
By weird that it may seem joyo sounds more good, sounds great, very fender old school vintage good amps I love it I'll will go for that one and save a bunch of bucks thank you so much for this video appreciate it
Joyo has a lot of good stuff for the $$. If you’re careful with your spending, you could literally build a rig for $150. That being said, the switches can be funky. The Iridium is also great, but just does so many cool things,
No amp, just pedals into sound card. The Joyo has some filtering that acts as a cab sim which you can disable apparently. I always use these straight into a PA live.
@@Shalini_Jay_Music yes you will need a DI box w XLR to go Front of House (FOH) I just used one at the end of my fly rig for church last Sunday. Worked like a charm! So much that I got another one to make another ampless rig/ board😀 this is a very useful piece of gear. And yes I do also own the Iridium and dig that as well. I use it for Fender clean w a dirty Marshall sound on the favorite switch. The Joyo took my OD/ Dist pedal very well. Keep rocking! We are in a golden age of gear !🕺🏾🕺🏾🤘🏾
The Iridium really sounds pretty bad in this video...when I tried it in the store it was amazing...pristine cleans and better than any clean tone I ever tried.Is it the youtube compression making this sound so terrible in comparison or is it deliberately done ?
Same as my experience exactly. I have both and the iridium sounds way better. I can get the iridium to sound great like youtube demos (not this video), but i can never get the joyo AS to sound like youtube demos. The joyo AS seems like they're specifically designed to use with single coil pickups. All the good sounding demos of the joyo AS use single coil guitar.
So...what if I wanted to use these on my pedalboard into my tube amp? I feel like everyone that demos or buys these are bedroom players--I'm concerned only with how to use these live within the context of my current amp/cab live set up.
They're designed to replace your amp. You can turn the cab sim off on the strymon and use it like an amp in a box pedal going into your amp. If you do this put it after your drive pedals.
The joyo sounds good for the price..but iridium worth also the price..respect the tone of the guitar..but i had gokko american sound..not expensive price but it sound like expensive..just try..
I'm kinda new to direct input guitars. I play at church mostly and was thinking of buying the joyo just to get my feet wet. Is there anything else I'd need for that application? I normally play thru a hot rod deluxe with a pedalboard.
I'd get one to try it. They're dirt cheap. If you run the amp clean then you can put it at the end of your chain. If you want to run it hotter then put it before your ambient effects. This would also work if you want to go stereo out
@@JasonAyalaSpare See - I gave you information. Not speculation. It's up to you to take it or just dismiss ist. The true tone series is ment to be run into a power amp and a guitar speaker. For direct recording you need any kind of speaker sim. You don't have to trust my word. Just ask the manufacturer. Or just ignore it a use your channel to spread wrong information. Have fun, bb.
@@hbert06 It's not speculation. It is a fact that this Joyo (Sound Series) has a built in speaker simulation. Lots of info on that on various DIY pedal forums, along with the info on how to bypass it.
@@oscarabellorios IMO there's no better or worse, I use it at the very first of my signal chain (right after tuner), the sound suits my style a little more!
@@JasonAyalaSpare Thanks man but in my experiment just notice joyo AM is a gem if you paired some any cab simulator pedal at the end of the chain. Just discover :)
@@Singonthetree kind of makes sense since the American Sound really is a pretty amp pedal. So if you run it clean, wouldn't you want the hotter drives to go after?
The Joyo sounds much better, it’s the clear Winner for me. The Joyo tone is rounder, fuller and sounds much less digital than the Strymon pedal, probably because the Joyo is analog and the other is a small computer
Fizzy. But.... you're definitely clipping your input signal. Great video though for the money I'd buy this American sound. Actually I bought it a long time ago. 😁
just ordered one "back", such a Fender Amp cavalcade, JOYO 40 €s , and 3-band eq! I remember turning downer the high and I had JAZZ! NOTE: I do have the ZOOM G2, which has a Twin 65 Clean tone: which I now use, a most wonderful pedal ladies n gentlemen the ZOOM G2! I have 6 of that model...... , so summs summarum, boy that Iridium sucks, I mean to my ears n eyes it just cant get good! sounds bland and meeh..to me...round/ chime/punch????? I want them all, and the A/B/C......, the AM Sound is analog, but my ZOOM G2 is digital: STILL , using FD Clean ZOOM G2 does NOT sound as DIGI as the Strymon IRIDIUM, WHY??????
Perspective. AU Strymon Iridium is AUD$599 from the boxshifters. JOYO American Sound is AUD$75. Pretty much the same price direct from AliExpress in 2024 after factoring in tax. I paid AUD$45 in shipping for mine from AliExpress 4 or 5 years ago. Strymon worth 9½ the price of the JOYO? Not to me.
I did not see you use either the Chime or Punch amp settings which are entire categories the Joyo does not even address, so it's really not a fair comparison. The Joyo does 1/3 of what the Iridium can do at a ridiculously great price and that is probably all most people need, so can't complain, but there is more to the Iridium than is shown here.
Your recording level is from time to time too high and the sound is distorted on USB interface input - this is very unpleasant digital distortion because A/D converter hits the limit of signal possible to transform to digital.
@@MartIn-ud7nv its all smd components. They're pretty tough to work on & it's really easy to break the traces too. I've worked inside a bunch of these.
I understand your comparison and all, but it just reminds me of people that demo a Katana then say , "But it's just not the same as my $1200+ tube amp".. Really ? No shit... But like the Katana, the Joyo is an awesome piece of gear at a great price. When you have a piece of gear you put out that is being compared to similar gear that is literally 4 to 10 times the cost of your gear, you are as they say, over the target..
Does it need a power amp pedal like the Mooer Baby Bomb to go direct. I have no clue about direct. I’ve been searching for hours and just getting more confused. I would like to take my pedal board and go direct to pa to play with jam tracks. I have no clue where to start. Any advice would be appreciated!!!
I have to mention, I really don't like your idea of what comprises a good tone. You cranked the shit out of the Mids and Bass and Drive on the Joyo in your quest for a "Tweed Sound", and it just gets messy. Add to that, you play with the neck pickup, and the thing sound almost like unusable fuzz! Let's just say we have different tastes, I guess...
I don't know bud, I don't think either sound like a Deluxe reverb. I only played through a Deluxe 62' for like 5yrs, so I'm pretty familiar with it. Neither sounds even close, the only thing I've heard that almost nailed it was those old POD 2.0. And that had a lot of limitations to it. They need to make a really good plug in version of the deluxe. The new UAD amp sims will drop kick that Strymon.
Ehh I don’t think a plug in is gonna come close to the iridium. The appeal of this vs a Vibrolux or Princeton which are obviously the first choice for anyone trying to make a record but if you record some or most of the tracks in a small home studio setup or in apt I just can’t do that with a Fender up to five or so where it needs to be. And then buying an ox attenuator for 1600 gets into absurd territory. The Iridium sounds better than many micd’ tube amps I’ve heard whereas I e never heard a plug in that sounded even close. I’ve played gigs with a Bassman, AC30 and a Dekuxe and had the sound guy make me play at z2-3 every time. Which at that point might as well just use a pedal.
@@dahliafiend I use a UAD apollo with either the Friedman buxom betty or the fender amp they have and I wouldn't go near the iridium. I don't think the iridium is bad or bad sounding. I just think the newer UAD modeling destroys all. Nothing comes close. But, I am talking for exclusively recording. Kind regards.
You know.. I just bought it and I thought it was going to sound close to my joyo american sound or ac tone.., absolutely not... not even close... the dynamics are just night and day... if you don’t want to spend 400 dlls the other options are ... mmm, ok... but just so people know... it’s not close at all
@@macsoto6947 The iridium is a loooot better... I thought it would be closer since all the videos that compare it sound pretty close... the iridium has a LOT more fidelity and realistic dynamics... although the Joyo pedals are a great deal... if you don’t want to spend 400 dlls.... honestly, putting 2 joyo’s for stereo sounds pretty damn good... and they take pedals really well... my fuzzes and distortions get a lot of character from the joyo’s ... since I have a stereo rig.,, I used 1 AC tone on one side and and american tone on another... very, very good recording... the British sound one I didn’t really care for... but amazing choices for sure... but to compare them with the Iridium is not even fair... it’s a total different beast... the cleans sound amazing... and just the dynamics and harmonics are in another level... if you are serious about recording direct... or don’t have an amp... definitely consider the iridium...
Strymon is always overpriced. You never get your moneys worth with their products. I never got why people buy them with so many better alternatives out there for much less money.
