Warm Audio Centavo Overdrive

Been playing since the early 1970's.

My search for the ultimate tone is finally over since I invested in this rather cheap pedal ! (It's even cheaper now than when I bought it about 18 months ago )

I've heard of the Centaur Klon of course but realized that it is way overpriced.

After seeing Jeff Beck live using the Klon , I decided to see what's out there and quickly decided for the Warm Audio version.

It felt like meeting an old friend after plugin it in.
The volume controls becomes very responsive and it's easy to dial in just the right tone. Works great on both single coils and humbuckers.

Build quality is really great and looks like it was made in the1970's with zero tiny SMD components, rock solid.

If something fails in the future it would be an easy thing to fix my self !

the pedal sounds fantastic. saturation is creamy, little emphasis on mediums but sparkly and with MOD on bassy enough. Could be the only overdrive you'll actually need, and this is truer than ever BECAUSE.. because despite the buffered bypass, despite the modern construction, won't accept well anything before it. I've put several pedals upstream, true bypass or not, and the result is a little but evident loss in the highs on the Centavo. even true bypass pedals set to off do this. If you own two pedals that have this syndrome (i have several) you're stuck, in my case a fuzzface wants to be first, if i do so the Centavo results to be less sparkly, acceptable, but you won't get 100% from it. If i put the fuzzface after it, the fuzzface sounds oversaturated and unacceptable. So: put pedals after it, if you can.

I went a bit down a klone rabbithole, watching lots of youtube videos etc. I don't recommend doing that with this style of pedal as I have learned you really don't know til you plug your guitar into your amp here. I tried another klone that jumped out to me from the shootouts as head and shoulders better than all the others, and liked it for a particular sound enough that I thought - "ok, try another highly regarded one before deciding". So I ordered the Centavo.

Its big! Really big. You can fit 2 boss style pedals and a mini pedal probably if you wanted to in the same space. But, sonically it blew the other pedal entirely out of the water. Not in the same category at all. The volume on the guitar rolls back perfectly. The amp reacts as though the amp controls are on the pedal. The gain range is my style of nuance in the low to medium gain, and when you want a lot of gain it puts that somewhere at the end of the sweep. Very practical. It stacks beautifully with my other gain pedals.

I never tried a real Klon. I have, however, bought and returned my fair share of overdrive pedals (thank you Thomann). I don't like what most pedals do to the sound of my guitar, the way the strings react to my picking hand especially. There are exceptions - Barbershop and Hot Cake, for example. But generally I think I would be happiest straight into an amp except Im the singer too and thats my main focus when Im playing live. So, pedals mean I don't have to stress too much, just sing and stomp when I need.

This pedal reminds me of some outboard studio gear (which Warm Audio also clone) - just running your signal through it improves it. Its almost a bit too hi fi for my slightly messy, exposed, low gain and aggressive style, but the reactivity and musicality have me kind of addicted.

Highly recommended if that classic sound shape and behaviour is important to you, and you hear the difference between the Klon sound and an overdrive with a lot of mids. If the Klon thing is an occasional colour on your palette, then I think you will feel a bit overwhelmed by the real estate this thing commands.