Recently, I picked up a JHS Notaklön overdrive pedal.
What do I think of it? Read on for my initial thoughts.
Table of Contents
- What Did You Get?
- Why Did You Get It?
- Why Was It An Overnight Sensation?
- How Does It Sound?
- Other Thoughts
- Final Thoughts
What Did You Get?
I bought a Notaklön overdrive pedal, by JHS Pedals (of Josh Scott fame).
I got mine from the second-hand market. If you want one, they’re still being made. You can buy one directly from JHS’s website.
At the time of writing, the Notaklön is JHS’s latest Klon klone pedal, featuring the Shamrock mod that JHS used to do to Klon KTRs.
Oh, and JHS market this as being damn close to the sound of an early Klon Centaur, as shown in their promotional video.
Why Did You Get It?
It’s simply because the opportunity came up.
JHS launched the Notaklön back in November 2023, and I think it’s fair to say that this pedal was an overnight sensation. It sold out very quickly, and ever since JHS has been taking pre-orders and shipping out batch after batch.
I don’t buy many pedals in the run up to Christmas, in case Kristi gets me some as a present. And this pedal certainly had Christmas stocking potential (probably why it was so popular). I don’t remember if we saw it before JHS switched to taking pre-orders or not, but either way, I wasn’t going to get one for myself, just in case.
(In the end, Kristi bought me the Boss BP-1W and Wampler Ratsbane, which together have become one of my favourite signal chains of 2024. Hmm … maybe I need to add a ‘Signal Chains Of The Year’ blog post to my annual roundups in December?)
And, after that, I largely forgot about it.
Regular readers may recall that I already have my Klon klones of choice: the Ceriatone Centura and the Warm Audio Centavo. I’m not really looking to spend a lot of money on another one – and if I ever do, it’ll probably be the Origin Effects Halcyon Gold.
However, this particular Notaklön turned up on my local second-hand market at a very nice price, so I decided to grab one and add it to my collection of klones.
Why Was It An Overnight Sensation?
I think it’s down to three things:
- the whole IKEA-style branding and self-assembly experience,
- pricing, and
- Josh’s A/B comparison against his real Klon Centaur
Branding And Experience
For the Notaklön, JHS took the stripped-back look of their budget pedal line, and added an IKEA-inspired twist: this is a pedal that you get to assemble yourself.
To see what the build process is like, here’s Wub (of Ritual Devices) building a Notaklön at my local guitar store:
I can see why JHS launched this in the run-up to Christmas. What a great stocking filler!
Pricing – This Is A Cheap Klone!
What made the EHX Soul Food such a popular klone? It wasn’t tonal accuracy: it doesn’t sound like a Klon, and even if it did, back then the wider playing public didn’t know what a klone should sound like anyway.
It was price. The Soul Food was the first mass-market affordable klone pedal. And the Notaklön has that same advantage.
Put it this way: my Notaklön is almost the cheapest Klon klone pedal that I’ve ever bought. (My NUX Horseman was cheaper, but not by much.)
If it lives up to the promise of JHS’s A/B comparison, it’s an absolute steal.
The A/B Comparison
In JHS’s own promotional video, Josh Scott did an A/B comparison between the Notaklön and his original Klon Centaur. It came out damn close, if not pretty much indistinguishable. Fun to own, cheap to buy, and sounds like the real thing? Who wouldn’t want one?
However … how can I put this?
It’s Josh, who made the notorious “Bad Monkey Does The Klon” video back in March 2023, and who revealed he’d been secretly using a Kemper for his pedal demos (while showing a real amp in those videos) back in 2022.
He’s shown that he can be a bit of a prankster, and I think it’s a good idea to be cautious about taking anything he demos at face value (which is good advice for any demo, to be honest).
I don’t have a Klon Centaur to A/B the Notaklön against. I can’t try and repeat his results. But I can compare it against the Klon KTR and a few other klones, which I’ll do in a future blog post.
What Is It Like To Build?
I can’t really answer that. I bought mine from someone who had already done (nearly) all of the assembly, so that’s an experience that I missed out on.
The only thing I had to do was to attach the three control knobs.
I found that a bit difficult, because there wasn’t an obvious way to work out where the pointer on each knob should be pointing to. It would have been nice if there was a marker on the enclosure that I could have used to line-up before fitting each knob.
In the end, I had to take my best guess.
The main issue with this is that it’ll make it a bit trickier to compare settings between different Notaklön examples. For example, 8 o’clock on my pedal isn’t going to be 8 o’clock on yours, because we’ve aligned the control knobs a little differently.
How Does It Sound?
Notes About My Rig
Today, I’ve grabbed my PRS Silver Sky, and I’m just exploring how it sounds as a clean boost on a totally clean guitar.
Where’s The Low-End Gone?
I’m on the neck pickup of my Silver Sky, and immediately I can’t help but notice that the Notaklön has taken away all the wonderful warmth that’s so integral to the sound of the Silver Sky.
In my experience, it’s not unusual for Klon klones to shelf off more low-end than my real Klon KTR does. The Notaklön seems to do this more than most.
It reminds me of the JHS Morning Glory v4 pedal, and the way that pedal dumps low-end.
The Top-End Is Very Cutting
Maybe this is caused by the lack of warm, I don’t know, but I’m finding the top-end to be very cutting.
I ended up switching IRs to one specifically designed for taming the top-end of a signal chain, just for my own listening comfort. That helped quite a bit.
Where Is The Complexity?!?
If you’ve read my recent Dutch 24 reviews, you may recall that I also had to switch IRs for that pedal. That was worth it, because it unlocked the rich tone that the Dutch 24 has to offer.
Here, I don’t seem to have unlocked anything. I’m just sparing my ears from fatigue.
One of the reasons I love my Klon KTR is because it adds complexity to the overall guitar tone. (I don’t know why – added harmonics maybe? Not my field.) I’m just not hearing that with the Notaklön.
To make sure I’m not losing my mind, I went back and forth between the Notaklön and the JRAD Archer Clean a few times. (The Archer Clean is on my board for the two upcoming Coffee and Klon posts.)
It wasn’t even close 🙁
On the flip side, if you’re someone chasing a “pure” tone, then the Notaklön may be a useful tool for you.
Other Thoughts
Fit And Finish Issues
There are a couple of imperfections with the pedal.
- The enclosure’s base isn’t a perfect fit.
- One of the control knobs is a bit raggedy.
Neither of these affect the sound of the pedal. They’re just disappointing, and something I’m not used to seeing, even on budget pedals made out in the Far East.
If I’d bought this from a retailer and paid typical Klon klone pricing for it, I probably would have discussed these QC issues with them.
Power Jack Is Awkward And Fiddly
A much more worrying problem is that I have to use a bit of force to plug in the power adapter. I’m worried that I’m going to break it one day.
There’s nothing special and peculiar about the cables from my power adapter. I’ve been using them for over a decade, and this is the first pedal where I’ve run into this problem.
I’m happy that it’s not an alignment issue. The central pin on the pedal seems to be slap bang in the middle of the hole that the cable plugs into. I think it’s just that the jack hole is just too small, and this is makes it a very tight fit.
Final Thoughts
I haven’t spent a lot of time with the Notaklön since it arrived.
That’s partly because I’m still recovering from recent surgery. My pedalboard is currently setup for a couple of upcoming Coffee And Klon articles, and I’m not really up for swapping everything over to spend a lot of time with the Notaklön.
But mainly, I’m just feeling pretty meh towards it.
I’m not hearing anything that makes me want to put a huge amount of time into it right now. It’s shelving off way too much low end for my taste, and the top-end seems to lack any sort of complexity.
When life is back to normal, I will sit down and give this pedal another go, and compare it against both my Klon KTR and a couple of other Klon klones – with proper audio demos too.
Until then, it’s going back into its very inconveniently-large box, to gather dust on the shelf.
Seriously? You’re going to review a DIY pedal that you didn’t DO yourself! Every detail you gave like “it drops the low end” should be followed by, “Of course, I didn’t build it, so who knows if it’s correct or not.”
Do the work, man.
Hey Leo. It’s not that kind of DIY pedal. It’s literally sold as a pedal that a child can build. It’s not a kit. It’s flat-pack furniture, just in pedal form.
Interesting that you have the exact opposite results in comparing them to “Living Room GD” youtube channel, where he builds and compares his Notaklön to his real $4000 Klon and does a side by side A/B comparison and states that they sound exactly the same. To my ears I could hear no difference either.