JHS pedal wizard Josh Scott’s latest clip sees him testing out Wampler’s new Collective Series pedals – the Triumph and the Phenom – and, in the process, dubbing the $99 Triumph overdrive pedal, “better than the Bad Monkey.”
As pedal geeks will know – and none more so than Scott himself – one does not invoke the name Bad Monkey lightly.
Back in March, Scott’s praise of the then-underrated DigiTech drive pedal sent asking prices over $600, a Bad Monkey that once belonged to Gary Moore was listed for $12,000 and the subsequent impact left the global financial system narrowly avoiding a complete meltdown (OK, not really).
That all said, to be fair to both Scott and designer Brian Wampler, the Triumph is not a cash-in – it’s just incredibly fortuitous timing.
The Triumph pedal was first introduced in December (months before the BM hype bubble), clearly touted its Bad Monkey inspiration from the start and – the internet being the internet – nobody batted an eyelid at the time.
Then, as now, the most appealing things about Wampler’s pedal were that it’s a great-sounding drive pedal, designed and made in the USA by a highly reputable boutique brand, and somehow priced at just $99.
As Scott explains in the post, the reason he considers the Triumph superior to DigiTech’s (once budget-friendly) pedal is thanks to the inclusion of a mids dial on the EQ section.
“That mids control alone is insane,” explains Scott. “This gets it into like Bluesbreaker land pretty easily – backing this [the mids control] off and turning it up puts it into [Tube] Screamer land; and that's why ‘better Bad Monkey’.”
Scott goes as far as to label the Triumph Wampler’s “best drive”, which is praise indeed, given the mutual respect shared by the two pedal builders.
Back in original DigiTech territory, we’re nearly four months on on from the Bad Monkey bubble, and used sale prices have now settled down to a recent average of $100-115, according to Reverb’s price guide.
We also note that Gary Moore’s $12,000 Bad Monkey also appears to have gone unsold and is now reduced to a much more reasonable, er… $6,681.
With a new, in-production alternative on offer from Wampler for less money, we suspect those used prices might now have a little further to drop. Good news for pedal buyers, bad news for Bad Monkey owners.
That is the used market hype-cycle in action, though: Josh giveth and Josh taketh away. For another of the JHS man’s recent new pedal tip-offs, check out the distortion pedal Josh Scott called the most unique design he’s seen “in decades.”
