The Boss OS-2 is the first guitar pedal I’ve had since I started playing guitar at 17 (so why not put it as my first article on musicanza.it?????). Let alone that I was playing in my bedroom, of 12 square meters, with a Sakura Stratocaster (paid 180,000 lire) and the speakers of the PC as an amplifier.
A guy from a parish group with whom I found myself playing once, after rehearsals, says to me: “I don’t use it, do you want it?”
And I: “Well, thanks, yes, it’s interesting, but how much do you want?”
“Nothing, I’ll give it to you!” “Are you sure??” It seemed strange, impossible…. “But yes, go easy, take it, I don’t use it anyway, I don’t like it!” “Well, but then… Thank you very much !!! : D “
My first guitar pedal… An overdrive / distortion, moreover, which for a grungetto like me (at the time) was the best !!!
Which then ended up between my Sakura and the PC speakers …
Features
It is a Boss, with his very famous box and the characteristics that have always distinguished this series.
It can be powered either with a 9V battery that can be inserted inside, or with… Boss type power supply with central negative, of course!
Virtually indestructible, a tank. Certainly there is no risk of damage to the pedal board …
The fact that the potentiometers do not crack at all given its age (honestly I don’t know the year of production, but if the line of the famous Boss pedals includes the first models starting from the 70 ‘- at least so they write here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boss_Corporation – this will be at least 30 years old) and that he has never had any problems says a lot about the quality of production …! Fantastic!
It is not true-by-pass, it should have a buffer in it (https://www.accordo.it/article/viewPub/22310) and … yes, if you connect some of them in series, the signal degrades a lot …
Sound
The Boss OS-2 is my first pedal, I learned to do everything with it (or so I think, then hearing others do more and better I understand that I still have to learn a lot ????).
It is a mix between an overdrive and a distortion. It has four knobs, in addition to the classic Level and Tone, which regulate volume and tone respectively, there are Drive and Color. Drive adjusts the overdrive level, while Color adjusts the distortion level.
With Color at a minimum I have to say that the Boss OS-2 is really an overdrive (not just in name), quite dynamic and manageable, with a nice dough. Adding Color, for minimum levels the sound gets a little bigger but it always remains quite manageable and with an even thicker paste, not bad, while after half it gets angry. It becomes very distorted, and compressed.
The adjustments are progressive, work well and have no sudden reactions in terms of sound changes.
It’s not bad, in the end it does his. With the tone at 9 o’clock, drive at 15/16 and color at 8/9 I played Santana, while for more pushy and open things by putting the tone at 15, Drive at 15/16 and Colo at 11, like basic adjustment, good or bad on it can do everything in blues / rock / grunge terms. Of course, he does not go into metal territories, but there is more to that, even remaining at Bosses like the Metal Zone MT-2 or the Hyper Metal HM-2 (which I had both, then sold because really too pushed, they weren’t for me).
Of course, I personally can’t say he’s excelled. It is very distorted and compressed, and on the market you can now find something of a much higher quality as a sound at lower prices, especially if you look at the used. In the beginning I used it quite a lot both at home and in the room with a Gibson SG and a Fender amp putting it in its clean channel, and I have to say that his has always done very well.
Conclusions
A pedal that belongs to a family that has made the history of guitar effects. Who has never had a Boss ???
Probably the Boss OS-2 is not one of the best, as the ultra-noble SD-1 could be (which, however, I never had the pleasure of trying, and above all of making an A / B comparison), but it is still a good pedal and a piece of history.
For those interested the used is on https://www.mercatinomusicale.com or up https://www.subito.it, or reverb.com otherwise even those who prefer to buy it new can find it easily (yes, it is still in production: https://www.boss.info/it/products/os-2/).
Published on musicanza.it on: 15/03/2020.
