Historic Hardware: Maxon Overdrive/ Ibanez Tube Screamer
We take an in-depth look at one of the guitar world’s most popular and influential overdrives with That Pedal Show co-host Mick Taylor, Analog Man’s founder Mike Piera, and the Tube Screamer’s original circuit designer Susumu Tamara
In the hard-rock era of the 70s, the sound of overdriven Marshall stacks filled stadiums around the globe – and terrified the parents and neighbours of bedroom guitarists everywhere. These were the good old days of LOUD, when tone equalled eardrumsplitting volume and hard-rocking guitar players were, for better or worse, anti-social by nature.
Hot on the trail of a more practical and less quarrelsome solution, amp designers on both sides of the Atlantic increasingly looked towards providing rock guitarists with the option of valve distortion at lower volume. In the US, during the early 70s, Mesa Engineering’s Randall Smith provided his answer with the Boogie/ Mark I amp’s cascading preamp gain, while in England, Marshall’s Steve Grindrod developed the company’s first ‘master volume’ model, the 2203, in 1975.
Meanwhile in Japan, the first of Roland’s Boss pedals, the CE-1 Chorus Ensemble hit the effects market in 1976, and by the following year the term ‘overdrive’ had well and truly been coined by Boss with the OD-1 Over Drive. Boasting valve-like asymmetrical clipping, it was an immediate success as guitar players suddenly found they had the world of overdrive placed conveniently at their feet, regardless of which amplifier they happened to be plugged into.
With a circuit closely resembling the Boss OD-1 (albeit featuring symmetrical clipping and a tone control), the Maxon OD-808/ Ibanez TS-808 originated from the Nisshin Onpa firm – an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) of guitar pickups and electronics – and was the brainchild of engineer Susumu Tamura. The design was unveiled in 1979 and was aimed at the domestic Japanese market under its own Maxon brand as the OD-808 Overdrive, while Nisshin’s customer, the Hoshino Gakki company, cornered the overseas market with the circuit in the guise of its Ibanez-branded TS-808 Tube Screamer Overdrive Pro.
Available from 1979 to 1981, this first incarnation of the Tube Screamer is considered by many to be the Holy Grail of overdrive pedals, with prices on today’s vintage market easily fetching several hundred pounds. During 1979, a rare variation of the TS-808 with a narrower enclosure was made for a short while. This pedal originally utilised a pair of 1458 chips and was reissued by Ibanez in 2014 as the TS-808 35th Anniversary featuring the fabled JRC4558D chip. JRC4558Ds were commonplace in the wider-enclosure TS-808s, with rarer versions employing RC4558P and TL4558P chips in the circuit. All TS-808s can be distinguished by their small rectangular metal footswitches.
In 1982, the design was revamped for the 9 Series Maxon/Ibanez compact effects pedal ranges. Repackaged as the Maxon OD-9 Overdrive and Ibanez TS9 Tube Screamer, the schematic remained relatively unchanged, with the notable exception of output resistor values (to reduce unwanted noise). Although the unit retained its distinctive green colour, the small 808-style switch was replaced by a large rectangular type. By 1985, the 9 Series was discontinued, and the circuit temporarily fell out of production.
In 1986, a new variation closely resembling the original circuit was introduced in the form of the TS10 Tube Screamer Classic as part of Ibanez’s extensive Power Series aka 10-series. Although TS10s are sought after by some, for others, their cheaper and less sturdy construction sets them apart from earlier varieties – although this didn’t appear to stop Stevie Ray Vaughan making good use of them!
It was an immediate success as guitar players suddenly found they had the world of overdrive placed at their feet