Nux Horseman OD

I play and record at home with a fairly modest range of equipment and I wanted a pedal to give me a decent grunty OD sound which was also capable of producing some nice crystal clear Gilmour-ish tones as well. I wasn't getting exactly what I was looking for with a Big Muff reissue which I bought a few months ago so a bit of due dilligence and research among the numerous recent YT vids concerning Klons and the various clones available and I was seduced the possibilities of the Nux Horseman.

First impressions were good: the box comes with velcro pads, a short but clear leaflet explaining the various functionalities, the build quality is excellent, footswitche, knobs, etc. are all perfectly fine and as soon as I hooked it up on my pedalboard . . .there is was: a lovely clear transparent overdrive that cuts through the rest of the mix and which gives a very wide range of possible tones from rather dark and gnarly to clean ringing notes that just soar. My signal chain is usually Boss TU-2 >> clean American sound preamp for EQ >> TC MojoMojo >> Big Muff rams-head >> Nux Horseman >> delay >> reverb, running into a Vox-style hybrid tube amp then into a 12" Celestion equipped cab.

So far I'm mainly using it on the silver setting: treble around 12, volume from 9-12 and then using the gain to dial in the right tone for the mix. Running it as a boost lets me use the MojoMojo to add colour which might otherwise become a bit lost and too fuzzy if turned up loud. Having just the American sound preamp in front of the Horseman allows some adjustments from an EQ standpoint and it even manages to tame the somewhat noisy Big Muff a little bit so I can get a sort of background "wall of sound" effect with the volume turned down. The amount of saturation possible is really useful allowing me to just bump up a certain sound while staying fairly clear to really pushing the tubes without it all becoming just a noisy soupy mess with no definition.

What I particularly like is the way you can setup the pedal and then use your guitar's volume and tone knobs to adjust the sound on the fly and it responds really well to the dynamics of your playing whether its by palm muting or the attack of your pick. Even a relatively low volume on the amp you can hear the harmonics singing with the Horseman.

On the few songs that I've recorded since using this I can hear a difference. All other things being equal there's a bit more spatial separation and definition between the various guitar tracks which has added up to the recordings being more dynamic and interesting.

All in all I'm delighted with this pedal and it has become my favourite go-to effect in the few weeks that I've had it. II think it's a bit of a hidden gem, perhaps dismissed by many because its not from one of the big name brands but it's definitely staying on my pedalboard for sure.

++ points: great sounds, very versatile, inexpensive, small footprint, build quality.
-- points: it doesn't make the coffee nor massage my shoulders after playing for a couple of hours !

Voilà, if you want a klon-type OD and don't have €200 for a boutique version then this IS the one to get.

If this is a close clone (and it is!) of the original Klon Centaur I can (almost) understand why people are paying outrageous money for them. I use my Horseman first in front of my multi-FX and then into the front of the amp.

The Horseman is on almost permanently at low to zero gain. It gives a thickening and slight sponginess to the sound which is reminiscent of a pushed valve amp. Notes seem to 'bloom' with an edge that I havent heard from a budget pedal before. Bravo NUX, an absolute winner!

I've only just come to grips with this thing - so far I've used it on the Silver mode running the gain flat out, and also as a clean boost on the Gold mode.

I'm very impressed with the tone in both cases. It's a very nice tone "sweetener" as a clean/treble boost. It has unity gain with the volume at about 10 o clock, so it can add plenty decibels of boost if needed.

I mostly like to run it in silver mode with the gain dimed. This gives a great moderate/high gain sound which is great for chords and leads. It palm mutes like the gain structure of a real amp and has real amp-like harmonics.

A certain amount of "clean" transient shines through always, especially in the low end (a bit of a "thump" of the clean note coming through). This isn't unpleasant and is true to a vintage amp sound, but it can be smoothed out by stacking another overdrive in front. Doing that actually turns this into a nasally late 70's and even 80's hot-rod plexi kind of sound to my ears - even up to the hair metal and early thrash metal sound, but with the vintage amp character shining through.

If you are an old-school kind of player who would have turned everything on 10 and used the guitar's volume and tone to control your sound, you can definitely do that with this pedal - and imposing those limits can get good things out of you as a player. The EQ is very bright when it's fully up, but is still usable. It sounds good when it's rolled back aswell - more dark and mid-focused.

The build quality and design is great. The switching options for gold/silver and turning the buffer on and off are clever, the silent switch has a very modern & solid feel to it, and the aesthetics that pay tribute to the original are a nice touch.

I have never tried an original so I can't compare to the benchmark in that sense, but after using it a few times now, I certainly understand the hype. It's a very inspiring pedal, and if you're thinking of trying one I would say try it. You can't really lose at that price.