Benson Amps - Germanium Preamp Review
Subtle and punchy!
Benson Amps is one of my favorite pedal brands. I haven’t had the chance to use one of their amps yet, but their pedals are the epitome of simplicity and great sound. Last year, we featured their Germanium Fuzz on the website, full review here. In the past couple of months, I’ve had the pleasure of having their new Germanium Preamp pedal on my board and tested it out with guitars but also synths!
There have been a lot of comparisons of the Germanium Preamp versus the original Benson Preamp pedal but since I don’t have the OG one, this review will be just for the Germanium Preamp. The Germanium version is not a 2nd version of the original pedal, they do share a lot of stuff but we’ll just treat it as a standalone pedal and we’ll just mention a few differences to the OG one so you know what it can do and if it’s right for you!
Design & Features
Benson pedals have a somewhat unique look because they all have a boxy design instead of a narrow and tall enclosure like most pedals do. I really like the form factor of the Benson pedals because they don’t take up too much space and can fit perfectly on any pedalboard! The mint green version I’ve got looks beautiful alongside the burgundy lettering and details!
The main difference to the original Preamp pedal is that they decided to replace the FET transistor with a Germanium Gain Stage that also exists on their incredible Germanium Boost pedal. By the way, the Germanium Boost is, in my opinion, their best pedal. It can be used on literally any sound and just give it more body and power in a way I can’t really explain. So, when I first got the Germanium Preamp I was so excited to have the same functionality plus more tone controls and a drive on top of all.
Germanium Preamp has only four knobs and a footswitch. Treble & Bass knobs are pretty self-explanatory and they control the mid/top frequencies and low-end frequencies of your signal respectively. Essentially they act like a Low-pass filter (Treble knob) and a High-pass filter (Bass knob).
Volume controls your overall clean volume and boosts your signal just like the Germanium Boost pedal we mentioned earlier. The Germanium gain stage provides a slightly less gain compared to a FET transistor but don’t be afraid, it can still give more than enough volume when you need it.
The Drive knob controls your gain or drive. As in most drive pedals, you’ll use this in relation to your volume control since it also boosts the gain of your original sound. Keep in mind that the drive the Germanium Preamp provides is quite mild but in the best way possible. This is not an overdrive or distortion pedal and it’s not made to be one. A thing I love about Benson pedals is that while they have a lot of range, they somehow manage to be usable in every single setting. You can just randomly tweak knobs and still have a great tone once you turn them on. You can push the Drive knob to its maximum and you’ll still have a very rich but detailed sound which is amazing!
The only downside of the Germanium gain stage used is that it stops passing sound at 120 Degrees Fahrenheit or around 49 Celcius which is extremely hot. So the only scenario where this pedal might stop working is if you have it in direct sunlight on a stage during a very hot day. There is no way this will happen in your studio so you don’t need to worry about it too much.
Preamp, Drive, Fuzz, Distortion
A very common misconception is what a Preamp actually is compared to an Overdrive, Fuzz, or Distortion. I’m not really an electronics expert so I’ll try to demystify this as easily as I can. Preamp pedals are, as their name implies, devices that amplify your signal while trying to keep it as pure and clean as they can. They are used in front of an Amplifier to shape, EQ, and boost your signal before it reaches your amp. The louder and stronger the signal goes into the amp, the better job your amp will do. An overdrive, fuzz, or distortion emphasizes adding gain and distortion to your signal in slightly different ways. An Overdrive pedal provides a gain boost to drive your amp into distortion, a Distortion pedal will give you even more gain and distortion than an overdrive, and a Fuzz pedal changes your signal into a square wave instead of just clipping the sound and adds more harmonics on top of it.
Where does the Benson Germanium Preamp stand?
Germanium Preamp is a Preamp pedal that can give you enough Gain to act like an overdrive pedal. You won’t reach the crunchy and distorted tones you can reach with an overdrive or distortion but it’s enough for a subtle and semi-clean drive sound. If you’re not looking for a pedal for harsh and angry overdrive & distortion sounds, the Germanium Preamp is really versatile and can give you amazing clean sounds but also very crisp and rounded drive sounds. I used it in front of a cab sim pedal and straight into my interface and I quickly realized how versatile the EQ controls are and how soft and full of texture the drive is. It’s a pedal that has a ton of applications and scenarios you can use that we will talk about later and just sounds excellent every time!
How to use it?
Or actually, how I used it? I’ve tried to cover as many examples as I could with the Germanium Preamp to see how it would do. The obvious application is to use it with your guitar where I played both single coils and humbucker pickups with just the Germanium Preamp and a Cab Sim pedal straight into my audio interface. The tones you get out of it are warm and round and you can crank up the Drive as much as you want and still preserve clarity and all the details of your playing. The clean tones are just perfect and, well, very clean and transparent as they should be. I don’t really care about super-distorted and harsh sounds so I just need a nice and clean boost and drive and the Germanium Preamp always delivered!
Another very cool way to use this pedal is with synths! I love playing synths with drive and distortion pedals to make them come alive and give that extra grit I often miss. The mild character of Germanium Preamp suits synths perfectly! If you ever plugged a synth into a cheap Overdrive or Distortion pedal you’ll know that they will suck your sound in and completely destroy it even on very low settings while the Germanium Preamp manages to color the sound, boost it, and give it gain and drive while it stills sounds like the original synth sound you played. It has been my go-to drive pedal for synths for the past few months and I totally recommend you try it too!
Drums! Another thing that’s craving for some boost and drive is drums! There’s not a single drum part in my music that does not have some kind of saturation plugin or pedal. My favorite plugin is by far the Drum Buss stock plugin in Ableton Live. It’s a phenomenal plugin that I’ve used a million times so I tried to achieve similar results with the Germanium Preamp. Drum Buss has Drive, Damp (which is something like a low-pass filter), Crunch which boosts the treble and high frequencies, and Boom that boosts the low frequencies. With the EQ controls and the Drive knob on the Germanium Preamp, I managed to get very similar results which blew me away. You can use your Bass knob to give your Kick and low-end more body and power, add some extra crispiness to your high-hats with Treble and lastly Drive to squash everything up and make your drum loops gritty and fat.
Conclusion
There is no way I won’t get excited about a Benson Amps pedal. I just need them all. There is something about the simple controls combined with the analog craftsmanship of the people at Benson that creates magic. Just a few controls alongside quality materials are all you need. These types of pedals sometimes feel like they’re made for guitar tone purists, but in Benson’s case, they’re accessible and user-friendly for everyone. I’m definitely not the tone-purist type of person, I most often experiment and dismantle my sounds and with Benson pedals, I can do that knowing that it will sound good in every scenario.
The Germanium Preamp is a pedal that stays on your pedalboard forever and always delivers. You can use it as a clean boost or as a warm analog drive just by turning a couple of knobs. The knobs are very responsive at their full range which is something that many pedals lack so you can dial in the exact sound you need. The fact that is also great for instruments and sounds other than guitar is also a huge plus for me and probably for a lot of people out there. I’m mostly a synth person and knowing I can freely run any synth (analog or not) through the Germanium Preamp and make it sound prettier makes this pedal worth it even more.
I won’t be able to answer the question if you need the original Preamp or the Germanium one but I’m sure you’ll love a Benson Preamp in any case. If you want more drive and slightly harsher tones maybe you’d prefer the original one, if you prefer something a bit more mild and warm, you’d love the Germanium Preamp. Just get one and tell me I was right!
PS: Chris Benson who runs Benson Amps is such a kind and cool person who loves making amps and pedals. As I said a lot of times before, I’m all about supporting companies that are not just companies. They are people who love their craft, and their customers and want to create things that are useful and inspiring to musicians. So take things like that into consideration before your next purchase - even if it’s a Benson pedal or not. Support the people who are a part of the community and try their best for us - not a company that sees all these as a market and cares only about their wallets. ;)
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