Kernom Pedals | Golden Age of Gear Ep. 49
In this episode of The Golden Age of Gear, Derek and Joey dive into some truly wild sonic territory with three next-level pedals from Kernom — the Ridge, the Moho, and the Ellipse. These French wizards have been making a quiet but VERY loud splash in the guitar world, and today we dig into why their analog-driven, feature-packed designs have so many players talking.
We’re exploring how these pedals blend analog tone, clever digital control, and deep tweakability to create everything from classic overdrive flavors to gritty fuzz madness and rich modulation textures. Whether you're chasing transparent drive, thick vintage fuzz, tri-chorus dreaminess, harmonic trem, or a super-flexible overdrive that can mimic your favorite pedals from across your board — these boxes kind of do it all.
What We Cover:
🎛️ Kernom Ridge – An all-analog overdrive that can emulate your favorite ODs using its “mood” knob to switch clipping types on the fly. MIDI, presets, tone shaping, AND a unique enclosure? Yeah… it’s a thing.
⚡ Kernom Moho – A fuzz machine that goes from vintage, spitty, gated tones to modern high-gain fury. Octaves, ring mod, smooth transitions between textures… Derek even likes it, and he’s famously “not a fuzz guy.”
🌊 Kernom Ellipse – Modulation galore. Harmonic trem, rotary, flanger, phaser, vibe, tri-chorus — all analog-driven with beautiful control over shape, blend, and movement. Not stereo, but ridiculously deep and insanely musical.
Along the way we get into:
How the “mood” knob actually alters clipping components
Pre/post EQ tricks for shaping drive the way amp builders do
What really matters with harmonic trem
Univibe purism (Joey has opinions)
The surprisingly impressive design choices in Kernom’s enclosures
Why these pedals feel like an analog counterpoint to modern multi-FX units
As always, we’d love to hear from you — what Kernom pedal impresses you the most? What should we check out next? Drop your thoughts in the comments and hit that subscribe button to help keep the show rolling.
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