The Eavesdropper Dr. Square Is Fun, Versatile Take On An Obscure DeArmond Distortion Pedal

This is a really thick sounding, hard clipping distortion pedal for folks who don’t subtle gain sounds.

Born Out Of The DeArmond Square Wave Distortion Generator

Eavesdropper’s Dr. Square was inspired by the Square Wave Distortion Generator, a pedal I was not familiar with prior to this review and demo. However, if it sounds anything like the Dr. Square, it must be a wonderful dirt pedal. Eavesdropper has tweaked the circuit and added some features to expand the offerings. In addition to the 3 control knobs, there is a toggle that lets you add more sustain and body, as well as one that lets you add more bass frequencies in. The volume and gain controls are pretty self explanatory, but the shift lets you mix in more highs (clockwise) or more lows (counter-clockwise).

These beautiful pedals are available on Reverb as well on this exciting new pedal marketplace, NotPedals.com. Eavesdropper themselves doesn’t have a website, but you can find them on Instagram. Based out of Houston, Texas, these pedals are handbuilt and ready to ship out of the US.

Demo Time

Below you can hear the Dr. Square in action! I’ve got my trusty HSS Mexican Strat running into the pedal, which then hits the UAFX Dream (amp sim), Walrus Canvas Stereo (DI box), and UA Volt276 (interface) for the recording process. Can you tell I’m hyped about the Oasis reunion??

My Thoughts

There’s no doubt that this is a sweet sounding pedal. From the minute I plugged it in I had a blast, as it just pours out thick, crunchy distortion. While it does clean up nice, this pedal is at its best when you’re really cranking the gain and have the squish-toggle flipped on. It’s not that this necessarily sounds like a RAT, but I found myself using this for sounds that I typically turn to a RAT for. It has more clarity, and the expanded EQ is quite powerful, making this a great choice for choosier tone tweakers.

One really fun thing was that when you max the gain, you almost get this cool filter-y sound. I can’t quite place what it reminds me of, but if you watch the end of the demo you’ll hear what I’m talking about. While I can’t say that this is a particularly revolutionary distortion, it deserves a lot of credit for the unique circuit and the overwhelmingly big distortion sounds it produces. In particular, I felt right at home as punk rock guitarist, and I could see this being a go-to distortion pedal that would difficult to displace from a gigging board. Eavesdropper deserves a lot of credit for branching out with a unique distortion circuit, versus the armada of more mainstream clones that I’ve reviewed. Overall, this gets a firm thumbs up from me and I highly recommend it for folks who want warm, loud, but clear distortion.