The Joyo Hot Plexi is a distortion pedal made by rising stars Joyo, supposedly modelled on the classic ‘brown’ sound of the Marshall JCM800. It’s a fine sound to aim for, as the JCM800 was really the sound of 80s and 90s Rock and Roll. But does the Hot Plexi do anything like the job that so many know and trust the JCM800 for?

In a word, no. The Hot Plexi is capable of pushing out some satisfactory sounds, but nothing I could do with the Joyo pedal blew me away. The distortion was cold, mostly, and never really went past a tame overdrive until the volume and drive knobs were turned almost all the way up. The tone pedal was also virtually useless. Against the reliable sounds I can get from the DS-1, or my Boss Katana’s native distortion, the Hot Plexi’s distortion really didn’t measure up.

I experimented with the Hot Plexi alongside other pedals, too. I tried it with the Behringer DC-9 and the Caline Hot Mushroom compressors, but both made the Hot Plexi sound worse, somehow. I’ve recently been having fun with the Mooer Shimverb, too, and even through that, the Hot Plexi didn’t give me any excitement.

The overall sound of the Hot Plexi is just okay; it’s not a bad guitar pedal for the price I paid. The Hot Plexi goes for around £40-50 new at the time of writing, but I got mine for £20 on eBay, and I was satisfied with that price after receiving and using the pedal for a while.

The dull-gold casing of the Hot Plexi is made of metal, but it feels plastic-y and cheap. I put it in a chain with a Boss DS-1 to compare their distortion capabilities, and it was immediately noticeable how much cheaper the Chinese-made Hot Plexi felt.

Would I buy this pedal again? If I’m honest, no, and not for more than£20-30. But that’s not to say it’s a terrible pedal. I just couldn’t find a groove with it, nor place its sound within my current build. Maybe others can.

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