I recently acquired a Tone Tattoo. The Tone Tattoo is EHX’ only ALL ANALOG multi-effect pedal. It consists of a Pocket Metal Muff, a Neo Clone, and a Memory Toy in one pedal with a separate switch for each. I didn’t have a Pocket Metal Muff (any Metal Muff) or a Neo Clone. I already had a Memory Toy, but the Tone Tattoo’s Memory Toy has a control that the stand alone doesn’t, and anyway you can never have too many analog delays on your board right? So, I could kill two and a half birds with one bullet by pulling the trigger on the Tone Tattoo. I’m trying to use analog pedals as much as possible.

So, let me talk about each section. First in the chain from right to left is the Metal Muff. At first, I thought this would essentially be a Pocket Metal Muff, but this circuit is different from all of the other Metal Muffs – the original Metal Muff with the Top Boost that many owners think is too aggressive, the Micro Metal Muff which also includes the Top Boost, and the Pocket Metal Muff which replaces the unpopular Tob Boost with an incredibly useful SCOOP switch. The SCOOP switch allows you to quickly select between no scoop, a moderate scoop, and a hellacious scoop. The Pocket Metal Muff is EHX’ answer to the Boss HM-2, but some people think it’s too “fizzy”. The Metal Muff section in the Tone Tattoo includes the SCOOP button from the Pocket Metal Muff and adds Treble and Bass controls in addition to the volume and drive. That’s more tone control than even the Micro Muff. It’s almost like having a Metal Crayon! In addition to the improved tone section, they include a noise gate with adjustable threshold. If you’ve been considering any of the Metal Muffs, you should definitely consider a Tone Tattoo even if it’s just for the built-in Metal Muff.

The next effect in the chain is the Neo Clone, not the Nano Clone which they could have chosen to include instead. So, let’s talk a bit about the difference between the Nano Clone and the Neo Clone. The Neo Clone is advertised to be the same ALL-ANALOG design as the original Small Clone using bucket brigade devices. The Nano Clone IS analog, but doesn’t claim to be the same circuit as the original Small Clone, so it’s probably not. The Neo Clone has a depth switch. The Nano Clone does not. The Neo Clone plays nice with others effects on the power daisy chain. The Nano Clone warns in its owners manual that it requires its own separate power supply because it can interfere with (shut down!) other effects on a daisy chain. (?!?) So, what you get in the Tone Tattoo is the Neo Clone which I think is the better of the two. I don’t have a Neo Clone or Small Clone to test it against, but as far as I can tell from online videos, this works exactly like a Neo Clone with one interesting addition. The LED changes from red to green to indicate whether the depth switch is engaged.

The Memory Toy section works exactly like my Memory Toy except that they’ve added a GAIN control that controls the INPUT gain to the effect, not the VOLUME, but the input GAIN. When you turn it up, the effect (the echoes) begin to distort before the dry signal. Distorted echos are a classic bucket brigade device feature, and here you can control how dirty, or “warm”, those echos are…VERY NICE.

This pedal is a fantastic example of the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. In this case, even the individual parts are at least as good as their stand-alone counterparts. This is really rare. Usually, when a company merges stand-alone effects into a multi-effect unit, the leave out something from the original effects. In this case EHX ENHANCED the original effects. The Metal Muff section has two Crayon-like tone controls and a noise gate. The Neo Clone is the better of two effects they could have included and adds a color changing LED to indicate the status of the depth switch. The Memory Toy allows you to control the input gain which is normally done using a VERY sensitive internal pot on the stand-alone Memory Toy. EHX really likes to add value.

In addition to being better versions of their stand-alone counter parts, putting them all into one box means that they take up less space on your pedalboard and you can power them all with a single adapter.

So, is there a downside to having three great pedals in a single unit? Yes…sort of. These are three hard-wired analog units, so you cannot change the order of the effects. The order is dirt -> modulation -> delay. This is mitigated by the fact that 90% or more of users would put them in that order anyway. You can’t put anything between any of the effects, but really you don’t have to. I put my other OD/Dist before this pedal and my mod/delay after it. So, I can run my Soul Food, Hot Tubes, Big Muff, Germanium4 through the Neo Clone and/or Memory Toy on the Tone Tattoo, and run the Tone Tattoo through my Worm, Canyon, or other Memory Toy…and Yes…stacking Memory Toys is a good thing.

Overall, this is an amazing, well thought out, well built, flexible, useful, sturdy pedal that is well worth the money. In general, I tend to go for stand-alone effects rather than multi-effects, for instance a Crayon AND a Hot Tubes rather than a Hot Wax because it gives you more flexibility, but I think that in this case the multi-effect actually gives you more flexibility and a much better value, and it’s ALL ANALOG. How rare is that?