JHS Notaklön Review — They Built a $119 Klon and Everybody Lost Their Mind

Let me tell you about the most petty, brilliant, hilarious move in recent pedal history. Josh Scott of JHS Pedals spent years talking about how the Klon Centaur was overhyped and overpriced. Then he built his own version for $119, shipped it in pieces, and told you to put it together yourself. IKEA style. With goop included so you could cover the “magic” diodes yourself.

That’s Wu-Tang energy. That’s Protect Ya Tone.

The Backstory

The Klon Centaur is one of the most mythologized pedals ever made. Original units sell for anywhere between $5,000 and $10,000 on the used market. For an overdrive pedal. The mythology grew so large that players convinced themselves the Klon had some kind of supernatural quality that no other pedal could replicate. JHS decided to call that bluff.

The Notaklön launched in November 2023 and the first batch of 3,000 units sold out immediately. The internet exploded. Every YouTube channel in existence built one on camera. And the verdict? It sounds like a Klon. Because it is a Klon circuit — with JHS’s own Shamrock modification baked in.

I Was One of the 3,000

Mine came in the first batch. I didn’t build it alone — my six-year-old daughter ran the bench with me. Snapping the boards in, checking parts off the list, quality control the whole way down. She bills in fruit snacks.

Somewhere in the middle of the build she drew a picture, and it went inside the enclosure before the back plate went on. It’s still in there. It always will be. Which means this pedal can never be sold — not because of collector value, because there’s a crayon drawing sealed inside it. She soldered herself into the signal chain without touching a soldering iron, which is the most Notaklön thing that has ever happened.

What You’re Building

The box arrives like a flat-pack kit (where you at Ikea?). Inside you get a pre-wired circuit board, knobs, jacks, a white enclosure, hardware, and a tube of goop for the diodes. No soldering required. Assembly takes about 10-15 minutes and is genuinely foolproof. You snap it together, dial in your settings, and you’re done.

The white enclosure is clean, simple, and looks sharp on a board. Three knobs — Output, Treble, Gain — plus a slider switch for the Shamrock mod. That’s it. No overthinking, no menu diving, no nonsense.

Mine Says Amelia & Dad on the Back

My Notaklön went together on 12/15/23 with my daughter running quality control. The backplate got signed the way serious lab equipment should — “Amelia & Dad,” plus a heart, a cat, and a lighthouse. JHS hid their own jokes inside too: the circuit board says “Meatballs anyone?” and credits Ingvar Kamprad, the IKEA guy. A pedal your kid can sign her name inside — no $10,000 Centaur does that.

How It Sounds

At low gain with the output up, it’s a genuinely good transparent boost. That’s the job, and it does the job. Your tone stays your tone — just bigger, fuller, and more present. Roll the gain up and you get that classic Klon character — harmonically rich overdrive that sits perfectly in a mix without getting muddy or fizzy.

The Shamrock mod slider is the secret weapon. Engage it and you get an additional 4dB of gain with an extra stage of hard clipping. It pushes the pedal into grittier territory — still musical, still controlled, but with more hair on it. Most players end up living in Shamrock mode once they find it.

Touch sensitivity is excellent. The Notaklön responds to your playing dynamics the way a good amp does — dig in and it growls, back off and it cleans up. That’s the characteristic that made the original Klon legendary, and it’s here in full.

From the Bench

The build quality post-assembly is solid. The enclosure is durable, the hardware is tight, and the true bypass means zero signal degradation when it’s off. For $119 street price you’re getting boutique-level tone in a pedal you built with your own hands. That’s a flex.

Who Is It For?

Anyone who’s been curious about Klon-style overdrive but refused to pay $5,000 for the real thing. Anyone who wants a great transparent boost. Anyone who wants to say they built their own pedal and actually mean it. If you like your tone clean and dynamic with just enough edge — this is your chamber.

Bottom Line

The Klon Centaur is a good pedal in a $10,000 costume. The Notaklön is the same good pedal in a $119 t-shirt. Josh Scott made his point, and the point is a 36. The box grades a 30 — top of the Master segment. Excellent, real strengths, easy recommend. Buy one. Build it with someone.

As for mine — mine’s worth more than every Centaur on Reverb combined, and the meter has nothing to do with it. The meter grades pedals. It doesn’t grade what’s sealed inside the enclosure.

C.R.E.A.G. — Cash Rules Everything Around Gear. Nothing ever proved it harder.

Elsewhere in the chambers: the Drive chamber also holds the Chase Tone Secret Preamp — the always-on sweetener that makes everything after it sound more expensive.

More info: the Notaklön at JHS Pedals — straight from the maker, no middleman.

Built something too. Fretsmith — the reference I actually use on the bench: verified specs, string tension, setup calculators. No accounts, no subscriptions, one-time purchase. The pedals plug into a guitar. Somebody has to know what the guitar needs.