Mikey Demus

Mikey Demus is the guitarist of the Welsh metal band Skindred, a role he has held for 20 years as of 2019¹. He plays left-handed², and his sound in Skindred is built on cranked Orange amps³. Beyond the band, he is the founder of the pedal company Redbeard Effects, a joint venture with Adrian Thorpe MBE, the pedal designer behind ThorpyFX⁴⁵.

Cranked Orange amps behind the Skindred sound

Demus usually relies on cranked Orange amps to bring the noise in Skindred³. His signature Orange Rockerverb 100 MKIII is always part of his rig⁶. That amp is also the reference point for his first pedal: the Red Mist MKIV is based on Mikey Demus's signature Orange Rockerverb 100 MKIII amp, but with more extended range so it can be turned to several different tasks⁷⁶.

Because the amp is always in his rig, he does not need the Red Mist in his own signal chain unless performing through some sort of PA system⁶.

Guitars: Fender, Gibson and signature Manson models

Demus plays left-handed on Fender and Gibson guitars and a signature Manson³. Gearnews notes he got his first Manson signature model guitar, the Manson MD-2². Manson has since launched a third iteration of his signature guitar, the MD-3, available in Dry Satin Black at £1999 and Atomic Tangerine at £2099.

The Skindred pedalboard

Demus's 2021 pedalboard features two of his signature pedals, and he held onto the ThorpyFX Peacekeeper, meaning he deploys two core overdrives as part of that board⁶. His signature pedals come from his own company:

• Red Mist MKIV, a medium-to-high gain distortion pedal based on his Orange Rockerverb 100 MKIII⁷⁸
• Angry Rhubarb Paradynamic Overdrive MKII, an overdrive with dual gain-stage controls and a single-band parametric tone stack⁶

He sets the Red Mist with all EQ dials at 2 o'clock for his signature sound⁶. His wah flourishes in several Skindred signature songs at a Birmingham Guitar Show performance sounded fantastic, as Guitar Pedal X's Stefan Karlsson put it⁹.

Redbeard Effects

Redbeard Effects is the brainchild of Demus, a self-confessed rock and roll gear head, and its products are hand made in the UK¹⁰. The company's first pedal was the Red Mist MKIV, Demus's first foray into effects pedals². Its second offering, the Honey Badger, is a collaboration between Demus and Thorpe described as a thick-skinned and aggressive fuzz with vast octave abilities¹¹¹².

On the company's aims, Demus said in a statement:

Questions