Here's a circuit that combines many desirable features. Feel free to experiment with the component values.

For example, using lower value capacitors around the tone control will give a brighter sound, and vice versa. The capacitor on the left sets the tone at fully clockwise, while the one on the right sets the minimum tone sound. This circuit has been updated for 2002. A buffer mode switch has been added - see the notes below (normally you would just wire this permanently the way you want to use it. Also, thanks to Todd Modjeski who pointed a correction required for the input over-voltage protection. The circuit features are:

Battery power is connected by inserting a mono guitar plug into the input socket This power supply uses a voltage divider to provide half-supply voltage bias to the circuit Input over-voltage protection (the 1K resistor and 2 x rectifier diodes) High impedance unity-gain buffer (the BC549 transistor) to interface the high output impedance of a guitar with the following circuitry High pass filter (the 2.2K resistor and 0.15uF capacitor) to compensate for the natural low-middle emphasis of guitar pickups Soft-clipping non-linear amplifier (the 1st half of the TL072 and the 4 diodes in the feedback path) with variable gain control A switch to use soft-clipping (overdrive), or apply hard clipping (distortion, with the 2 diodes to ground) Low pass filter to compensate for the high harmonics added in the clipping stages (the 6.8nF capacitor) The Tone control is a variable low pass filter (50K pot and a second capacitor) to allow you to customise the amount of treble cut An output buffer with 6dB of gain to provide a low impedance output A Level control to allow you to use the pedal to boost or match normal guitar levels (or use as a middle booster with low gain and high level settings) A footswitch to use or bypass the circuit When bypassed, the overdrive effect is shorted, so no background "fizz" bleeds into the clean signal LED indication to show when the effect is on, used with a Zener diode to restrict available voltage to the LED to give early indication of battery failure Bypass mode switch - use hard bypass to preserve original tone (and for bypass to work even if the battery is dead), or use buffer mode to drive long leads without treble loss, or to drive other effects such as volume pedals without tone loss

Notes
The Op Amp should be any dual low noise device, such as a TL072. The 1N4148 diodes can be any small signal silicon diodes. The 1N4004 diodes can be any 1 amp rectifier diodes (eg 1N4007 is OK also). The input buffer transistor should be any high gain low noise device, such as a BC549. The top left portion of this circuit supplies 9V power and 4.5V bias to the rest of the circuit. Connect all the 9V points together, and connect all the 4.5V points together.