ElectroHarmonix
118 Guitarist July 2010
£150 & £125
EFFECTS
The Rivals
The Line 6 MM4 (£269)
modulation modeller is a
potent force, with ring
modulation, chorus, tremolo
and flanging. Eventide’s
ModFactor (£397) offers all
the modulation effects you’re
likely to need, while the
PitchFactor (£468) does the
business for pitch effects. For
pure Ring Modulation, there’s
the Moog Moogerfooger
MF102 (£244). Analogue
delays with tap tempo are
thin on the ground and
usually expensive. There’s
the Moogerfooger MF-104Z
Analog Delay (£560) or, if
you want digital emulation of
an analogue delay, the TC
Electronic ND-1 Nova Delay
(£241) is an option.
A
lways prolific, it was
perhaps a surprise to
some that Electro-
Harmonix only launched two
new effects pedals at this year’s
NAMM show. But those two
are landmark additions to the
range, combining 21st century
features with the vintage
sounds of earlier pedals. The
Ring Thing is a “single sideband
modulator” and provides ring
modulation (adding new
features to the original
Frequency Analyzer) while also
throwing pitch shifting into the
stew. The Deluxe Memory Boy,
however, carries on the long
tradition of E-HX analogue
delay pedals started with the
Memory Man in the seventies,
but adds new functionality.
Ring Thing
Ring modulation isn’t exactly
a mainstream effect in guitar
culture. With its droning
metallic timbres it’s one of
those sounds that polarises
opinion – often being thought of
as unmusical. What Electro-
Harmonix has done with the
Ring Thing, however, is to
provide ring modulation, but
also use it as the basis of a new,
more harmonious effect that
E-HX calls single sideband
modulation, which uses just
one band as opposed to
standard ring mod’s two
together. In addition to this, the
Ring Thing has a pitch shifter
that Electro-Harmonix says is
capable of transposition,
detuning, chorus and vibrato.
Four modes are selectable by
pressing a white rotary switch –
choose from ring modulation,
single sideband (upper band,
single sideband), lower band or
pitch shift. The switch can also
call up one of nine onboard
programmable presets, made
active by a press of the preset/
tune footswitch, which can also
be used to scroll through the
presets. Holding down the
footswitch also allows the Ring
Thing to automatically tune its
internal modulator to any single
note you play on your guitar. Six
knobs enable you to adjust the
parameters, the function of
each knob (apart from wet/dry
blend) varying depending upon
which mode you’re in.
Sounds
The standard ring modulation
effect will give you all the
dissonant and bell-like timbres
that you need – either
transforming your guitar sound
or just adding a metallic edge.
The single sideband sounds can
be a little more musical in
colouring the sound and you
can dial in a very useful range of
Electro-Harmonix
Ring Thing & Deluxe
Memory Boy
£150 & £125
The latest pedals out of NYC reflect E-HX’s legacy while
still being right up to date by Trevor Curwen
tremolo, vibrato and rotary
speaker-like sounds in those
modes with careful setting of
the controls.
In pitch shift mode you get all
notes shifted up or down by the
same amount to a maximum of
+/- two octaves. The pedal does
the standard sub-octave thing
very well with really good note-
tracking and that goes for any
fixed harmony. If you’re into
Whammy-style pitch-bending
effects, plugging in an
expression pedal will do the
Photogr a Phy by J oby SESSIo NS
GIT330.rev_ehx 118 19/5/10 5:12:49 pm