Electro Harmonix Electric Mistress

122 Guitarist January 2008
ELECTRO-HARMONIX XO PEDALS
£60-£134
EFFECTS
Holy Stain
DigiTech’s RP50 (£59) offers
a drum machine, cabinet and
pickup modelling in a seriously
good and affordable package,
while the Zoom G1 (£54)
impressively mimics the nuances
of a genuine tube amp: it provides
excellent effects too. Fancy
something crazy? The Z-Vex
Seek Tremorama (£149) mimics
the sound of your amp cutting
out, all with added modulation…
Electric Mistress
The BOSS CE-20 (£149) offers a
sextet of lush and warm choruses
that can be used for bass and
acoustic should you be so
inclined. If jetting is your bag, the
DigiTech Turbo Flange (£89)
gives no less than seven flanging
options via a dedicated rotary
selector, while the Dunlop Uni-
Vibe (£169), in effect, combines
both modulations effectively in
a bomb-proof chasis.
The Rivals continued…
pedal with really usable sounds.
The fuzz and distortions are
totally analogue, while the
vibrato, reverbs and pitch shifting
are digital. This was meant to be a
great introductory pedal to give
people more for their money, but
people seem to be buying it just
because they like its different
tone. Who knew?”
Although hardly an Eventide
H8000, the Stain includes the
aforementioned drive settings
alongside room and hall reverbs,
pitch shift and tremolo. The four
digital effects are selected by the
mode switch – you scroll through
them one by one until the desired
base is reached – while the
analogue side is chosen via the
three-way dirt knob.
Sounds
With the mix control all the way
off, you can use the Stain as a
classic E-HX dirt machine,
significantly altering the
character of the two drive tones –
but not the clean setting, strangely
– with the three-way Color pot.
There’s no dedicated gain control,
but we didn’t find we missed it as
much as we’d originally assumed
we would.
The pitch shift function
operates between a maximum of
a 4th above and 5th below a given
note and, if you set the amount
control just off centre, you have
a very useable chorus. We have to
report that the tracking isn’t
especially impressive, but you can
obtain some nasty sounds when
using the most extreme fuzz
setting available and dialling in
a suspended 2nd.
Again, the digital precision
allows the tremolo to be more au
fait with modern equivalents,
while the character of the reverbs
benefits a great deal from some
time spent with the tone pot.
Of course, each effect is likely to
require a different mix of settings
of each control, so dedicated tone-
tailoring is going to be required to
be made on the fly to a certain
extent. In short, for every sound
you dial in, you’ll need to alter
something when you change
either the effect or dirt pot. We
can’t criticise too strongly
considering what the Holy Stain
actually is, but don’t assume that
it’s on a par with any of the more
modern processors out there, at
least as far as operation goes.
Stereo Electric Mistress
The Mistress is, of course, one of
the company’s most legendary
items and this more compact
option is likely to prove the most
popular. It mixes a subtle flanger
with a lush chorus, while a rate
control regulates the speed that’s
depicted via a flashing LED.
“The Stereo Electric Mistress
is the one that performing
musicians should go for,” Rick
agrees. “Simple to set up, nice
flanging and the ability to
combine it with the chorus makes
a lot of sense. It stays pretty true to
the original Deluxe Electric
Mistress from about 20-30 years
ago, even though it’s digital. It
would have been impossible to
create the ability to make a chorus
and flanger that can be used
together in that size of box or at
this price otherwise.”
In the interests of discussion, we
asked Rick to point out the
differences between the Mistress
and the infinitely more complex
Flanger Hoax. “This is strictly a
matter of the guitarist’s patience,”
he says. “The Flanger Hoax is the
best single modulation pedal I
have ever heard or used: the filter
manipulation and the relative
degrees of modulation and
interaction is untouchable. It’s
kind of a cult classic, I think, but it
is a forced classic because you
actually have to know what you’re
doing to create on the Hoax. It is
very complex and musicians tend
to have their patience tested.
Actually, I think the flanger on it
is well below its potential: it
seriously needed a memory
storage.”
Sounds
The only niggle we have is that
there isn’t a mix or FX level pot,
although the more subtle settings
of both modulations are
restrained enough to negate its
inclusion. With the rate set to
around four and the chorus to
around six, the shimmer is
inspiring to play around with, and
we found that its character altered
a great deal with differing
amounts of rate and depth.
Dialling in a spot of f langer adds
more movement beneath the
sound that becomes increasingly
metallic the more you wind up
the flanger depth.
With an increased flanger-to-
chorus ratio the tone is richer still,
albeit with an intensified swoosh,
and if you enjoy those underwater
tones as much as we do, there’s
plenty of wetness available with
full chorus, increased rate and
subtle use of the flanger.
The secret is to treat the rate
pot as your friend and, for
modulations both subtle or in
your face, this is pretty special.
Verdict
All four of these pedals have
something going for them and
even the Holy Stain, which is
unavoidably limited in its onstage
practicality stakes due to the
involved nature of the user
interface, is available at a
staggeringly good price.
We’re torn between the Stereo
Memory Man and Electric
Mistress as to our favourite, and
the choice would probably depend
on how patient we were feeling.
The Mistress is close to the
perfect flanger/chorus pedal and
only the lack of an FX level pot
stops it from being awarded a
higher mark.
The MM, complete with
Hazarai lest we forget, is a
fantastic-sounding delay and echo
that’s simple to use and, although
it certainly would have its uses on
stage, we’d suggest that it would
be equally impressive as a
recording tool.
No less stirring yet probably
more exclusive in its appeal is the
Micro POG, easily the most
musical of any octave pedal we’ve
played in many a year. Yes, it may
seem that it’s a little expensive
considering what it does, but if you
have any use for a stable
polyphonic octave generator in
your arsenal, this is the one.
More than just mere pedals,
Electro-Harmonix has long
provided musical tools and these
four boxes are yet more to try,
buy and use to your creativity’s
content.
With the mix control all the way off, you
can use the Holy Stain as a classic EHX
dirt machine.
The Holy Stain includes four digital effects: two reverbs, pitch shift and tremolo
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