Ego Trippin': EHX Superego Synth Engine

Your tone dismantled into grains that are reshaped and then recombined

Bill Ruppert is a pretty amazing dude.  He is responsible for Effectology, a series of videos where he takes Electro Harmonix pedals and a guitar and produces sounds ranging from steel drums to analog synths to haunted spaceship factories.  Definitely watch ALL of his ridiculously cool posts.

His latest episode focuses on  EHX’s new Superego Synth Engine.  

We’ve talked a lot about using subtractive synthesis with your guitar but the Superego uses granular synthesis.  Based on sampling, granular synthesis essentially chops up your signal into very small pieces called grains and can then play them back in layers  at different frequencies, phase, speed and volume creating lush, complex soundscapes to unpredictable staccato tones.  


The real audio alchemy of this pedal is the effects loop.  Bill Ruppert throws harmony, delay and modulation effects at the Superego and it just eats them up and spits out some of the most mind-warping, non-guitar tones that we’ve heard in a while. 

It’s a great accompaniment pedal or a way to fill more sonic territory in a way that reminds me Dave Gilmour’s “Sound on Sound” effect using delay.

Don’t be intimidated by this very unique pedal.  There are only 4 knobs and a switch and that’s all you’ll need to conjure up clouds of sound to play over.  Expect it to be out by the end of May with a retail of $283.60.

Magical Wahs and Synthy Drones from Electro-Harmonix

EHX Superego Synth Engine

 For nearly five decades Mike Mathews and his company Electro-Harmonix have designed some of the most popular and groundbreaking effects of all time.  From the Big Muff to the Memory Man, EHX needs no introduction.  Set for a spring release are two amazing new products.

The SuperEgo picks up where the Freeze left off

SuperEgo Synth Engine:
I know the word “Synth” is in the title but don’t expect thick, multi-voiced square waves from the SuperEgo.  Complete with All-seeing-eye graphic, this is what I would categorize as a “Blanket” or “Sound-scape” pedal.  Using similar technology as their Freeze pedal, the SuperEgo can sustain notes indefinitely but that’s just where the fun starts:
-Send your signal through the effects loop to add modulation, pitch shifting, delay or anything you can think of.
-Add a glissando effect when moving from note-to-note to create a violin-like attack.
-Selectively layer notes on top of one another to create a thick, complex background.
-The Latch/Auto switch allows you to select the notes to sustain or let the SuperEgo detect whatever you play.

The New Crying Tone Wah

Crying Tone Wah Pedal:

This version of the original Crying Tone features a Big Muff Circuit

Ok.  This is different.  A wah with no moving parts!   The Crying Tone Wah was originally produced by Electro-Harmonix in the early 70’s but I would hardly call this a reissue.  The wedge-ish shaped pedal rocks back and forth and returns to the “up” position using good ole’ gravity.  Internal sensors detect it’s position  It’s rumored that EHX will be releasing an entire line based on this design so look out.  It’s not going to make “cocked” wah players happy but never having to replace worn out parts or dealing with squeaks will no doubt appeal to lots of cats.

 Premier Guitar gets the scoop on EHX's new toys.

Crush Groove: Bit Reduction

 proguitarshop.com Reviews WMD's Geiger Counter

Today everything is Hi Def.  It’s the new buzz phrase to someday be replaced with the next even-greater level of realism to be developed.  Audio and video seems to always be striving for some greater clarity.  Leave it to musicians to tell clarity to fuck off.

When Leo Fender was designing his guitars and amps in the 50’s the last thing he wanted was dirt coming out of his products.  But, it wasn’t long though until a slashed speaker cone, a faulty mixer channel or an overheated amp started giving some players the extra “balls” that they’re music was 
asking for.

Since then, countless amps and stompboxes have been created to distort the pretty sine wave that their guitars produce naturally and the rest is history.  

 

proguitarshop.com review's Death By Audio's Robot

Jimi, Reduced Jimi, Getting Crushed Jimi, Fully Crushed+Voodoo

From the late 70’s on the focus of digital audio has been, for the most part, to achieve the highest level of clarity.  At the same time, simple processors were providing the music for video games and powering the first digital synth engines.  These sounds were far from “perfect” but after a few decades many have become charmed by their quirky, bleepy tones.

We can now take our guitar signal and bring it back to the Galaga days and beyond.  How?  Bit Crushing!   Otherwise known as bit reducing, we are actually taking the amount of building blocks available to process the sound and drastically reducing them.  When you do this, the processor has to decide how to organize aspects of the signal which can result in a wide spectrum of glitchy, fuzzy and unpredictable insanity.  It’s like if you were to ask a 4 year old to draw you a picture of a your car.  You’ll for sure get something but nothing like your driving.  Players looking to experiment with “synthy” tones.  Look no further.  Bit crushers can mangle and contort sounds waves better than Yoko Ono and Jimmy Buffett combined.

Most of these bit crusher devices reduce the quality of processing then add or exaggerate a number of parameters from octave dividing to arpeggiation.  This is when it get’s WAY out there.

Check out the vids to see if if bit crushing fits in your box.

 Hexe's Bitcrusher III is rather insane