Electro Harmonix C9 Organ Machine

Turning the sound of a guitar into an organ! - Something I've always liked the idea of! - The POG2 was my first attempt to achieve this, but only gave one approximation (well, that's all I managed) and was a very church pipe organ kind of sound. There are at least a couple of online demos of the C9, but if you look closely, there appear to be many cuts and edits, which suggest that even the "Experts" are making many mistakes and overdubs. There also appear to be only a few reviews here, made some months ago. Therefore I expected this to be rather tricky (even difficult) to use. The Thomann sound samples are encouraging though, and having a mix of guitar and organ sounds more usable. Some of the other reviews suggest that this is more of a "Fun" pedal, rather than a "Must have". I waited over a year to see if more users came along, but the price just went up recently (damn!). A more expensive "Fun" pedal? - Perhaps! - The actual sound this produces is VERY convincing, even more so because I follow it with plenty of reverb. It probably all comes down to your expectation and how you intend(ed) to use it. If you play rhythm chords, it works brilliantly with mostly dry sound and just a bit of organ underneath. Being fully polyphonic, it captures every note of every chord and it's as if the band just gained an invisible keyboard player. If you want keyboard organ to be up front and leading, then you need a keyboard player. The C9 produces very familiar sounds which can fit in with the rest of the band, so long as it is not your main up front requirement. I find it to be very easy to use (my expectations weren't high), so long as I remember I'm playing guitar. It is NOT a true bypass pedal - This is stated in the manual. I've had to get another true bypass switch pedal.

This little box claims to turn your guitar into something else...one of ten classic organs. Before I made this purchase I watched all of the demos that are available on line. As a result of watching these demos I was pretty confident that it was going to deliver in terms of sound and functionality. Did the little box match my expectations? Here is a breakdown of my findings.

Construction: I own many Boss pedals but have never owned an Electro Harmonix pedal. The construction of the Electro Harmonix pedal looks good in photographs, but it's not as solid as I expected. The build is quite good (a metal casing) however, I don't think that it is as sturdy as the boss range of pedals, it is lighter than it looks. There is no battery option either. It has to be mains powered. 8/10.

Playability: It's easy to use the controls on this pedal. Really easy. The sounds are all pretty impressive. However, the tracking isn't always spot on (it's accuracy seems to depend on the speed at which you are playing and what you are playing, or trying to play!). 9/10.

Conclusion: It's potentially a really useful pedal. The sounds are very good - but in use the pedal takes some getting used to. To get the best out of this pedal you will have to experiment and adapt your playing a little. Also, be realistic in your expectations. The guitarists in most the online demos are pretty good and show the pedal at it's best. My playing is probably quite a bit above average but sadly I couldn't make it sound as good as what I'd seen on most online demos. It's still worth keeping this pedal though as it's such a unique stomp box. 9/10.

Thomann Service: 10/10.

On the surface of it, this machine comes with a lot of nice, classic electric organ sounds. once you get used to the way of playing. I.e. very clean with out bending and articulation that suites a keyboard sound, you can get some good results.

The problem is getting consistent volume at the right level and I imagine trying to integrate this into a live setup is hard... for me I'm using it in recording and so I can play around until I get something that really sounds OK. I've given the sound 4 stars, but you really have to work at it to get good results.

I think that the price is a little steep, but then everyone has their own opinion on such things. In concept this is wonderful, the thing I've been waiting for! In practice, it could use some improvement to make it a robust tool sound wise that you can easily switch to as part of your guitar rig.

BTW - I'm not such a fan of Thomman's new packaging. This came in a MASSIVE box with a couple of cables I ordered and , Total overkill, and the box has to be almost destroyed to get into it.

The pedal is good, the tracking of the guitar signal is excellent, but you need to adopt a very straight and clean picking style - no bends or vibratos and I recommend a compressor ahead of this pedal to clean and sharpen the guitar signal. That said - this is a great addition to my 3 piece band. I use a A/B-Y pedal to select signal path and either send the guitar signal to the guitar amp or output the C9 directly to the PA desk. One thing I DON'T like is the lack of dynamic control on the vibrato. I can't hold a chord and bend down to speed up the "leslie" effect and I can't keep my balance for one of these "horn" type of replacement knobs. EH should really incorporate an expression pedal jack for this. I also seem to have "lost" the Clavioline sound. Some way of reloading factory presets would be very nice. My apologies for not writing this in Spanish, no sabe los palabras tecnicos.