Electro Harmonix Soul Food

I chose to purchase the Soul Food pedal over other overdrives having listened to many online samples and reviews. I was particularly interested in this pedal for it's transparancy and solid clean boost sound with a crunch tone for lead. I'm not a heavy metal player so high gain overdrive was not a priority for me. Overall I was not disappointed with the sound. It gives a very nice fat crunch with nice sustain over lead riffs when needed, without interfering too much with my guitars tone. I play an Amercan standard strat with fat 50's pickups through a clean channel on a quilter 101 mini head. The pedal has enough tone control to roll back the highs when using the bridge pickup and tame the higher notes. The sound is warm and dynamic with a nice blend of harmonic overtones. As a clean boost it also works very well which makes it versatile in use if you are using a seperate pedal for distorsion on your board.

I have two negatives to add to this review based on my sample. One of these issues may be just a sample variation but it does point to poor quality control which is dissapointing. At first it was impossible to fit the battery. The PCB board inside is so close to the void where the battery is fitted that it was impossible to close the back with a battery inserted. It took numerous attempts to get the battery in and after approx 30 minutes and carefully routing the battery cable with a small screw driver I finally got the back to close! If you are a player that likes to use pedals on batteries then this could be a potential issue for you. I would not like to do this on a dark stage before a gig!

The footswitch button is also quite stiff and requires quite a lot of pressure to engage. It also makes a loud audible click when pressed and sometimes (not always) makes a pop through the amp when engaged! It's a shame EHX didn't use a quiter switch.

Since I now use a board with seperate power supply the battery issue is not a deal breaker for me. I'm getting more used to the switch with futher use. Overall I like the tone that this pedal can produce and enjoy using it with a little reverb added for lead tones. It will remain on my pedal board for now! The battery issue may well be a sample issue on my copy as I have not seen this mentioned on other reviews.

I've tried half a dozen OD pedals over the last few months to match my Randall Diavlo, and it's not easy to find a match because most are just swamped by the gain in the amp. I needed a transparent boost/OD such as the TC Spark or a Fulltone FatBoost, but the Soul Food get such great reviews and at such a good price that I thought I'd try it first.

Delivery: fine, as expected from Thomann.

Product: it's a really well made product, with great features. It came well packaged and included a power supply (which very few at this price, or even twice the price, do). Plugged it in, no problems.

Sound: I tried it firstly with my SG which has a 498T pickup, quite a powerful pickup, and had the amp set a tad before breakup. The pedal offered huge tonal increases with regard to sound, gain and equalization. Rolling off the volume cleaned the pedal up very well, and the attack had a big affect on the pedal. The pedal worked as just a volume boost, an overdrive and also has plenty of distortion. I have a damazio DP103 in the neck and this also sounded great, but with less 'thump' as is the characteristic of that pickup. Next, I plugged in a Les Paul which has standard 8k or so pickups, a brighter guitar, and the Sould Food brought a powerful singing you'd expect of a Les Paul, but better than I've previously heard with this guitar - I was very pleasantly surprised because these are not expensive or high quality pickups, but they sound good. All the pickups had added punch, thickness, depth and clarity which only a really nice transparent overdrive can offer.

At this price, and I've heard no end of reviewers say the same: every guitarist should own one.

Five star, highly recommended.

I have had one EHX Soulfood for a few years and I bought it for its great quality as a low gain OD. In this role I use it as an “always on” pedal and it enhances the tone of my JTM 45 set at slight breakup greatly, rendering a fat base tone with loads of harmonics and nice sustain.
I have now bought this second Soulfood to use as a slightly dirty solo-boost after my other ODs just before the amp. And it excels in this role as well. Plenty of gain to push the Marshalls input-stage and the ability to add more grit and bite with the tone and drive knobs. 5 stars for sound and versatility.
And it’s cheap as chips!
Standard sturdy EHX construction have held up for the 4 years I have had the first one. I hope this new one does the same.
I have heard that this is EHXs take on the legendary Klon Centaur but I have never tried that one out. It doesn’t matter neither. This pedal sounds great!
If you’re after a low gain OD and/or boost look no further! Get some Soolfood!

I bought the Soul Food to my Marshall DSL5, which has a gain channel that i dont like that much. The Soul Food alters this channel to a crispy sound, that works for me just fine. It provides a wide variety of sounds, from light push, to insane gain with wild tops. I can´t compare to other klon clones, only with my Dark Matter and MojoMojo Paul Gilbert OD, and this one wins by a mile.

On the clean channel it sounds somewhat screamy, at least on my amp.

It is very sturdy build, like a tank. You get a power source, which is nice for the price of this pedal.