Electro Harmonix C9 Organ Machine

This is a very cool pedal. good tracking of the guitar, but some learning about ehat pickusp and playing style gives the best spound is needed (not very much thouhg)

Sound is perfectly Ok for soundscaping in a DAW. combine it with guitar mixed in and it aso adds to the sound. only issue may be that the sounds between this and B)/Key) overlap a bit if you like to get more than one. the only pity about this pedal. The fab four sounds are spot on, but not all organs are equally useful (to some extent a matter of taste).

a pedal with a best of from B9, C9, KEY9 would be a killer.

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.