Electro-Harmonix Hog Guitar Synthesizer

i've had this pedal (with the foot controller and an exp pedal), for about a year now... time to review it already!

when you first start to play around with this pedal, its somewhat confusing and 'gimmicky'. you really need to play around with it for awhile before you can get a grasp of what it can do, and how to implement it into your style.
but man, once you find the sweet spot, you'll wonder how you ever managed without it!
its all very tactile, very hands-on and tweak-friendly. ahhh, wonderous analogue.

the octaves are fine, though can sound a bit 'tinny' on full attack.
for that reason, i rarely have it on full attack, instead prefering to 'fade in' the octaves to create a texture backdrop to my chords and lead parts. its like theres a keyboard player jamming along with you! aye.
Also, I don???t tend to use the last 3-4 octaves, its just a little too much for me??? but im sure there will be a need for it in the future.
to the modes!
octave bend: i use this when i want extra boosts for chorus' and the like, master the exp pedal and you'll get a very satisfying 'sweep' to please the gods.
step bend: mainly use for dissonance and more subtle bend transitions.
volume: i use this when i only want a particular part of the riff/chordprogression to be highlighted by the hog. you can get some great accents this way. (again, exp pedal mastery is vital).
freeze gliss: ooooh, here's the good stuff! freeze those damn notes, and tweak them to hell, creating epic drones and swirling clouds of atmospheric resonance, dissolving and collapsing on itself as it rises and falls. sorry, got a bit carried away. with the exp pedal and loads of reverb and effects, you can really create a lush backdrop to your music. try adding some oscillation from your other pedals to break up the monotony. the frozen notes have a habit of getting extremely crazy the more you play on top of them.
freeze + vol: if you want a more controllable freeze gliss, here it is. not as crazy, and it doesn???t pick up any stray notes once you freeze.
wah wah: don???t expect wonders! But this is a perfectly ???usable??? wah wah sound, if perhaps a bit leery. perhaps I just need a firmer exp pedal!
filter: a lot more interesting this. can create some delightful swells, and can tame those screeching high octaves somewhat.

no problems yet for me!
though i havent gigged with it much yet, so we'll have to see if it stands the test of time. the knobs seem a bit fragile, so go easy on them!

n/a

i find that im always running my guitar through the hog, whether its effect is subtle, or full-on drones and soundscapes. for that reason, its really become an essential piece of kit, vital to my individual sound.
to anyone who recently made a purchase - dont freak out! i know i was, but i gradually came to realise how much it could do for me, without sounding like such a gimmick.
the key is not to go too overboard, learn to tame the beast, and treat it as an extension of your guitar (an instrument in its own right), which can be coloured further if you should so wish.
if mine got stolen, then id claim it on insurence.
im smart like that!

read the manual. buy the extra footpedal. you will enjoy having six different settings for this pedal available.

sat down with this pedal for the better part of a day and tweaked it. there are still a lot of other functions that i can see it fulfilling, but for now i am sticking with two settings each for the octave up, gliss, and step down settings. that being said, using this pedal becomes more intuitive as you spend time with it. it is not that it is hard to figure out so much as it takes some time to get it to agree with your other pedals. i put a Bad Cat Two Tone after it as an overdrive, and a Fulltone '70s pedal and Blues-Bender in front of it, along with a picture wah and an envelope filter--they add a good drive to the HOG, and some interesting sound options without using the wah function on the pedal. as i experimented i found i had to be really respectful of the HOG and not try all of the faders at once--a few select ones will do, but once i went with that it sounded great.

ps/ tens are almost unthinkable for me--an eight is pretty good.

play a lespaul DC with SD's for pickups. Also run a USMasters Vector sometimes as a changeup from the lespaul, but they both have humbuckers...anyways--i have a load of pedals and this one is a great addition. sounds great with the humbuckers and haven't had any complaints really.

the tracking is pretty good, and while there are always ways to improve a pedal, EH did a good job of choosing what to include and upgrade. the controls give you a lot of different sounds, and most of them are good. if there was one thing i didn't like it is that the fade in/out sliders could be a little more flexible.

i don't know. some people have gone bonkers over the paint, and that seems to be a big problem with EH gear, but for the most part i am happy with the pedal. i especially recommend the extension pedalboard (six settings on one pad)--it can save you a lot of trouble, you will have a lot less chance of scarring the paint and breaking any sliders once you have your settings, and it is only an extra 120$. you already dropped a load on the pedal, why not upgrade it for a little more.

hmmm. never had to get ahold of EH for any reason, and i have owned a few of their pedals. once again, maybe an update (let's hope not). because i have never had any problems with their pedals in the first place i will give em a 9 until further notice.

i play hard rock, metal, a little fusion, etc., and i will find a way to fit this in. it may sound a little different, but that's the point of progress, sometimes, isn't it?

and yes, i would buy it again. i don't think there is anything quite like it anywhere else.

The build is in check with similar EH pedals like the Microsynth and the POG, the aluminium case is okay, easy to dent, the paint job is pretty and functional but none too resistant, and it's quite easy to twist the sliding controls (they're not supposed to twist) with not too much bother. I can invisage have to open it up after a couple of years of use to clean out the dust collected from underneath the sliders. The three big footswitches to the bottom of the unit are sturdy and produce a comfortingly resolute click when stepped on. The three small mode-switching buttons towards the top of the unit are fine with fingers, although swapping these with accessible footswitches would be a much better option here. Despite all this, I bet it lasts longer than one of those big green Line6 delays (admittedly that's not saying a lot). As far as features go, it has 10 sliders which add various octaves and harmonics: minus 2 octaves, minus 1 octave, original, plus one fifth, plus 1 octave, plus 1 octave and a fifth, plus 2 octaves, plus 2 octaves and a third, plus 3 octaves, plus 4 octaves (!). In addition, there's a slider to control the amount of dry signal to let through, attack and decay settings for the first 4 octave sliders are controlled by an additional slider, while the remaining upper octaves have their own slider. Finally, theres two sliders for the filter, controlling the frequency and the resonance.

To the top of the pedal, there are three buttons. The first is a spectral control, which lets through only the loudest frequencies, a button to select one of the 7 expression modes available, and an expression reverse button, which changes the direction of travel of the (optional) expression pedal.

On the back of the HOG, there's a jack input, d.i jack output, a jack amplifier out, a jack input for an expression pedal, another jack input for the optional memory pedal (which allows you to store your favourite settings. considering how many sliders there are, this is a sterling idea, although shouldn't it have been built into the pedal?), a 10-pin midi expression input as an alternative to an expression pedal, and the DC input socket. The HOG comes supplied with its own 9V 500ma DC power supply. EH warn that you should only use their power supplies with the HOG, i'm not sure how relevant this is - it's something companies like Boss/Roland have warned us for years, for no apparent reason - although the unit does seem to get quite warm towards the centre and top of the unit when in use, so perhaps things aren't quite as straightforward as with some other pedals. Certainly, i'd warn against trying to use it with a Power Brick or similar multi-power supply unit.

The manual is sketchy but a useful reference point for a HOG beginner, there are one or two demonstrations of this pedal on certain online video sites - although I think everyone who tries it will eventually take a different route with this pedal, so the usefulness of these are quite limited.

As far as actually getting down and using the pedal goes, for the first couple of days it's completely mind-boggling, then you have a series of 'revelations', when you realise how the various options interact with one another.

The myriad of sounds this is able to produce, and the amount of control it gives the user over the final 'shape' of the sound is pretty spectacular, though to get the most out of the functions you'll need a decent expression pedal with a bit of resistance to it (not just one of those cheap M-Audio units). The effected sound has just the slightest amount of delay between the note being struck and the note reaching the amp. In normal use with a little dry signal added, it's barely noticable, and a quite similar feel to the tracking on some midi-synth units. The initial attack of the note is smooth, and while the unit does colour the effected sound (slightly or infinitely, depending on how you set it up), the overall effect can sound quite retro or very modern, depending on the pedal settings, playing style, guitar type and amp type. With the spectral filter activated, the sound responds nicely to changes in playing dynamic/pick attack etc. It's with this setting that it struggles most with chords, the deeper the notes the harder it gets. If you try, for example to play a C5 and drop the C root note to a B (like you would do to begin a decending bassline in C), it begins to 'wobble' somewhat. The wobble can be incorporated to be a nice effect in itself, and that's the deal with this pedal - it isn't perfect, but with a bit of practice and effort, you can turn its tendancy towards idiosyncracy into very personal sounds - fresh sounds even - something that is so hard to come by with an instrument as well travelled and popular as the electric guitar. That said, the HOG isn't limited to electric guitar. If you can keep your playing tight, it sounds okay with a bass guitar, electric mandolin sounds wonderous through it though the top octave settings are somewhat redundant (4 octaves above a mandolin sends most species of mosquito into a frenzy). A cheap keyboard suddenly becomes a big church organ, although big 10 fingered diminished sine wave chords are guaranteed to confuse the life out of it.

The gist of using this pedal with electric guitar appears to be 'less is more' - pushing up all the sliders produces a huge harmonically rich sound - which sounds like it could be quite nice but unless you're good at manipulating the envelope and filter controls, you'll more than likely find a sound capable of setting your amp on fire and bursting your ear drums. To some, that might be a spectacular bonus. The best results come from having just a few sliders up at a time. A combination of the -2 and -1 octave sliders gives you quite a nice (slightly driven) bass guitar sound that you'll need some sort of bass amp to really appreciate. A dry signal with some +5 and +1 octave and a little cutoff filter applied provides quite a nice colourful sound suitable for chimy arpeggated motifs. Experimenting with the +1 octave and the filter eventually yields a fairly decent 12-string simulation, which wouldn't fool anyone in isolation but in a mix can be pretty effective.

Going through the expression modes, you begin to realise the scope of the HOG. The Octave Bend does exactly what it says on the tin, and is arguably smoother in travel than a Digitech Whammy, although it only does the one octave (the Whammy does 2). Activating the Exp. Reverse button sends the octave down instead of up. Some strange effects can be when the signal is shifted furthest from it's original pitch - it doesn't work in completely the same way as the slider - the sound certainly isn't as 'liquid-y' at extremes of pitch but is still controllable. The Step Bend works in much the same way, but the sound is a lot nicer at the extremes of pitch here. This particular setting is great for pulling off little cheeky country style bends. It's also worth noting that when only the 5th or the 3rd sliders are up alongside the dry signal, that you can then bend up or down these to encorporate 7ths and things. Intrestissimo.

Next up are the Freeze & Gliss functions. The basis of the effect revolves around playing a note, by moving the expression pedal through to it's toe-down postion while the note is playing freezes that note, much like a sample and hold function, but the resulting held note sounds much smoother. When it is initally held it sounds much like a gently modulating organ. By continuing to play with the expression pedal at the toe down position, new notes are introduced, and the modulation increases. Quite a nice effect is going to the toe-down frozen mode having not frozen a note, with no dry sound added, and thrashing the strings to create a crazy oscillating fade-in. Some guitarists may find this useful for creating background textures - with the dry sound incorporated, you can play over the resulting texture, although you can't prevent the same notes you play over the frozen drone affecting the modulation. Using the mode in this way can be effective for short bursts, but is less useful for longer sections.

Inbetween expression pedal positions produce an intresting glissando effect - it's use is limited in that it's quite easy to confuse the pedal into thinking a note is lower when in fact it's higher - occasionally the pedal realises the error of its ways and corrects itself, the result is a slow wild bend into uncharted harmonic territory, before returning to pitch. Like Forrest Gump going for a morning run, you don't know how far it's going to go or where it's going to end up. Some of the results of the sustained frozen notes clashing with slow glissando are delightfully avant garde. The improv crowd will love it. That said, the quicker the glissando, the more accurate it seems to be, although finding specific speeds via an expression pedal is pretty tricky - the midi expression input socket doesn't seem like such a crazy addition in this case, although you'll need a third arm from somewhere. Genetically engineered life forms take note, this is the pedal for you!

The Freeze & Volume expression mode retains all the functionality of the Freeze mode, with none of the idiosynchratic behaviour of the glissando effect, useful for one-off applications of the Freeze function before returning back to the dry pedal setting. If you want to use the volume function on it's own (controlling the octave generator with one control against the dry signal), there's a setting for that too.

The remaining expression two settings are Wah and Filter, which both give you varying degrees of filter sweep. The wah is okay, not quite as usable as a standalone Wah pedal, but much better than 90% of digital Wah simulations in multi-effects pedals. The filter on the other hand, is excellent. You can control the amount of sweep in both settings by adjusting the frequency and resonance controls to the far right of the pedal, and it goes right through from the deepest of subs (you'll lose these frequencies in a standard guitar amp, by the way), to cutting treble-y sounds. Limiting the scope of the filter can provide some more subtle filter effects.

It's not silent in use, but it isn't particularly noisy either. You can record with it and gig with it without too much bother on that side of things. I've tried it with my AC30 and a JCM900, with a variety of guitar and it seems equally happy between anything, although my personal preference is for single coils through the AC30.

It seems reliable enough. Whether you feel you can depend on it or not totally depends on what your previous experience of touring pedals has been. I'd trust it in a flightcased pedalboard, assuming I was the only one handling it. I've had a few power supply problems to my Big Muff in the past, but this uses a much better connector between the PSU and the pedal, so maybe, just maybe, EH have learnt their lesson.

As far as backups go - a 300 pound pedal? I'll take two, thanks! (note sarcasm)

Never had to deal with them. I've not opened it up and looked inside, but i'm kind of hoping it isn't all mounted onto one PCB like the Line6 pedals. Perhaps somebody a little more adventurous could let us know? That's generally the difference between being able to repair such a pedal and to simply replace it.

EH seem to have gone for the one stop shop option here, incorporating features found in it's POG, Microsynth, and aging Octave Multiplexer pedals, as well as a few additions never seen (heard?) before in a single stompbox. The result is an initially perplexing, but ultimately rewarding array of sounds, textures, colours and ideas that the more experimental player could quite easily build their whole rig around. You'll have to spec it up with the expression pedal and memory bank to get the most out of it, the memory bank in particular is a must if you want to take it out to gigs (to play, as opposed to watching bands and drinking beer with it).

My wishlist for EH is that they'd have put the expression pedal and the memory footswitch into the same pedal, and put the price up accordingly. From a marketing perspective the base unit is surely just a little too close to the POG for comfort? They could have gone the whole HOG with it...(sorry)

If it were stolen or lost i'd be pretty gutted, as over the past few months i've already began to build an entire library of sounds around this thing. I play a variety of stuff, mostly verging on the experimental. Flaming Lips are a big influence, as are Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Super Furry Animals. Although i'm not interested in directly copying any of these artists, this pedal does begin to reveal some of the textures and details these artists have used in the past.

For some the money (over ??400 with the extra gizmos) may be an issue - that would buy you a top of the line multi-effects pedal with complete range of modelled delays, distortions and modulations. As far as i'm concerned, for a single effect box to encompass so much in the realm of tonal shaping without particularly sounding like anything else or anyone else is like having the keys to the treasure chest. Now I can chime, grunt, wobble, scream and woosh. On a guitar. And it sounds FRESH.

What price originality?

Operation is deceptively simple. The interface is a collection of sliders controlling octaves and 5ths, either below or above the incoming signal. The complexity arises when you understand how subtle shifts in each slider result in a dramatic change in sound. The plethora of overtones this box yields offers an enormous amount of sonic sculpting, and the interplay between each slider will keep you busy for quite some time.

The manual provides an adequate description of each function. Little else. Experimentation will be your true primer, which is wonderful for anyone who loves to synthesize from scratch.

I'm using mainly my Fender Tele and Breedlove electric/acoustic with the Hog, in conjunction with Boss' DS-1 Distortion, BD-2 Blues Driver, the RC-2 Loop Station, and Line 6's Echo Park.

I can hardly describe how inspiring this unit has been for me. So far, I've been able to coax 12-string, koto, shamisen, flute, organ, and percussion sounds from the Hog. Coupled with the Loop Station, using one guitar I can sound like an entire ensemble. This is exactly what I was hoping for when researching/purchasing the unit.

There is some aliasing present, but it isn't enough to bother me. The filter section is critical in taming some of the more caustic tones (should you want to, of course) that result in cranking the higher octaves. Roll back the filter and resonance, and have the upper registers swell in by increasing the attack, and a high-pitched shriek becomes a sweet feedback, even at low volumes.

The lower registers are handy if you want to mimic a bass, although I've found the volume tends to diminish some when engaging only the -1 and/or -2 octave sliders. Could just be the response of my practice amp though, as I haven't gotten to try the unit out on my live amp due to being in an apartment.

The harmonies all track quite well, and there is little latency to worry about. You can obtain the glassy "denoiser" effect when the tracking warbles at times. But this hasn't been a serious issue, and I've intentionally confused the tracking for certain effects. Quite nice, especially with the spectral gate engaged.

The expression mode is especially interesting. I use the pitch bend effects for the most part, but the filter is quite effective as well. I was hoping for a more convincing wah sound to replace a crybaby I traded in, but the filter is rather eclectic so it's a fair trade-off for me. The freeze gliss and volume settings are fun, but having the dry signal only to play over while something is frozen is not as attractive as simply using the loop station to record and then play over.

I'm used to the tank build of Boss and Line 6 effects, so I'm a bit wary of the flimsy casing, sliders, and included plastic expression pedal. I plan on taking good care of the unit, as I do with all of my gear, so I'm not too worried. I'll likely have the box on a table rather than the floor to prevent damage. I can't afford having a backup on a gig.

N/A

Been playing for 18 years, teaching for 11. I play electronic and computer music, funk, rock, blues, classical, fingerstyle, touchstyle and percussive slap. I've used the Hog for all of these styles with phenomenal results. If this was stolen, I would definitely save up for another. I use Logic Pro, Max/MSP, Alesis' Ion, and the afore-mentioned effects in my creations. The Hog has significantly helped in realizing the sound I hear in my head, and I'm very grateful for this. It is almost an instrument in it's own right, and is a nice substitution for a more expensive midi-pickup to drive other synthesizers. Simply put, I love this thing, and would highly recommend it to anyone interested in pushing the envelope of what our art entails.

It's really quite simple to use, it has a series of sliders, each controls the volume of a certain octave pitch, ranges from 2 octaves below to 4 octaves above. You can get just about any pitch shifting effect out of this thing - that's where it gets trick. You will have to play around with all of the settings to find how to pitch shift from a 4th above to a 5th above like the Digitech Whammy.
Editing patches with the 6 button memory is a breeze, push and hold once you have the setting you want...voila, saved patch.

As usual the EHX manual supplied is brief, and leaves everything upto the imagination, though it doesn't explain it's limitations, you have to find them.

I love the tone of the octaves produced, they change with your guitar tone and dynamics, they did a great job here... Spend your money on this thing if you are considering a WH-1 whammy pedal, you get so much more... true bypass, and tone for days!

FOR A PITCH SHIFTER, THE TONE IS THE BEST, and the pitch bends are the smoothest. THE NOTE TRACKING IS NEVER OFF, AND YOU CAN PLAY MOST CHORDS. Aside to this, if you want to you can throw off the tracking you can!

The other modes like freeze volume and freeze gliss have opened doors for me that were not possible before...

I haven't had a single problem like the others have described with zero volume etc. Mine zeros out fine, you can completely set-up a sound with two octaves below, one above, and no original sound. Then you can pitch bend the entire sound! This is my bucket of slop!

I haven't had a problem in the 6 months I've owned it, but the unit is on the delicate side. Treat it nice, and you'll be fine...

I haven't had any problems with the paint scratching off.

Typical EHX quality... it works, I don't plan on standing on a $500 pedal.

It came with an M-audio expression pedal, but I bought a BOSS made from aluminum so I can stand on it and not break it. (while I tap dance my way around my sound)

never dealt with them, never had a problem.

I love this thing. I play it all, and have been for years. I love my true bypass, and tone pleasing pedals, amps and guitars. I'm not here to brag, just let you know that I enjoy this pedal...

I do suggest getting the memory box for stage shows, it's just easy, and extremely functional.

It's a really good pedal,but the painting is so fragile that with only moving the faders it scrathes the painting.Also,the most important thing that really is bad from this pedal,is that when you put all the faders down(at zero)there's a little bit of sound from the guitar.That is very annoying when playing with only the low octaves,'cause you could also hear(low but you can hear it )the normal guitar.And also when you use the attack,first you hear the normal guitar and after the attack.

Very good sounds,but there are the problems I explain above.

I love this pedal,and I don't understand why electro-harmonix people have made this two mistakes(painting and not zero sound with all voices-faders down).

I've sent them an email and they haven't answer me.A friend of mine sentthem an email about the painting,and they answer:yes ,we know that the painting is so fragile...

I play many guitar synths(gr-100,gr-300,gr-500,gr-50,gr-700,korg x-911,korg z3,also the Pog,the Microsynth and the Hog from electro-harmonix).I don't understand why electro-harmonix doesn't give me a solution about this pedal...Hope they realize about this two things going wrong with this pedal,and they make them well in the future.Also I hope they answer me anytime...

It's a really good pedal,but the painting is so fragile that with only moving the faders it scrathes the painting.Also,the most important thing that really is bad from this pedal,is that when you put all the faders down(at zero)there's a little bit of sound from the guitar.That is very annoying when playing with only the low octaves,'cause you could also hear(low but you can hear it )the normal guitar.And also when you use the attack,first you hear the normal guitar and after the attack.

Very good sounds,but there are the problems I explain above.

I love this pedal,and I don't understand why electro-harmonix people have made this two mistakes(painting and not zero sound with all voices-faders down).

I've sent them an email and they haven't answer me.A friend of mine sentthem an email about the painting,and they answer:yes ,we know that the painting is so fragile...

I play many guitar synths(gr-100,gr-300,gr-500,gr-50,gr-700,korg x-911,korg z3,also the Pog,the Microsynth and the Hog from electro-harmonix).I don't understand why electro-harmonix doesn't give me a solution about this pedal...Hope they realize about this two things going wrong with this pedal,and they make them well in the future.

Straight out the box this thing is completely overwhelming; you can fiddle with it in confusion for hours trying to find the sweet spots. However, if you can get your head round all the parameters its actually not as complex as it first seems, and once you find the sounds in your head it is amazing.
I'd say the optional foot contoller for storing presets and an expression pedal for controlling parameters etc. are absolutely essential, otherwise you simply will not be getting the most out the unit. A lot to ask after paying so much already i know, but definitely worth it.

Rickenbacker Model 1997 - Korg DT10 Tuner - ZVex Super Hard On - Snowball - H.B.E. "Big D" - EHX Big Muff - EHX H.O.G. - Line 6 Verbzilla - Line 6 DL4 - 1970's Selmer Treble 'n Bass 100 Tube Head - Marshall Powerbrake - Homemade 2x12" with Celestions. Phew.
I'm pretty fussy about pedal noise, and although this pedal isn't silent when off its pretty close.
The actual sounds this unit creates are amazing; church organ, hammond, bass synth riffs, washing soundscapes, thick overdrive, chirping birds etc etc etc etc. Personal favourite is the "Freeze Gliss" expression mode, which holds the chord you've just played and makes it shimmer while you play over the top.

Who knows? It looks pretty sturdy, but only time will tell. Only thing I can picture going wrong quickly is the momentary expression switch if you don't use an external expression pedal.

Never had to deal with EHX direct, but the company Hotrox UK I ordered this pedal and others from are absolute legends to deal with. Cheers guys!

I like to play anything that sounds a bit odd, and this pedal definitely fits the bill. Although its never going to be suitable for every song, when you bring it out its bound to wow. If it broke or was nicked then I'd have to replace it ASAP, as soon as I could save up the pretty ridiculous price all over again.

This thing is full of FUN sounds! It's about 4 to 6 times as cool as the POG! If you've never played with a pitch shifter then it will look weird to you, but if you know about pitch shifters and love to make insain noices then you'll love it!

Yeah, it sounds awsome! Just like the POG, it's sound quality is the best! I've had, the original Digitech Pitch shifter, and I know every one is all crazy about it, but, for real... the HOG totally smokes it! This is the best I've ever heard! It's crazy expensive, but what do you really want? You're going to get bumbed out if you buy some thing else, like the New Digitech Wammy, cuz that thing is totally a peice of crap. I bought two of those and out of the box one was totally broken! The HOG is SH*T! Spend the Money, you WILL Dig it!

Well it's EH, so who knows. I always asome that it's going to brake in the first year with them. That's Right EH, You need to step it up a little when it comes to quality control and longevity! I think that it comes with a One Year warrenty, but I really think that they should have given us a 5 year warrenty. When You spend big money you should be confident that it wont break on you. It is in a new box, that look a lot better then the older (Memory Man / Poly Chorus) boxes. I think that it will last a lot longer then most of the other effects. EH is usually pretty good about fixing their effect. Talk to me in a year and I'll give you a real review of it's reliabity.

EH is allways pretty good about customer support. They close at 5pm East coast time so that mean that they're closed by 2pm on the West coast where I am. So my only complaint would be that they stay open a little later to help out people on the more Westernly side of the country later in the day.

Is it the best thing I've ever used for pitch shifting? F*ck Yeah it is! It's great! I cant wait to try it on all of my Casios! I've owned or used a crap load of pitch shifters, and this is great! They've up graded every thing that I could of wanted to have changed on the POG, and thrown in a bunch of other stuff that makes it even better. If you have a studio and want to impress people record with you, buy this! You will totally convince people that you know what you're doing!

Extremely easy to use, it's either on or it's not. There is one big knob on it that does not seem to make a noticeable difference in tone.

I am the guitarist in a two-person band, and I use a two-amp set-up so that my guitar has both a bass and treble amp setting. Therefore, one of my amps uses bass cab speakers and the amp is set for bass! The Hog's Foot is essential for my set-up, because the bass boost basically transofrms my guitar signal into a bass guitar signal. To be honest, I'm not entirely sure what else one would use this pedal for, the bass boost is so overwhelming, it literally cuts almost all treble in the signal. The literature of the day when this pedal came out (late 70s-early 80s) says that it is for the "delta blues" sound; not at all true. But for bass, or guitar, it gives you that real John Wetton bass sound without a fuzz box. And you can't really use a fuzz box with it, the Hog's Foot is a very pushy pedal that really takes over your instrument's sound.

Totally dependable, but also dependable to always have A LOT of hum, no matter how low the setting.

Maybe E-H will re-issue it, they've re-issued a bunch of stuff!

For me, it's indispensible.