BRAD PAISLEY

ELECTRONICALLY REPRINTED FROM DECEMBER 2007
10 WAYS TO PLAY LIKE JEFF BECK
FEED YOUR OBSESSION
®
12
DISTORTION
PEDALS
ROUNDED UP
& REVIEWED!
ULTIMATE
TWANG!
BRAD
PAISLEY
PUSHES THE
BOUNDARIES
OF HOT ROCKIN'
COUNTRY
THE MOST
DIVERSE ARTIST
COVERAGE OF
ANY GUITAR
MAGAZINE!
In this Issue
THE SCORPIONS
JOE BONAMASSA
ALLISON ROBERTSON
SHADOWS FALL
PIERRE BENSUSAN
ELVIN BISHOP
LENI STERN
MARY HALVORSON
AND MORE!
2007
READERS’
CHOICE
BALLOT
PAUL
GILBERT
SOLOING
SEMINAR
GEAR Bench Test
Eventide
TimeFactor
TESTED BY BARRY CLEVELAND
VISIT ANY PROFESSIONAL RECORDING
STUDIO, AND odds are you’ll find at
GPTV
MORE
ONLINE
See and hear TimeFactor in
action on GPTV.
guitarplayertv.com
SPECS
|
least one Eventide product on the
job. Effects processors such as the
various Harmonizers and Ultra-Harmonizers, the Orville, and the more
recent Eclipse are so pervasive that
it is safe to say that the Eventide
“sound” is present on countless professional recordings made in the last
Eventide Stompboxes, (201) 641-1200; eventidestompboxes.com
PRICE
$499 retail/$399 street
KNOBS
Mix, Delay Mix, Delay Time A, Delay Time B, Feedback A, Feedback B, Xnob, Depth,
Speed, Filter, Encoder
FOOTSWITCHES
Active (Record), Repeat (Play), Tap (Stop)
EFFECTS
ALGORHYTHMS
10
PRESETS
20
DELAY TIME
Delays A/B: 3 seconds max. Looper: 12 seconds (48 seconds max, low bandwidth)
INPUTS
1/4" with Guitar/Line Level switch (2)
OUTPUTS
1/4" with Amp/Line Level switch (2)
MIDI CONNECTORS
MIDI In, MIDI Out/Thru, USB
POWER SUPPLY
9VDC/1200mA wall-wart
DIMENSIONS
4.8"H x 7.5"W x 2.12"D
WEIGHT
2.15 lbs.
KUDOS
Studio-quality effects with full-on Eventide mojo. Brilliant user interface.
CONCERNS
Can’t name presets. Bulky wall wart.
36 years. But those units sell for
between $2,000 and $10,000,
putting them and the classic effects
they contain beyond the reach of
most personal studio owners—much
less the average guitarist.
That is until now. Designed for guitarists and other musicians, the new
Eventide Stompboxes line packs
much of the power of the company’s
pricier processors into pedal-sized
packages at populist prices. TimeFactor serves up a selection of ten studio-quality Eventide delay effects
algorithms, and boasts an unusually
robust feature set that includes twin
independent 3-second delays, a 12second Looper, a versatile “Billboard”
display, true stereo operation, multiple tap-tempo capabilities, three
Bypass modes (including true
bypass), and extensive MIDI implementation (including sync to MIDI
clock).
“TimeFactor’s effects engine is a
newer version of the DSP engine that
sits at the heart of Eventide’s rackmount Harmonizer products,”
explains company CTO Tony
Agnello. “By using a code-compliant DSP, Eventide was able to port
GEAR Eventide
TimeFactor’s rear panel includes discrete stereo inputs with a Guitar/Line level switch, stereo outputs with an Amp/Line level switch, Expression Pedal and Aux Switch jacks, a USB connector used for
MIDI I/O (standard MIDI In and Out/Thru jacks are located on the side), and a socket for the bulky,
pedalboard-unfriendly 9VDC/1200mA wall-wart.
our best and most popular timebased effects to the stompbox.
After performing the delicate task
of extracting the Harmonizer’s
DNA, the remaining challenge was
to map the control functions from
the rackmount user interface—
which is almost never controlled
by foot—to a user interface tailored to the creative needs of live
performance.”
TimeFactor’s ten effects—DigitalDelay,
VintageDelay, TapeEcho, ModDelay, DuckedDelay, BandDelay, FilterPong, MultiTap, Reverse, and
Looper—may be used as is, or as
starting points for programming
your own sounds. The pedal’s 20
memory slots come loaded with
great-sounding factory presets,
ranging from relatively straightforward digital delays and vintagestyle echoes to chorused and
filtered delays to ring-modulation
effects and other more adventurous sounds. Having only 20 memory slots may be viewed as a
limitation, but that’s 20 more than
most delay pedals offer, and the
presets may be backed up to a
MIDI sequencer or SysEx librarian program (along with all sys-
tem settings).
TimeFactor operates in two
modes: Bank and Play. There are
ten banks, each containing two
presets. In Bank mode, you cycle
through the banks by tapping the
right footswitch, and then toggle
between the two presets in each
bank using the left and center
footswitches. You can also temporarily disable individual banks
that you aren’t using, saving you
the trouble of cycling through
them to access the banks you want,
say, during a live performance.
In Play Mode, the left and center foot-switches control the currently loaded preset. When the
Looper is loaded, the three
footswitches function as transport
controls: Record, Play, and Stop.
Otherwise, the left switch toggles
the effect on/off, and the
center switch engages Infinite
Repeat (100 percent feedback, with
delay input muted)—a great feature found on many old-school digital delay units.
Despite TimeFactor’s potentially
staggering number of features and
functions, its user interface is a
marvel of simplicity and efficiency,
suggesting the people who devel-
oped it actually used the pedal for
musical purposes during the development process, rather than simply dreaming it up on paper. And
even the pedal itself exhibits intelligence. For example, whenever
you turn a knob, the Billboard first
displays the name of the parameter you have selected—nearly
everything is named other than
presets—and then displays that
parameter’s current value. (The
Billboard even displays waveforms
and other simple graphics.) TimeFactor also automatically co nfigu re s its e lf for mono/mono,
mono/stereo, or stereo/stereo
operation, in response to which
input and output jacks have plugs
inserted in them. And those are
just two examples.
Perhaps the most brilliant aspect
of the user interface, however, is
having 11 knobs for immediate
hands-on control of critical parameters. In addition to the global
Dry/Wet Mix control, there’s a
Delay Mix control for adjusting the
relative levels of the two delays,
and each delay has its own Delay
Time and Feedback controls. Also,
as most presets include modulation and filter options, there are
dedicated controls for modulation
Depth and Speed and Filter
amount. A “soft” control labeled
Xnob changes purpose depending
on the effect type, and the
unnamed 11th knob is an encoder
that selects effect types, engages
tap tempo, serves as a Save button, and interacts with the three
footswitches in various ways to
control additional functions.
I tested TimeFactor patched
between my guitar and amp, in the
Eventide GEAR
amp’s effects loop, and as an outboard studio processor, using the
switches on the rear panel to select
the correct levels. In all cases, it
performed remarkably well, with
negligible noise on most settings.
And, although the majority of the
pedal’s nine delay effects were
designed to function optimally in
stereo (the Looper is mono only),
I was impressed with how well
they translated into mono.
But what about the claim that
TimeFactor’s delay algorithms are
derived from the same DNA as
those found in Eventide’s highend processors? To find out, I auditioned the pedal alongside an
Eventide Eclipse (which streets for
about two grand) to see how it
stacked up.
TimeFactor’s effects and the presets found in the Eclipse are not
exact equivalents—though several
are nearly indistinguishable. Comparing TimeFactor’s TapeEcho to
the Eclipse’s EchoplexingPong, for
example, yielded many similarities,
and the same essential vibe. Similarly, by tweaking TimeFactor’s
FilterPong setting, I was able to
create sounds almost identical to
the Eclipse’s FilterEcho. In other
words, while the effects were not
entirely the same in every respect,
they were remarkably close, with
equally excellent audio quality.
And, in some cases, I actually preferred the sound of TimeFactor.
It is characteristic of Eventide’s
classic delay effects that they somehow manage to sound both warm
(in the sense of rich and appealing) and exceptionally clear and
detailed—and that also goes for
the modulation effects derived
from them. TimeFactor possesses
that character in abundance, and
its clean digital delay effects are as
good or better than any I’ve heard.
As for TimeFactor’s VintageDelay effects, they weren’t quite as
full sounding and vibey as, say,
those produced by my tube-powered S.I.B. Echodrive (which I consider to be the gold standard for
analog delays), but they possessed
the deeply layered richness and
complex decay characteristics that
are the hallmarks of the best analog and tape delays. TimeFactor’s
modulation effects (chorus, flange,
and Uni-Vibe) were also impressive, as were the reverse-envelope,
multi-tap, and various filtered
sounds. Even the ring-modulator
effect rang with authority.
The Looper operates in a relatively straightforward manner,
though it has numerous hidden
functions, some of which are quite
esoteric. You get 12 seconds of
loop time at full bandwidth (lowerbandwidth 24- and 48-second
looping are also available), with a
choice of various recording, dubbing, and playback modes. You can
also have previously looped material fade out as you overdub new
material (à la Frippertronics), and
manipulate the time/pitch relationships of recorded loops in real
time—including setting the Play
Speed to pitch the loop in musical
intervals by using the Octaves,
Oct+5th, Dom7th, and Chromatic
settings.
To more fully access TimeFac-
tor’s capabilities, I definitely recommend connecting an optional
expression pedal. All of the
factory presets include expression
pedal assignments, and you can
make your own assignments by
simply moving the pedal through
its range while twiddling the knobs
corresponding to the parameters
you want it to control. Should you
wish to get TimeFactor off the floor
for easier hands-on access, an
optional 3-way footswitch can substitute
for
the
onboard
footswitches, and also be programmed to control numerous
other parameters.
My only beef with this product—other than its bulky wall
wart—is that you cannot name the
presets. Eventide is currently
working on an editor/librarian program for preset backup and organization, and it would be great if it
also allowed you to name presets
within the computer and simply
port them into the pedal. In the
meantime, you may use a MIDI
sequencer, or any number of SysEx
librarian programs—Eventide recommends MIDIOX for PC and
SysEx Librarian for Mac, both freeware—for backup. But these concerns are far from deal breakers.
Believe it or not, TimeFactor
actually has considerably more features than mentioned here—but I
believe enough has been said to
demonstrate why it should receive
an Editors’ Pick Award. This is
simply the most brilliantly
designed and best-sounding digital delay pedal I’ve ever encountered.
Posted with permission from the December 2007 issue of Guitar Player ® www.guitarplayer.com. Copyright 2007, New Bay Media, Inc. All rights reserved.
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