Every year, Mix contributors Rich Tozzoli, Mike Dwyer and Bruce MacPherson decamp to St. John, USVI, and temporarily turn a house into a studio where they record TV cues while also testing new equipment and software, resulting in a bevy of Mix Real-World Reviews written in a unique part of the real world.
One of the few pieces of hardware on the trip, the H90 is an advanced big brother to Eventide’s popular H9 pedal. This little beast takes the power of an Eventide H9000 rack unit and pumps in 62 algorithms—52 from the H9 Max pedal and 10 extra all-new ones.
For access, you have five push knobs, seven LED buttons, three footswitches and a high-resolution OLED display on the front panel. There’s MIDI in/out/thru, two expression pedal inputs, four ins/outs, and a USB connection for onscreen access to the H90’s control app.
It can run two programs at once that can be processed and stacked in a variety of ways, and it has a serious collection of presets. You can even run effects inserts into and out of the pedals signal chain.
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But, wow, it’s really about the creativity you get with this thing. How could you not be inspired by the pitch-shifting, delays, flanging, tape echoes, blackhole reverbs and so on?
At home, using the USB-connected control app, I’ve used it quite a bit not only with guitar, but plugged into my Oberheim OB8 and Virus Polar synths in full stereo spread. The word epic comes to mind but might not be enough of a descriptor.
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However, it’s not just for the studio, as I take it out on gigs for chorus, reverb and delay effects. It lets you have easy access to six different switchable parameters, either externally with controllers or internally with the tap switches. Oh, and don’t forget the built-in tuner. The H90 is an incredibly powerful multi-effects processor and is way more than just a stomp pedal; it’s a movie score in a box.
