ELECTRO-HARMONIX RAVISH SITAR PEDAL REVIEW

From simple one-knob pedals such as the Neo Clone, all the way through to some of the most complicated units on the market, the Electro-Harmonix range of stomp boxes is certainly an eclectic mix to say the least. The Ravish Sitar falls into the latter category &, after having seen many a person plug it in & stare at it in a bemused way, I thought it was time to roll my sleeves up & find out what this strange little box has to offer...

Obviously, as the name suggests, the Ravish Sitar is intended for use as a sitar emulator. One simply need plug their guitar into one end & their amp into the other & hey-presto, their guitar is magically transformed into a sitar, right?! Well, I wish I could say that it was that simple, but if you really want to unlock the powers of the Ravish Sitar then it's going to require a bit more effort than that! However, there's no need to worry as the rewards are there for those who are willing. If you have a penchant for a certain Middle Eastern vibe then do read on as I will endeavour to point you in the right direction.

RAVISH SITAR - IN USE

Firstly, let's quickly run through the controls. The Ravish Sitar pedal has six knobs lined up across the top of the unit: Dry Level, Lead Level, Sympathetic Level, Lead Timbre, Sympathetic Timbre & Mode/Preset & there's two footswitches: Preset/Drone/Tune & Bypass. The unit is also littered with a number of LED indicators & a dual-segmented display.

The obvious way to try & get an overview of the sounds that the Ravish has to offer would be to scroll through the presets. Stepping on the 'Preset' footswitch will toggle through the stored presets in cyclic fashion. Alternatively, one can navigate directly to a specific preset by turning the white 'Mode/Preset' knob until you reach the desired patch & then hitting the footswitch to load said sound into place. However, all of the factory presets are fairly extreme & I found that none really managed to achieve what I would personally expect from the pedal. Fortunately though, we have 'Manual Mode' & this is where the Ravish really started to come alive for me!

To understand how to control the Ravish pedal in Manual Mode we really need to understand some of the basic principles of the sitar. The sitar is essentially a fretted, stringed instrument much like a guitar; however, it has the addition of sympathetic strings that run underneath the frets. These sympathetic strings need to be tuned to whatever key one intends to play in &, of the playable strings above the fretboard (either six or seven of them depending on the type of sitar), three or four would be used to provide a drone & the others would serve for playing the melody. With this in mind, let's revisit the controls...

The Dry Level knob basically controls the dry unaffected signal of your guitar. One can use this as a Wet/Dry blender (all the way left & you'd get 100% sitar, all the way right & you'd have 100% guitar). The Lead Level knob controls the level of the strings that you'd find above the sitar's fretboard & the Sympathetic Level knob controls the level of the sympathetic strings found below. Personally I found that the Ravish worked best for my tastes with the lead level at about two o'clock & the sympathetic level somewhere between nine & ten o'clock.

We then have the Timbre controls. Think of these guys as independent tone knobs (of a sort) that control the lead & sympathetic sounds independently: the further left, the rounder & more mellow; the further right, the more 'zing' & buzz. For me it seemed to work best with the lead timbre just above nine o'clock & the sympathetic timbre all the way down. However, (with the lead timbre in particular), there seemed to be a real finite sweet spot & I'd imagine that the precise point will vary depending on the level that's hitting the pedal's input.

Then there's the Mode/Preset knob. This particular knob has an extra level of importance & Electro-Harmonix have chosen to highlight it by giving it a different colour & by painting the housing around it with a graphic that serves to single it out even further. When in Preset mode this dial simply lets you scroll through the stored patches; however, when in Manual mode this knob becomes far more important.

Below the preset knob you will notice three LEDs named 'KEY', 'DCY' & 'MOD' (these stand for Key Mode, Decay Mode & Modulation mode). As you push the Mode/Preset knob it will toggle between the various modes & the LEDs will light accordingly.

In addition to the labeled modes there are also two additional modes: Q Mode & Pitch Mode. (Q Mode is denoted by both the DCY & MOD LEDs being lit, while Pitch Mode is indicated by all three LEDs being lit). Also, when first selecting the mode that you wish to work in, the first letter of said mode (D, M, Q or P) will briefly appear on the left segment display just to make it that bit clearer. Next, I guess we better dissect these modes a little further...

RAVISH SITAR - KEY MODE

Now, this is perhaps the most important part of the pedal to get right; it's really not until you get to this stage that things start to make sense. Key Mode is essentially where you get to 'tune' your virtual sympathetic strings to the key that you wish to play in. Ignoring this stage in the process of setting up the Ravish will result in everything you play sounding out of tune, so it really is imperative that you understand how this works. (The tuning of the sympathetic strings really is at the heart of both the sitar & this pedal alike).

Directly below the dual-segment display are four LEDs labelled: 'SHARP', 'MAJOR', 'MINOR' & 'EXOTIC'. When in Key Mode, twisting the Preset/Mode knob will cycle through the available Keys: clockwise will progress upward (E Exotic, E Minor, E Major, F Exotic, F minor, F Major & so on), whereas turning it counter-clockwise will cycle downward (E Major, E Minor, E Exotic, D# Major, D# Minor, D# Exotic etc.). The letter pertaining to the Key you're in will show in the segmented display and whether it's sharp & the key value (i.e. Major, Minor etc.) will be displayed by the corresponding LEDs beneath. It's really important to make sure that when using the Ravish you restrict yourself to playing only in the key that it is set to &, while this may seem restricting to us guitar players, part of making your guitar sound like a sitar is in approaching it like it is one (and besides, turning the white knob on the Ravish is far easier than having to retune all of the strings on an actual sitar)!

...Oh, & in case you're wondering, the 'Exotic' option is actually a middle-eastern scale found in Hindustani music called the 'Bhairava' (it is essentially a major scale with a flattened second & a flattened fifth). Electro-Harmonix say they chose to include it after undergoing extensive research & listening tests. In addition to the included scale choices, it's also possible to create your own custom scale (this is indicated by all three scale LEDs being lit at the same time) & you can always save said scale to a preset for future use should you wish.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GZGDYJ77xA

RAVISH SITAR - THE OTHER MODES

In comparison to Key Mode, these guys are far less important. Their effects are subtle & if the setting up of the pedal is starting to make your head spin then you can get away with skipping these steps should you wish.

Firstly there is Decay Mode, where you can set the decay rate of the lead sitar tone, the available options are zero through nine & turning the Preset/Mode knob will let you fine tune it to your personal tastes.

Modulation Mode is also fairly straightforward. It basically allows you to add a subtle modulation effect to the sound of the sympathetic strings; this is said to emulate the sound of a tanpura (a popular accompanying instrument for the sitar).

Then there's Q Mode, where one can tailor the 'Q' (or 'Quack') of the lead sitar tone. It only ranges from zero through four & personally, I found the difference it makes to be rather subtle.

Finally we have Pitch Mode. Its purpose is for you to be able to customise how far sharp a connected expression pedal is able to bend the lead sitar sound's pitch (the options available range in semitone increments all the way up to one whole octave). However, one can only access this part of the Ravish if a suitable expression pedal is indeed connected up to the 'PITCH EXP' jack and this brings us nicely to...

RAVISH SITAR - CONNECTIONS

The Ravish Sitar has 5 jacks: an instrument input, a main output, a 'sympathetic' output & two expression pedal inputs. The Instrument In & Main Out are fairly self explanatory, but the Sympathetic Out gives you added flexibility. When a lead is connected to the Sympathetic Out it prevents the sympathetic string sounds from coming through the main out & sends them through this alternative output instead. This is handy if you want to treat the sounds independently through two separate channels on a mixer, if you want to send the lead & sympathetic sounds to differently voiced guitar amps, or if you want to create a stereo image with lead on one side & sympathetic strings on the other.

The expression pedal inputs are marked 'DRONE EXP' & 'PITCH EXP'. The pitch input is where you would connect an expression pedal should you want to perform wide sitar-style pitch bends with a pedal & the drone input allows you to attach a pedal for control of the sympathetic strings. To understand the drone capabilities though we need to talk about one extra thing that the Ravish Sitar has up its sleeve: Freeze Mode.

RAVISH SITAR - FREEZE MODE

Freeze mode is quite a cool little feature that works when the Ravish is in any mode other than Key Mode. Basically, by pushing & holding the Preset footswitch you can get the Ravish to hold the sympathetic strings you've just played indefinitely. This is really handy as it allows you to have an indefinite drone in the background that you can then play lead over the top of.

The use of an expression pedal connected to the 'DRONE EXP' will allow you to control the levels of the sympathetic strings with your foot & will also activate the freeze function when in the toe-down position. I can see this being a very handy addition for a lot of players as, when testing the Ravish, I found myself using the volume pot on my guitar a lot in order to achieve different levels between sympathetic drones & lead work. Although I didn't find this to be a problem (I'm the type of player that controls my sound from the guitar anyhow) there's no doubt that the use of an expression pedal would make it a simpler task for most. Plus, not having to hold your foot on the preset button in order to achieve a freeze would also be a more comfortable option I feel.

RAVISH SITAR - CONCLUSION

As you can probably tell, the Electro Harmonix Ravish isn't for the faint of heart! However, it certainly does have its rewards for those willing to put in the effort. It may not be the kind of pedal that you're likely to use as a main staple of your sound, but it will certainly enable you to achieve something quite unique when the time calls for it.

Do bear in mind that it would be a fools errand to expect the Ravish alone to convert your guitar into a sitar. You will need to alter your phrasing & approach to one that is more aligned with that of a sitar player should you want to achieve convincing results. Yet, If you have an urge to attempt a few Ravi Shankar impressions, or if you fancy following in the footsteps of John McLaughlin & the Mahavishnu Orchestra by treading the realms between western & eastern music, then you'd be hard pushed to find a better option.

I personally found that I was able to achieve more authentic sitar-like tones by running the Ravish into a DI rather than my guitar amp. However, when running it through your amp there are certainly some interesting hybrid tones to be had. Another nice surprise was how well it played with other pedals (running overdrives, modulations & even octave effects in front of the Ravish didn't confuse it at all) & this makes it possible to achieve some really far-out tones should you be the looking to push the sonic boundaries.

All-in-all, the Ravish Sitar is an interesting pedal for sure & is definitely worth checking out if sitar-like tones are on your agenda!

For more information on the Electro-Harmonix Ravish Sitar pedal, click the link below or give us a call on 01202 597180.

Electro-Harmonix Ravish Sitar - More Info/Buy

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