EHX Soul Food review
Posted on 25/01/2015 by ozzy in The Blog
The Soul Food was released by Electro-Harmonix as a part of their series of cool overdrive and distortion stomp boxes.
It's no secret that Soul Food is a clone of the Klon Centaur, the pedal that has become a legend. For its tone, as well as for its price.
It was really clever for Mike Matthews of EHX to take on the Klon, and release its clone. And as I understood from most of the reviews, a very good one. I never played Klon myself so I don't know how these two compare. What I do know is that Soul Food I bought gets me the Klon sound for less. Only quite surprised when I plugged it in.
The original Klon, as been no longer produced, sells for ridiculous sums of money on eBay. So to buy a Soul Food for a tiny fraction of cost of the Klon made a perfect sense to me. Even if it was like buying a pig in a poke.
That being said, the real question should be, why are people obsessed with the Klon so much. Is it mostly due to the hype? Maybe.
To be honest, I am not overly excited with it. The pedal sounds boxy, like being played inside of a cupboard, and anything over 10 o'clock on the gain mushes your tone to a dull, mid-rangey something. It cuts nicely through a band mix though, but doesn’t sound much of its own. I know that these things are down on to ones preferences. People mostly love it, to say the least, and that's fine. Unfortunately, the Soul Food is not my cup o'tea. So be prepared that there is a slight chance that you might not like it neither.
(I have tested the pedal with a few different Strats and Teles pluged in the VOX AC15 C1.)
Pros:
- It’s a clone of the Klon, isn't it
- Cuts easily through a band mix
Cons:
- Boxy, dull, and heavy on midrange... that's about it
- Doesn't sound much of its own