THE Moog guiTAR MoDEl E1 – TREMolo BRiDgE
which had fancy wood and $6500 price tag.
The new E1 has the same guts and is basically
a less fancy version for 3k less.
The Naked Facts
The E1 has an Alder body with a 25. 5"-scale
maple neck and ebony fingerboard. The guitar is USA-made and looks clean with excellent fretwork. It is available in three colors:
Candy Red, Black, and Butterscotch. Our
sample has the Wilkinson by Gotoh vibrato
bar, which is much better than your average
non-locking whammy. There is also a piezo
pickup system to give simulated acoustic
sound that can be mixed in with the electric
sound as desired. The two pickups are made
by Moog and are an essential part of the system, so don’t plan on replacing them. To me,
the pickups sound all right but not exceptionally good. They are not super hot, and the
overall guitar sound is very clean, albeit somewhat sterile. The natural sustain is very good.
For more on features be sure to read Michael
Ross’ article, “Hands On With The Moog
Guitar” in the Oct. 2008 issue of PG.
You Want Sustain? No Problemo
Now let’s get down to it. The reason you’d
spend over 3K for this axe isn’t because of
the guitar; it’s because of what it does. When
I was asked to review the E1, I was expecting some sort of new guitar synth. Well that’s
not what this is—in fact, Moog has only just
made MIDI compatibility an option, and our
review sample doesn’t have it. Even so, I
was surprised by what I found. The sounds
the E1 makes basically all come from the
strings, and they’re very organic. Moog and
Vo have made a system that will stimulate
the strings to sustain endlessly. Conversely,
this same technology allows for the system to
mute the strings. There is also the Controlled
Sustain mode, which mutes the strings you’re
not playing and gives energy to the strings
you are, which is a neat feature for soloing.
In addition, they include the Moog Ladder
Filter, which is a sort of tone shift—think new
fangled wah-wah.
The guitar, let’s face it, tends to be a staccato
instrument, so for a long time players have
searched for ways to get more sustain. This
path led from nylon to steel strings to electric
guitars and experiments with feedback, fuzz
boxes, compressors and a host of other stuff.
With the Moog you can just skip all that,
sustain is here to spare. There are three positions on the Mode Selector: Mute, Controlled
Sustain and Infinite Sustain. You won’t hear
a huge difference in sound between the two
sustain modes—the Controlled Sustain mode
blends the Infinite Sustain and the Mute
modes by giving energy only to the strings
being played while muting those that aren’t—
but the way they respond differently to your
playing is pretty cool. This makes it easy for
players who want sustain for soloing, but
don’t want to worry about muting the other
strings with their right hand.
How the sustain actually feels as you play is a
bit curious. There is a slight delay in the time
from when you pluck the string to when you
feel the sustain grab on to the sound. The
result, to me, is that the E1 is best at a legato
approach—long, sustained chords work great.
For single-note lines you really aren’t going to
play fast shred stuff, as it just misses the point
of the sustainer. Playing up and down on a
single string works really well, since the string
stays stimulated and you avoid the restart
delay feel. The infinite sustain really does
require you to rethink the way you play guitar,
as does the mute function. The mute can give
you a sort of banjo-like attack, basically all
attack and no sustain.
All this would be more than enough for most,
but wait, don’t order yet… the E1 comes with
a control pedal, so what you hear is the low
harmonic and with the pedal you can move to
the high harmonic. In sustain mode you can
use the pedal to control which pickup generates the sustain, and when you move the pedal
to either the heel or toe position, the other
pickup is actually muting the strings at that
position. With the control pedal centered, both
pickups give equal amounts of energy, giving you the strongest response to the strings.
When you engage either the Controlled filter
or the Articulated filter, that Harmonic Blending
option becomes available on the E1’s control
panel (the center-notched knob next to the
Filter Toggle switch). This is way cool, and it
offers such a great textures that you’ll want to
spend a lot of time exploring it.
Flip the Filter Toggle switch and the pedal
controls the ladder filter for what Fareed
Haque called “a wah-wah pedal for the new
millennium.” Of course it’s not a wah-wah,
but that’s the neighborhood it lives in. I would
be remiss to not make a quick mention of the
classic EBow, which was the first thing that
gave infinite sustain to guitarists. It is a great
product, but the E1’s possibilities go much
farther, as it’s polyphonic. The E1 is easier to
use and can do all the EBow does and frankly,
it does it better. The E1’s response seems
smoother and much more controllable, and
with the pedal and everything else I men-
tioned there’s just no contest.
The Final Mojo… or Is It?
The E1 is a whole new deal, which requires
you to completely rethink the way you play
guitar and how you make music in general.
There will be players who will have no interest
in this at all, but for others this will be the ultimate instrument. If Allan Holdsworth doesn’t
have one, I would be surprised. The recent
inclusion of MIDI compatibility seems only
natural to me; in fact, it’s hard to imagine why
they even made these without it—perhaps
to show how much can be done without a
synth? Anyway you look at it, it is amazing to
have synth-like sustain coming from strings. I
can see the E1 being a staple in every studio
in the same way the Yamaha DX7 was in the
‘80s. The possibilities for orchestral music
also seem very exciting. I mean, why not skip
the fake string ensemble and have real string
sounds? I am also sure we’ll be hearing sustained single-note solos in songs on the radio
real soon. As many times as reviewers will say
something like, “This changes everything,” I
guess I’ll say it anyway. This changes everything, so go check it out.
Rating:
you want cutting-edge tech and
infinite sustain.
Buy If...
Skip If...
you’re resolved to sticking to the
old school.
Moog Music
MSRP $3649
moogmusic.com
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