The PitchFactor is a “Best of” of Eventide’s long history of harmonizers, and of all the ‘Factor’ series pedals, this one probably had to be simplified the most from its rack inspirations.
Providing 10 different patches of pitch shifters and harmonizers, the PitchFactor shares a common setup and interface with the other units in the ‘Factor’ family: 50 banks of 100 presets total, tap tempo, stereo ins and outs, midi in and out, and expression pedal and aux switch inputs. In terms of usability in a live setting, this unit really fairs well.
The original Eventide rack harmonizers had a plethora of options and parameters for every available sound – far more than could be contained in this unit. But as far as pitch shifters and harmonizers, there is not much in the way of high level, pedal-based units on the market besides this.
The 10 available patches cover a smattering of different sounds, from two and four voice harmonizers and modulation-based effects, to arpeggiators and pitch shifters. Within each patch, you have 10 different parameters by which you can control the sound. Most of the parameters deal with the intervals of harmony you want to have, and how long they will be delayed, and the feedback of those delays. However depending on the patch, you can also control modulation depth and speed, fuzz level, octave resonance, reverb size and decay, and much more.
Overall, I’d say this unit provides some of the best pedal-based harmonizing you’ll find. Lots of options, and its easy to program and control. I still find that the Digitech Whammy takes the cake for pedal based pitch-shifting – it has a very pleasing glitchy / analog quality to it. In general, it seems the PitchFactor provides a preview of some of the amazing things you could do with one of their rack units. – Daniel Tirer
