Today, Eventide announced immediate availability of Blackhole® – a reverb pedal as big and mysterious as the cosmos. Escape Earth and create haunting echoes, ethereal landscapes and otherworldly ambience.
Like all Eventide pedals, Blackhole allows players to fine-tune every aspect of the effect. With its new user-friendly, intuitive interface, just about anyone can shoot for the moon and land beyond the known universe. A historic element of Eventide’s sound, the Blackhole algorithm was introduced in Eventide’s DSP4000 Ultra-Harmonizer® hardware processor and now opens a host of possibilities on a pedalboard. With Blackhole, users can pick and choose from five otherworldly presets to create supermassive atmospheres with the ethereal reverb of Blackhole, soar through nimbus clouds with the airy delay of Dark Matter, achieve sonic supernovas with the resounding swirl of Nebula, experience an uncharted galaxy of sound with the warmth of Singularity, and achieve a stellar rotation of sonority with Pulsar – or get creative and create presets on their own.
Blackhole can load as many as 127 presets via MIDI, which are also accessible in the preset list on the Eventide Device Manager (EDM – a PC or Mac application for software updates, system settings and creating/saving presets). Five presets can be loaded at a player’s feet for access from a latching/momentary Dual-action Active Footswitch. The rear-panel Guitar/Line Level switch allows impedance matching with guitars, synths, FX loops or DAW interfaces. A single Aux switch can be deployed to Tap Tempo, or a triple Aux switch can be used for easy preset changing (up/down/load). Blackhole offers multiple Bypass options: Buffered, Relay, DSP+FX or Kill dry. MIDI capability is available over TRS (for use with a MIDI to TRS cable or converter box) or USB. With this degree of flexibility, Blackhole provides a journey from cathedral-esque spaces to a new frontier of aural experimentation, unlocking a universe of sound-sculpting capability.
Blackhole opens boundaries with two types of infinite reverb. “Infinite mode” continuously layers new sound on top of a suspended reverb while “Freeze mode” holds the effect in stasis, allowing musicians to play over the reverb tail. The Freeze Footswitch allows instant access to this feature. Unlike other reverbs which may offer pre or post modulation, Blackhole features modulation built into the very reverb structure itself; this modulation can be used to smooth out the rough edges of the most extreme settings and offers unique tone-shaping ability.
Reverb size can range from a cartoonishly small room to a limitless universe, while PreDelay can offset the onset of the reverb. Any combination of parameters can be mapped to an expression pedal. Blackhole’s Catch-up mode helps dial in a sound when toggling between presets/parameters, while tone can be fine-tuned with Lo, Hi and Q (resonance) controls. Blackhole’s tone controls can be used to add airiness or tame the low end. Movement can be added to the EQ controls via an expression pedal. The unique Gravity control can custom-tailor the reverb tail in two realms – normal or inverse decay – to create interesting swells or suck the dry signal back into the reverb tail. At longer decay times, Blackhole allows the articulation to shine through without competing with the reverb tail.
Discover what lies beyond mere halls, rooms, plates and springs; Eventide’s Blackhole pedal transports tone to an alternate dimension of ambience. Blackhole is available for $279 (MSRP) from Eventide dealers worldwide and at https://etide.io/BlackholePedal.