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Hello! Chelsea here again, doing another gear review!

Today I’m reviewing the Electro-Harmonix MEL9 digital tape replay machine.

If you know what a mellotron is, chances are you’ve already heard about this pedal. If you haven’t heard of a mellotron, I still bet you’ve heard some music that features one.

Strawberry Fields by The Beatles, Nights in White Satin by The Moody Blues, The Rain Song by Led Zeppelin, and even newer music such as A-Punk by Vampire Weekend.

Before the MEL9 was released, Electro-Harmonix released the B9 and C9 Organ Machines. These pedals werr similar to the MEL9, but could not do everything a mellotron could do.

The MEL9 has 9 settings. Orchestra, Cello, Strings, Flute, Clarinet, Saxophone, Brass, Low Choir, & High Choir. In addition to these 9 sounds, the pedal also comes equipped with dry and effect volume settings knobs as well as an attack knob and a sustain knob.

Orchestra: The orchestra setting is great, I have found, for background music, it truly sounds like you have a symphony in your studio.

Cello: I find the cello setting great to use when I play my guitar with a bow. It really creates a rather unique sound that is difficult to duplicate otherwise.

Strings: The strings setting is great for outros and choruses.

Flute: Although I haven’t used the flute setting much, I do still find it to be good for background effects, especially in a loop.

Clarinet: The clarinet setting is great to use with a looper, creating layers. It creates a sound similar to a synthesizer.

Saxophone: The saxophone setting is another one I use as a background setting with a looper. Also sounds similar to a synthesizer.

Brass: The brass setting is also great to use when layering music, it has a very unique tone and sounds great paired with the orchestra setting.

Low Choir: The low choir setting is very dramatic and works well for a more cinematic feel.

High Choir: The high choir setting I use often. It is similar to the orchestra setting in my opinion, and sounds great as both the background and lead.

This pedal has 2 volume controls (dry & effect), an attack setting, and sustain.

The 2 volume settings are great for controlling how much effect you want in what you’re playing. Turning down the dry setting helps dull down the effect and turning it up helps to shape it. The higher the dry knob is turned, the more you can hear the strings on your instrument.

The effect setting controls how much effect you want, turning it down all the way removes the effect entirely as turning it up increases it.

The attack setting is made to control the “swell”. As I have found, turning this feature up will help to “blend” the effects. And the sustain feature is pretty self-explanatory but none the less, it works well.

Overall I think this is a superb pedal.

It is great for creating psychedelic and cinematic music, dreamscapes as well as layering with a loop pedal. I would recommend this pedal to anyone imaginative or interested in any of the styles listed above.