Garage acoustics aren’t the best, to put it mildy!
In garage rehearsals with my band the Drop Daddies– it can get loud, and we’ve been struggling with the mics feeding back.
So, a few weeks ago, I ordered an inexpensive Behringer Feedback Destroyer FBQ2496– it was used on Guitar Center for only $50. GC has a good return policy so I figured it’s worth a shot.
My pedal board is flush with overdrives, but sorely lacking in distortion. I’ve never loved my RAT – it has scurried on and off my pedalboard over the years, never finding a permanent home there. I’ve really been needing a solid traditional distortion lately, to use with my band covering tunes by Green Day, Blink-182, Weezer, etc.
I love my Vox Ice-9 overdrive, so I decided to try out the Vox Satchurator. It’s apparently a boutiquey version of the classic Boss DS-1. When I received it, I immediately plugged in and lost myself in its glorious tones for an hour or so. It sounds really really good. Very different from my overdrives and fuzz. It has a big, saturated, overtone-rich distortion. Excellent for thick heavy leads, but also equally good for massive chunky rhythm.More
After nearly a year, I’m still loving my Epiphone Les Paul 1960 Tribute Plus. I‘ve played a number of gigs with it and it has proven itself absolutely reliable and roadworthy. It has really excelled in every situation – loud indoor gigs, scorchin hot outdoor summer gigs, and of course my everyday practice, both unplugged and amplified.
This model seems to be a diamond in the rough at Epiphone- a truly great collection of features, including the awesome Gibson ‘57 Classic pickups, for a very competitive price.
I’ve often wondered why I haven’t seen Epiphone really promoting this model as much as it deserves. Well today, I noticed that it’s currently featured on the front page of Epiphone’s website, as part of their 140 years (1873-2013) anniversary. There’s a nice write up with a few choice quotes from Les Paul, and some gorgeous pictures.
Maybe they’ve finally decided to seriously promote this gem of a guitar!
In my series on building your own iDevice Guitar Interface, I demonstrated an interface which connects through the headphone/microphone jack. This is similar to the commercial products like IK Multimedia Amplitube iRig, Peavey AmpKit Link, Griffin GuitarConnect. And like all those, it works well, but it is not the most high-fidelity solution.
There are also a number of products that instead connect using the dock connector on the bottom of the iDevice, for example the Apogee Jam, Sonoma GuitarJack, Alesis iO Dock and Line 6 Mobile In. These interfaces have their own A/D converters, and pass the signal digitally to the iDevice providing higher quality audio. The downside is that you can’t charge the iDevice on battery while using the interface, which may be an issue for live performance and recording.
There’s a new contender in the dock-connected interfaces, and it looks pretty nice: the IK Multimedia iRig HD. In appearance, it looks very similar to the Apogee Jam. I prefer this style of interface, rather than the Sonoma, and Line 6 approach which have the entire unit hanging off the dock – that seems very precarious and likely to break the dock.
Also, at $99 the iRig HD is cheaper than the $129 Apogee Jam. If you have a newer iDevice with the lighting connector, the iRig HD is an even better deal, as it includes the lightning adapter cables as well as the older-style 30-pin connecter, and also a USB connector for use with a computer.
All that said, I’m perfectly happy with my DIY interface for practice, but if I was using it for recording or live performance, I might consider buying this iRig HD.
Answer: when it’s 13V!
As I mentioned previously, my pedal board’s power supply died, so I’ve been temporarily using an old Korg 9V power supply.
I’ve been getting some hum from Ryan’s Fulltone Fat-Boost, and finally decided to do some sleuthing to figure out why.
Fortunately, before I even cracked open the Fat-Boost, I hooked up a multimeter to measure the voltage output of the Korg supply, and it turns out that this little guy is really putting out 13V, not 9V. Well, that’s annoying. Is it mislabeled, or just over-compensating for something?More
The night before my St Patrick’s Day gig with the Drop Daddies, we were setting up at a rehearsal space for a last minute practice. I powered up my gear, and none of my pedals were working!
After a bit of trial and error, it was clear that my ancient SKB PS-25 pedalboard power supply had finally keeled over. I never use batteries, but fortunately a couple of the pedals had old 9V batteries still in them, so it was enough to scrape by for the rehearsal.
The following morning, just a few hours before the gig, I went through my box of old guitar gear to try to find a replacement 9V DC negative-tip power supply.
Hey, here’s the power supply for my Digitech Jamman Delay which I’m not currently using in my live rig. It says 9V, 1.3A. Strange, it doesn’t show a polarity, but it’s a power supply for a guitar pedal, and the plug barrel fits, so it must be good, right? What could possibly go wrong?
Some users of guitar interface cables like my DIY cable project have noticed an unreasonable amount of feedback when using Apple’s GarageBand iPad app.
Good news- Apple rolled out an update to GarageBand yesterday which appears to resolve this.
Thanks PaulB for letting me know!
The new Mobile In iOS guitar interface and Mobile POD app from Line 6 claims to put the POD sound library in your iPhone or iPad.
This interface connects to the 30-pin dock, which as I described in my DIY iOS interface project, is the higher-fidelity lower-noise way to get audio into your iPhone/iPad. This is because there is a high-quality 24-bit 48kHz D/A in the interface itself, and the signal is transferred digitally into the iDevice.
Again, my main concern with this type of device is that it hangs off the bottom of your iPhone/iPad on that delicate dock connector, with the guitar cable plugged into that. It makes me nervous that the inevitable kick-the-cord accident will brick your $600 iPad. Also, the iPhone/iPad can’t charge while this is plugged in, so you have to make sure you’re fully charged up.
At $79.99, this is cheaper than the other digital guitar interfaces (Apogee Jam, Sonoma GuitarJack, etc). The iOS app is free, but is tied to the hardware. You currently can’t use the app with another interface.
Intriguing, but I’m not rushing out immediately to get one. Are you?
I wrote about my love of looping back in 2010, when the new JamMan Solo and JamMan Stereo were announced.
Now, I’ve finally replaced my old Oberheim Echoplex Digital Pro with a shiny new JamMan Delay.
This unique pedal combines a looper with a nice delay modeler. It doesn’t do everything my old Echoplex did, but it’s a nice leap forward in technology- with stereo recording, tons of memory (and SD card expansion), stereo recording, USB connectivity and software librarian, not to mention some really nice delays.
But before we get to happiness, let’s first talk about a major manufacturing issue, nearly a total deal-breaker. If I hadn’t figured out a solution, I would have had to return the JamMan Delay and seek looper nirvana elsewhere. More