Gear Diary
Making Song Presets on The Helix
After preparing my basic Pedal Board preset, I’ve spent the last week learning my way around the Helix, preparing presets for our setlist. I’m loving this thing! I’ve been waking up early to craft song presets before work, and staying up super-late every night. Yes, I’m obsessing, but there’s a lot to prepare if I’m […]
Helix vs Blackstar
I mentioned last month, as I awaited the Helix arrival, that I was considering going ampless- completely replacing my entire amp and pedalboard rig with a single device: the Helix. So, once I started learning to edit on the Helix, the first thing I did was try to make a preset to match the sounds of […]
How To Use Solo on DL32R Mixer
We’ve had our Mackie DL32R Mixer for how long now? (nearly 2 years!) And I’ve never bothered to figure out why the Solo channel controls weren’t working as I expected. When I solo a channel, its Solo button turns yellow, and the yellow all-caps SOLO indicator shows up in the top right quick access panel button. But, […]
Helix Has Landed
My Helix arrived last night. Sweet! I lost myself for a couple hours, going through the presets and getting familiar with the unit. I borrowed a JBL EON 610 full-range powered speaker for the occasion, and the combination sounds amazing. I haven’t even tried plugging it into my Blackstar Stage 60 yet. It sounds soooo […]
Helix Is On Order
The Helix finally came in stock today, and it’s on order! While I’ve been waiting over the last couple weeks, I’ve been obsessing about my big rig transition to the Helix. I’ve come across a couple of new video demos which just blow me away how good the Helix sounds. These demos have me seriously […]
Hard Disk Failure with DL32R
At our Outpost gig last weekend, I noticed at the end of the first set that the red recording light was off in the Master Fader control app for our DL32R mixer. I know that I started the recording before the first set! Did I bump it accidentally during the set? So, I restarted the […]
Selling For Helix
It’s been a year since I saw that first demo of the Helix at NAMM, and I haven’t stopped dreaming about it! But I decided that I should really sell some old gear before investing in the Helix. And I just never got around to it. But after the dreaded HD500X sunlight-wah-freakout happened again, this […]
Sunglasses for the HD500X
My band plays a number of outdoor gigs every year, and I usually need to wear sunglasses to survive the gig. Aside from the sunlight-triggered-wah-freakout issue I wrote about last year, the HD500X works fairly well in the sun. The light rings around the footswitches tend to disappear in bright light, but the main display […]