NAMM 2016!!!

It's nearly here! I can't wait, to binge watch everything on YT, and hang around being antisocial checking updates. At the moment I am hyped up for the Ibanez mini pedals, and the virtual Jeff vibrato. I wish I lived in Anahiem.

Anaheim NAMM is really fun to attend. You should make a point of going when you're a little older. But no, you don't wish you lived in Anaheim, t sucks there because of Disney Land.... but if you live pretty much anywhere in Souther California (or are visiting in the winter) its well worth getting a ticket to the NAMM show. Always fun. Summer NAMM in Nashville is also fun, but its not loaded with as many famous musicians. And it seems like the manufacturers save their best stuff for new year...

I can't stand the online video coverage... its like a giant run of ads with bad sound quality. At the show its hard enough to hear what you're trying, the videos are the pits. I should make a point of going to summer NAMM this year. Nashville is not THAT far from me...

I'm actually kinda excited about this Helix thing that Line6 put out to compete with axeFX and the Kemper.... I am very interested in the way you can integrate it in all sorts of cool ways with your actual tube amps. Its kinda expensive for a Line6 product though.... Pete Thorn's demo piqued my interest in this thing. I am sure the sound quality is adequate for the FX models at least, but the i/o flexibility from an all in 1 pre/post FX system, amp sim and cabinet Impulse host is really impressive. Even if the models aren't up to Fractal or Kemper's stuff? Hell, they are not designed well to integrate with an analog setup.... I've been flirting with buying a G-System for looping different amps and having a bank of effects when I need them, but apart from the cost of helix it seems to offer a much wider effects palette plus the option of running your amp direct into an impulse response of your favorite cab for low volume home recording. Ad unlike the G System it has distortion and amp models that sound okay when you just want a close-enough solution. I was kinda thinking of putting my ac4 on a loadbox, turning it way up and putting it in a helix loop for drive, then putting the pres from my HC30 in 2 more loops for cleaner stuff and pumping the output of whatever effects unit into the effects return of the HC30 to use the nice Matchless poweramp. NAMM show is great in person to decide if its worth investing in the new gadget with all the bells and whistles like Helix or if you wanna go half the price with the tried-and-true device on the used market. I mean, I probably won't hardly use the amp models and for recording I could do cabinet impulses in my PC, but there are a lot more delay and modulation models in Helix than G-System. Seems easier to find the exact sound you want without compromise. Or not. Tough to know without trying it extensively at the Line6 booth... I shoulda gone to 2015 summer NAMM and tried her!

A, I would love to go to NAMM, it sounds amazing B, I thought Disneyland was in Florida C, Not all the online stuff is terrible, it depends who you watch. The Andertons crowd do some good stuff there, and if Glenn from SSS is there then he'll do some good stuff. D, Distance is so much different for you Americans. What do you mean Nashville is not far, it's bloody 12 hours. That would get you all the way across Britain,North to South. E, I don't usually like Line 6 products, but the Helix looks quite nice, though I'm really not in with the whole big, expensive, digital, processor crowd, I much prefer pedals, and a tube amp, though I am very impressed with the Kemper, as it really does the real deal of emulation (You can do pretty much everything, you can change the size and shape of the tubes your emulating, etc), though it's never 100 percent like the real thing. I don't really like the axe fx. Just watch Glenn's vids on them, he does really good comparisons.

B. Dineyland's in California, DineyWORLD is in Florida.... Dineylan was walt's 1st attempt at a theme park but he didn't buy enough land to realize his vision so he started over in Orlando FL. Dineyland is basically the same as the Magic Kingdom section of Disneyworld. I went to World twice as a kid and Land as an adult with the former manager of the band Garbage, Shannon O'Shea suring the (wait for it) winter NAMM show one year.

D. 12 hours is not that far, especially when the ride is interesting and scenic.... and anyway, I could buy a plane ticket if I didn't want to drive. My ex-wife moved over 8 hours away from my home and now my son covers 16 hours roundtrip a month to spend time with both of us. You Brits come from a tiny piece of rock in the north atlantic and don't know what it means to raodtrip or plan a serious tour for a band. Its hard and tiring to get exposure for your band here, in the UK its easy.

E. I have never done much with multiFX either.... I've flirted with various units from my home studio used in a guitar context and 2 dedicted guitar fx rack units (the quadraverb GT in the late 90s and more recently a TC G-sharp), but I usualy just create a doubling/detune/un-chorus effect between 2 amps and maybe do a little slap delay or subtle plate reverb simulation.... I am really interested in bing able to call up a ton of different simualtions of stompbox modulation and delay as well as a lot of rackmount studio type sounds and save my patches for easy recall.... the distortion pedal and amp modelling I will probably not use much, but I am really into having the option to use the simulated cabinets with my head on a load-box for silent recording at home. If it weren't for that I would just get a used G-system for $500. It has enough styles of delay and modulation to satisfy me, great AD/DA converters and the same I/O flexibility as helix. I dunno. I want to sit and try a Helix and develop an opinion. Its like triple the money of a secondhand G system!

I just scooped up a new loadbox to try out (the hotplates had a great lineout but a mediocre sounding load while my weber with an actual speaker voicecoil sounded great as an attenuator but the lineout was crap). I am hoping the Mesa one will please me. People seem to like the loadbox part but have mixed feelings on the cab sim bits, but you don't have to use the cab sim and I don't usually plan to so who cares? for $200 I am sure I can resell if I dislike it. I am starting to chicken out on the Kemper. It models pretty well, but FX aren't its strong suit. Though I use effects sparingly I am spoiled by 1st rate stompboxes and need my simulations to be Axe FX or TC quality, not an afterthought like they seem to be on the kemper. Plus all the metal guys favoring the kemper really freaks me out.

The plan is to load down myac4HW (because it has righteous drive tones when cranked into full bore saturation) and put the whole amp, from input to loadbox line out, into a true bypass loop of the G system or Helix for overdrive. Then I can add a little EQ before or after to shape the drive as well as add pre and post gain effects if I want... in 2 other effects loops I was thinking I would put the 2 preamp channels of my HC30 for cleans using the amps inputs and the power-amp sends. Add effects to taste there too. Then the output for the whole unit could be returned to the power-amp return on the HC30 giving me a punchy 30 watts of sorta-Class A tube power.... if I wanted stereo I could build another HC30 poweramp and feed another 2x12 I guess. I kinda wanna get back to a wet/dry/wet rig, but with more options than my old one and a multi-effects with the ability to incorporate a few true bypass loops of analog seems like the easiest way to accomplish the whole setup.... obviously the dry amp would be an actual AC30. my HW or 62, set for a just breakin' up tone. It would be cheaper to go TC G system here. Save me a good $800 I could invest in going stereo if I want.

I wish we were taught about American geography here, instead of hours of crap about rocks, and clouds. It's actually very interesting.

The inverse, we Americans are taught our own geography and then NOTHING ELSE! Anything beyond the blue is heretic or communistic. All you really need to know is where Texas is and how to draw it.

I can't wait for Namm. I plan on buying some new goodies if they put out anything cool for bass and putting them on my youtube page as demo's. Last year they only has the Ibanez fanned fret bass.

here's my touring musician's guide to American geography... when you drive west past Ohio you start to have fields and clouds.... keep going west and you get the rocks you learned about in school and lots of 'em.... the stages get bigger, the audiences get smaller, the cities look more like towns... all along the way the number of rabib anthrax and metallica fans, anti-intellectual, barfighting, adult former-athletes and mouthy republicans with guns will go up while the overall population goes down, even in the "cities," sandwiches slowly turn intot acos and then burritos, the pizza gets worse and worse... until you finally hit California/Oregon and everyone is crazy in the other direction (apart from the arch-conservative vintners in northern California). Also, you are going to see the amount of cowboy boots go way up as you get west of center until it abruptly drops off as you head out of the actual desert. I recommend buying J toe boots in the southwest where they are cheaper than in Nashville/Memphis. J toes are great for clicking stompboxes.