jimmarchi1's forum posts 8022

okay, here I am

1st, this version of the ac30 is the worst pedal platform bar none, so if you are a pedal guy, stop reading

it is voiced more like an original ac50, being extra bright and clean on the top boost side and the switchable bright caps on the normal side are more likea pre-top-boost AC30 treble model... I have read that the new ones are voiced closer to vintage, but now the cabs aren't built as well... I think the current custom series has a tube rectifier while the older ones don't (not 100% sure though) and both versions have shitty solid state driven trem and reverb instead of lush, tube driven trem/vibrato. Seriously an ac30 shouldn't have on-board reverb anyway and the tem they added sounds wrong for a vox though tis not entirely unusable. AC30s are cathode biased but there's a part called a cathode resistor that sets the basic operating range for the output tubes and these ac30s are the coldest and therefore most brittle sounding versions of the ac30. Although other versions range from 'this amp wrks better than my central ehating to keep me warm in the winter' levels of heart all the way up to 'I think I'll fry a few eggs on the top of this amp' in the case of most examples made before '64....

all this said, I have heard these amps sound quite good in the right hands with the right tubes and speakers... they represent a real value assuming you have a backup amp you like because reliability is notoriously spotty (probably due to the flimsy PCB's used and the board-mounted tube sockets)

I will use one of these as backline if its provided for a fly gig but I personally wouldn't buy one.

do you have a decent mic and audio interface?

that's odd that you don't see stuff on soundcloud... I get plays all day, so everyone else is seeing them... is it that the embedded stuff on this thread isn't working or duid you go to my profile and fail to see them?

I kinda started working with someone, but it doesn't mean I can't have a different singer or a mix of singers on each track... can you link me to a recorded example of your singing?

are you interested in writing your own lyrics or are you more comfortable just performing?

yes... my late wife was a huge laetherstrip fan and I am a huge tubeway fan, so it was something we could agree on prior to the separation!

thanks for the compliments.... I think fellow moderator Nik Farr is going tot ake on singing/lyrics duties for this project.... I have like 3 more songs in the pipeline now. Here's the draft sequence for the latest:

it soudned so good to me with mainly plugins and no ambiance that I posted it to soundcloud.... now the one I am working on in 6/8? not going as smoothly arrangement-wise

any thoughts on things I should change in the arrangements or structures before Nik ahs at is?

I think the plunky sound is part of the charm.... between the stock bridge, shortscale and weedy pickups the mustang basses just have that 60s garage thing

if you want a serious bass with heft and sustain then there are plenty of options for that, the mustang is more a of a recording option

I've been putting my guitars into the external audio input of my Moog Sub Phatty the last week or so. Its really amusing to treat your guitar like a synth, especially if you have a bunch of guitar effects like octafuzz and chorus sandwiching the Moog filters, drive, envelope generators and LFOs

it looks like inactive EB mod Nik Farr will be contributing vocals, lyrics and maybe some guitar and synth as well....

yeah, its all organized now and the effects are actually in the back of an ac30 combo cab and I just connect a few cables and the midi controller, select a bank set up for the number of amps I am using.... AND HAVE AT IT

I had a cab clone, it was fine.... I only ditched it because it didn't have all the cuntionality I wanted. Used as intended it was good for the money. I am sure the impulse response, digital cab sims are btter, but they cost an arm and a leg. The reactive load in the mesa was pretty nice sounding.

I can't understand how one could need a lot more gain with the low headroom AC4. I enver even managed to get the gain to 10 in hot mode, halfway up and it was getting silly for such a small amp

the gain to headroom ratio on the ac4 is not in favor of headroom... the preamp has plenty of power to drive itself into fuzzy solo turf in normal mode without even hitting the power amp hard.... add a boost or OD out front and you are talking molten gain... use hot mode and turn up a little and prepare to obliterate all cleanness

its never going to cover metal though, so if that's what you need don't bother buying stuff

if I were you I would invest in a load box cab-sim since your church won't let you use the internal speaker in the amp, then you can use it as a glorified FX processor and even run delay and reverb after the amp if you want

check out the affordable mesa unit, dump your money into that

it took me until I was 30 to master BBQ, AKA charcoal grilling... the grill is a frustrating piece of equipment Boom

gas is a little more forgiving because its mainly a high temp, direct heat affair (or should be as there's little to be gained flavor wise from slow, indirect gas cooking.... you might as well use your oven).... if you have issues with gas grilling consider that you might need to look at your grill. Does it have good cast iron grates? How many burners and BTUs? Like music gear, not all ags grills are created equal and a mediocre gas grill is never going to give you the pro results you want. You can however trick it out like a squire guitar.... but there are limits to what you can achieve.

anyway, good suggestion about breakfast.... once you make a few successful omlettes the mother sauces like hollandaise don't seem that ahrd when you try thm. Pancakes are easy and are not far from crepes.... maybe I'll post Narcy my whole-wheat pancake recipe....

you might want to try something easy first

that's how my dead wife ate when left to her own devices... marshmallows and jimmy dean sausage on a bed of fruitloops...

yum

its shameful to reach the age of 18 and not be able to make yourself a reasonable dinner

also, cooking skills get you laid.... seriously

is that a knockoff 355?

yes, I cook really well, been at it since highschool...

I make an impress meal 5 to 7 nights a week these days... I am debating ordering pizza tonight as I am hella tired though.

But yeah, try the recipe, I created it for my toddler. its like gourmet kids food.

you should try one, its sexy sometimes across a mix buss to tweak the overall shape of a track but its not ALL THAT... very much a upper-refined pultec

the cello is a smaller scale than the double bass... you would want lighter gauge strings at high tension on a fretless short-scale to approach electric cello tones, but cello is seldom played pizzicato solo for extended passages, its primarily a bowed instrument when its out front....

'cause its loaded with thugs wielding analog synthesizers like the boys from Depeche mode and Yaz

99% great article... wish you had addressed other types of synthesis aside from analog and virtual analog though! the virus offers limited FM capabilities like an Oberheim Xpander and the Micro Korg has some very basic wavetables, but at heart they are VA's focusing on classic subtractive synthesis. There's a whole range of sounds prevalent in every form of electronic music since the mid 80s that cannot be generated via straight subtractive synthesis.

You should also add the Studio Electronics SE1 to your list of almost-rans. Its an incredibly powerful mini moog clone with full midi implementation, patch memory and a bevy of useful mods including a 2nd resonant filter with 2 modes at 12db/octave copped from the pre-Curtis-chip oberheims. Plus the filters are on a swappable card system so if you were inclined you can buy other cards to adjust the voice of the synth from Moog and oberheim to other things (for instance a 303 filter). If you already have a midi controller it can't be beat for price versus performance and the interface will be familiar to anyone who has used a mini moog emulation plugin. One can literally dial up anything from Yes to Human League to Dr Dre in seconds without knowing much of anything about synthesis. SE has beena round since I was in grade school (they started out modding model D's for MIDI as the famous MIDI Moog) but they haven't ever gotten a lot of press for some reason. More of a secret weapon. Maybe I shouldn't be publicizing the SE1 now that I have one.

I was also sad to see that you favored the MS20 to the ARP Odyssey reissue. While the MS20 is more versatile I think the ARP just sounds better. And it dials in really quickly.

basildon thugs with synthesizers....

as long as you don't schedule your tour during tea time...

I updated my comment a little... good luck

go PLAY a bunch of stuff and decide if you need built in keys, on board sequencing, multiple voices or what have you... all these synths have not only different character but a very different feature set....

in your shoes I would stay away from the moog and for the same money buy a MIDI controller with a lot of nice keys and nice assignable mod wheels and maybe 3 more affordable synths, an analog mono bassline with a 303 style seuqnecer, a multi-oscillator analog module and an FM synth module (so much techno uses variations of the DX100 and TX81Z 'lately bass' patches, and you can't make that sounds with an analog synth, though you could get a sampler and load up some FM bass samples).

Do you need a polysynth of monosynth? It seems like you're looking at both.... do you need something with a built in sequencer? Do you need a keyboard? You listed 2 true analog synths and 2 modelling synths in there too.... have you heard them next to eachother? The virus is anlog-like but really has a sound of its own not unlike the nord lead.... its very modern.

original Detroit techno actually relied pretty heavily on FM synths... Derrick May is a noted DX100 user... a lot of Juan Atkins' classic stuff is loaded with FM sounds as well as the Korg MS10 and Sequential Pro One (so looking at Dave Smith synths isn't far off, but the OB6 is an oberheim reissue with the 2 pole fitlers and much slower envelopes than the harsh/snappy Pro One, way different sound, so you are looking at the wrong Dave Smith synth for traditional techno, oberheims are more of a synthpop thing, look at the prophet range unless you are looking to do something all your own)... and the MS20 reissue will cover all of the noisey sounds pretty well though I have never been a fan of that synth, just its filters and noise gen and even then the mono/poly filter is wicked too.

For 4 operator FM sounds the world's your oyster as there's the new Korg Volca FM module as well as Yamaha's new mini keyboard DX synth... and the old Yamaha TX racks that were also popular in 80s/90s Detroit are still readily available on ebay for a pittance. Techno also relied heavily on entry level lofi samplers from ensoniq and roland, though Akai eventually took over as the Detroit sound became famous and these guys had more money to play with. Octave One created the popular glitch vocal samples because they ahd trouble programming their Ensoniq sampling keyboard (I want to say it was an ASR10 but I think it was actually an even older, grittier sounding model). Old digital samplers have a sound though they are a total PITA to program as are older FM synths.

I am not a huge fan of the Virus as it is a jack of all trades. master of none... but if you can only buy one synthesizer the Virus will cover a lot of bases and is geared towards techno and acid house sort of analog noodling right out of the box without reading the manual. I wuld like to own one just as a utility module, but I never seem to bite the bullet on the buy in because there's other cool stuff out there that's cheaper and more interesting.

I have a sub phatty and a midi moog SE1, they both sound great. I seldom use them for techno though.

I get a lot of mileage out of my x0xb0x, Bassbot and Volca bass for techno and use them for much more than just acid twittering.

Also, the Juno 106 was huge in techno circles (as well as every other genre of electronic dance music) and still is. Its been ehard on more dance tracks than probably any other synth. I think roland system 8 can simulate it as well as a million other synths from their golden era, but god knows how accurately.

in old, underrated synths ensoniqs ESQ1 and SQ8 are killer wavetable type synths with tons of highly tweakable digital envelope and LFO generators as well as analog Curtis filters like you used to get in later Oberheims from the Matrix series that have a more aggressive, techno sound. They do require some menu diving, but they can handle ANY job. The Korg Poly800 is a good old DCO analog beast that's in the alpha juno camp but warmer.

and then there's the ARP Odyssey. Damn it sounds great. Its a real workhorse analog monosynth reissued by Korg very accurately in a mini key version or a module. I love mine and use it constantly, even just to make horrible noise after work... it has less deep bass and 1 less oscillator than your average moog but the synth is also less sloshy sounding and has better cut than a moog for leads.

If you want a moog monosynth that can also cover early oberheim sounds look at the Studio Electronics SE1 or SE1x, itstheir MIDI moog under a different name to avoid trademark issues but they also added some new features including oberheim 2 pole filtering.

everyone likes the bass station 2, I had a super bass station rack way back when. It was okay. The new one sounds pretty similar. Its like a more aggressive SH101 to my ear. The Arturia Mini and Micro sound really cool and can produce some very ahrd analog sounds for techno. I find them to be more in the Dave Smith camp than roland. Very biting and 'out front' in a prophet way but more versatile and very stable.

ugh, I could go on and on w/o giving a ton of info.... I suggest buying new from a retailer with a no-questions return policy

you should go and read all my synth reviews as I've been pretty detailed.

These guys also really know their shit:

http://equipboard.com/v8project

http://equipboard.com/whorse

it literally is the same song... no joke... I played with the structure a bit, bumped the original chorus melody onto synthesizers and sampled trumpets and changed the end of the chorus a little harmonically in a way that still worked with the old melody and suggested a 2 new top lines to counter it (guitar lick and new vocal). But as far as revisions go they were pretty minor, no pun intended.

The other 2 are also guitar-based compositions I had sitting around; one started out as a country ballad in waltz time but sounded good with that dense blippy analog sequencer loop undulating thru the first verse to me... the 3rd one that I posted yesterday was a pearl-jam-esque power chord rock tune that just never worked as a guitar piece so I revised the chorus and put the guitar part on simulated oberheim sound, then surrounded that with my hardware synths, some Reaktor pads and resampled Emulator sounds.

If you know anyone who can sing who is interested in working on lyrics and cutting a vocal thru thee web please pitch my project to them. I would like to work with a Brit. I don't want to work with anyone I already know. The results are too predictable with my usual pool of singers/lyricists in Philly.... and they're all busy at the moment failing at their solo careers and eating rammen noodles at every meal.

why not just go to Buckingham Palace and bone the Queen?

I've been doing THIS lately:

the thing is, he DID need instructions to know how to rock....

yes

precisely

...and rape

now its 3 tunes... I will probably wind up with 9 to 14

also... handbanana?

I might buy the theta, but for 250 smackers I could get all sorts of stuff that's more useful so I have to consider and try a demo model if possible... but the MIDI features I thought the theta had were really what was going to justify the expenditure

from a technical perspctive the chain you have will be fine, artistically you will need to rig her up on the floor and jam out and then try different orders of the pedals and when you hit the best order just nail it to the pedal train

its this accent:

https://youtu.be/RSpo81b_i1A?t=5s

https://youtu.be/WhjsafZcrXA?t=2m40s

https://youtu.be/RSpo81b_i1A?t=11s

https://youtu.be/WhjsafZcrXA?t=3m50s

nope, I'm wrong.... its not MIDI controlled... must be a different ISP product I am thinking of!

In that case I can't justify spending $250 on a glorified distortion pedal. Thanks though Boom.

high for a modern pedal that's mainly gain-based effects, but it sure does a lot of sound shaping.... hmmm

I'm going to mull that over for a day or two and see if the local music chains have one I can try on some different isntruments.

at 350 retail it really ought to arrange my songs for me....

does it accept MIDI program change messages or allow for MIDI control of any knob functions? I want to think its a MIDI controllable preamp for some reason that at least allows real time MIDI patch changes

hahaha, I guess use it if you are stuck with it

or wait, how much do you want for it? I can't imagine using it for guitar with my collection of guitar gear, but I am always looking for new gadgets to use to treat my outboard synthesizers prior to pressing record (there's a different feel to effects that are 'part of the sound' when you're playing a keyboard or tweaking knobs while a sequence plays versus stuff applied later in a DAW even if the results are pretty similar to what you get adding distortion or whatever at mix down because you aren't going to be able to change a recorded part to take advantage of an effect unless you do it by editing, whereas at the tracking phase you might play an extra note or get more extreme with that filter cutoff knob and pitch wheel)...

I haven't been planning on buying more gear for awhile because I bought a lot lately, but if the price makes sense to me I might be interested in the theta

if you're only using the noise gating on the theta then why not just get a decimator?

and what on earth do you need a noise gate for? there's hardly anything in your rig to generate noise.

I think you could just dump the theta and go simpler and be just as happy.

public statements like that are an excellent way to divert attention should one of the youngins go missing

get yourself crossed off the suspect list right away, nothing ruins a dinner date like a gaggle of interpol officers taking pictures from the next table

I already forgot your name, I can only retain technical data.

If I had a thing for young people, I have one of my own.... muwahahaha

how good does your delay need to sound as a bassist? You're not going to lean on it like The Edge....

try the Kemper, I'll bet something that pricey has a 7 day return policy or better

are teenaged musicians commonly abducted by adult musicians in the UK?