Products on The Metro Gnome

NAMM was an absolute spectacle - with thousands and thousands of products for us to see, touch, and hear. The trade show is exactly that - a place for sellers and buyers to get together to trade goods. With the January NAMM Show being the largest in the US, if not the world, a lot of the sellers launch new products at the show. There are 4 products I found in my NAMM adventure that want to tell you about in this issue.

* The SpinSlide®
* The Fender™ G-DEC®
* The Piano Wizard™
* L Benito Guitars

The SpinSlide

I like this idea so much that I want to bring it to Australia - and I very well might! The SpinSlide is a modified guitar slide. The big functional benefit is that with a simple movement you can move from slide playing to finger playing. There are a couple of slides like this on the market already, but I like the SpinSlide better. Why? Well, for one, the SpinSlide is as narrow as a typical ring when you are using finger side of the slide. That means that I can bend my fingers naturally when I place them for chords. Second, the SpinSlide has a soft padding inside the slide side which makes it easier to "grip" and much more comfortable to use. Third, because the slide is effectively only a half slide, my knuckle doesn’t hit the other side of the cylinder and, therefore, doesn't get bruised (it also gets air and doesn’t get as sweaty). And fourth, the SpinSlide comes with 4 different sized rings, so I could choose the size that fits my finger best. I always had wanted a smaller slide than the standard, but hadn't gone through the effort and expense of buying one.

So my pick of the slides is the SpinSlide. There's a demo online of how easy it can be (see www.spinslide.com), with a little bit of practice, to spin it around with one hand and without interrupting play. Have a look! If you want one - let me know.

The Fender G-DEC

Fender G-DEC

G-DEC stands for Guitar Digital Entertainment Center - but I call this little ditty "karaoke for the guitar." Now, before you get offended by that, read on.... When you play the electric guitar, you have to have an amplifier and speakers to hear it. And when you're learning the electric guitar, you're probably practicing alone in a bedroom or a garage. Well, this unit is a great upgrade from a standard amp, because it has inbuilt bass and drum sounds that you can play along with (you can turn one or both off if you want to). And, cooler than that, the unit also has effects built into it that modify the guitar sounds to match different styles of music. And, even cooler than that, you can isolate the standard effects, modify them, and save them as your own custom effects. But the pièce de résistance is that the G-DEC can take MIDI and MP3 inputs to bring real songs to life for guitarists.

Personally, I think the G-DEC will give people who are learning how to play the guitar more reason to practice (and more satisfaction when they do practice) as well as a greater understanding of how the guitar player fits in with an overall band. But even seasoned players can use the G-DEC to learn and practice new songs so that they come to rehearsal they can be ready to go! It's fantastic.

The Piano Wizard

The concept is simple - when you learn your native language, you start by hearing it, then you speak it, then you read it, and then you learn how to break it down into it's structure (nouns and verbs, sentence diagramming, etc.). And everyone knows the best time to learn a language is EARLY. You actually start learning it right from the beginning, because the sounds you are exposed to even before you can speak are really important in your development.

So why wait to learn a different language? And why change the natural path to learning a language? Well, we shouldn't!

And the language of music is no different to any other language. Here's the path. First, expose your child to music from the beginning. Some people start when the little tyke is still in the belly. Let them hear music. Then teach them to play music... and start early. And this is where I introduce you to The Piano Wizard.

The Piano Wizard is essentially software (included) that works with a midi keyboard (included if you need it) connected to your personal computer via a midi-USB cable (included). But don't let that technical description scare you - this looks and feels like a video game that can be played by anyone from about 3 years of age. You start by putting some removable colour strips onto the keys of the keyboard. Those colours match the colours shown on the keyboard shown across the top of the computer screen. When you start the game, coloured icons move up the screen toward the coloured note and the player hits the note when the icon crosses one line but before it crosses another. If the player plays the right note at the right time, s/he scores points. You can control the speed of the game (the tempo), the complexity of the song, and the precision of when the note needs to be played. Once the song is over, the game reveals the score and asks if the player wants to play again.

Once the player is ready, the game level advances so that the icons begin to travel from right to left across the screen to the keyboard. This begins to give the player exposure to reading music, by making them work out how changes in notes vertically (on screen) are interpreted horizontally (on the keyboard).

I cannot possibly give the game complete justice here. But I have a demo version of the game available to show to parents, schools, music teachers and, well, anyone who is passionate about getting kids to play music and like doing it. Consider this a teaser. Let me know if it's piqued your interest. (Oh, by the way, the piano is just the start!)

L.Benito Guitars

L.Benito Guitar

The wood is what drew me to these guitars. Meeting Lito Benito, the luthier, and the really friendly team of people at the L.Benito display kept me interested. Playing the guitar for 20 minutes in the soundproof booth was fantastic and gave me even more reason for hanging around. But, by far, the best thing about my NAMM experience with these guitars was listening to two exceptional guitar players just sitting down for a jam. I just couldn't leave until they took a break.

Great Wood - Great Design

L.Benito acoustic guitars are made in Chile. Although they make guitars in traditional woods, too, the wood that caught my eye (and the one they're most proud of) is from 3000 year old Chilean native trees: Alerce. The wood has a rich, deep colour and beautiful grain. The harvest L.Benito uses was cut in 1973, so it has strength and age that make the resonance absolutely beautiful. The trees are now protected and so the world supply for guitars is fixed - what L.Benito has is all there is. The quality of the guitars is further enhanced in the workshop; to give you an idea of the instrument quality we're talking about here, Lito honed his craft at none other than Taylor Guitars in California where he eventually worked his way up to head luthier - not too shabby. The quality of the wood combined with excellent design and craftsmanship makes this guitar an absolute stand out in the world of acoustic guitars. The uniqueness of owning one in Australia would just make me the envy of all guitar enthusiasts. I will continue my lessons so that I might one day deserve to own this guitar.

Unfortunately, we can't get any of the above products in Australia today, though rumour has it that 500 Fender G-DECs have been ordered and will be available later this year. But hey, if the SpinSlide or the Piano Wizard or the L.Benito guitars grabbed your attention - just let me know. I made connections with all of them, and I'm happy to introduce you to them.

Do you want any products that aren't available in Australia? Write to us and let us know your story. How did you hear about the product? Why do you want it? How have you tried to get it? We want to know.

Affordable 24 Track Digital Recording: The Tascam 2488

The Snapshot

Reasons to go digital:

* Improve recording quality - No hiss!
* Save time! - No rewind and fast forward time – instant reset to exactly where you want to be on the track
* Preserve your material – No degradation of quality or disintegration of material like you get with tape or vinyl

Who should use it?

* Young bands who don’t want to spend more money paying other people to put together their recordings or demos
* Anyone wanting to upgrade from analog to digital
* Professionals who need a simple, yet high quality way to produce demos before going into the studio

Strengths of the Tascam 2488:

* Tascam is a company known for its solid Portastudio home recording range
* Value for price – Currently retailing for less than A$100 per track, this is by far the most affordable 24 track digital recording equipment on the market
* Not bleeding edge technology – Tascam didn’t introduce this model early – they waited a few years more than others - the result is reduced bugs and improved functionality at a great price

Weaknesses:

* It’s not “point and shoot” – the advanced functions bring a level of complexity to running the system – but it’s not for beginners

The Detailed Review

The Metro Gnome went to The Guitar Hive in Ashfield to meet with professional musician, Ben Little, and to talk about his new toy, the Tascam 2488 Digital Portastudio™. When I arrived, Ben was leaning over the Tascam tweaking a few levels and punching a few buttons while his freshly recorded song was playing.

We do unconventional reviews at The Metro Gnome. We also publish more conventional ones. And we invite manufacturers to provide information about their own products in this section of The Metro Gnome.

Ben got the Tascam about 2 months ago, and between his active playing schedule, guitar students, and other activities, he hasn’t spent as much time with it as he would have liked. But he has written and recorded a song in that time and has a lot to share about how things are going so far.

Since the early 90s, Ben has recorded on a Tascam 488 – an analogue 8 - track unit that has served him well. The limitations of the older technology and the advantages of digital are what made Ben invest in the 2488. Besides only having 8 tracks, the unit only had 2 effects loops – a limitation the 2488 completely eliminates. Ben still uses the 488 and plans to for some time to come. “I have 12 years of songs and ideas recorded that can only be played on that machine. It’s a great archive.”

If he needs to, Ben can record the songs (or the individual tracks) from his analogue system to his computer as wave files and then can upload them to the 2488. This is a benefit of the set-up that Ben uses – he doesn’t use the Tascam 2488 alone – he uses it in conjunction with a program called WAVELAB on his computer.

We talked for a little while about how Ben is learning to use the 2488. His first bit of advice, simple and obvious, in a clear, unwavering voice, was to, “Read the fucking manual.” But even so, it seems that the only way to really learn how to use it is through trial and error.

Online forums are a great way to learn about the intricacies using of a new piece of equipment (or for investigating what equipment to buy). For the Tascam 2488 I found quite a few worthwhile forums. Here are 2 that had some pretty good content on them….

* http://www.tascam2488.com/
* http://www.homerecording.com/bbs/forumdisplay.php?f=11

So far Ben estimates that he’s spent about 5 hours on one song (including some general getting-to-know-you time) with the 2488 and he’s pretty happy with the results. But he knows that to record an album of his own material he’ll need to be able to use the 2488 as if it was second nature. So he plans on scheduling some time each week to dedicate himself to learning how the 2488 works. “I will be really confident with the functionality before I invite other musicians to record. Recording time should be spent on creating great music – if I have to concentrate too hard on the basics of capturing it – well, it’s a waste of everyone’s time.”

In each issue, Gnome Recording will cover different elements of the How To’s of recording. We’ll cover engineering, recording, mixing, mastering, producing, and (importantly) marketing. We’ll show you the best websites to visit and take you from the basics through to how the Pro’s do it. Stay tuned. And make sure you’ve subscribed to The Metro Gnome so you don’t miss out.

Ben then showed me how it all worked. His recording has 1 track with lead vocals and two with backing vocals. Then he has four tracks of guitar; one lead guitar, one guitar with chorus effects, and two grungy rhythm tracks. One track for bass and finally, three tracks for drums. One carries the bass drum and the top hat, which Ben says is a bit unconventional, but he did it this way this time…. The other one is for the snare drum. All done with an Alesis SR-16 drum machine, which Ben uses to create demos.

Ben can manipulate each track extensively, and he demonstrated a few techniques to me. For example, he isolated the bass guitar and the lead guitar and showed me how the lows on the rhythm guitars were conflicting with the bass line. So he tweaked them to eliminate the lows. This is basic recording stuff and I expect that every system can do it, but the Tascam menus were easy to understand and the interface was really easy to use.

I learned that each track can actually hold up to ten ‘virtual’ tracks on the Tascam, but once you want to “lay it down”, you choose one.

Ben wrote this song with particular vocal artist in mind and the Tascam 2488 is giving him to opportunity to share his vision for the song with that artist. “When he [the other artist] heard the song, he said that he liked it. He asked me to add some fiddle and take out the lead vocal – that way he could add his own vocal to it.”

The only trouble Ben has had with the 2488 was in getting the CD writer to write. He worked around it for now (again he has the advantage of being connected to his computer and can easily send information from the 2488 to his DVD burner) and he’s convinced that it is a user problem rather than an equipment problem. But it was a frustrating roadblock and one he hadn’t expected. “I’ll figure it out,” he said, but you could tell he had spent more time on it already than he wanted to.

Overall, Ben is very pleased with the Tascam 2488. He knows he has a lot more to learn about how to use it, but he’s confident in his purchase decision. Based on what he’s told me so far, I reckon it’s a good machine for the money and that musicians experienced in recording will get a great deal of value out of it. It certainly isn’t for a novice – functionality-wise or budget-wise.

I think we’ll have visit with Ben again in a few months to see how he’s going on his album.

The Manufacturer’s Feature List for the Tascam 2488 Digital Portastudio

* 24-track recording at 44.1kHz/24-bit
* 36-channel mixer
* 3-band EQ on 24 channels, 8 inputs and tone generator with high and low sweepable shelving bands and full parametric mid band
* 3 aux sends on all channels except the effects return
* Loop effect provides reverb, delay, chorus and more on an aux send and return
* Up to 8 assignable dynamics processors for compression during recording or mixdown
* Assignable guitar multi-effects processor for distortion, flange, and more
* Dedicated stereo compressor on the stereo output
* 8 inputs: 4 XLR with phantom power, 4 - 1/4" mic/line inputs
* 20 - 45mm faders including master fader
* Large LCD display for viewing meters and edit parameters
* CD-RW drive to record mixdown, import/export WAV files and backup hard drive
* 64-voice General MIDI sound module
* Standard MIDI file player
* High-speed USB 2.0 jack connects to PC for data backup and SMF/WAV file transfer

Do you have feedback about this review? Or do you want to ask a question or make a comment about the Tascam 2488? Click here to go to the Musician’s Forum and post a comment.

Gnome Links:

* For more information on the Tascam 2488 Digital Portastudio go to:
o http://www.tascam.com/Products/2488.html
* You can read about the Alesis drum machine that Ben uses for demos here:
o http://www.alesis.com/products/sr16/
* Wavelab 5 by Steinberg is audio editing software. The manufacturer’s specs are here:
o http://www.steinberg.net/ProductPage_sb.asp?Product_ID=2181&Langue_ID=7