Winter NAMM 2017 (ultra Pic-heavy)

[emjazz]

It is.

 

[mngnt]

Wot's dees?

View attachment 1037145

This is very interesting.

Pulled from B&H site:

Highlights

• EQ Pedal with Vintage-Console Tone
• 100% Analog MOSFET Circuitry
• High-/Low-Shelving Knobs & HPF/LPF Knobs
• 2 x Midrange Knobs with Selectable Mids
• 1 x 1/4" Input
• Input Suitable for High-/Low-Impedances
• 1/4" Output with +10 dB Pad
• 1 x XLR Output with -20 dB Pad
• 1 x 1/4" Parallel Output
• Accepts 9V Battery & Phantom Power

Features
Designed to give you vintage-console tone in a stompbox enclosure, the Tech 21 Q/Strip is a DI pedal putting many EQ selectors at your disposal. The unit gives you two parametric midrange bands with selectable midrange frequency knobs, as well as knobs to instantiate broad boosts or cuts in the highs and lows. Also included are high-pass and low-pass filters for cutting out unwanted rumble and undesired high-end respectively.

The pedal uses 100% analog MOSFET circuitry to achieve its warm, larger-than-life tones, and indeed, can be used to recreate the frequency curves of different speaker cabinets, making the pedal especially useful as a DI which can allow you to bypass an amplifier onstage and go straight into the house's PA in live scenarios—even while you're using your favorite stompbox distortions, overdrives, effects, and more. With a 1/4" output, a 1/4" parallel output, and an XLR out, you have many options when it comes to routing yourself. With a versatile 1/4" input stage, you can plug in both high- and low-impedance instruments.

• Features at a Glance
  • High-pass filter for cutting unmusical rumble
  • Low-pass filter for rolling off undesirable high frequencies
  • EQ can recreate the curves of speaker cabinets to facilitate direct connection to the house in live scenarios
  • Input works equally well with high- and low-impedance sources
  • Parallel 1/4" output, quite handy for studio use
  • +10 dB pad on 1/4" output, -20 dB pad on XLR output
  • Operable via 9V battery (available separately), external power supply (likewise) and phantom power (through XLR jack)
  • Smooth-action actuators
  • All-metal housing

 

[Madhouse27]

First of all, a huge thank you to wintremute and the other contributors for the awesome reporting and all the great pics. I lifted a few to include with my comments.

One thing I'm really excited about is the Hammersmith K Series basses. I've got a feeling they're going to have their hands full after this show.

I've said it before, but Schecter really needs to bring back the Stargazer!

I liked the LTD photo spread. I've never played one, but they certainly make some good looking stuff. The black and white ones are in the $499 price range!

 

[maverick49]

Thanks to @wintremute for great coverage.

I went yesterday, lots of beautiful, cool stuff. Visited Hammersmith - @MarkoYYZ I think I may need to order a K!

Saw some guitar heroes like Lukather, Morse, Petrucci. My favorite event was a clinic by Juan Alderete at the Ampeg booth. Such a down to earth guy and he can create some fantastic inspiring noise with his genius and pedals. Damn if I am not half deaf now as I was sitting in front of the V4 rig! Juan did NOT help my gas for pedals at all! Lots of EarthQuaker, Godlyke, and vintage pedal goodness. Here are some lame pics of his pedal board.

 

[MYLOWFREQ]

And the "TB Journalism Award 2017" goes to... Wintremute!!!

 

[/\/\3phist0]

And some other bass dude looking on......

Ok last guess.
Bob Daisley?

 

[JFLbass]

Demeter Flip-top. 400 or 800 watts. Your choice.

Wow!!! Is it a sealed 15" cabinet design??? This is awesome!!!!!

 

[Munjibunga]

Wow!!! Is it a sealed 15" cabinet design??? This is awesome!!!!!

Yes it is. And the amp compartment is sealed so there is no air leakage from under the cover.

 

[Munjibunga]

If you look closely, you can see Stevie Wonder. Skeptical bodyguard is skeptical.

 

[silvertone]

Stevie stumbles into someone singing Superstition...
(Grabbed from a Facebag post):

 

[wintremute]

I thought I was going to be trapped in LA. Flash floods and freeways closed. But right now I'm taking a quick break in Barstow, and then back on tbe road.

 

[nostatic]

I drove from Santa Monica down to Anaheim around 8:30am this morning, did a quick hit, then got out of the show before noon. Was a good decision, got home in time to watch a bunch of rain fall. Safe travels - especially over the I15 summit towards Vegas. I was coming back from CES last year and drove through a nasty snow storm at night. One of the few times I've been genuinely scared while driving - and I used to race cars

 

[Jigmay]

If, at the end of the 21st Century, we can't look back at the beginning of the century and call it The Golden Age of Electroc Bass Luthierie, I'll eat my hat.

If I could walk out with one bass, it would be a Rick Turner ABG. A true original in his approach, and his instruments play, sound and feel like no others.

 

[funkymonk13]

Thanks to @wintremute for great coverage.

I went yesterday, lots of beautiful, cool stuff. Visited Hammersmith - @MarkoYYZ I think I may need to order a K!

Saw some guitar heroes like Lukather, Morse, Petrucci. My favorite event was a clinic by Juan Alderete at the Ampeg booth. Such a down to earth guy and he can create some fantastic inspiring noise with his genius and pedals. Damn if I am not half deaf now as I was sitting in front of the V4 rig! Juan did NOT help my gas for pedals at all! Lots of EarthQuaker, Godlyke, and vintage pedal goodness. Here are some lame pics of his pedal board.

View attachment 1037306 View attachment 1037307 View attachment 1037308 View attachment 1037309

Awesome man. Did you get to check out the Earthquaker devices booth? They make some cool pedals. I woulda loved to see those demos with Juan, Nick Reinhart and Jonathan Hishcke

 

[Passinwind]

So yesterday when I was leaving NAMM but had to check out just one more booth...well, it appears that I was chatting with @Passinwind and didn't know it!

That was pretty hilarious. Thanks a ton for all the pics of stuff I never got to see myself at the show. I really enjoyed talking with you as well.

 

[ashtray]

Closer pic of Stevie Wonder, courtesy of my brother:

 

[FingerDub]

Stevie stumbles into someone singing Superstition...
(Grabbed from a Facebag post):

All the best things about music, right there in that clip.

 

[ashtray]

Carrots! NAMM has everything!

 

[wintremute]

Made it home safe. I'll try to post the rest of the photos tomorrow. Yes, there's a lot of Fender.

Here's a teaser...you'll never guess who I had my photo taken with at the Hamersmith booth!

 

[Tslicebass]

First off, hats off to Wintremute, he's pulling more than double duty with the pictures compared to the rest of us combined.

Saturday was a bit more relaxed for me, rather than jetting around the place on my own trying to see as much as possible, I took my time with a friend of mine and looked at a few items more extensively.

First up: Lowdown Basses.

This is a new company based out of Chicago that makes more affordable custom basses. Prices ranged from 1500-2500. They caught my eye on Friday and I made it a point to come back Saturday after talking with their luthier Tim Seisser for a bit. Glad I did. They have a kind of rugged elegance to them, with all the grainy wood and nothing but oil finishes. When I sat down with them a played a while, I immediately noticed how comfortable they were, in the sense of a broken in catchers mitt or a favorite pair of shoes. the wood finish felt wonderful; the feel of lightly oiled grain under your hands lends a sense of groundedness with the instrument. Your body is more able to intuit what it's doing with the instruments when you have that extra sensory feedback. The neck was nice - slightly wider fretboard with a comfy back and 34" spacing made playing naturally easy without having to get used to it. They sounded superb - I could easily get an aggressive roar out of them, or dial it back to a mellow thump with a turn of the tone knob. It's worth noting that the two that I played were passive; just a volume, pickup selector, and tone. I'm usually dead-set on active circuitry, but for once I didn't feel like the basses needed them in the slightest. They sounded great by default.

I immediately got the impression that these are working-man's instruments, not meant to be particularly showy, ostentatious, or absurdly polished (though they certainly are pretty), but something you can take on the road with you and enjoy without fuss. It's worth noting that Tim said that this was the explicit design philosophy behind them, which he nailed. Color me impressed - this is a company to watch in the future for sure.

In the same booth were the SonicFarm amps, which also sounded wonderful. I didn't really play around with them too much, I was more focused on the basses, but I managed to grab a blurry shot of them:

Somebody requested more Sandberg shots, so I tried to get some more I may have missed.

Equilibrium Guitars. These were designed with the modern-day shredder in mind: slim, quick neck and jumbo frets that made zooming and tapping around the fretboard easy as pie. The active electronics made it easy to dial in an aggressive middy tone perfect for any modern day metal band. These kind of gave the opposite impression of the LowDown basses: smooth and sleek and waiting to unleash whatever wanky mayhem you can think of. I liked them

speaking of wanking, here's a final shot of yours truly noodling away on that Sandberg puzzle bass:

After two full days at the convention, I'm all NAMM'd out for this year. I'm going to enjoy a quiet rainy sunday and let my feet recover. Turns out Converse aren't the proper shoe for walking around 10 hours a day

Thanks for coming by the booth icon. That converse foot is a real thing. I found out the hard way they are not great in the rain either.