I've Gone LIVE !

I had been recording with Tracktion 3 for the past few months. It was the first DAW I had played with and it was really easy to put together some decent tracks. I decided to up the capabilities using Ableton Live 7.

It was a bit ackward at first but I'm starting to get the hang of it. What I like is how you can really tweak your clips and tracks to do exactly what you want.

I've recorded two tracks to pract lately:
Whole Lot of Rosie (AC/DC) and Shout At The Devil (Motley Crue)

Keep on rockin'.

I gots me a tele!

So I had never really liked the looks of the Telecaster, but my buddy bought a cheap Squier Telecaster for fun a few months ago and I tried it and really liked it. It just felt "bluesy" and so light. I got to liking the looks more and more in the past months.I was looking at my local online classifieds at work mid afternoon when I saw this Fender Standard (Mexican) Telecaster that looked sweet. The description said the guy was looking for the best offer over $300. The ad had been there for 2 weeks so just for fun I emailed him ... I can drop off $250 cash after work if you still have it. I wasn't expecting a reply back but he emailed me back telling me he'd accept and wanted to know how we could meet. I emailed back to call me on my cell, which he did like 5 minutes later. So he comes to meet me in the parking lot at the Bank where I work and we make the exchange ... all about within an hour of emailing him. Check it:

Orange!!!

After some deliberation ... I've decided to get this ...



More explanations later ...

The Studio

I had been looking for a cheap second LCD monitor for my little studio and stumbled upon a $180 20" monitor at Business Depot. I set it up pretty quickly. The main purpose is to have my main Interface (either Tracktion 3.0 or Ableton Liv 7.0) in one window and other software I rund at the same time in another window: Beatcraft (drums), Gear Box (edit the tones on my POD X3), and Guitar Pro (tab software to learn music). I've a nice little set up now. Check it out:

POD X3 Gets a Computer Interface!

Finally! It's here!!!

I bought a POD X3 back in January of this year. I only found after I had received it that the computer interface (Gearbox) wasn't available to the public yet, despite releasing the X3 in October of '07. I loved editing my previous POD, the POD XT Live, with the Line 6 Edit software. After visiting the site daily to get updates on the status of the release, I saw Friday they finally released it and I'm so relieved! I was growing tired of editing my tones with the knobs on the unit itself. Here are some screen shots showing the guitar amp selections and some guitar settings. What a joy to have drop-down menus again!:

Another thing I missed immensely was the public site that holds tones that other players upload to the server. I'm currently working on Whole Lot of Rosie by AC/DC and I found the perfect Angus Young tone in no time. I didn't even have to tweak it! I'm going to have to do a quick read through of the manual but I really like what I see so far.

The Taxman Cometh ...

I got my income tax return this week, so I picked up the acoustic/electric Guitar I had set aside at my guitar shop. It's an Ovation CK047 FKOA. The top is made of koa wood. It's looks real rich and darkish. I friggin' love it!!! It cost $580, which was real decent.

I tried a bunch of acoustics and this one totally stood out for me, sound wise. The look of it is super hot too. What I like is I can really noodle on it like an electric guitar, since the neck is pretty slim and the action is a lot lower than the crap acoustic I borrowed from my mom ... shhhhhh . You can hear legatos really clear on it. The onboard tuner is the sh1t too; real smooth to operate.

I recorded with it a bit through my POD X3 but I'll have to twiddle with it to get a clean amp + I can't be sitting in front of my computer and studio monitors like I do with my electrics, since the sound from the speakers goes in the guitar, through the pick up, feedback. Anyhoo ... check it out:

I got my son a Gibson!!!

My son (Samuel, 4 years old) got a Gibson guitar for Easter!

I bought him a Gibson Power Tour electric guitar. We went checking out the ladies in the mall while my wife and daughter did the groceries. We ended up going to Toy R Us. He comes running to me " Dad dad dad! A guitar like you!". I told him maybe the Easter Bunny could bring him one. On Sunday morning the Easter bunny brought him one!

They go for about $70, which I never would have paid. I didn't even look at what it did on the box. I thought it was one of those toy guitars that plays tunes and does sound effects. I just found it too cool to resist at the sale price of $19.99. I have a white Les Paul. This is the SG model; close enough.

When we got it I realized that you can actually play guitar with it. You have 12 frets. Open is A, First fret A#, etc. You can play cool stuff like Iron Man and Breaking the Law. My son just likes to shred on it. On him, it looks like a full sized guitar on an adult. It has Heavy Metal, Punk, Indie and Rock settings.

Maybe I'll try to post a video later of him shredding it out!

Check out Youtube for some videos of people playing with it.