Re: Zoom 508 delay vs. Steinway pianos vs. Klein guitars

[mgsam@wave.net]

Thank you TW Hartnett and Kevin Simpson for your provocative replies; we
love good feedback.

Gathering our loop adled thoughts, we must first apologize for the typos in
the previous post.

Second, we bring up the example of the proverbial five year old, because we
have found that on stage with an audience staring us in the face, we have
the intellectual and emotional resources available to the average five year
old.  Furthermore, we find that this isn't unusual for live musicians.
Granted we have not administered a round of Piaget developmental tests to
hundreds of musicians...but you get our point...live means stress, stress
means a reduced ability to cope with awkwardly designed, poorly layed out
equipment.  Stress on stage can mean tears, fist pounding, and a pronounced
inability to read, let alone find directions.  Sounds like a five year old,
doesn't it?

On the other hand, both posters underestimate the acuity of your average
five year old in non-stress situation.  Ever seen one whip out something in
Kid pix on a Mac or a Windows pc with a mouse?  They get technology real
fast when it's well designed.

We do regret the price point comparison that our post inevitably brought
up.  No, a Klein guitar and a Steinway aren't in the same price range as a
Zoom 508 (duh), but we were thinking about the resources available to the
designers of these critters.

When Henry Steinway and his boys built the ultimate piano, they had several
years of experience building more conventional "box" piano in Germany and
the feedback from players and builders.  They listened and thought about
their tradition and the musical ends.  Interestingly, it's reported that
Henry was losing his hearing and part of the reason the Steinways created
the then radical soundboard was the need to make the piano loud enough so
he could hear the notes being played in a 19th century concert hall.  At
the same time, one of his sons had become interested in the new science of
acoustics developing in Germany.  (Incidentally, T.W., far from being a
"simple analogue device," a Steinway has several thousand parts.  It's the
INTERFACE that's simple and intuitive, not the instrument itself.)  But
back to the point...there were indeed centuries of experience and feedback
from musicians and builders that finally contributed to this seminal
design, but it was a family that paid close attention to the needs of
players and their audience who got it right.  There were also happy
accidents that just don't seem to happen much in the corporate world,
unless the corporation is really working on finding those accidents (like
3M with Post-its).

As for Steve Klein.  The guitars that bear his name are built in a
barn...literally.  The impetus for his ergonomic design came after years of
thinking about the guitar and player's needs.  It was also the marriage
with Ned Steinbergers innovative and brilliant tuning system that created
the beast.  Again, two individuals obsessed with good design, the player's
needs, and paying attention.

Now, how much money do you think the people at ZOOM have to spend on
product development as compared to a 19th century immigrant family living
in New York in the 1850s, or a single offbeat and brilliant designer and
guitar builder living in California?

We would dare speculate that Zoom has much more in the way of resources and
cold hard cash.  And we don't see any contradiction in profit and good
design.  If the product is intuitive and easy to use, it should sell MORE
and open up a bigger market.  But excuse our cynicism, we think the impetus
behind the Zoom 508 is the need to roll over the product line before the
next Namm show. Unlike Klein and Steinway they have new models every
year...and isn't it amazing that with all that practice they just can't
quite seem to get it right!  Could they be in the business of musical
consumerism instead of the business of musical instrument making? ;)

We don't think the people that put the Zoom 508 out have ever looped
onstage live, or talked much to musicians who have.  We think they think
about margins, inventory, volume and product placement.  They could be
selling electric shavers just as easily as so called musical devices.  And
we are stunned that given the prior fifty years of recording that Zoom and
others of their ilk can't make their machines more intuitive.  And really,
at four seconds of delay and with a lousy interface, plus you gotta pay
extra for the pedal, is this thing REALLY a bargain?  Will it help the
musician make music or turn him off because of the limitations?  Would a
musician do better to save his pennies and spend the $550 bucks at Sam Ash
to get a hold of the Oberheim? (And as we mentioned before, we have our
gripes about our Echoplex too, but it's a thoughtful and sometimes
brilliant effort at creating a musical instrument, and not must an offering
to the alters of guitar consumerism).

In summation, we don't care whether the technology behind a musical
instrument is analogue or digital.  We don't care about price points.  The
LoOpDoctOrs want to make live music and we want the best tools available,
so spare us worrying about the suits at Zoom and their parituclar
corporate/technological  constraints. At the $100 price point you can find
Casio watches and car stereo units that are just as complex in their menu
driven choices as the Zoom 508 but much more intuitively designed, and yes,
a child can figure these things out very quickly indeed.

Finally we would love it if the folks at Zoom would study the evolution of
the Steinway piano and the Klein guitar and then think, real hard, about
how it might apply to their products.  (hee hee, can't you just see the
Zoom guys showing up for their tour of the Steinway factory of the Klein
barn?)  Better yet, think about the human body, the human mind, the human
ear and the human hand and what they need need to make music.  And you
don't have to just go to analogue instrument makers for instruction
either...how about some of the hipper software designers out there?

As far as next year's model for next year's Namm show...Zoom, do your
interface homework and skip the show. ;)

Best,
The LoOpDoctOrs