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Looper's Delight
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Interesting topic. For a really long time, I was basically studio bound. Racks and floor pedals and everything. Crazy. Since it was all in my hermetically sealed world, it was fine. Then I tried to play out. It was a disaster. I basically tried to move my studio into someone's living room to play a party. It was overwhelming. Also, I was not used to the tear down/set up deal. I used to play out all the time, but all I had was a double rack, amp and a foot controller. Set up was simple. I realized I had to go back to that, or something in between. So I began the big "thinning." What did I use? What could go away and not be missed? Did I need everything at every gig? I noticed that with the addition of a real synth (not the shit sounds that the GR-30 comes with. I could get rid of things like the Spacestation. Did I need to make my guitar sound like a synth when I had a synth? Slowly but surely I got it down to one 6 space rack (Digitech 2120, Repeater, MPX1, and a XV-5050 synth module) , a controller for the guitar multieffects, and a midi controller for the Repeater. Two expression pedals, one for the GR-30, one for the Lexicon MPX1. Oh yeah, and an FS300 for the Repeater. Throw in the Alesis Air FX and Air Synth and... I still had TOO FUCKING MUCH! But I could deal with it, if I had the 30 min I needed to set up. Lights help. I suck at setting up in the dark. Problem was I'm just not willing to put in the 2 hours it takes to do all the break down and set up (add a half hour or so for good measure) to play an hour or so. Definitely NOT appropriate for a festival where you have 5 min to set up. So I've now kind of reverted. I still will drag the big rig out to big gigs. However, when I'm going to jam with a friend, or play a festival, the rack and it's pals stay home. Guitar, GNX2, Repeater, AirFX, Amp. Maybe the GR-30 from time to time, but probably not. My set up is great. Last Sunday I played with Big City Orchestra at the NorCal Noise Fest. I was up and running in under 10 minutes. One of our bandmates, decided that no amount of pleading was going to get him to pare down his rig. He brought it all and tried to set it up on a table outside the dinky cafe and then bring it all in pre set up. Of course, we all had so sit and wait 15 min while he figured out why we weren't getting any signal from him. I internally smiled and thought, "that used to be me. I'm such a smug bastard." Lucky for all of us, a band dropped out and we had extra setup time, so it didn't really effect us. If it had, he would have taken half of our playing time with is routing problem. So... moral of this story? Bring what is appropriate for each gig. I can now go to a cafe and set up in under 10 minutes and take up the space of a twotop. Size matters. I can also pull out the big guns if I know I have 2 hours to fill. If you can get your rig to 4 things, not including your instrument, I'd say your golden in either situation. One of those "things" could be a rack of gear including a poweramp. Remember, that means you can have less effects in your rack, and need to still have a speaker cab. (or two if you're stereo) Same goes for my Digitech 2120. It does a lot more then the GNX2, but it takes the same floor space AND two rack spaces. Same for the Repeater. It would rock if the Repeater was in a box like the Boomerang, but I think they were thinking of the DJ/Electronica market. As a bonus for me, I'm finding that my Hartke Kickback Bass amp sounds great for guitar after the GNX2 and great for my bass. Little A/B switch and I'm doing double duty and I've only tacked on another 5 min max for set up time. Mark Sottilaro On Saturday, September 28, 2002, at 02:11 AM, Louie Angulo wrote: > Hoi there, > I was used to playing with a guitar, a couple of stomp > boxes and an amp, but since i got the EDP,repeater and > Roland GP100 ,well, is turned into a rack.I am still > using all of this with my tube amp but i am debating > on replacing it with a power amp and 2 speakers.What > are the pros and cons or trade offs in terms of sound > and do you have any suggestions on specific brands?I > wanna keep having the punch of my tube amp of course! > thanx > Louie > > ===== > > > __________________________________________________ > Do you Yahoo!? > New DSL Internet Access from SBC & Yahoo! > http://sbc.yahoo.com >