A very popular and incredibly expensive amp [Dumble] is sought out by many guitarists, until they learn the price. The last one I saw was listed at $50k, but I've heard that's not the most expensive. Users include Stevie Ray Vaughan (not anymore), Robben Ford, Larry Carlton, Ben Harper, and others. Dumble did some magic with the preamp to make a tone that's distorted at lower volumes and sounds great. You're not likely to get a new one these days, so others have stepped in, including Bludotone, Two Rock, and others, including Ceriatone, where you can get yours in kit form or magnificently built.
Carlton and Ford realized it was expensive to tote amps around Europe, so sometimes they found other ways. Ford used the Zendrive pedal, which is available in a few different forms and versions. There are so many Dumble-like pedals, it's near impossible to decide. Even the very cheap knockoffs can be had for well under $100. Here's where your work comes in: you need to research the pedals, whether locally, loan, or YouTube. YouTube is indispensable for hearing equipment. Whatever it is, someone put several demos on YouTube. The best video, in my opinion (it's my damn blog), is That Pedal Show's shootout of 7 pedals claiming D-tone. Let's ignore the fact that none of us have Dumbles and we may not be able to identify the tone. The guys thoroughly go through the pedals, that range from about $140 to about $600. The funniest/saddest entry was the combination of the Blues Driver and GE-7 Equalizer, which got them into the general neighborhood. The pedals were all pretty good, but I liked The Dude; for its similarity and tone in general.
At this level, we're subject to the 80/20 price/performance triple-tone Special Rule<tm>. This is where all the pedals sound great and close to their mark, but how much more are you willing to spend to sound the closest? I couldn't rationalize $600 for a pedal, so I waited for a good deal on a Dude. The Mad Professor Simble is another winner, to my ears, just from listening on YouTube. The aforementioned 80/20 price/performance triple-tone Special Rule<tm> also demands you look at the input and output jacks. You have to see whether they're on the front or the side of the box... this determines part of the tone*. I'm not going to give it away - do the research. * I made that up
Special mention to Wampler. Everything I've seen of theirs is high quality and sounds great. Their entry was the Euphoria. Let's not even speak of the Marshall pedals... tons to sound like every version of Marshall. Hint: listen to the MI Audio Super Crunch Box.
The first thing I noticed was The Dude was a lot smaller than I expected.
I have no idea why I expected a larger pedal, but there it is. I like big pedals - they're much harder to fit on pedalboards, and cause other guitarists to have fits. If you can't cause fits with your pedals, you have to do it with your playing. I am doubly talented, in that I can cause fits with either. The pedal is also very solid, which is great as a weapon if the crowd (or other band members) attacks. Because The Dude traveled so far to get to my house, I let it sit in its box for 24 hours, to settle in and adjust its mojo to my house. If you play it too early, it may not have its mojo set yet, or use the mojo from its prior owner. Do you really want a pedal with mojo from Utah? Well, maybe you do... Utah is run by the Mormons, but consumes the most traffic from Pornhub of any state.
Where was I?
Oh yeah, Duding.
I assume you can power the pedal with a battery, but I wouldn't bother. It could take a week to get it open. Who uses batteries anyway? Ok, Eric Johnson prefers his batteries at 7v, but we're not Eric Johnson, are we? [If we are Eric Johnson, send me a message - we have things to discuss.] The pedal is black.. I hope I don't offend anybody by saying that. The writing is white, and I don't imagine it will show up well onstage. Since I rarely get onstage, it's a moot point. My wife would prefer a mute point.
I've been playing guitar since after the Moon landing, and I've collected huge amounts of Goodies. Naturally this means there is not a 9v adapter in the entire house. I think they hid when they heard I needed one. I just bought some other pedals and I know they needed adapters too. Nope - not one. So I discovered The Dude accepts a 9v battery, because I had to take one out of a different box, because we have no 9v batteries either. Do you see where this is going? I keep watching stuff leap off shelves at my wife. We're calling an exorcist later this week.
Fortunately The Dude works. I know this because the green light glowed. I never paid attention to LEDs until I got a Danelectro pedal with a piercing blue LED. The blue ones sound better than the green ones. Don't let anyone know I told you so. It will be our little tone secret, ok?
The YouTube demos get you the general idea, but you really have to play with something yourself (NO, don't do it) to get a real idea of how it handles. Let's start with the SRV fans: if you're buying this pedal to keep the gain all the way down and the volume up to overload your amp, you are going to be very disappointed. The volume control is heavily dependent on the gain control, so by the time you get much output, you have too much gain to cleanly overdrive your amp. This is the single warning I can pass along, but if you were that concerned, you'd have already bought a Tube Screamer, or one of the 666 variations of it.
Now for the fun part: the moment you plug in til the moment you have to be torn away from playing. This is a seriously fun pedal. Again, I have never played through a Dumble, but this pedal stands up well on its own. It has a very wide range of tones and way more gain than I thought it would. Forget using it for clean stuff or backing your guitar's volume to 2 - you'll just get less grit.
The Dude has 4 knobs: volume (volume), treble (treble), ratio (boost/gain), and deep (thick). They do more or less what you'd expect them to do. Deep is something you will need to play with. After playing around, I kept it at 9:00 because the tone got too 'large' above that setting. It probably wouldn't record well any higher. Most of your attention will be focused on the ratio control. It goes from Smooth all the way to Too Much. I wound up with it around 9:00 too. It starts with a smooth, silky tone, which the treble control can do very little to ruin. I test stuff out through my Marshall Code 25 because it's tiny, solid state, and some of the presets are anemic, to be polite. If it sounds good through this, it will love my real Marshall and Fenders. The tone is large, brown-ish and smooth overall. It gets larger and way distorted as you turn it up, but still brown-ish. I think the key is not to crank the treble knob. In fact, it's almost too heavy (for me) past 12:00. It's fat and chewy at all levels. It doesn't sound like any pedals (or amps) I have, and I have a few. It's hard to give you a 'sounds like.' It's more of an overdrive than anything else, with gain to spare.
Bottom line: buy the damn thing, used or new. If nothing else, it will give you a large, smooth tone to add to your palette. With a little tweaking, it will make you Larry Carlton and Robben Ford (assuming you can play like them). It's reasonably priced (roughly $140+ used, check Reverb) and music to my ears. I hate everything, so when I say something nice, it might be worth checking out. In the meantime, check out the reviews on YouTube. I want to make my own channel, but video isn't my specialty and I'm too ugly to appear on video, so I'd have to find a good looking person to front for me (Sofia Vergara, anyone?).
If you have any questions, ask in the comments.
I'll post further observations as I play with it more (don't you dare).
At some point, I'll A/B it with the Lovepedal Superlead (dimed Marshall tones). If I'm feeling particularly prickly that day, I'll A/B it with a phase shifter and a washboard.
Showing posts with label tone. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tone. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 29, 2020
Friday, May 3, 2019
Marshall CODE 25 - further reviewed
I've been playing with the CODE 25 a little more lately, so I thought I'd share my impressions. This begs the question who I'm sharing with, but let's ignore that for now, shall we?
In case you don't get guitar magazines in your cave in Outer Lower Cockerspanistan, you know this is a recent series from Marshall, of solid state modeling amps, available in (I think) 25, 50, and 100 watts, with different speaker configurations. The test box (this makes it sound like Marshall sent it to me for review, even though I bought it just like everyone else) is a CODE 25, which is 25 solid state watts (tube watts are louder [I'm making this up]) into an 8"(?) speaker.
Let me get this out before I continue: Real Men<tm> use tube amps and combinations of 12" speakers. Now my testosterone will remain intact, hopefully til the end of this segment.
DISCLAIMER: this is my opinion; you will disagree. Put your opinions on yer own blog, Chief. Better yet, leave a comment and we can discuss it like guitar players (children with expensive toys). I have some expensive toys, so my opinions are informed by them and a long time listening to tones. I am not comparing this amp to a hideously expensive vintage amp unless that's what it claims to sound like.
FEATURES
It's small and light. This alone is worth its weight (sorry).
There's built-in effects.
You can control more than is apparent with the Bluetooth app, via your phone. This is both handy and a gee-whiz, blinky light feature. If you have kids, let them play with the volume control on your phone, so that it makes your amp louder - they'll love it.
You can play with quite a few options, including basic amp, several cabinets, and lots of stompbox effects. I have not studied anything, so my experience is just twiddling knobs and seeing what the app could do. The variety of controls is pretty cool, and in theory, should be very helpful in setting up your tones for studio and gigging.
There's an MP3 player input, a headphone output (both 1/8"), as well as an USB connection.
Very bright, easy to read orange display
Warning: 25 watts is waaaay too loud for the living room
APPLICATION
The amp is used as a living room amp, so I'll see it there and continue to play often. The real amps are in the Amp Vault<tm>. There is no such thing as an Amp Vault<tm>, and even if there was, I couldn't afford one. The last amp to sit in its spot was a Fender Mustang I, an earlier version and Fender's offering of the modeling special. It will not leave the house or sit anywhere else.
TEST EQUIPMENT
C'mon - I plugged a guitar or two into it (mostly a Strat). WTF else do you want from me - see how it sounds in the bathtub? With the toaster?
SOUND
This is where the excrement hits the rotating device. I don't have an equal with which to compare it, so I have to put it up against what it claims to do and how it claims to sound.
The amp suffers from some sort of tonal adjustment malfunction throughout the presets, of which there are 99. It's very trebly, to be polite. You'll have no trouble cutting through the din. Unfortunately I don't like this, so there was a lot of playing with the Bass/Mid/Treble knobs. Perhaps it's different with a different speaker in the 50 or 100 watt models, but I'm not going to find out.
There have been serious advances in digital sound and tones over the years. Don't forget - the first digital devices suffered horribly from latency... it took an amount of time for your signal to get from the guitar to the amp (or MIDI device), so there was an appreciable delay. The delay is gone, thankfully.
The amp models in the presets are largely Marshall simulations, as one would expect. They have some resemblance to their namesakes, but not a lot. Usually the presets are the most gee-whiz, over the top sounds you can find, which wasn't really the case here. I have to admit there are some really cool heavily saturated tones, for sitting in the living room and plinking away.
I suspect this would be a good amp to have when you're recording at 1am and have to get some sound to 'tape' with moderate tone. Some of the tones might fit well into tracks, but I haven't tried as yet.
Does it like effects?
No.
Correction: it likes its own effects just fine. I tried a Hughes&Kettner Rotosphere (Leslie emulator pedal) and a Lovepedal Superlead. Ironically, the Superlead is intended to mimic the tone of a cranked Marshall, which it does pretty well (better than some of the amp patches). Gain pedals are just not going to work, whether using a clean or dirty patch, because the amp distortion is all generated digitally, inside the amp, which doesn't operate the same way we're used to with our 'regular' amps. The Rotosphere fared better. I guess if I were into the whole low weight, high convenience thing, I'd use the internal phaser instead, and leave the pedals home.
Is it sensitive to input? Can the guitar's volume make a big difference in tone?
Not really.
I tried a heavily distorted patch that I liked, then tried backing down the guitar's volume. I had to back it down really far and the tone just got skinny and plinky. A less-distorted patch had greater success, but not what I'd prefer to hear. Some of the patches are sensitive to which pickup you use. Let's say that when you use the front pickup of a Les Paul and the amp sounds like an icepick, you might want to avoid the rear pickup. You also might want to re-engineer the patch.
The amp has a noise gate, which is very tricky to adjust. With a high gain patch, there will be high gain noise (it's physics). The gate starts out adjusted to shut down the signal pretty early, which is a good thing. It's worth playing with, though, because you don't want to shut down too fast.
How does it SOUND, stupid?
For sitting in the living room, it's just fine, thank you.
Against any of my tube amps - NFW. The amp needs to be more responsive. There's a certain 'give' in a tube amp, where you can alter tone with the way you play and by adjusting the guitar's volume. This is missing entirely. There's no give, no air. If you were to put this amp up against any of my regular amps, you'd hear and feel the difference. There's no dynamics... just a patch. Stated differently, it mimics amps but doesn't do the full impression.
The above is my complaint about non-tube amps from day one.
You can call me a Tube Snob all you like, but why do you think all the manufacturers are trying to make their modern, non-tube amps sound like tube amps? It's part of their advertising pitch - "You get all the tube tone with none of the heat and weight."
Mind you, they've come a long way, and it's perfectly suited as a living room or basic practice amp. If you like the tones, it's just fine for you, even playing live. Make sure you have your patches set up on a footswitch, because you'll need different ones for lead and different songs.
It has long been said that the most difficult tone to emulate is a slightly dirty tube amp - between all out stack and clean. This is absolutely correct and you cannot make that happen with this amp.
LIVE
Would I gig with this amp?
Are you out of your f#&@ing mind?
Obviously I'd need the higher watt version, but that's less a problem than the sound.
I did gig with this amp, sorta. I did one song as a special guest and didn't want to bring a Serious Rig. I instantly regretted it. The top end emphasis didn't translate well through a p.a. (or onstage).
If you're interested, play one. Your opinion may differ from mine. It may be a godsend to you (and your back).
In case you don't get guitar magazines in your cave in Outer Lower Cockerspanistan, you know this is a recent series from Marshall, of solid state modeling amps, available in (I think) 25, 50, and 100 watts, with different speaker configurations. The test box (this makes it sound like Marshall sent it to me for review, even though I bought it just like everyone else) is a CODE 25, which is 25 solid state watts (tube watts are louder [I'm making this up]) into an 8"(?) speaker.
Let me get this out before I continue: Real Men<tm> use tube amps and combinations of 12" speakers. Now my testosterone will remain intact, hopefully til the end of this segment.
DISCLAIMER: this is my opinion; you will disagree. Put your opinions on yer own blog, Chief. Better yet, leave a comment and we can discuss it like guitar players (children with expensive toys). I have some expensive toys, so my opinions are informed by them and a long time listening to tones. I am not comparing this amp to a hideously expensive vintage amp unless that's what it claims to sound like.
FEATURES
It's small and light. This alone is worth its weight (sorry).
There's built-in effects.
You can control more than is apparent with the Bluetooth app, via your phone. This is both handy and a gee-whiz, blinky light feature. If you have kids, let them play with the volume control on your phone, so that it makes your amp louder - they'll love it.
You can play with quite a few options, including basic amp, several cabinets, and lots of stompbox effects. I have not studied anything, so my experience is just twiddling knobs and seeing what the app could do. The variety of controls is pretty cool, and in theory, should be very helpful in setting up your tones for studio and gigging.
There's an MP3 player input, a headphone output (both 1/8"), as well as an USB connection.
Very bright, easy to read orange display
Warning: 25 watts is waaaay too loud for the living room
APPLICATION
The amp is used as a living room amp, so I'll see it there and continue to play often. The real amps are in the Amp Vault<tm>. There is no such thing as an Amp Vault<tm>, and even if there was, I couldn't afford one. The last amp to sit in its spot was a Fender Mustang I, an earlier version and Fender's offering of the modeling special. It will not leave the house or sit anywhere else.
TEST EQUIPMENT
C'mon - I plugged a guitar or two into it (mostly a Strat). WTF else do you want from me - see how it sounds in the bathtub? With the toaster?
SOUND
This is where the excrement hits the rotating device. I don't have an equal with which to compare it, so I have to put it up against what it claims to do and how it claims to sound.
The amp suffers from some sort of tonal adjustment malfunction throughout the presets, of which there are 99. It's very trebly, to be polite. You'll have no trouble cutting through the din. Unfortunately I don't like this, so there was a lot of playing with the Bass/Mid/Treble knobs. Perhaps it's different with a different speaker in the 50 or 100 watt models, but I'm not going to find out.
There have been serious advances in digital sound and tones over the years. Don't forget - the first digital devices suffered horribly from latency... it took an amount of time for your signal to get from the guitar to the amp (or MIDI device), so there was an appreciable delay. The delay is gone, thankfully.
The amp models in the presets are largely Marshall simulations, as one would expect. They have some resemblance to their namesakes, but not a lot. Usually the presets are the most gee-whiz, over the top sounds you can find, which wasn't really the case here. I have to admit there are some really cool heavily saturated tones, for sitting in the living room and plinking away.
I suspect this would be a good amp to have when you're recording at 1am and have to get some sound to 'tape' with moderate tone. Some of the tones might fit well into tracks, but I haven't tried as yet.
Does it like effects?
No.
Correction: it likes its own effects just fine. I tried a Hughes&Kettner Rotosphere (Leslie emulator pedal) and a Lovepedal Superlead. Ironically, the Superlead is intended to mimic the tone of a cranked Marshall, which it does pretty well (better than some of the amp patches). Gain pedals are just not going to work, whether using a clean or dirty patch, because the amp distortion is all generated digitally, inside the amp, which doesn't operate the same way we're used to with our 'regular' amps. The Rotosphere fared better. I guess if I were into the whole low weight, high convenience thing, I'd use the internal phaser instead, and leave the pedals home.
Is it sensitive to input? Can the guitar's volume make a big difference in tone?
Not really.
I tried a heavily distorted patch that I liked, then tried backing down the guitar's volume. I had to back it down really far and the tone just got skinny and plinky. A less-distorted patch had greater success, but not what I'd prefer to hear. Some of the patches are sensitive to which pickup you use. Let's say that when you use the front pickup of a Les Paul and the amp sounds like an icepick, you might want to avoid the rear pickup. You also might want to re-engineer the patch.
The amp has a noise gate, which is very tricky to adjust. With a high gain patch, there will be high gain noise (it's physics). The gate starts out adjusted to shut down the signal pretty early, which is a good thing. It's worth playing with, though, because you don't want to shut down too fast.
How does it SOUND, stupid?
For sitting in the living room, it's just fine, thank you.
Against any of my tube amps - NFW. The amp needs to be more responsive. There's a certain 'give' in a tube amp, where you can alter tone with the way you play and by adjusting the guitar's volume. This is missing entirely. There's no give, no air. If you were to put this amp up against any of my regular amps, you'd hear and feel the difference. There's no dynamics... just a patch. Stated differently, it mimics amps but doesn't do the full impression.
The above is my complaint about non-tube amps from day one.
You can call me a Tube Snob all you like, but why do you think all the manufacturers are trying to make their modern, non-tube amps sound like tube amps? It's part of their advertising pitch - "You get all the tube tone with none of the heat and weight."
Mind you, they've come a long way, and it's perfectly suited as a living room or basic practice amp. If you like the tones, it's just fine for you, even playing live. Make sure you have your patches set up on a footswitch, because you'll need different ones for lead and different songs.
It has long been said that the most difficult tone to emulate is a slightly dirty tube amp - between all out stack and clean. This is absolutely correct and you cannot make that happen with this amp.
LIVE
Would I gig with this amp?
Are you out of your f#&@ing mind?
Obviously I'd need the higher watt version, but that's less a problem than the sound.
I did gig with this amp, sorta. I did one song as a special guest and didn't want to bring a Serious Rig. I instantly regretted it. The top end emphasis didn't translate well through a p.a. (or onstage).
If you're interested, play one. Your opinion may differ from mine. It may be a godsend to you (and your back).
Monday, December 15, 2014
Carlos Santana Does it Again - or Does He?
I'm sitting here, desperately trying to avoid doing anything productive and being incredibly successful. Part of the traditional activity of being incredibly successful at avoiding doing anything productive is the traditional activity of watching something on tv, or in my case, online. I'm what they call a cord-cutter; a person getting away from cable and using the 'net to watch whatever I want. So up pops a Santana concert and I'm glued to the computer, as a lifelong Santana fan.
And who doesn't love Carlos?
I just have a few questions:
* what happened to his tone? That clear, singing sustain seemed to have evolved(?) into a very dirty, high-gain tone without much brilliance (or all the high end rolled off). His PRS namesake guitar is magnificent and has a small camera attached to the headstock, allowing a very interesting view of him playing (providing you don't get dizzy easily).
* Sarah McLaghlin? (yeah, I know I didn't spell that right). I recognize the weepy tune from an SPCA commercial. Carlos is playing a nylon string guitar. It's attached to a stand for no apparent reason. Is this a mic thing? Sarah is desperately in need of hair.
* Carlos seems to be touring with a small circus, including a number of dancers. I wonder if he thought he'd be as famous as Miley Cyrus if he got dancers. Regardless, I'm thinking this would not be a good idea for me - I can barely walk without tripping over my own feet, no less colliding with a lady with a huge, colorful headpiece and a tiny yellow outfit. Normally this would not be a bad thing (I can take or leave the headpiece) but I have a show to worry about.
* Something called Everlast (the boxing gloves guy) came out to sing a song. He's a bit melodically impaired, not singing so much as growling. The best I can do is Dr. John without all the singing ability.
* Carlos' hat appears to be on backwards. Perhaps, like his shoe line with the dangerously high heels, he's making a fashion statement. I make one fashion statement: I give it the finger.
* Lauryn Hill? The rather large fellow in the tan rug must be Cee Lo. C'mon... Carlos really didn't have to go with this concept of using 'hip' front persons. Judging from album sales, this was apparently a really good idea. Sigh..
* No Santana concert would be complete without his Big Jewish Hit: Oy Vey Como Va.
* The Project J and B: this seems to be largely one guy singing Maria and another guy saying UH-HUH for no apparent reason, with no apparent timing. You must be really cool when you say Carlos Santana in a Carlos Santana song; way too cool for me to understand.
* Rob Thomas: I've actually heard this song. This guy can't sing either but oh boy, he must be hip; he has an earring.
So I mentioned I got a job.
Well, let me be 100% accurate - I am logically, technically, provisionally, traditionally and damn near fully working. Soon. Still waiting on whatever it is they make you wait on before your start date. I think we're off to a really good start: H/R gave me the wrong information and I had to complete all of the paperwork a second time.
I asked about a dress code and the answer was more or less affirmative: there is a dress code but they're not going to tell me what it is. It's also possible that they don't know what the dress code is - I'm new here and don't know squat. It is also possible that there are several dress codes, depending on how far from Manglement and the metal detectors you work. At first I objected to the anal probe but the lady with the gun was pretty cute so I let her continue. Of course they didn't find anything but I may go back and tell her I hid a surprise for her.
Oh dear... I have a conundrum... I'm typing this shit out, being creative, and there's now a huge manhunt on the scanner in the next county [there are helicopters and a Dairy Queen involved]. To top that off, my wife just arrived with some sort of double chocolate ice cream with huge Oreo chunks [click].
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Joe Walsh - Analog Man
I'm a big Joe Walsh fan from way back.
It's rare to find a rock star who shares so many of my passions: tone, tubes, lunacy, ham radio, guitars, and writing. It's also rare to locate a writer whose melodies stick inside my head in a forever kind of way.
We haven't heard any solo Joe since 1992's Songs for a Dying Planet, which would be our loss. Joe's back with Analog Man, which was, of course, recorded digitally. The title refers to being an analog man in a digital world. There's a great line about having to ask a ten year old how to operate something.
Joe has loosely joined the extended Beatles family by marrying Ringo's sister-in-law (or something like that). Ringo appears on two tracks. But nothing says Beatles like being produced by the Invisible Beatle, Jeff Lynne. Usually Jeff's sterling production is stamped all over the songs in a very sonically apparent way. Fortunately this is not the case here. Don't get me wrong - I like Jeff Lynne as a musician, writer, singer, and player. And occasionally a producer - he has done some great work. One Day at a Time is pretty heavy Jeff. The combination of the acoustic guitars and too heavily compressed clean guitars leaves no room for guessing.
So what's new? Joe has stopped drinking. You can tell from the song titles and a bit of listening that he is a happy ex-drunk: Family illustrates this well but not in an over-the-top way.
I got on the mailing list so they notified me that today was the official release. Joe himself will be appearing in New York, but unfortunately at an Apple store. If I go anywhere near an Apple store, I may melt and don't want to take that chance. My browser broke last time I had to go to apple.com and I'm still trying to clean out the smoke.
What I'm looking for from the new release is the same thing I'm looking for from any Joe Walsh music: some tunes that will not leave my head. Melodies that get stuck and will be replayed forever, like Indian Summer and At the Station.
Want some familiar, radio-friendly Joe? Funk #50 would be your tune, complete with hooks you might already know.
Joe: thanks for being part of the soundtrack to my life. Stop by when you're in Philthydelphia (no dates scheduled) or drop me a line. We'll talk tubes and you can try to convince me to learn code :)
It's rare to find a rock star who shares so many of my passions: tone, tubes, lunacy, ham radio, guitars, and writing. It's also rare to locate a writer whose melodies stick inside my head in a forever kind of way.
We haven't heard any solo Joe since 1992's Songs for a Dying Planet, which would be our loss. Joe's back with Analog Man, which was, of course, recorded digitally. The title refers to being an analog man in a digital world. There's a great line about having to ask a ten year old how to operate something.
Joe has loosely joined the extended Beatles family by marrying Ringo's sister-in-law (or something like that). Ringo appears on two tracks. But nothing says Beatles like being produced by the Invisible Beatle, Jeff Lynne. Usually Jeff's sterling production is stamped all over the songs in a very sonically apparent way. Fortunately this is not the case here. Don't get me wrong - I like Jeff Lynne as a musician, writer, singer, and player. And occasionally a producer - he has done some great work. One Day at a Time is pretty heavy Jeff. The combination of the acoustic guitars and too heavily compressed clean guitars leaves no room for guessing.
So what's new? Joe has stopped drinking. You can tell from the song titles and a bit of listening that he is a happy ex-drunk: Family illustrates this well but not in an over-the-top way.
I got on the mailing list so they notified me that today was the official release. Joe himself will be appearing in New York, but unfortunately at an Apple store. If I go anywhere near an Apple store, I may melt and don't want to take that chance. My browser broke last time I had to go to apple.com and I'm still trying to clean out the smoke.
What I'm looking for from the new release is the same thing I'm looking for from any Joe Walsh music: some tunes that will not leave my head. Melodies that get stuck and will be replayed forever, like Indian Summer and At the Station.
Want some familiar, radio-friendly Joe? Funk #50 would be your tune, complete with hooks you might already know.
Joe: thanks for being part of the soundtrack to my life. Stop by when you're in Philthydelphia (no dates scheduled) or drop me a line. We'll talk tubes and you can try to convince me to learn code :)
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