Summer NAMM 2006

Gearwire gets a warm and fuzzy feeling when Electro-Harmonix busts out the Metal Muff and Little Big Muff. The Metal Muff is a heavy metal version of the popular Big Muff, with a harder sound more suitable for "brewtal riffage."...  

The Electro-Harmonix 2880 Super Multitrack Looper is, for all intents and purposes, a foot-controllable multitrack recording unit. Like other loopers on the market, the 2880 is extremely useful for live situations where musicians...  

Gibson gives and in-depth demo of its revolutionary Les Paul HD6X-Pro for Gearwire. The HD6X-Pro, combined with some external hardware and software, allows you to split the signal from all six strings, add different effects...  

Framus proudly shows Gearwire its Hollywood Custom, a semi-hollow electric with a bookmatched, flamed maple top, Seymour Duncan P-90 pickups, and a decidedly retro vibe. ...  

Dennis and Peter from Hammond demonstrate how to assemble the Pro XK-System in less than two minutes. We actually tried later to get them to do it blind-folded while a techno remix of "A Whiter Shade of Pale" played in the...  

Andy Fuchs, president of Fuchs Audio Technology, gives Gearwire a grand tour of his company's entire line of boutique amplifiers. He even throws in a smokin' demo of the Tripledrive Supreme. Andy started making amps from...  

Gearwire talks with David Lee, chief product designer for Hagstrom Guitars. Lee talks about the golden days of Hagstrom in the late 1950s, when Hagstrom switched from manufacturing accordions to making electric guitars in...  

After a 23-year absence, Hagstrom returns with a new line of guitars. Pretty nice looking guitars, too. Check out the Hagstrom Swede and Super Swede, for example. The Swedes -- beloved by Nirvana/Foo Fighters/Germs guitarist...  

Is there something preternatural going on at Electro-Harmonix? They've managed to come up with a hum eliminator called the HumDebugger that seems to completely remove all extraneous noise from your signal. The HumDebugger...  

Attention cork-sniffers: if you've got a passion for sipping wine and playing guitar, you're in luck. In celebration of its 60th anniversary, Fender unveils the limited-edition Custom Shop Presidential Select Stratocaster....  

Hear the Sustainer in action, courtesy of Fernades Guitars. You can think of the Sustainer as a kind of built-in EBow that can sustain all six strings at once via a generated magnetic field. Besides sustaining notes, the...  

Focusrite gives Gearwire a look at the Saffire LE, a stripped-down version of original Saffire Firewire interface. The LE features 24-bit AD/DA conversion, VST/AU effects, six inputs, and of course, the Firewire interface. ...  

Summer NAMM 2006: Akai shows off its MPD24 velocity-sensitive pad controller. The MPD24 features 16 pads with four selectable pad banks, six assignable faders, and eight assignable knobs. The unit offers MIDI or USB operation...  

Fender shows off its upgraded line of Highway One guitars and basses. The new Highway Ones include slick features like jumbo frets, hotter pickups, Greasebucket tone circuits, and thin nitrocellulose lacquer finishes for...  

For a long time, if you wanted to record your guitar silently, you pretty much had to choose between digital modeling devices and solid-state practice amps with a line out. Getting real tube amp sound directly to tape just...  

Kevin Bolembach, president of Godlyke Distribution (parent company for Guyatone), gives a thorough demoing of the company's brand new GST-UO5 Ultron Auto Wah. The Ultron, Kevin says, is basically a tricked-out tribute to...  

Focusrite serves Gearwire a tall glass of Liquid Mix, a frothy blend of digital processing and mixing power. Liquid Mix features 32 channels, 40 onboard compressors, and 20 onboard equalizers. You can also download more EQs...  

Fender introduces the Classic Player Series as an extension of its Classic series. The instruments in the Classic Player Series are based on vintage guitars from the '50s and '60s, but with some souped-up features like S-1...  

Summer NAMM 2006: Alesis unveils the iO|14 and iO|26 digital audio computer interfaces. Both units offer ADAT optical inputs, analog mic/line inputs, two firewire ports, and more. The iO|26, as you might expect, is larger...  

Fender gives gearwire viewers a peek at the G-DEC 30, an upgraded version of the original G-DEC amp with double the watts and more onboard backing tracks and presets. ...  

TC Electronic and TC Helicon have quite a lot of new products headed to market, including the TC Helicon Voice Solo, a voice monitoring system that can be floor-mounted, or mounted on a mic stand with or without a boom. On...  

If you often find yourself wanting to record a few ideas on the fly without having to mess with menus, plugs, channels, and the like, Line 6's RiffWorks software is for you. RiffWorks is designed to be used in conjunction...  

Rocktron brings out its upgrades to the Rampage, the brand spankin' new Velocity series, fresh from the factory. Velocity amps range in size from the beginner's practice amp all the way to the customizable V50, a 2x8 stereo...  

Sony's redesign of the MZ-M100 minidisc field recorder features a more ergnomic design (with a bigger record button), plus the ability to record at both High MD and regular minidisc formats. The file uploading speed is faster...  

M-Audio demonstrates its Black Box Reloaded just for Gearwire. This upgraded version boasts 40 amp models, 121 effects, 100 drum patters, the ability to synch time-based effects to beats, and is Pro Tools-compatible....  

Sony takes portable digital to the extreme, offering 96k, 24-bit recording in the field. The Sony PCM D1 looks like something out of a Star Trek episode, with titanium features, a built-in preamp, a high-pass filter, plus...  

In the very near future, people will marvel that old-school DJs developed back problems lugging all that heavy stuff around. M-Audio's DJ software Torq provides a virtual mixer to control your digital library. Torq allows...  

Sony unveils the 7509 HD Headphones, which have a frequency range up to 80 kHz, far above most other headphones. The human ear can actually only hear sounds in the 20 Hz to 20 kHz range, but it has been theorized that frequencies...  

The folks at Duncan-Turner Acoustic Research have been wearing out their thinking caps. Their latest innovations include a partnership with Guild Guitars to offer battery-powered acoustic pickup that cuts the "quack" acoustic...  

An amp with a swappable preamp section? Yes! The Randall MTS series amp module comes in a wide range of amp sounds; the modules are easily inserted into Randall's RM4 preamp, RM combos and RM heads, ready to play within seconds....