Making A Roadcase

Roadcases are fun little projects to encase and protect your precious electronics. This is the second one that I’ve built and I’ve enjoyed both of those endeavours. My old one became superfluous after I blew up the amp (I have a habit of doing that) and as these projects are bespoke by nature, it was time to update.

I’ve had this Yamaha EMX 512SC for a few years now and I cannot speak more highly of it. It has a great sound with lots of bottom end when paired with my A15 speakers. The big surprise for me though was the cheap arsed Chinese DMX lighting controller that you see on the top. My lighting system consists of this unit and 10 x ADJ Mega Par Profile plus a couple of laser lights. DMX is 80’s technology which basically is a standard for lighting systems. I didn’t know much about it but today you can buy these units very cheaply from your electronics store and they are very versatile. Paired with DMX standard lighting you can change the colours, intensity, focus and direction of your lighting. It depends on the light what you can do with it but with the controller you can also program lighting shows to match a song or play.

Anyway these two units complemented each other perfectly and so it was a natural progression to pair them into one unit. This way I had only one power point to plug in plus two speaker cables and one DMX cable daisy chained to the lights. An easy set up.

I had to also include an electronic fan and venting to ensure that the P.A. was happy with access to the reset on the ELCB within the unit. It is quite heavy for the size of the unit and so I added the wheels. The trick with wheels is to have two fixed wheels and two lockable, swivel wheels to steer with. I incorporated a lockable drawer and a shelf to stash the microphones cables and torch.

I used ¾” construction ply for the construction which used to be 19mm but seems to have been downsized to 17mm these days. The last time I built one of these I added corner protectors which you can get in plastic or metal but this time I didn’t feel the need.

The last tip that I can impart on this project was that I got an RCA to 1/8” jack so that the kids could use the play lists on there cell phones and run them through the P.A. It worked a treat so long as they didn’t play around with the phones whilst songs were playing. You can get some pretty harsh sounds with any loose connections.

Making a Lagerphone

 

I’d always harboured a desire to make a lagerphone and finally I’ve ticked it off of my bucket list. A lagerphone is essentially a tambourine type of instrument made from a broomstick and crown capped bottle tops. From the Idiophone family it is mainly used in folk music and is known by many names from many different cultures.

The first task was collecting the bottle tops, which required much merriment and the sampling of various types of lager which had different coloured bottle tops. I was clearly the right man for the job.

Another pre-requisite was my penchant for hoarding. During renovations I kept one of our old curtain rods, which was about an inch and a quarter diameter (32mm). It also featured a finial which with a nose added became the ‘Noddy’ head. In my research I discovered that it was commonplace to place a boot at the bottom to protect a venues flooring. It so happened that I’d kept one of my fifteen year old’s boots from when he was a toddler. Actually we kept all of them.

The next stage was punching holes in the bottle tops. For this task I used an off-cut from one of our veranda posts, which I had drawn diagonal lines from corner to corner and drilled a 5/16” (8mm) hole in the centre where the lines bisected. With a nail punch I could then line my bottle top up over the hole using the diagonal lines and with one tap I could punch a hole in the centre. The jig worked quite well although I had to manually pull off the bit off metal still left hanging.

Next I space out where I wanted the bottle tops which was basically a north/south/east/west pattern. I carefully drilled them and bought some screws with a clean shank to affix each set of twin bottle tops.

Additionally I placed a mint tin containing ball bearings into the boot which was simply screwed to the curtain rod between the tread of the boot. I used a bit of plumbing pipe insulation for the handle and the sock of the boot. Also on the large beer can at the top I placed a nut suspended from a bit of wire to act as a clapper.

I thoroughly enjoyed the process and the thought of terrorising my clan gatherings with my new lagerphone fills me with wicked glee. So if your interested in making a lagerphone here are a few name variations to Google as the various designs are as different and wild as your imagination.

a.k.a.

• Boozaphone,
• Mendoza/mendozer,
• Monkey stick,
• Murrumbidgee River Rattler
• Teufelsgeige
• Jingling Johnie
• Stumpfidel
• Ugly Stick

Rainy Day Pedalboard For Guitar

If your into electric guitar, then chances are that you’ve got a few stomp boxes, lying around. Once you’ve collected a few then eventually you get to the point where you start thinking about a pedal board. Such is the dilemma that I faced on a recent rainy afternoon.

The brief was simple I just wanted a board that I could walk up to, plug in and play –  no flat batteries and no multiple adaptor clutter.

I went about researching such a thing simply by checking out a whole lot of other peoples boards on Google’s “Image Search”. Interestingly, during this process I saw a few pedals used more often than others. The four common stand outs were;

1. a Wah Wah pedal of some kind,
2. an Ibanez’s tube screamer as made famous by SRV,
3. Boss’s RC20 looper and
4. Boss’s TU3 Chromatic Tuner – the one with the disco lights.

Beyond these four pedals it was open slather. Each pedal board was wildly individual, incorporating a plethora of designs and configurations – some home made others just plain obscure or whacky.

In assimilating these designs another design concept came to the fore and that was the use of velcro tape and hook carpet to enable the pedals to be securely but temporarily mounted. In the end I went with this idea because it was simple and allowed for ongoing adjustments and configurations.

I started with just a simple 15° wedged box (800mm x 300mm) shown above.

Originally I planned to enable the wedge to sit over my microphone stand and the red and green lines on the bottom of the wedge indicated the microphone’s legs that would sit in the as yet unbuilt slots. I abandoned the idea for the sake of simplicity but I still think the idea has merit.

The power supply is the Gator G-BUS-8. This worked out fine because one of my pedals was the 18volt Dunlop Univibe and the Gator was the only supply that would accommodate 18V (3 of) as well as 9v (8 of) plugs. It was for me, expensive but in the long run all the electrical work was thus pre-solved. The Gator is not the only option here for those of you contemplating such an adventure; there is also a Dunlop version and T-Rex have several models.

The other practical concern was to be the fact that there was going to be a whole lot of cables that were to be stuffed into this wedge shape and so eventually I would have to make a sealed cover to keep them tidy within the wedge. Ultimately when it was finally set up I would only have to plug in my wedge, guitar and amp to be good to go.

I have three commercial pedalboards, which all have their own unique benefits but some of them are extremely complicated affairs and my needs are simple. A little distortion, some chorus maybe some E.Q. is all I really need. That’s not to say that I don’t like experimenting with the kinky stuff because I do but in the end its all about the music. The old K.I.S.S. adage seems to apply here and this pedal board is both simple and adaptable which I really like.

Vintage Fender Factory

Take a trip back to the 1950s in this restored film footage of a tour of the Fender factory.

Zoom H2n Review

I purchased one of these little microphone recorders awhile ago after sniffing around the Line 6 Back Track recorder. The unit is about 4”in -100mm in length.

Mostly I am very pleased with the recorder as it has done for me what digital cameras have done to photography. Record as much as you like and as many takes as you like. If I have too many false starts I just stop it and start again. You can easily trim the fat through the machine or with your computer afterwards. (You will have to buy a decent SD/SDHC card for it as it only comes with a 2GB card to get you started.)

You have several options with regards to how you can record using the 5 on board microphones. Most notably the mid-side  configuration which essentially mixes Left & Right microphones with a unidirectional microphone at the front allowing adjustment of the width of the pattern from 30° to 150°. The other major configuration is an XY pattern of 90° which is my favourite.

The unit  takes two AA batteries which give you 20 hours play time. It can use rechargeables but you have to register them within the unit so that it can accurately tell you how much usable time you have left. For me 20 hrs is plenty and AA’s are more preferential then AAA’s because of the cost.

I should also mention that it comes with Cubase LE which is the light version of Cubase. As I already have Cubase 5 I didn’t play around with it too much but it all seemed quite adequate for editing etc.

Along with the Zoom H2n I also bought the accessories kit that in my view should really come with the unit. The accessories kit comes with:

• Wired remote control with extension cable
• Windscreen
• AC adapter (USB type)
• USB cable
• Adjustable tripod stand
• Padded-shell case
• Mic clip adapter

Personally I’m not likely to use the remote or the windscreen but the rest is essential. Even the strange looking handle attachment means that I can clip it into my existing mic stands and it looks like its meant to be there.

The recording quality is excellent once you get your distances right and I would thoroughly recommend this unit for both enthusiasts like myself and serious recording aficionados who would like a field unit. This is probably my favourite piece of kit that I have purchased in 2012 and I would rate it a whopping 5 out of 5 rubber chickens.

The Fender VG Stratocaster

My favourite guitar is my Fender VG Stratocaster, which I call ‘Freddy’. I love it for multiple reasons including the fact that it was the first decent guitar that I ever owned. Nostalgia aside I think it is still a great guitar on its own merits. Based around an American Series Stratocaster the VG was introduced in 2007 where it won “Best In Show” at NAMM but was discontinued after April Fools Day in 2009. The VG was a collaboration between Roland and Fender and featured electronic modelling to give it some unique features or at least unique at the time. Two extra knobs were included; The T knob (Tuning) and the M knob (Mode)

Mode :

• Normal
• Stratocaster
• Telecaster,
• Humbucking
• Acoustic

Within the guitar modelling mode I would have to say that Normal and Stratocaster are somewhat smoke and mirrors. Normal isn’t really a feature it is…well, normal and in case Fender don’t realise it you are actually playing on a Stratocaster (you could play around with the tone knob to achieve the same results). Telecaster comes under the same umbrella and as I own a Tele I would have to say it doesn’t even come close to the real thing. For Humbucking you could read ‘Les Paul’ and I love it and use this a lot to give that warmer tone. Acoustic is also terrific and one of my favourites. Another thing about this guitar particularly with the acoustic mode is that its easy to play and there are a lot of songs that I struggle to play on a real acoustic but I can play perfectly on the VG in acoustic mode.

Tuning :

• Normal,
• Drop D,
• Open G,
• DADGAD,
• Baritone,
• 12 String.

The ability to change tunings at the drop of a switch was a major selling point for me. Drop D in case you don’t already know has the bass E string tuned down a tone (DADGBE). Now this is not hard to do in a live situation as it is, after all only one string but it’s a popular tuning and I use it a fair bit. Open G is the big attraction for me being a Keith Richards fan and is the altered tuning I use most often. The ability to throw in an G song into your set whenever you like and then revert back to standard is pretty damned cool. DADGAD or Dsus4 tuning, is a modal tuning that is very popular in Celtic music. Unfortunately I’m not much into this folk tuning but I sometimes have a crack at Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir”. Baritone – baritone tuning is tuned lower than the guitar, but with the same relative tuning. There are variations on the theme and in this case it is based on the quart bass; the same as standard but lowered a fourth (BEADF#B). I fool around with this tuning a bit just to see what songs sound like relative to my voice. Sometimes I come up with little surprises. I also capo this tuning on the fourth fret to give me Hendrix’s Eb tuning, handy if your playing along with the records and Eb quite often suits my voice. 12 String – the option of six and twelve strings is really handy to have on board and colours your repertoire nicely all on one guitar. I have read criticisms of the sound of the two acoustic models but for my money they sound authentic and are a major plus in this guitars arsenal.

*Note; The Tuning functions don’t work if Mode is in Normal. Tuning functions are also relative, that is if you tune down to E flat, all of these tunings will transpose down a half step.

Many criticisms were cited for the guitar’s demise including price. In my opinion this was a fair cop but some of the other criticisms were somewhat unfair.

The choice of tunings has long been a bone of contention within VG forums and it must be said that there is merit to this argument. I don’t know why these tunings were chosen but a user defined system would be the ultimate guitar. Imagine being able to program your guitar to any tuning that you could think of and then switch between say half a dozen options at the flick of a switch. At the very least the inclusion of open E would have been a bonus.

The use of batteries to power the modelling system was often sprouted as an issue but having a second wire attached to the guitar cable seems to me, to be more problematic. In the owners manual the use of nickel–metal hydride batteries (Ni-MH) is recommended and is indeed the key to powering up the system for acceptable periods of time (my experience is 1 hour for normal batteries and 4 hours for rechargeable NiMh). I personally like GP ReCyko+ batteries because they were easy to identify the + ends and they worked well but interestingly my local supplier discontinued them because they said that people were having problems with them and they were replaced with the ‘eneloop’ brand. I’m looking for a new supplier. One issue I do have with the battery system is the fact that when they do run out the sound deteriorates rapidly and sounds fairly ugly at high volume levels. A second battery pack would therefore be an advantage.

Rise of the Phoenix : Roland G-5

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKhGu-BPpng

The VG seems to have arisen from the ashes in the form of the G-5. Where as the original VG was MIA the G5 seems to be somewhat mongrel in that various parts are from different countries which has addressed the pricing issue from the previous version. The other change seems to be that the five way pickup switch has been pimped to enable some variations on sound colouring. In the acoustic mode the 5 way switch enables steel, nylon, resonator, electric sitar and jazz modeling from the original VG. The 5 way switch also allows both a wide range variation at the bridge and neck position for the Strat, Tele and Humbicking models. I can’t find anything majorly different from the original that would require me to upgrade to the new version but if I didn’t already own the original I would seriously consider checking it out.

At the time that I bought my VG the alternative to such a guitar was the Gibson Robot. I seriously considered the Robot but it was more expensive and since the principle was based on mechanics I thought there was too many components that could break down especially considering the poor quality of the finish. Now the VG has been resurrected the competition includes Line 6’s James Tyler Variax and that is a serious contender which addresses many of the concerns of VG critics. The Variax however isn’t a Fender and for my money that is still worth something.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4fBdFbym34&feature=related

Home Recording Reno

My little music room is only 8ft x 9ft. With space at a premium I had to be careful because over the years I had collected a ridiculous amount of  music paraphernalia. The idea of this little project was to store my music collection but also give me room underneath so that I could store and access my amps and speakers etc. The bench was supposed to provide an area where I could work on my guitars but in reality it is always covered in crud and I do that work on the dining room table. I have some large music books that have never fit into standard bookshelves and so the lowest shelf is built to accommodate those. Then there are 6 shelves for my CD’s which are also slightly higher than standard to accommodate special editions and so forth. I left the centre shelving out to provide for my little Jimi shrine (the walrus was Paul) and the top shelf is for music DVD’s. The roof of the shelving is wider than the rest and I use it for box sets and smaller books. All up that is a bucket load of weight supported by two metal frames I welded up underneath and some 3 1/2″ x 2″  stud work. I really enjoyed this project and it was a lot easier than I thought it would be. I incorporated two minor details that improved the design. The rounded corner on the bench I reciprocated on the upper and lower shelves which gave a slight art deco feel to the piece. Secondly I airbrushed the edges of the bench slightly darker to reflect my sunburst guitars which hang next to it – it doesn’t look much in the photo but in real life it turned out very effective.

 

Baghead Writes A Love Song

Here’s a little song that I wrote for my wife. Excuse the quality; it’s strictly low-fi – I recorded this with two push button cassette players to bounce down tracks.

[https://soundcloud.com/baghead-kelly/song-for-cassandra-demo]

Verse 1

More than a thousand miles away,
I send my love to my baby today.
I guess I’m just a sentimental fool,
A lovelorn poet in a world so cruel.

Verse 2

I want to run my fingers gently through your hair,
But every time Cass baby your not there.
I’m waiting for the day when you walk through my door,
And two becomes one just like it was before.

Verse 3

Eloquence escapes me at about verse three,
Rhyming couplets and poetry.
One baby two baby three wait and see,
All your babies sitting on this daddies knee.

Verse 4

I guess I’m tired of waiting this waiting game,
Whats a candle without its girlie flame.
Wait for me Cass because I’m true blue,
I’m coming back baby just to marry you.

Outro

I love you,
I need you, need you, need you,
And it won’t be long before we’re back together.

Hey Hip Doodies – You Too Can Lay Down Some Whack Beats

LoopMash Free by Steinberg

I realise that I am stuck in the past musically speaking and so Soundcloud has been a revelation to me. There are 10 million users and counting. It is already the next big thing. For me, the most glaring ear opener, so to speak,  is the prevalence of house, dub step and hip hop music. It would be hard to estimate but the majority of music on Soundcloud would be of these  kinds of genres. Now I would hazard a guess but music software must be at the forefront of this revolution. Anyone can be a musician these days whether you play a traditional instrument or not. So if you have an iPhone then Steinberg has this tricky little app that is based on its LoopMash VST. The old Bagster rates it at 4/5 rubber chickens and if your too lazy to read the instructions then watch this video;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5U3i_7I5YOA

Home Recording Tip

Now I’m not really a person qualified to hand out home recording tips but I do have this one. When I built my little home studio I also made the little sheet music rack that you can see on the wall. Essentially it is just a slanted plank with a trim nailed to the bottom to hold the pages.  – What I do is I use masking tape to join my sheet music together in sequence. I usually have the lyrics typed out on the first page, the rest music. Only masking tape will do and I’ve got sheet music over twenty years old treated in this way. – The rack is sized to fit 6 x A4 sheets but if I made it again I would make it for eight sheets. The trim at the bottom creates a half inch (15mm) lip and in hindsight I would double the size of that as well. The reason being is that I usually pile song sheet on top of song sheet and a full inch would be better. The whole shebang is suited to my height (I like playing standing up) and I have a microphone installed from the ceiling above it. I can just stand there and do my thing and it all works a treat. So if your building a home studio then here is something that you might like to incorporate into your design.