The Song Fight Bulletin Board

Today's Stupid deal seems a little crazy to me, but I guess the pricing is possible because the product in question is made in China with cheap parts. Quality may be an issue. Even with all that it still seems a little nutty. Anyway, the deal is a 120-watt, 2x12" ALL TUBE combo amp, for $229. It's the Bugera 6260:

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/stupid

Power: 120W (tube)
Tubes: five 12AX7 (preamp); four 6L6, convertible to EL34 (power amp)
Two channels
Two inputs: high gain; low gain
Speakers: 2x12" Bugera
Controls: 3-band EQ, presence, crunch button, gain, volume, reverb
Built-in reverb
FX loop
Impedance: 4, 8, 16 ohm
Footswitch included

If you're a guitar player with not much money to burn but you want what apparently is actually a decent sounding all tube amp, this could be a good way to go, although, buyer beware because of the cheap parts and labor that may result in quality control issues...

Damn, that's like the equivalent to a Fender twin reverb, statistically. That price is really low if it is close to the Fender! I do need a new twin combo. I gave my old one to my nephew in a time of need for him and he uses it daily, which I wasn't even using it yearly.

Not the combo, but comparing the Bugera 6260 to a $1700 ENGL.

Tannoy Reveal 402 Powered Monitor Speakers are the SDotD today! Only $80 each!

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/stupid

Here's a review of them from Sound on Sound to give you more info:
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jun14/a ... reveal.htm

Jon Eric recently bought a pair of these. Maybe he can chime in with his opinion.

Yeah, I like them! I haven't had much time to work on my music lately, but I've also been using them for general listening. They have a nice even response, so I never feel overwhelmed by bass when listening at comfortable levels, which is what happens with most of the commercial speakers I used to use before I got these.

Also, I got them at the same price they are today. I think it was a different SDotD, so this might not be the last we see of these.

On sale today, the MXL 990 condenser mic for $80. If you're using your computer/iPhone/iPad mic or a Radio Shack dynamic mic or something crappy like that, this would be a very low priced big step up for you. It needs phantom power, though, so you'd need something to provide that.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/condense ... ID=4068665

The MXL990 used to be my main workhorse mic, and I would still highly recommend it as a great general-purpose mic. These days I mostly use them for micing amps (which is rare) and prefer the V88 for various reasons (mostly I think it has a slightly brighter sound), but the 990 is still quite capable and lovely.

Basically, MXL's condenser mics are generally quite nice, and I have a rather stupidly large collection of them now thanks entirely to SDotD.

fluffy wrote:The MXL990 used to be my main workhorse mic, and I would still highly recommend it as a great general-purpose mic. These days I mostly use them for micing amps (which is rare) and prefer the V88 for various reasons (mostly I think it has a slightly brighter sound), but the 990 is still quite capable and lovely.

Basically, MXL's condenser mics are generally quite nice, and I have a rather stupidly large collection of them now thanks entirely to SDotD.

I have the MXL 9090, which has (I'm pretty sure) a similar condenser to the 990 in one of its capsules. I like it a lot, and it was my main vocal mic until I got a Rode NT-1A.

MXL makes affordable products. You're not going to get professional studio quality, but you're going to get more bang for your buck than just about any other brand out there, and they're fine for most Song Fighters' purposes. They're also surprisingly reliable for their price range; I've had mine for six years and counting. If you've only ever recorded on dynamic microphones or computer stick mics, then getting a condenser by MXL is a great idea, even if it's not a SDotD. Highly recommended.

For a limited time, the full versions of Amplitube for iOS are FREE! Normally they are $20. This is a pretty darn good amp simulation app. I think you could use this with GarageBand on iPhone/iPad and maybe get more options than what GarageBand's built-in amp simulator provides, but I'm not sure.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/amplitu ... 24000?mt=8
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/amplitu ... 50924?mt=8

Today's stupid deal is a 16 input, 8 output USB audio interface, with MIDI and phantom power, for only $200. That's a pretty sweet price for that many inputs. If you think you may occasionally record a live band, but you don't want to invest a bunch of money into being able to do so, this could be a decent starter option. Or you could use it to just leave a bunch of different mics and instruments all plugged in and ready to go, no need to swap cables between your 1-2 inputs. On the down side, at least for some folks here who have expressed a dislike of this brand, it's a Tascam. But I recently bought the 4x4 model of this line of Tascam interfaces and it's been working great for me (on my Mac). Your mileage may vary.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/stupid

TASCAM US-16x08 USB Audio Interface

Features
16 mic and line inputs
8 Ultra-HDDA mic preamps
8 balanced line outputs
Built-in DSP mixer for low-latency mixing
Supports both Mac and Windows

Tascam hardware is pretty good, especially for the price. My issue with them comes from how they tend to stop putting out driver updates for new OS versions even on products they're still selling, especially on Mac.

It seems like a great device, though, and it's probably great as long as you don't expect to use it for more than a few years (or you're on Windows where drivers tend to keep on working forever).

Incidentally, this device is specifically what replaced the US-800, the last Tascam product I bought (which worked for about two months until OSX updated).

If you're looking for a deal on a 2015 Gibson Les Paul, Hello Music has some for over $500 off what you'd currently pay at Musician's Friend or Sweetwater:

http://www.hellomusic.com/gibson-usa-lp ... -sunburst/

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/LPTD15HSNH-15
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/guitars/ ... ric-guitar

It's still $2229 so it's a hefty chunk of change. Also it's a 2015 model, and that year Gibson included a bunch of controversial "innovations" on their entire line of guitars whether people liked it or not (and many seemed not to). But still, a new LP of that level for $2229 is pretty awesome.

I know we don't have the best opinion of Tascam interfaces, but one thing for sure is that when they are on sale, they are cheap for what you get:

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/stupid

TASCAM US-4x4 USB Audio Interface

Today's Price: $149.99

I've been using that for a while and I like it so far. I like having the four inputs with both XLR and 1/4", on the front, and the two headphone outs. It's pretty much got everything I need for anything I do at home.

Do you want a real Gibson SG, brand new? Get one now for only $500 on the Stupid Deal of the Day!

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/stupid

Only comes with a gig bag, not a hard shell case, but still, a real Gibson. This thing can probably rock out pretty hard.

Lunkhead wrote:Do you want a real Gibson SG, brand new? Get one now for only $500 on the Stupid Deal of the Day!

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/stupid

Only comes with a gig bag, not a hard shell case, but still, a real Gibson. This thing can probably rock out pretty hard.

Somehow I thought that all "Future Electric Guitars" would have robotuners!

50% off Monoprice microphones. These mics get good reviews in Tape-Op.

http://www.monoprice.com/Category?c_id=115&cp_id=11502

Today's deal is an honest to goodness handmade in the USA Gibson, for $599. It's the 2013 model 4-string EB Bass, originally $999. I think it's basically on clearance because it's an older model (but it's still new) and because it seems like they may have discontinued this line of basses. I can't find any info about 2015 or newer models. It comes with a hardshell. Reviews seem generally positive. It's got two humbuckers that both can be split to single-coil modes, a master tone and a volume for each pickup, so lots and lots of tonal options.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/stupid

I've been looking into tube amps recently, and I just scrolled back and saw that Bugera amp from May-- 120w. Which makes me really confused, because in reading I see that a Vox 15w will apparently blow your head off and 30w is enough to play a pretty big room. So what the fuck do you do with a 120w tube amp? And how do you keep it from catching on fire from just being so loud?

And there there is this thing: http://www.musicradar.com/reviews/guita ... 800-615917

840w per channel?!?!?!?!?!?! (and light enough to carry in a backpack) What kind of god damned speaker do you hook that thing up to and do you get a whole Michael J Fox in Back to the Future type thing happening if you do?



(Contrast this with solid-state amps, where the wattage required to be loud is a lot higher. My Princeton 112+ is 65w for example and is just enough for a small rock club and still probably needs to be mic'd.)

Classic scene. What is up with that weird guitar? I wonder if they picked the smallest guitar available so as not to make Michael J. Fox look small. Also there is no way he could stand right in front of that speaker facing it with everything turned up without being annihilated by feedback.

This seems somewhat informative:

http://www.300guitars.com/articles/ampl ... -decibels/

Apparently a 120w amp should be approximately twice as loud as a 12w amp. It's not a linear scale I guess.

The other thing with a high-watt tube amp is you can get a cleaner sound at a higher volume.

That's a good link, thanks. Though here's a funny line:

You could afford to move up again to the 50-100 watt range if you are playing large venues and outdoors.

That Matrix amp above is FOUR HUNDRED WATTS. Tiny little thing. The demo videos are of it hooked up to like a 12" speaker, so it can obviously go downrange. And one of them has a guy talking about it like it is just enough for a pub gig-- and I'm like "wtf".

But I really like the idea of it being so light, and you could hook it up to a light speaker (like they do in those Anderton demos on YouTube), or you could apparently go direct into the house PA, which appeals to me from a mixing standpoint.

J

Do they mean watts of power draw or watts of sound power? Because sound power watts are massively loud (10W is around 130dB) but a lot of amps are crazy inefficient at converting one to the other.