Me, Myself & I with a POD Express Black

 

27 seconds of 2B pencil, watercolor, fun and learning my new POD Express Black.  This is the look I did for The Guru Pilgrimage,  that I will probably do a few more of. Fast to draw, no inking, splosh some watercolor around and your done. The cute/ wonky shapes let you get away with a lot. I will probably redo that drum kit though. Love the look of SIMMONS, but that is also something I probably need to stay away from.

 Still to come to grips with BIAS, SAG and other amp controls, but that is all part of the fun.

Since I started recording I have used a distortion pedal into the ADC, then applied a cabinet in REAPER.  I have tried a few, mixing it up sometimes, but always found the Line6 UBER METAL to mostly be the best for me. And it is some 18 years old! The POD EXPRESS BLACK has amp models and cabinets and the above clip is using the POD with a cabinet.

I have effects turned off though, and reverb, chorus, flanging and delay are added in REAPER during the mix.

All the go now is a NANO CORTEX or HX STOMP like devices.  Mattias at his FREAK GUITAR WEEKEND uses 3 patches in a HX STOMP for his sound straight to the PA.

A HX STOMP would be nice, but that unit is about twice what I paid for my most expensive Ibanez RG guitar a few years ago. The cost, and my use of it as a distortion pedal just doesn't make sense to me, as a hobbyist granddad in his home studio, making music for myself that only 3 others will hear.  Unless it is used in a YouTube short, then maybe 250 will.

Some 12 months ago BOSS released their IR2 amp/Cabinet pedal and I was interested in getting that. Watched all the reviews, saw the price of Sweetwater etc, and........... it wasn't for sale in Japan.. yet. So I waited. It took some 12 months or so before it was available here. At which time I had seen it wasn't quite what I was after.  I am really only interested in Metal tones, which the BOSS has the opposite focus on.

I then noticed the recent POD EXPRESS BLACK. Now that is my thing, focusing on METAL tones. The price was right, and available.

So that is where we are now.  The unit can store 21 presets, which is 21 more than the pedals I have do, and means I can came up with 2 or 3 sounds I will actually use. It also has a PC editor, which is so much easier than using the units knobs and buttons.  

It is a power hunger device though, and needs a 500mA 9VDC adapter but runs on batteries too. So after playing with it a bit , I ordered the adapter, as that is far cheaper long term.

This drummer animation works better in a different improv jam with a different preset using the inbuilt cabinet:

Of course the riffs and licks in the above animations are the same old boring things I automatically play, and I need to focus on expanding my musical vocabulary, so I have something new to say musically.

BUT, part of it all is just for my own mental well being, and being a Happy Camper:

And changing topic slightly...

I watched Rick Beato's "what I learned visiting Asia" this morning. Unfortunately, he got distracted by messages coming in when he live streamed and was asked about Atlanta Music shops then talked about that way too long 😖 

What he learnt was music is still big in Japan and Korea. Playing it, Making it, seeing it live, Having places to go to see it performed that aren't stadiums or theaters. So much live music in Japan from overseas touring musicians, that don't bother to visit Atlanta, or anywhere else any more.  Music Stores are all around Asia. Lots of people play guitar in all genres in Japan and it isn't all dead or dying like America is.  

The decay in America isn't universal, but Australia is similar, for the same reasons, related to the destruction of "the middle class" through all kinds of now several decades old policies which favor rich corporations and the super rich. 

When I was at university in Australia, the pubs everywhere had bands several nights a week. But sometime during my time in Japan, 1987 ~2001, all the Pub stages were removed and replaced by Poker Machines, and Australian live band music "pretty much" died. Between 2005 and 2015, 80% of music stores closed around where I lived in Sydney.  Billy Hydes Music, Dicksons Music, Venue Music, Farrells Music all gone.  Just MALL MUSIC Dee Why  and Turramurra Music left when I left the country.

I am glad to be living in Kyoto, Japan at this time. 

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