Merry Christmas!! Santa has an eclectic bag of musical Christmas gifts for those special in your life. There are goodies for that music engineer-producer, guitarist, drummer—anybody who plays, listens and enjoys music!
Newfangled Audio/Eventide Elevate Mastering Plug-in is an advanced mastering plug-in with multi-band limiting, human-ear EQ and audio maximizer. Elevate automatically adapts the attack, release and look-ahead parameters for each of the filter bands to greatly reduce “pumping” and breathing artifacts. By manipulating transients across the critical bands you can preserve or emphasize fast transients to avoid squashing your entire mix. By using linear phase auditory filters, audio is equalized in a way that sounds natural. With a good set of presets by APS Mastering, Matt Lange, Jeremy Lubsey, Eric Beam and others. Elevate sells for $199 with upgrades from Equivocate for $75. eventideaudio.com/products/plugins/master- ing/elevate-bundle
Samson’s MediaOne M30 Powered Studio Monitors at $79.99 are compact, full-range speakers with internal amplifiers, solid wood construction and high-quality components to produce big sound while occupying minimal desktop space. Great for producing music or just listening to Christmas songs, they have 10-watts per channel, mighty three-inch co-polymer woofers and 3⁄4-inch silk dome tweeters. There are a bass boost switch, both stereo RCA inputs and 1/8-inch inputs for connecting headphones, and subwoofer outputs.samsontech.com/samson/products/studio- monitors/media-one/mediaonem30
StickItStand is a new patent pending stick-on guitar stand. It stays attached to your guitar yet the instrument will still fit into your gig-bag or case. Made from a high-grade silicon rubber, it sticks on your guitar via a peel-off, electronics-grade double stick adhesive. With it attached to the lower back of the guitar, your guitar will securely lean against a wall or amp will less chance of falling over. The “one size fits all” Stick-It-Stand works easily on most acoustic or electric guitars and is the perfect accessory for an active guitar player. It sells for $19.95 MSRP or get in on an Amazon Holiday special at $14.95. StickItStand.com
The Podcast Hotline Kit is a connection kit to interface your cell phone or tablet to your recording studio. It’s 1.5-meter multi-cable starts with a 1/8-inch TRRS plug that goes into the headset jack in your cell phone. The cable splits out into a red-colored 1⁄4-inch jack to receive external microphone input audio from your mixer and also a white cable for audio out of your smartphone. In this way you can use an external mixer to mix several audio sources in your studio and “patch” them into your phone or tablet to facilitate your podcast. It sells for $19.95. podcasthotlinekit.com
IK Multimedia iRig Pre HD is a certified Apple audio interface with a single XLR mic input and stereo output. iRig Pre HD is guaranteed to work with all iOS devices using a Lightning connector including those without headphone jacks. The iRig Pre HD comes with both a Lighting cable and USB cable for connection to Macs and PCs for recording anytime and anywhere with your favorite dynamic, ribbon or condenser microphone with phantom power (with batteries inserted). You’ll have best-in-category sound quality with up to 96kHz/24- bit resolution and full, flat frequency response from 20Hz to 20kHz (+/- 1.5dB). iRig Pre HD bridges the gap between portable devices and professional microphones for recording instruments, sound for media, video, speech, interviews, documentaries and more. It sells for $99. ikmultimedia.com/products/ irigprehd
Promark by D’Addario FireGrain Drumsticks use a revolutionary heat- tempering process that transforms ordinary hickory drumsticks into precision, durable tools. While keeping their original weight, balance, and feel, FireGrain sticks allow drummers to hit harder and play longer, naturally. No excess vibration, no space-age gimmicks, just natural hickory, hardened by flame. FireGrain hickory drumsticks are available in the sizes: 7A, 5A, 5B, 2B, plus Rebound and Forward models 5A and 5B. They sell for $12.99 MAP. promark.com
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2018!
