Stupid Deal of the Day on Musician's Friend

[Lunkhead]

Today's deal on Going Today is a pair of Direct Sound EX-29 Extreme Isolation Headphones for $75.99 + $5.00 shipping. Ken has these headphones and I've tried them out, and their ability to block out outside noise is pretty amazing. You can wear them while recording drums and you'll hear little to none of the room drum sound, for example. You could probably stand next to a cranked up full stack of amps and blast away with these on and not go deaf. They're pretty awesome. I'm tempted to get a pair myself though I'm not really sure I actually need them.

http://www.goingtoday.com/

[ken]

These headphones are also good to wear when you are putting your mics up to hear what the mic hears and not what is going on in the room. You can move your mic around a source and hear how it changes because you aren't hearing everything else going on in the room.

Ken

[ken]

Tascam 144 for $99 today on MF. If any of you are running a J-Station directly into your computer you should think about upgrading to this box and running your J-Station in via the Spdif input.

Get a short spdif cable along with it: http://accessories.musiciansfriend.com/ ... sku=583989

Ken

[jb]

Rather than a dedicated SPDIF cable, you can take an old RCA cable, peel off one side or the other, and use that as your SPDIF cable. It's the same stuff.

[Lunkhead]

Going Today has the Audio-Technica ATM250 Dynamic Instrument Mic for $149.99, which is $30 less than what Musician's Friend is charging. I don't know anything about this mic, though.

http://www.goingtoday.com/

[ken]

Buy.com has M-Audio Studiophile AV 40 Powered Speakers-Refurbished on sale for $80 for the pair.

These go for $150 on Musician's Friend and I was surprised to see how good the reviews were.

[Lunkhead]

I bet this Peavey JSX 2-12 Joe Satriani all tube 120-watt combo amp can really shred. It's almost 50% off, at $799.

http://guitars.musiciansfriend.com/prod ... sku=481441

[ken]

I don't know if that amp will let you surf with the aliens or not.

I hope everyone noticed that MF has free shipping with no minimum right now, so if you have been putting off buying a new set of strings or something you should do it now!

Ken

[Märk]

Rather than a dedicated SPDIF cable, you can take an old RCA cable, peel off one side or the other, and use that as your SPDIF cable. It's the same stuff.

I have tried this, and it didn't work. Digtal audio cables are co-axial, analog cables aren't. If you have super high quality RCA cables, maybe, but I couldn't get it to work.

[fluffy]

Except that RCA cables are usually coaxial

(There's a braided wire mesh that goes around an insulated wire.)

Seriously, the only difference between an RCA cable and an SPDIF cable is the color of the plug.

[Lunkhead]

You've got another chance for a deal on Direct Sound EX-29 Extreme Isolation Headphones. These suckers are awesome. I don't have a pair but Ken does. They are good for tracking drums and making sure the click/tracks don't bleed into your drum tracks, or for positioning a mic in front of a guitar amp/cabinet, making sure you're hearing the monitoring through the mic rather than the direct sound from the amp, etc. You might not want to wear them for 8 hours in a row as they're pretty heavy duty, though.

$75.99
+ $5.00 shipping

http://www.moonlightspecial.com/

[fluffy]

Today you can get a Kaossilator for $119, for those who want to screw around with electronic noises and stuff. Only catch is that it's pink.

[fluffy]

Today's deal is the FireStudio Project for $350. I bought one of these a while back and I'm pleased as punch with it.

[Lunkhead]

Speaking of fake drums, today's stupid deal is a drum VST for only $40, which supposedly comes with a kit that's sounds a lot like John Bonham's.

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/pr ... sku=582521

It's so cheap I'm tempted to order it even though I don't really need it...

[Billy's Little Trip]

Speaking of fake drums, today's stupid deal is a drum VST for only $40, which supposedly comes with a kit that's sounds a lot like John Bonham's.

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/pr ... sku=582521

It's so cheap I'm tempted to order it even though I don't really need it...

Ooooo OooO get it! I just checked out the samples and he's got the Bonham sound down perfect. Click on led Zep. http://www.stevenslatedrums.com/

[fluffy]

Today's Woot is a collection of refurbished M-Audio gear to get started on a studio setup, each item costing $60. There's a keyboard, a mixer, a vocal mic, a recording interface, and monitor speakers. I've never been thrilled with the M-Audio stuff I've tried but these look like pretty good deals, and cheap enough that it's okay if they turn out to be crap. I'll probably pick up the monitors, at least.

[ken]

Today's Woot is a collection of refurbished M-Audio gear to get started on a studio setup, each item costing $60. There's a keyboard, a mixer, a vocal mic, a recording interface, and monitor speakers. I've never been thrilled with the M-Audio stuff I've tried but these look like pretty good deals, and cheap enough that it's okay if they turn out to be crap. I'll probably pick up the monitors, at least.

Wow. That's a pretty good deal. I can tell you that I am a big fan of both the Fast Track ("Recording Studio") and Key Rig ("Keystudio"). $65 is a pretty good deal on that and you would be hard pressed to get those used at that price. I would stay away from the mixer and microphone myself.

Ken

[fluffy]

Yeah, I ended up ordering the Keystudio as well, since I've been wanting a keyboard controller with fiddly knobs (which my Privia doesn't provide) but my first-gen Oxygen8 has just been a disappointment (mostly due to driver issues, and the fact it even needs a driver to begin with).

Oh, and it looks like the keyboard also comes with a beginner version of Pro Tools. I'll probably screw around with that, although I doubt I'll be switching to it from Logic.

[Lunkhead]

Today's deal is the Audix Fusion F15 small diaphragm condenser mic with a mic cable, for $50:

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/pr ... sku=270282

I don't know anything about this mic, but Audix seems like a reputable mic maker from what little I know, and it's cheap enough for low budget Song Fighters to afford.

[Lunkhead]

Today's deal is a super cheap 2-in/2-out Firewire audio interface, the Phonic Firefly 202, for $40.

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/pr ... sku=582554

The interface is super bare bones. It does not have preamps, phantom power, mic inputs, hardware direct monitoring, etc. But for $40 it may be one of the cheapest ways to get a real, licensed version of Cubase LE. You would then be able to upgrade to a copy of Cubase Studio 5 for $200 (or Cubase Essential 5 for less) if you wanted to have a real licensed version of a more powerful flavor of Cubase. (LE might be good for some basic Song Fight stuff but is actually pretty limited.)

[Lunkhead]

Today's deal is the Line 6 "Pod Farm" plugin for $40:

http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/pr ... sku=703355

It comes with "18 guitar amps, 24 guitar cabs, 5 bass amps, 5 bass cabs, 29 stompboxes and studio effects, 6 mic preamps", which is a lot for $40, I think. This just might help you stop having shitty guitar tone on your recordings. If you are just plugging your guitar in direct, you really need something like this. It will sound a lot better than just putting your direct tone through a generic distortion plugin.

Also today on Going Today is the Korg Pitchblack chromatic guitar tuner pedal for $70.

http://www.goingtoday.com/

There really is no excuse for out of tune guitar.

[Lunkhead]

Today's deal is a Gibson Limited (production) Run Tribal V for $799:

http://guitars.musiciansfriend.com/prod ... sku=527772

This thing was selling for $1499, and still is direct from Gibson via Amazon. If you're a metal head or a real hard rocker or you are way into old heavy music from the 60s and 70s featuring gnarly dudes thrashing flying Vs, this deal could be for you. It looks like a serious shred machine (though it doesn't have a 24-fret neck, unfortunately).