2010 | Line 6 Blog

Recording Acoustic Guitar

Dec 17, 2010 Line 6 General, Line 6 Tips & Tricks, Propellerhead Reason & Record

With proper microphone placement, great-sounding acoustic guitar recordings can be done at home. Here are some easy tips to get you started!

Tags: line 6, Line6Piper, line6piperpropellerblog, microphone techniqes, miking acoustic guitar, propellerhead reason, propellerhead record, recording acoustic guitar

M9: Replacing Teddy’s NYC Subway Pedal Board

Dec 10, 2010 Line 6 General

When tone-tweaker and M13 evangelist Teddy Kumpel needs to pare down his rig and brave the New York City subways, he grabs his M9 and heads out the door. But it wasn’t always this easy… By Teddy Kumpel If you’ve read my other blog posts (here and here), you know by now what a fan [...]

Tags: distortion, echo, gig, kumpel, m13, m9, modeler, new york, nyc, pedalboard, pedel board, scene, stage, stompbox, subway, teddy, tuner, volume, wah

WORLD Musical Instruments and Production Guitar Number One

Dec 1, 2010 Line 6 General

Just got back from Korea overseeing production of the first batch of James Tyler Variax guitars, and they are coming out great. They are being made by our Korean partner, WORLD Musical Instruments Co. Ltd. When we set out to find the partner for our off-shore guitars, we searched the globe. I talked to people [...]

Tags: candy apple red, guitar assembler, guitar factory, guitar production, James Tyler, james tyler variax, jtv, jtv-69, jtv69

Dialing In Spider Valve MkII Tones: Pt. 4

Nov 19, 2010 Line 6 Tips & Tricks

Line 6 Expert Rowbi has been a Line6.com Community member since November 25, 2006, has posted over 4,000 times and has earned over 3,000 points. He’s treating us to a series of blog posts and videos centered on one area of his expertise: Spider Valve™ MkII guitar amplifiers. For more helpful gear tutorials, visit Rowbi’s [...]

Tags: amp, crunch, edit, effects, expert, fx, harmonizer, harmony, octave, pitch, pitch_glide, pitch_shifter, rowbi, smart_harmony, spider valve, sweep, tube, video, youtube

Making Music Videos For YouTube | Part 1

Nov 12, 2010 Line 6 Tips & Tricks

Jordan Colley is the resident video production guy at Line 6 HQ. You might remember his work from “that video that you saw on YouTube” or his epic masterpiece, “that other video you saw on Line6.com”. Making a compelling demonstration or music video can seem like a secret art sometimes, but it doesn’t have to [...]

Guide to Home Recording, Part 2: Choosing Microphones

Nov 5, 2010 Line 6 Tips & Tricks

Vocals to drums, the right microphones ensure the best recordings. This article continues Line 6′s home recording series with an exploration into the most common microphone types, specs and applications. Big recording budgets, giant studios and seasoned engineers are becoming increasingly scarce so be sure you’re making the right microphone choices. Read Part 1 of [...]

Tags: 414, acoustic, banjo, cello, Condenser, cymbals, dB, drums, Dynamic, freq, frequency response, guitar, interface, kb37, mandolin, MD421, microphones, midi, mike, mix, phantom power, pod farm, pod studio, podfarm, polar pattern, pop filter, presence, RE20, record, recording, ribbon mic, SM57, spl, toneport, U87, ux2, ux8, violin, Vocals

Dialing In Spider Valve MkII Tones: Pt. 3

Oct 29, 2010 Line 6 Tips & Tricks

Line 6 Expert Rowbi has been a Line6.com Community member since November 25, 2006, has posted over 4,000 times and has earned over 3,000 points. He’s treating us to a series of blog posts and videos centered on one area of his expertise: Spider Valve™ MkII guitar amplifiers. For more helpful gear tutorials, visit Rowbi’s [...]

Tags: amber, amp model, amp models, bassman, blackface, community, edit, editor, expert, fbv, fbv express, fbv shortboard, fender, mac, manual, midi, nashville, pc, rowbi, shortboard, spider valve mkii, twang, twin, twin reverb, valve, youtube

CMJ 2010: The Long Road Home

Oct 23, 2010 Line 6 General

Hundreds of overheated music fans spilled out onto a Brooklyn sidewalk after (yet another) excellent BrooklynVegan CMJ event. Incredible sets from Ted Leo, Morning Teleportation, Titus Andronicus, No Joy, Jamie Lidell, Dominique Young Unique, Reggie Watts and others sent us away exhausted but exhilarated. Yesterday’s spike in Spider Valve™ praise was matched by this afternoon’s [...]

Tags: band, blog, brooklyn, brooklynvegan, cmj, dl4, Dominique Young Unique, green pedal, Jamie Lidell, ld300 pro, lowdown, Morning Teleportation, new york city, No Joy, photographer, psychedelic-rock, Reggie Watts, spider valve, SV, synth, Ted Leo, The Flaming Lips, Titus Andronicus

CMJ 2010: One Down, One to Go

Oct 22, 2010 Line 6 General

Lots of great music, lots of great people, a scheduling mishap that threatened to undo an entire CMJ event (welcome to the rock and roll business), and we’re officially halfway through our own little CMJ music marathon. Today’s Planetary Group/Future Sounds party was a great success. (No surprise, they’ve been throwing this annual daytime bash [...]

Tags: amps, apple trees and tangerines, backline, beyond this point, black dub, brooklynvegan, cmj, daniel lanois, future sounds, indie-pop, LD, lowdown, party, planetary group, showcase, soul, spider valve, SV

CMJ 2010: Can You Take Me Higher?

Oct 21, 2010 Line 6 General

Anxiety, nerves, butterflies – call it what you want. But no matter how many times you’ve played, or how many stages you’ve played on, you never lose that little sense of heightened awareness that comes before a performance. It might hit you in the morning, it might hit you at showtime, but it always hits [...]

Tags: anxiety, bassist, blog, brooklyn, butterflies, cab, cmj, event, guitarist, lowdown, nerves, new yourk, nyc, perform, spider valve

CMJ 2010: We Have Arrived

Oct 20, 2010 Line 6 General

Months in preparation. Thousands of dollars in airfare, hotel rooms and rental gear. 30 short minutes to prove yourself. For many indie bands, making a pilgrimage to the CMJ Music Marathon is no small feat. But that’s what makes this event so special. New York City is a bustling place where people feel free to [...]

Tags: big apple, blog, cmj, festival, lowdown, new york, nyc, sinatra, spider valve, twitter

James Tyler Variax and Wildwood Manufacturing

Oct 20, 2010 Line 6 General

When we set out to find a manufacturing partner for the USA-made James Tyler Variax bodies and necks, we searched the entire country. We looked for a team that shared our sensibilities. (Sensibilities that need to mesh with James Tyler’s exacting standards.) We found a wonderful partner in Wildwood Manufacturing. Wildwood Manufacturing has been making [...]

Tags: james tyler variax, JTV-US, Wildwood Manufacturing

MIDI Mobilizer Inspires MIDI Apps on iPhone, iPad, iPod touch

Oct 15, 2010 Line 6 General

By Chris Grigg, Mobile Products Manager As you may have heard, Line 6 makes the first – and so far, only – real hardware MIDI interface for Apple® mobile devices: the MIDI Mobilizer™. Ever since we first announced the MIDI Mobilizer, MIDI-using musicians everywhere have been really excited about the possibilities of using their Apple [...]

Tags: app, apple, apps, app_store, controller, interface, ipad, ipod, keyboard, mac, midi, midi memo recorder, midi_mobilizer, mobilizer, piano, portable, sequencer, smf, soundfont, synth, sysex, xy

Why Do You Make Music?

Oct 8, 2010 Line 6 General

“A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself.” – Abraham Maslow In my last blog I talked about animals and their songs. Usually animals sing for a very specific reason, some of them are to attract a mate, to warn [...]

Tags: Artistic, line 6, music, Why make music

Guide to Home Recording, Part 1: The Computer

Oct 1, 2010 Line 6 Tips & Tricks

Big budgets, giant studios and seasoned engineers are becoming increasingly scarce, and more and more musicians are recording their music at home. This article, the first in a multi-part series, explores and demystifies the fundamentals of home recording: everything from software to interfaces and beyond. By Philip De Lancie Whether you’re a singer-songwriter or in [...]

Tags: ableton, computer, CPU, daw, firewire, GHz, gx, mac, memory, OS, pc, pod studio, propellerhead, ram, reason, recording, rpm, usb, ux1, ux2, windows, XP

James Tyler Variax Receives “Guitarist Choice” Award!

Sep 30, 2010 Line 6 General

James Tyler Variax receives “Guitarist Choice” award from Guitarist magazine (and the guitar isn’t even out yet). Read the entire review here!

Tags: guitarist, Guitarist Choice Award, Guitarist Magazine, james tyler variax, line 6, Variax Review

Dialing In Spider Valve MkII Tones: Pt. 2

Sep 24, 2010 Line 6 Tips & Tricks

Line 6 Expert Rowbi has been a Line6.com Community member since November 25, 2006, has posted over 3,700 times and has earned over 3,000 points. He’s treating us to a series of blog posts and videos centered on one area of his expertise: Spider Valve™ MkII guitar amplifiers. For more helpful gear tutorials,visit Rowbi’s website. [...]

Tags: boogie, dual rectifier, express, fbv, high gain, insane, marshall, mesa, metal, midi, recto, rowbi, shortboard, spider valve mkii, spider valve mkii edit, youtube

Propellerhead Community: Peff’s BitCrusher BC3 Combinator

Sep 17, 2010 Line 6 Tips & Tricks, Propellerhead Reason & Record

Peff, aka Kurt Kurasaki, is constantly coming up with innovative and inspiring ways to use Propellerhead Reason and Propellerhead Record. Some of his fine work can be found in the Record and Reason Soundbank ReFills, and he regularly posts on his blog about new ideas he’s trying out, providing food for thought along with several [...]

More Thoughts on the James Tyler Variax from Dwayne Larring

Sep 17, 2010 Line 6 Artists

Producer Dwayne Larring (Kelly Clarkson, Nick Carter, Voxhaul Broadcast) is currently in the studio tracking guitars. With a pile of great guitars to choose from, only one has opened up “a world of possibilities” for him. Can you guess which one? Did you miss last week’s video of Dwayne?

Tags: dwayne larring, james tyler variax, JTV-69US, jtv69, Kelly Clarkson, Nick Carter

Producer Dwayne Larring in the Studio with a James Tyler Variax

Sep 10, 2010 Line 6 Artists

Having helped shape the careers of Kelly Clarkson, Nick Carter, Voxhaul Broadcast and many other artists, producer Dwayne Larring is serious about tone. See what happened when we left him alone with a JTV-69US…