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Server farm amps!

764 views 4 replies 3 participants last post by  63Blazer 
#1 · (Edited)
I got to hear one of only two prototype server farm amps last weekend. Amazing and I couldn't figure out why we didn't think of this before. Controllable and downloadable via iPhone iPad, and Apple Watch.

Two big time racks/effects companies we often talk about here (not allowed to say specifically yet) was bought by a huge Japanese company we all know (but not Ibanez) and they utilize their also high tech and computer resources from other ventures they own to make millions of dollars of effects available to all of us.

Here's how it works:

You plug into something like a amp type controller into the wall which has a speaker or two rated at 15 or 30 watts, plug in a cord, and play. There's no networking cables or MIDI.

Server Farm kicks in:


But what you are doing, after you log into the server farm is to make some or all of the millions of patches and effects available to you. I think there's a monthly fee, like Adobe Photoshop, and different plans.

When you play, the signal goes from the amp type controller via wifi or 4G LTE to server farm with chosen effects you set beforehand, transmits back to controller like amp, and you hear whatever it is that you preset.

You hit an A note on your Fender Musicmaster guitar but it comes back an Ibanez RG550 A note if you want it to, or a 12 string A note on a Martin, or an A note 2 octaves lower on a 1962 Fender P-Bass (and many other great options).

Speed of light:

The signal travels at the speed of light and being that there's only so many guitar players slated to use this $500-ish amp/controller unit and software and monthly subscription, there's no lag time. So what you play is represented by what you hear coming out through the amp controller.

If you hit a note too lightly, as in flubbing it, the server farm detects it like auto spelling and increases the volume so it sounds cleanly hit. If you hit a note too loud, it auto-corrects and makes it hit lighter. What you get is a sort of already recorded and quantized sound as if you were in the studio for hours and dialed in a great tone ready to put on your CD.

Studio musician recorded samples:

The samples are so that when you hit your note on your, let's say, cheapo Fender Musicmaster guitar, the note that comes out of the amp controller is a studio recorded note by a well known studio musician who played that specific note in a sound proof multi-million dollar studio in LA or Nashville. When you bend a note it predicts what bend you did and plays back a sample but you really can't tell it's not your sound coming through. It's *almost* as if what you are hearing is what you are playing.

A bit artificial:

All told, it's a little artificial sounding but great for jamming on the fly. It can make a beginner sound much more polished, but it will make a very strong guitarist with a lot of feel sound like Justin Bieber or Taylor Swift designed it and it's a little sterile, but what's 500 bucks?

No settings to worry about:

There's no need to set volume and tone, either. The controller detects the sounds around you and gets into a preset that sounds pretty good. My friend who has figured out his own system based on this himself (computer networking tech) says in 30 seconds all he has to do is plug into a wall, plug into his Line 6, go into PA and it's 99% percent "there".

But the server farm makes it even more dialed in and there's no fussing with setups for gigs and just let the computer technology do all the heavy lifting. And the controller itself is light enough in that you carry your guitar in one hand, controller in the other and you can play virtually any gig, any style, acoustic or electric or bass or keyboard or string section, and proceed.

While there's a side of me who loves playing guitar and hearing back what I play, I also like what's in virtual land and being able to use those tools, too. It's all good as far as I am concerned and all tools to help us. I can PM anybody a sample video if they like (as long as they promise I didn't say it here). Sometime next year at NAMM this amazing product server farm/controller/software will come out and I suspect will be all the buzz.
 
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#3 ·
:lol: Nothing about any of this sounds appealing to me. Real-time replacement of your live playing with other player's sampled playing? It's basically taking everything that makes you as a player unique, and gutting it.

EDIT - nothing wrong with you being excited about this, though. It's pretty damned cool that technology has gotten to the point where this is possible!
 
#5 · (Edited)
:lol: Nothing about any of this sounds appealing to me. Real-time replacement of your live playing with other player's sampled playing? It's basically taking everything that makes you as a player unique, and gutting it.

EDIT - nothing wrong with you being excited about this, though. It's pretty damned cool that technology has gotten to the point where this is possible!
It's fascinating that computers, I guess speed of light unless software slows it down at points, makes almost anything possible.

I played piano, uprights and grands, and forged my own sound. I worked hard to get to where I wanted to be.

But it blew me away the first time I tried a Yamaha DX-7 which much of the 1980s was done on. I play a key/keys on a Yamaha synth, but what comes out are real sampled violins, violas, and basses in a string section which is pretty darn convincing. I guess I should have stuck to improving on the piano but the pull of technology was too much for me and many musicians and I got my first Casio with what was an amazing 100 sounds or so and perfect drum machine built in. I thought this was god in a box.

No, it's not me playing but me calling up a patch. But if I play fast on the keyboard, it plays fast, if I flub a note, it flubs a note. This was revolutionary for the 1980s. It may have put studio string sections out of business live or recording. Personally I like Burt Bacharach string sections over the DX-7 but it's much more controllable in a synth.

And in the late 1980s you had real time quantizing putting your efforts into perfect tempo on the fly, and autocorrect tuning ten years after that where what you sang or played was put into perfect pitch.

Now we can do that for guitar, and via wireless, but what comes out is like the DX-7 strings or 1990s autocorrect fake vocals, and it's, well, Britney Speaks/Taylor Swift processed and so not real. It's kind of like playing one stomp box too many set just a tad bit too high on effects and trying to put your signature on it. Too much Digitech or Crybaby Wah or MXR Distortion+ then you sound more like the effect and settings than you do a real person. It's a tricky balance.

With server farms, fast networking, and 2016 supercomputers at your command, you almost can't hit a wrong note, and you can't hit a note too quietly or too hard within the context the software considers acceptable. But you feel as if you are actually playing it instead of calling up computer instructions via TCP/IP and 4G or whatever.
 
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