Start Me Up
Five awesome new products to get your gear engine revving this month…
Five new products you need to check out
Roadie 2 1 This handy robot tuner is now in its second incarnation – the device analyses the vibrations from a picked string to know its current pitch, then the motor rotates the peg until it’s completely in tune. The whole process takes just 30 seconds and can be used to quickly switch between open tunings via 20 pre sets accessed using the on board O LED screen and knobs. It even keeps track of tuning stats and each string’s quality, so you know when to change them out. It can help with restringing too! (£114, roadietuner.com) On-Stage Spring-Up Locking Guitar Stand 2
There’s not much innovation to be had when it comes to guitar stands, right? Let On-Stage prove you wrong with its nifty locking design, which secures your guitar in place when it’s in the stand. All you have to do is push the guitar down and the lower yoke springs up to lock it in place. That means the stand and guitar essentially become one, so that you can shift the pair around the stage together with the minimum of fuss. Electric and acoustic models are available.
(£19.95,ernieball.co.uk) Ernie Ball Super Slinky t-shirt 3 We play strings. Web end strings. We sweat all over ’em, and we sometimes end up breaking them. But now, youcanwearthem–sortof.Ernie Ball has slapped its iconic packaging on a series of fine-looking tees with eye-pop ping colours to match. There’s a choice of Super Slinky, looking resplendent in pink, Regular Slinky, in a lime-ish green, plus Power Slinky in a deep, deep purple. Each tee is made out of 100 percent cotton and is available in sizes from small to XXL. (£19.95,ernieball.co.uk) Strymon Zuma R300 4 S try monist outing the Z um a R 300 as“the most technologically advanced low-profile effects pedal power supply”. This discreet box offers two stages of isolation, pre-regulated output sand multi-stage filtering. Four isolated 500 mA outputs are onboard, while a fifth output delivers switchable 18/12/9V, providing 500 mA at 9 V ,375 mA at 12 V and 250 mA at 18 V. If you need more power down the line, you can use the Z um aR300’ s 24 V Th ru jack to add further Strymon supplies. (£199,
strymon.com) Chicken Picks 5
Now available in the UK, this Dutch-designed pickaims to deliver maximum volume and a thicker tone courtesy of its chunky format, all with minimum effort from your picking hand – an added bonus is less hand fatigue and less string breakage. Plus, by changing how tightly you keep hold of the pick, you can tweak your attack without losing grip, all thanks to the Chick’s grippy texture. There’s no pick drag with this one, so acoustic players may want to look elsewhere, but electric players will want to peck, sorry, pick one up. (£6.79,chickenpicks.com)