Daddy’s Blog

A quick update, as promised, the Week 16 Gibson LP Classic Custom in Silverburst with ’57 Classic Humbuckers has arrived and is now at many of the Daddy’s stores.  Also just in from Gibson, the Week 18 entry in the Gibson Guitar of the Week program, the SG Supreme Bass with a Triple A maple top and Fireburst finish, landed on Wednesday and is now on the way to our stores.  Powered by a Vintage Style TB Plus Bass Humbucker and a Bass Mini-Humbucker, the bass is light and quick just like the EB-3 from the ‘60s and ‘70s, except that this latest version is all dressed up and more powerful than ever.

The latest cool amp from Vox, the AC-50 combo will be hitting the stores this week.  The AC-50 is part of the Classic Plus line (AC-50 and AC-100 head, plus the 50 Combo); each amp is powered by EL-34s in the output section and 12AX7s in the pre-amp section.

Vox is attempting to form the perfect union between the familiar classic Vox tone and more modern sounds.  So, channel 1 covers the shimmer and overdrive of the AC-30 plus the addition of the Tone Cut control “musically rolls off high end as it is turned up.”  Channel 2 is the high gain channel and the added “Fat” and “Bright” switches will give you your choice of modern blues, classic rock or classic metal sounds.  If you like tone, you’ll like this amp, check it out now at Daddy’s.

 

Yamaha has just announced the July release of the NP-30 electronic piano.  Now, another digital piano release from Yamaha is not unusual.  The giant Japanese corporation currently owns almost half of the digital piano market in U.S. music stores (Casio checks in at 28.9%, Roland at 13.6% and all the others M-Audio, Korg, Kuwai, Kurzweil, etc. are scrambling for the left-overs) but Yamaha is currently capturing only 6.4% of the under $500 piano sales.  While Casio is the clear leader in that category on the strength of PX-110 sales, the NP-30 could quickly change all of that.  The NP-30 has 76 Graded Soft Touch tm keys (feature different levels of resistance without the added weight of moving hammers) weighs only 12 pounds and can be powered by 6 AA batteries or by an optional power supply.  Ten voices, 32 notes of polyphony and AWM Stereo piano samples complete the picture.  At a selling price of only $299.99, it will be interesting to see if this is just a shot across the bow or a direct hit on Casio’s dominance in the under $500 digital piano market.

Industry News

Last week, in a letter to their dealers, representatives of PreSonus stated that “Apple Computer Corp. has taken issue with PreSonus’ use of the name FirePod (PreSonus’ FireWire Interface), claiming the name too similar to Apple’s I-Pod trademark.  PreSonus has been forced to discontinue using the name FirePod as of June 30^th, 2007.”  What does this mean?  Well, for consumers the selling price will drop to $399.99 as of June 1 and ultimately, the FirePod will be replaced by a similar product with a different name.  It also means that even though Apple, who as of 4^th quarter of 2005 sold 14,000,000 iPods, that’s a rate of 100 a minute for three straight months, felt they needed to protect their trademark.  I’m guessing that PreSonus has only sold a few thousand FirePods and would hardly seem to be much of a threat to Apple but in today’s litigious world, Apple has to vigorously and consistently defend their trademark or run the risk of appearing not to care if someone else uses the Pod moniker that Apple has so effectively raised to an iconic level.  So, there it is.

Tune into WOKQ 97.5 - NH’s premier Country radio station next week and here some of Daddy’s finest music instructors attempt to teach the morning crew to play a musical instrument!  The song…”Stand By Me”

On Tuesday, Terry Barton, the piano teacher from Daddy’s Manchester will be in studio, on Wednesday, Tom Delrossi, the drum teacher at Daddy’s Portsmouth and Portland will be in studio and on Thursday will be Daddy’s Portsmouth guitar teacher MJ Stockbridge.

Each day, one of the morning crew will be taught their “part” of the song and on Friday it will all come together as they attempt to play “Stand By Me”.

Good luck to the morning crew - I’m sure they will do us proud!

We’ll continue with our listing of brand new gear that is still showing up on a very regular basis. However, another highly anticipated piece has fallen victim to “unavoidable delays”. Zoom just announced that the H2 will not arriving until August because as Zoom explains, “Though the original mic design was acceptable for podcasting and ENG, this redesigned mic section will better meet professional musicians’ standards for sound pressure level and signal to noise ratio. The new mic design, with 4 directional mics using the same mic capsules as the H4, will mean that the H2 will have the same SPL and S/N ratio as the H4.” So, a better H2 will be arriving much later but at the $200 price point, there should still be a lot of pent up demand even after a 10 week delay. Keep your fingers crossed.

The Gibson Guitar of the Week program continues to deliver some incredible instruments. Over the last couple of weeks, the Explorer Pro in Heritage Cherry and the Les Paul Antique Classic in Ice Tea Burst (w/H-90s and gold hardware, very nice!) have arrived and are currently appearing in my favorite music stores. The Les Paul Classic Custom in Silverburst shipped on May 7^th and should be arriving any day! Rumor has it that some of the cool kids who bought the SG Silverburst have already put deposits on this Les Paul so they have a matching set. Don’t know for sure if it’s true but that’s what I heard.

Billed as the “Missing Link for Software DJs” the Numark Total Control has finally arrived in Daddy’s stores. Sporting 31 buttons, 20 knobs and 5 faders that will send midi data from the controller to your favorite DJ software, a simple USB connection to your computer gives you “Total Control”. Numark’s latest offering is bundled with their proprietary Cue LE and Native Instrument’s Traktor LE software. At only $249.99, Total Control is a completely affordable solution to your interface questions.

Industry News

Harman International, owners of the JBL, Lexicon, Digitech, dbx, Crown, AKG, DOD and Soundcraft brands, recently announced they have agreed to sell the company to Goldman, Sachs and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. for close to $8 billion. Founder and current CEO, Sidney Harman, only a few months away from his 89^th (!) birthday, was quoted as saying, “I consider it an obligation to find…a safe supportive harbor for the company and its employees, customers and suppliers.” He further stated that a new CEO has been chosen and final details are being worked out at this moment. The new owners will pay $120 cash for each Harman share but Harman has retained the right to consider other offers during a 50-day period. Don’t worry about the KKR Goldman group because if the deal doesn’t go down, Harman will pay them a $75 million break-up fee if the sellers settle on another offer. The immediate or long-term impact on any of the Harman brands will yet to be determined.

Last April, the musical instrument industry was abuzz with the news that Fred Rubin, former owner of Ace Pro Sound and Recording in Miami had filed a lawsuit against Marty Albertson, CEO of Guitar Center, Guitar Center itself and seven manufacturers. The suit claimed that Albertson took part in “unconscionable acts and uniform trade practices – that defendant Albertson coerced and otherwise induced the supplier defendants to refrain from dealing the plaintiff – in violation of Florida Deceptive and Unfair Practices Act”. Now, exactly one year later (April 1, 2007), U.S. District Court Judge Marcia G. Cooke has ruled that 24 motions from that original $1 billion suit will be allowed to proceed. This ruling does not address any guilt or innocence of the accused parties but merely the whether or not there’s enough evidence for the process to continue. In Judge Cooke’s opinion, there is and the suit carries on.

Coincidentally, while the notion of “price fixing” and other illegal business practices rear their ugly heads in this suit, the Federal Trade Commission has subpoenaed several manufacturers and the National Association of Music Merchants regarding price fixing and MAP (Minimum Advertised Price) policies. It appears that the FTC is still in the fact- finding portion of their investigation and it’s unclear whether anything will come of it. No one has been charged with any wrongdoing although the subpoenaed organizations have been required to come up with sales records dating back more than seven years. There is some thought that this may be an extension of a ruling by the FTC against five record labels back in 2000. These five labels, who controlled upwards of 85% of the market, eventually agreed to suspend their MAP policies when it was revealed that the labels had attempted to control the pricing of their product sold to the consumer. The difference in the MAP policies that are prescribed in the MI industry is that, and I can speak with some personal knowledge here, these policies are in place to police how much the product is advertised for in publications or the Internet. This is done to establish and maintain value for the product and to put all retailers on an equal footing in terms of presentation of product. These policies as they are used in our industry make no attempt to control the selling price of the product to any consumers. Sounds to me like the FTC is on a fishing expedition; albeit an expensive one for our industry and for tax-payers everywhere. It will be interesting to see what comes of the Rubin lawsuit and this FTC investigation, either way someone is going to pay.

Information for “Industry News” was gathered from articles in “TWICE” and “Music Sound Retailer” magazines.