Daddy’s Blog

Dream’s came true yesterday in Boston during our first annual Dream Cymbal Day. There were cymbals for miles( while many feet..see pictures) and multiples of many. There were many cymbals that I hadn’t even heard yet( Energy Rides and Hi-Hats ) that sounded awesome. The many drummers that came and bought cymbals agreed. There were Gong’s, as promised, displayed in the Gong area.(I’ve never said before). It was great day. We will have the remainder of cymbals from Dream Day on display in Boston for another week. They will still be priced low. If you haven’t heard these cymbals yet, you need to. You’ll be blown away by the sound and the price. Check it out.

Michael Tocker-drums

About a month ago, we got a call from Sully Erna from Godsmack regarding the purchase of a ton of their old touring and recording equipment. Naturally, when you need to sell or trade your gear, Daddy’s Junky Music is the place to call. Sully knows this, so he hit us up and Candi Bramante (promotions director), Brian Guilbeault (one of our warehouse managers), and myself went down and met Sully at his storage space and picked up a ton of gear that had been used on the past couple albums and through a number of studio sessions. It’s been a huge amount of work getting everything photographed, cleaned and tested so this post will be short and to the point. We’re going to be selling everything on eBay for Sully and the band so pretty soon I’m going to have a pile of some really cool live and recording gear available for auction. The auctions will probably go live the beginning of next week so as I get everything listed, I’ll be going over the items in more detail on the blog. Hopefully this will give you all some insight as to what goes into a live tour and some examples of some premium gear that can be used in a variety of live and recording applications. For now, I’ll leave you with a small preview of what’s to come. Ok, well maybe it’s not small, but when you sell millions of albums and go on huge word wide tours that’s not exactly a small feat either. Check it out.

Godsmack approved wall of sound!

Here I am "working". I'm actually just telling my wife I'm busy and can't talk! Nice timing on the photo op Candi. Makes me look like a slacker. It was nice to see Sully wasn't afraid to get his hands dirty. He was really great to work with. That's his long time friend Fro on the right side of the case helping load up.

Sully and I by the Daddy's truck. In the back of the truck is Brian Guilbeault, one of our warehouse managers. He drove Candi and me down and gave us a hand getting everything loaded up and brought back to corporate safely. Thanks Brian!

There’s a ton of stuff not pictured here because it was just getting ridiculous and I was running out of room in the photo to pile more stuff. That big road case under the mixer is chock full of pedals, processors, percussion, strings, cables, and a ton of other items. Stay tuned for more detailed information on all the gear!

2 more shopping days till DREAM CYMBAL DAY in Boston. I’ve recieved the cymbals( more then 100 and yes..some gongs) and even dropped a box of ‘em on my foot.(ouch..That answered my questions about which is heavier a box of rocks or a box of cymbals..cymbals most def)There are many rides and crashes from all 3 Series(Bliss,Contact,Energy) and Hi-Hats in all sizes( 12″ hats, under $90.) The prices for the one day( calendar marked right..Friday 10/16.. 11-7) are great . These cymbals are hand hammered. Come in , grab an armfull, bring your trades, and have a good time hittin’ stuff. The selection will never be better and the prices will never be lower. Come early stay late! Thanx

Michael Tocker-drums

In the last few posts we’ve talked about Studio Monitor’s, the various types and brands, what their application might be and how you would use them. It’s Monday morning and I figured to conclude our discussion about Studio Monitor’s I would show you my personal choice and favorite brand that is currently on the market. ADAM Monitors. Now, Daddy’s Junky Music doesn’t stock a lot of ADAM’s because for the most part they are really expensive. We can special order anything that they make and get it to you quickly. They do however, make a couple of moderately priced offerings that we do stock and in my opinion they crush everything else in that price range. They are the ADAM A7’s.A7’s have a 7″ Kevlar woofer and a Ribbon Tweeter. Looks weird right? Some of you may have seen a ribbon tweeter, and some of you have not. Bottom line is this. It’s a better, more efficient and accurate design than most traditional style tweeters. A ribbon tweeter is supposed to have a higher frequency response which allows it to reproduce higher frequencies than on a conventional design. There’s just something that you get when you listen to an ADAM speaker that you just don’t hear when you’re listening to something else. There’s a quality of sound that you just have to experience to be able to understand it. I’d recommend anyone in the market for a quality Studio Monitor to take a look at the ADAM line of speakers. ADAM A7’s retail for $1000 for a pair. If you’re in and around that budget for a pair of monitors you’d be doing yourself an injustice by not listening to a pair of A7’s before you make your decision on which to buy. Currently I’m saving my pennies so I can buy a new pair of ADAM monitors for my home recording studio. They are the S3x-H. The S3 is a mid-field monitor which basically means you sit further away from it. The reason that I’m going with this type of monitor is because of where I sit in relation to the speakers, and I like a dual woofer and mid-range speaker design because I feel it has the best detail and presence when recording vocals.

Lastly, just because we all like to window shop I figured I would show you something utterly ridiculous and crazy that they make. I’ve never seen or heard a pair of these in person but to say that I’d love to is an understatement. These Main monitors which are used basically when you want to play back at high volume and get a huge full range reproduction of your recording are called the S7A’s. They have two 15″ woofers, two 9’s woofers, two mid-frequency ribbon tweeters and one high frequency ribbon tweeters. Each speaker pushes over 4,000 watts. The cabinets on them are so big I could probably crawl inside them and go to sleep. Now, 99.9% of the world’s population will never need anything like this. Certainly not in a home studio environment. The only reason that I’m showing them to you is just to give you and idea of just how deep the scope is of what’s available out there. I think it’s probably safe to say every one of us has gone to our favorite car manufacturer’s website and built our dream ride once or twice. I guess for me, it’s more interesting to dream about building a recording studio than buying a fancy car, but I suppose that if you bought a pair of  S7A’s for $45,990 (no, that’s not a typo) you might expect them to have wheels that pop out of them so you could drive them to work. If you have any other questions about anything gear related, don’t hesitate to call 800-373-8393 X100 or email bfoley@daddys.com. I love to talk about gear and if myself or anyone else at Daddy’s Junky Music can help you realize your gear dreams, we’re all about it! Give us a call or stop by your local Daddy’s and check us out!

There are so many brands and models of studio monitor, it’s really hard to choose something. All of the manufacturers offer quality products in a variety of price ranges to suit every application and budget. So how do you choose which studio monitor will be right for you? As I mentioned in the last post, some of it is budget and size, but at the end of the day it’s really about the sound. Another brand of monitors that Daddy’s carries is M-audio. They are similar in power, size, and expense to the KRK speakers I showed you guys yesterday. The major difference in my opinion is the physical appearance, and the sound. The M-audio monitors are brighter in my opinion. To put it another way, they reproduce treble frequencies at a louder volume. This is neither good or bad. It’s simply a different speaker and that speaker has different sound characteristics.

M-Audio BX8A

Some people like more treble, some more bass, and some mid-range frequencies. Depending on the type of recording you are doing and the type of instruments or vocalist that you are working with your preference may lean towards one manufacturer or another. It’s important to remember that once you learn the “behavior” of the speaker that you are using, you will be able to get a proper mix. Don’t be discouraged if it takes multiple tries and multiple trips to the car or to your home stereo before you get something that you like completely. That’s why there are studio’s out there that specialize in mastering and get a premium fee for this service alone. It literally takes hundreds of hours of mixing before you really start to get good at it and pick up on all the subtleties that someone with a trained ear will hear. It’s really just like anything else. The more you do it, the better you get at it and the faster you can get the work done and move on to other things. To see the our entire inventory of studio monitors go to www.daddys.com. You can also call me anytime at 800-373-8393 X100 or email bfoley@daddys.com.

In the last few posts I’ve been talking about computer based recording interfaces and a few standalone recording products that we sell at Daddy’s Junky Music. Today I wanted to talk a little about another vital part of the signal chain, studio monitors. I wouldn’t say that the speakers are as important as picking a quality interface to get your audio into the computer, but I would say that they are the next most important piece of the puzzle. Having a good quality set of monitors will go a long way to help you get an accurate and proper sounding mix of the music you record when you go to put it on a CD or listen back to all of the parts mixed together. The purpose of a studio monitor is to provide you with an accurate mix of the music when you listen to it during playback. This allows you to add or remove certain sounds and frequencies in the interest of getting things to sound proper. This way, when you take your final mix and listen to it on your stereo or in your car, you can hear everything clearly. Mixing on a set of studio monitors will give you the ability to control the amount of bass in your mix for example. If you were to do a mix on a basic set of speakers that amplify or enhance the bass for the purpose of it sounding good, you may perceive that there is too much bass in the mix and therefore turn the bass eq down. The problem with this is that when you then take the song and listen to it in your car, you may find that there is no bass in the mix because you thought it was too loud and in fact because you heard it on a stereo it gave you a false sense of what was actually in the mix. Ultimately, once you practice mixing (and it takes a ton of practice to get good at it) you can “learn” the behavior of any speaker that you listen to and mix your audio accordingly. However, if you get yourself a nice pair of studio monitors it eliminates some of the “learning” process involved in figuring out how your mix is going to translate when you play it in a stereo. Daddy’s sells a wide variety of recording studio monitors in a broad price range. Pound for pound, in my opinion one of the best deals we have to offer our customers is KRK. KRK is a company that specializes in making studio monitors. They offer three basic models of speaker in various price ranges. The Rokit 5, Rokit 6, and Rokit 8. The number in this case designates the size of the woofer. The size of the woofer does impact how much bass you get from the speakers, so the best way to choose which one is right for you would be based on size, (how much room you have on your desktop) and the type of music, or instruments that you will be recording. If you’re going to be recording just acoustic guitar and vocals say, you could get away with a smaller woofer. If you are going to be recording hip-hop or electronic music, then you will definitely need a larger woofer to handle the low frequencies.

The speakers are priced at $299.99 for the 5’s, $399.99 for the 6’s and $499.99 for the 8’s. They are sold in pairs. In the next post I will go over a couple of other brands and options for studio monitors. Daddy’s Junky Music has the entire line of KRK monitor products available to our customers from the budget conscious Rokit series right up to there top of the line Expose. You can call 800-373-8393 X100 or email bfoley@daddys.com or stop by one of our 20 retail locations and speak with a salesperson. We’re always happy to do what we can to help our customers find the right gear to fit their needs. We have a best selection of used gear in stock anywhere so go to www.daddys.com and check it out!

….was a great song by The Posies from the early ’90’s off of the equally awesome Frosting On The Beater record. It also describes our event at the Boston Store on Friday October 16th perfectly.It’s our 1st Annual DREAM CYMBAL TASTING DAY . Dream Cymbals , those fine hand hammered affordable cymbals produced in Wuhan China, will be sending over 100 Cymbals to our shop. There will be selection’s from the Bliss, Contact and Energy line’s of cymbals. There might even be a couple of Gongs thrown in. These cymbals are always at a great price, but for this day they will priced even lower impossible as it would seem. There will be Dream Cymbal  product experts there as well.        FAQ’s

Q:What are the hours of DREAM DAY at Daddy’s Boston?

A: 11:00 AM till 7:oo PM, so you can Dream all day.

Q: Will Daddy’s be accepting trades at this event?

A: YES! Bring ‘em in.

Q: Will there be an open bar?

A: no

See you then.

Michael Tocker-drums

We’ve been talking about computer based recording products in the last few posts, so today I wanted to cover something for those of you out there who don’t have a computer that would work for recording or maybe it is not available to use for recording. There are a large number of great digital recorders out there that have CD quality sound and a great feature list. In particular one of the products that I want to mention is made by Zoom, and it’s called the HD8, or HD16 respectively.

The HD8 is a full 8 track digital recorder with built in effects, drum machine, bass synthesizer, and CD burner all under one roof. It’s made out of a rugged all metal chassis so it can stand up to being brought on the road. This unit is capable of recording two inputs simultaneously, and it also has direct USB transfer to a computer in the event that you want to use another program to mix and burn your audio onto CD’s, backup your data from the Zoom’s internal 40gig hard drive or just use the Zoom as a digital interface that will function like some of the interface products we’ve been talking about in earlier posts. It’s a nice box that has some quality features and construction and it retails for $499.99. For those who need more inputs and connectivity you can check out the HD8’s big brother, the HD16.

The HD16 is the same in every way, with one major exception. This is a 16 track total, 8 simultaneous digital recorder, so it’s much more capable of recording an entire band or a full drum set without having to go back and overdub. Another nice feature of the Zoom boxes for me is that it has independent led meters on each channel. A lot of digital recorder products have a small LCD display that you have to get all your information from and setting levels is an important part of getting a quality recording so I’m happy that Zoom included the level meters on their products. It makes setup and getting the proper level so much easier. The HD16 sells for $699.99 and is available at any local Daddy’s Junky Music store or for purchase online at www.daddys.com. Give me a call at 800-373-8393 X100 or email bfoley@daddys.com for more information on this or any other recording products in general.

In the last couple blogs we’ve been talking about computer based recording interfaces for a variety of applications. Today I wanted to cover one interface in particular that is exclusive to Daddy’s Junky Music. More specifically, the interface itself is not exclusive, but the special software bundle that is packed in with it is the exclusive part. You don’t pay any extra for the added bonus software so there’s simply no reason to buy one anywhere else. The Presonus Audio Box.

Front Panel Inputs and Controls

Rear Panel Outputs and Midi

The Presonus Audio Box USB is a basic two channel USB audio interface. This unit is bus powered, which means that it does not need an external power supply to function. The power derived from the USB port on your computer is sufficient to power the Audio Box. It is capable of recording two tracks simultaneously, so it’s perfect for the home recording hobbyist or solo artist. A common application for an interface like this would be to record vocals and guitar. The beautiful thing about it is that it’s only $149.99 so it will fit into most peoples budget. The interface comes with a full version of Cubase LE recording software and a myriad of other great plug-ins and software. Remember what I mentioned before? You only get all the extra plug-ins and goodies if you purchase it from a Daddy’s Junky Music store. This box records at CD quality, 44.1khz so the audio will be up to par with the majority of the other products that are available for this type of application. If you have any questions about recording interfaces or computer recording products in general then you can email bfoley@daddys.com or call 800-373-8393 X100 anytime.

Last time we covered some all in one type solutions for getting your audio into the computer environment. That method is nice and easy, it provides you with a tactile interface that is more familiar for some, but it’s not always in the budget. Today I want to point out another product that will work well for those of you who need to find a more budget conscious solution to get your audio into the computer. My personal choice in interfaces are made by MOTU, otherwise known as Mark of the Unicorn. In my opinion they make the best combination of quality and price with what I believe to be the best support department that I’ve ever had the pleasure of dealing with. They have a large range of products that fit both casual and professional applications, but one in particular stands out for it’s value. The MOTU 8pre.

Front Panel Controls and Metering

Rear Panel Inputs and Outputs

The 8 Pre is a full 16×12 interface, that’s 16 inputs and 12 outputs by using the optical audio in and out located on the back panel. For the purpose of this discussion let’s just call it an 8 channel interface. So basically it will allow you to record 8 mics at once or 8 instruments. The inputs on the back allow you to plug in either XLR (mic) or 1/4″ line (guitar) connections. You can also use this products as a standalone eight channel preamp that you can integrate into your existing setup if you just need to add more input channels. These units retail for $549.99.

By using an interface like this you are presented with a couple of options. If you have an analog mixer that has direct outputs you can send the audio from your mixer channel strip directly into the 8pre. This would give you the ability to have that analog feel some people like so much. You can adjust multiple channels on your mixer at the same time and get real time feedback from the moment you turn a knob or move a fader. Working this way is great for those of you who like to use a physical mixer instead of pointing and clicking a mouse on a virtual on-screen mixer. The only thing to consider is what we touched on last time. More outboard gear means more noise. Again, good quality components go a long way for giving you a great sound with minimal noise, but the saying less is more in this case rings true. In the next blog I will be highlighting a couple of very basic recording interfaces for the budget conscious or home recording enthusiast. If you have any questions on any of the gear that you see at Daddy’s Junky Music you can always give me a call at 800-373-8393 X100 or email bfoley@daddys.com.