This picture is of Chase And The Reach, who won the This Bus is a Rockin’ contest with their song “Battlegrounds.” Their prize was an opportunity to shoot an HD music video on the John Lennon Tour Bus parked at the Vans Warped Tour stop in Mountain View, CA. They also got a Godin guitar and other music-related prizes.

Thanks to our friends at the John Lennon Songwriting Contest for providing prizes for this contest!

We got a chance to play with a StealthPedal at the Broadjam offices, and it’s a really cool hybrid of software technology and old-school music hardware technology. The StealthPedal is both an Audio Interface and software Controller in a compact, wah-style pedal. It’s built tough enough to use live on a regular basis, but it can also play an integral part in recording by controlling the included “Powered by Amplitube” software or any other amp and FX modeling software with MIDI control capabilities.

The StealthPedal also comes with a great assortment of software including AmpliTube 2 Live guitar and bass amp and fx modeling software, standalone and plug-in, Ampeg SVX UNO, standalone and plug-in bass amp and fx modeling software, AmpliTube X-GEAR, Sonoma Riffworks T4 for immediate recording/composing/online sharing with your Mac or PC and AmpliGrooves Loops from Sonic Reality. Plus it’ll all work on either a PC or Mac.

The winner of this giveaway blog will win all of this, plus a great extra: AmpliTube Fender Studio software. It’s an LE version of the official guitar/bass Amp and FX software AmplitTube suite, bundled with the StealthPlug guitar-to-USB audio interface cable. It also includes the AmpltiTube X-GEAR expandable guitar/bass amp and FX modeling system, Riffworks T4 recording software, and AmpliTube Fender LE Amp and FX modeling software which includes 15 pieces of gear sampled from the most sought-after classic and modern Fender amps, cabinets, stompboxes and rack effects.

How do you win the IK Multimedia StealthPedal package and AmpliTube Fender Studio software? Simple! Add a comment here telling us what features stand out, and how you would use the products. We’ll take comments for three weeks, and then narrow down the comments and have you, our members, select a winner. You just need to be a registered Broadjam member to participate. If you don’t have an account sign up today!

Broadjam members – we’ve got deals for you on stage clothing and accessories from our friends at ShopBop.com. With the code below (used at checkout), you can get an additional 30% off all of ShopBop.com items that are already marked at 70% off. That makes for some cheap duds whether you wear them under the lights or out to dinner!

ShopBop has all kinds of interesting, stylish clothing, some of it very “challenging.” While they primarily cater to women, many of their jeans will work for men as well, including their designer denim line, studded denim, and tie dye jeans. They also have lots of leggings on sale.

Broadjam members can use this coupon code during the checkout process as ShopBop.com today, August 24th, through midnight on August 25th: 30OFF70

I was working at Ensoniq – a synthesizer manufacturer – in the early nineties, and one of my responsibilities was artist relations. A friend mentioned that we should get some of our gear to Les Paul. So I called his son Russ and made arrangements to drive to his house in New Jersey and drop off some of our keyboards. He greeted me at the door like I had known him for years.

His house is big, but not a mansion. It is the Smithsonian Institution of musical instruments. I think he saved every instrument he ever made or played as well. As he and Russ showed me around their home, he would point to an old box and say stuff like, “that was the first multi-track recorder ever developed” or he would pick up a stack of papers and pull out plans for a synthesizer he designed in the forties. Or when we walked into his studio that had eggshell reflections carved in wood, yes carved, he would make a comment like “Frank and I recorded in this room.” Needless to say, I was in awe and excited before I got there and simply blown away and motivated more than ever by the time I left. Although there were many instruments, my sense is that the memories in his home studio were priceless.

I made a few more trips to his house with various pieces of gear and each time I witnessed a true inventor at work. It’s pretty obvious that I would have a helluva lot more questions to ask him than he would have about our products. Like anyone would be in my position, I wanted to barrage him with questions, but he always beat me to the punch. He had an insatiable curiosity and always wanted to learn more.

On one trip he put the “Log” in my hand. I think he said, “This is the first guitar I ever invented.” It had a door hinge (bridge) on it with a weird looking coil and one or two strings that felt like telephone wires. (See photo.) I’m still not sure if it was the first one he built, but needless to say I was shaking like a leaf anyway. On another trip I left one of our DP-4 fx processors for him to check out. During our next chat, we discussed the technology and then he suggested we should check into the detuning of the reverb in patch #143. I went back and put it on the Peterson and he was right, there was a slight detune on the sustain of the verb.

When I was at Sonic Foundry, I traveled to NYC a bit and would have a quick bite or a chat with him before his Monday night show. Again, he was so inquisitive about our software and wanted to know all the details of how it was conceived and developed. Man, he could still play. I’ve been to his show several times and it is one of the most entertaining I’ve seen. He did a tuning thing with his guitar in one of his opening numbers that I have never seen anyone else do to this day. I was not the only one encroaching on his time at the shows, but he made everyone feel like they were somebody. It was an education watching how he treated people.

The last time I saw him was at the AES show in NYC a couple of years ago. He was having lunch and I joined him for a moment of chat and he started firing questions immediately and asked how Broadjam was doing. We had talked about Broadjam on several occasions prior to that as well and we spent a lot of time discussing the compression schemas of Mp3s.

Over the years, I probably spent less than thirty hours in his presence. But each time he was extremely gracious and created the feeling like we’d known each other forever and anyone who came in contact with him felt the same way. Many know him as the inventor of the electric guitar and other cool things. To anyone who knew him, he was an inspiration and a friend. Rest In Peace Les.

Roy

Everyone,

Thanks so much for your wonderful thoughts on the Bose Blog Giveaway – it has created an interesting blog to say the least. Two of the finalists generated a lot of interest from their supporters. Larry Carr, a long time member of Broadjam, had lots of support from veteran Broadjam members who have been writing and communicating with him for years. Rick Voisey, a veteran performer as well, had numerous people vote for him and also clearly demonstrated that he is well respected by his fans as many of them signed up simply to support him.

It ended up being a tough call. We contacted our friends at Bose and explained the situation, and they generously offered to give both artists a system. So, on behalf of Bose, let’s congratulate Larry and Rick on a job well done and wish them the best with their new L1® systems.

Regards,

Roy

Have you seen the 6-Pack Leaderboard recently? It’s really heating up as the competition moves on…