The case for new gear.

Experimenting with different instruments can often introduce a variety of methodologies for creating music which challenges the process and often retains an element of excitement.There are a lot of educational resources out there that actively dissuade people from the pitfalls of GAS, and discourage splashing out on shiny new gear but very often new instruments…

The Super Helpful PDF

The Super helpful PDF is a (non-exhaustive) list of useful VST Plugins, Virtual instruments, Sample libraries and effects that can be used in your own composition or music production. Some have more of a learning curve involved than others, but the beauty of it is everything in this list is free to download and use.This…

Cross Training… For Musicians

Cross training is a common training technique utilized by competitive athletes and research has widely shown that this training method holds several benefits to overall performance.As musicians, the concept of cross training can be a widely undersung area of our practice and it can be easy to become pigeonholed into a specific area of music…

Never ask [Redacted] what happened to their only non-male members of Staff

I’ve always used this platform as a means to introduce readers to things I find cool or interesting, and to highlight the efforts of some amazing people in the music industry. But there are some things on the opposite side of that binary that warrant discussion. A number of years ago, I noticed that I…

Have you a moment to talk about our lord and savior?

So, at the time of writing it is 2 days until Christmas. I’ve just finished semester 1 of what will be my last year in third level education, at least maybe for a while. Understandably the last year being the tail end of BA3 and the beginning of BA4 has kind of gotten in the…

Music in Practice; Pitch Shifting 101

Name: Jason ByrneComment: Why can't we infinitely pitch shift a signal without it losing its original character? And how far can we alter pitch before it loses its character? Hi Jason, Thanks so much for your question. There’s a couple of ways I can answer it because I’m not 100% sure of the context or the issue…

Walking in the Footsteps pt.2

Two months ago, I wrote an article on how I used ‘Giant steps’ as a means of navigating F Blues. I wasn’t far off the mark, but the penny hadn’t dropped yet, hence today’s article. There’s something important I missed, and instead of succumbing to a lazy edit, I thought it might be more informative…

Hold on, Remote Pedal Testing?

If you're anything like me, and I think if you clicked on this article you probably are to some degree, one of the minor frustrations of this pandemic is the loss of the routine guitar shop browsing.Nothing beats taking the pilgrimage to any of the number of guitar shops Dublin city centre has to offer…

Music in Practice; Walking in the footsteps

Prior to the beginning of this Academic year, I made a vow that come September, I would focus as many hours as possible to perfecting my walking bass. Over the months, module assignments were shoehorned and bent towards this area of bass playing; Walking over static chords, Walking over ii V I's, Walking over Jazz…

Pedal Review of the Month #1: Friedman BE-OD

Friedman BE OD  The Friedman BE OD is a transparent overdrive based on the Friedman BE-100. This compact pedal is designed to emulate the much desired transparent tube drive from the cranked BE-100 amplifier and provides as many parameters as you could possibly need to sculpt your tone.Built for fans of high gain, this pedal…