HarmonicaBoogie.com
- => Gear Lust => Topic started by: Rick on February 19, 2013, 01:46:08 AM
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I bought a Harp Attack from Lone Wolf . I also bought a wah wah pedal for my guitar. The Harp Attack is real nice. I wish I had it ten years ago. The wah wah pedal is real trippy. I play icky goos of notes that sound real cool and that I could not replicate again to save my life. Ha ha.
Hopefully I can get it together and make a backing track from this sonic confusion.
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Actually, I bought a Harp Attack and a Harp Break from Lone Wolf. I played the Harp Break for 2 hours tonight. Wow, it is so awesome. My weak crystal Astatic had that Little Walter sound. I have never been able to get that sound before with my old equipment. I played the Harp Break directly into my mixer and into the PC. Ha ha, I'll have a backing track soon.
Oh yes, and it has the wah wah pedal on it too. And of course as a test I played the harmonica through the wah wah pedal. It sounded exactly like I was cupping the harmonica. Imagine that! Kinda redundant, since I would rather actually cup the harmonica. So in the recording I only play the guitar through the wah wah.
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Hey Rick,
Which do you like better, the Attack or the Break?
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I played the Break for 2 hours, and it does everything I want. I recorded with it too, which gives me a good feel for it.
I only played the Attack for 5 minutes. So my next session I will do with the Attack, so I can properly compare them.
But wow, was I impressed with the Break. Easy harp tone.
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Stick up a st in G and see what we do with it.
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Hi Stan,
It will be pretty rough, but it will be in E, so you'll have to dust off that A harp.
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Done and dusted, cant be any rougher than my head!! ;)
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I'm curious to hear how the Harp Break sounds.
I want to get back into recording. Have had far too much going on.
Bought a new military mic (1952 U.S. Army signal corp) and haven't even had a chance to try it yet. Plan to restore it, and put another military element into it if needed - an excellent dynamic element that I found elsewhere.
-Eric
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I connected the Harp Break to a reverb pedal, and then record right into the board.
It sounded excellent to my ears. It's a real value! It was fun to play too. As I played, I heard more going on than what I hear on the recording.
It was so good, I almost can't imagine how the Harp Attack could be any better. (The Harp Attack has a small verion of a 6v6 tube in it).
At any rate, this weekend, I should be able tweak the recording a bit and put it up.
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Thanks for all the kind words on "Time". Ha ha, all your words were too kind.
But, I just wanted to comment on that Harp Break. Even though my playing does not have the finesse that would really help you hear the qualities of the Harp Break, I think I think you can hear it.
The Harp Break is all solid state. No tubes. I have played the Harp Attack a little. It has a small tube inside it. It is voiced the same as the Harp Break. This is not my final opinion, but so far they sound the same to me. Which to me means, if I was to buy one, I would get the Harp Break so you don't have to worry about the tube burning out.
But the next song will have the Harp Attack on it.
About the next song.
My new thing is that I am learning bass guitar. I have a "Bass guitar for Dummies" book which I bought about 5 years ago. I think I have fumbled with playing bass on enough songs that now when I read this book, the lights go on and I say "ah ha!". Before, I just wanted some bass lines I could put into songs, but this book shows you how to make bass lines. The rules are simple.
The cool thing I realized is that really, the bass guitar is the center of the universe, that is, the center of the band. When the bass plays a note, the band has to play the chord compatible with that note (ignoring passing notes in this generalization).
At any rate, I found that I noodle around on the bass. I come up with something that contains some self contained energy and "coolness", and then I play the harp over it to see if it is a good harp bass line. And zoweee, cool new interesting, creative stuff. And it can be as simple or harmonically complex as I want. For now, I will probably be somewhat tonic and subdominant ( I, IV) based. Nothing is easier for the harp than that. When you go to the IV, the harp does not even have to change if it does not want to.
So, at any rate, I'm all hepped up.
And the Lone Wolf distortion pedals have me hopped up about harmonica again too. Damn, harmonica is like my second throat. I really miss it when I do not play it at all.
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Just an observation on the bass. I'm playing with a group that meets on Saturdays for practice. Once the drummer couldn't make it and the practice went fine but when the bass player was gone I was lost. The bass is the glue that holds the group together and on mission. At least that's my experience as limited as it has been.
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I have been continuing to jam with the Lone Wolf Harp Attack. It is a beautfiul piece of gear. I think the tone is a bit fatter than the Harp Break. Both have the same tone shaping within them, I think.
Both hit the ball out of the park. It is an embarressment of riches to have both.
Something that I am really loving is that I feed them into a Subdecay "String Theory" (a reverb pedal). I listened to a lot of reverbs on YouTube. I was looking for one for my guitar. This one had the most character. But it just has a mono output. For harp I love the fatness of a stereo output, so I then feed it into a Lexicon MPX 200 Hall reverb. I use just a touch of the Lexicon to give me my stereo.
And wham! What a beautiful sound!
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Thanks for the reviews, Rick, very helpful!
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Just to rattle on. If I had to choose between the two I would probably get the Harp Break. The slightly thinner tone, ... it is like it is a little thinner at the edges sounds so much like that good JT-30 & amp break up sound. Also it has a knob that I think is an active bass knob. You can dial in more bass. Or, what I love about both pedals, is that you can back off the distortion, and get a nice clean harmonica sound very easily.
What I was trying to communicate that both pedals hit the ball out of the park.
My latest "piece of a song" I am working on is another bass line that I made up that is really fun to play harmonica to. My method is that I make up a bass line, play harmonica to it. If it is hard to play harmonica to it (or its constraining), I throw it away and make up another bass line. Once I have one that the harp can improvise over easily, bingo! I use that one. Wow, what a great way to write song snippets! And then I add guitar.
The snippets are much more "harmonica-centric" than my old method of writing with the guitar, then putting harp to it. The guitar is much more modal sounding, which is a sound I love. (Probably an accident.) It sounds much more like the blues songs from the 1930's, where it was a man and a guitar and a microphone (and maybe a harmonica!).
But at any rate, now I have these great harmonica pedals to play over this stuff. Zowwie.
Sorry about burbling on about all this stuff. But I'm having so much fun... And my wife just looks at me funny when I try to burble about this stuff in her direction. :-)
Okay, okay, I've had more coffee. And I'm playing the guitar part on a Stratocaster -like guitar I built (from parts on ebay). The unique thing about it is that it is a stereo guitar. The three treble strings go to one tone chain drenched in reverb, while the 3 bass strings go to another, direct to the mixer in this case, dry, no reverb at all, and I can pan the strings left and right. Stere eri erio!
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Well, responsibilities from work and from home have crushed me from both side, so I never finished the second demo song.
Poor review!
But I'll finish my review anyway.
The Harp Attack and Harp Break are voiced the same. The tube in the Harp Attack does thicken the tone some. But I don't think the tone needs to be thickened. The general voicing was already perfect.
So I like the slightly thinner sound at the edge of the Harp Break. Also, since it has no tube, there is less chance of it ever needing maintenance, so I prefer the Harp Break.
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Thanks Rick, I look at these pedals so much, not in the budget right now, but one day. Randy has been busy, he has an anti-feedback pedal now, a reverb, and a special pedal he designed with Jason Ricci (a compressor).
Man, why is harp gear so expensive?
harps $40-$150 EACH, and you need many unless you're Tinus.
jt30 or GB mic with a vintage element $300
Amp $400 - $2000 or more
pedals by Lone Wolf and others $100 to $200 each, some harpers have as many as guitar players
More harps when yours die out $$$$$
Guitar- you can buy an expensive American Fender, Gibson or PRS, but almost everyone agrees the low end gear is really good stuff (except Gibson). My strat is awesome, it was $200 new. So you set it up once, change the strings occasionally, and you're good. Amp and pedals are the only items in common with harp, but availability makes them cheaper generally, though there are exceptions.
There are lots of guitar guys with GAS (Guitar Acquisition Syndrome), but they don't need the extra guitars and many GAS guys will just end up on a reality intervention tv show someday.
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I've probably bought more harmonica hardware than I need ;) But one item that I've *used* is the Lone Wolf Harp Delay. Based on the quality of that unit, the Harp Attack or Harp Break would be tempting, if I could decide between them :o
-Eric
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I play my guitars and harmonica directly "into the board" so I don't use an amp. Although I do have two unused harp amps, one of Randy's and a Kalamazoo that needs work.
Here is my list for the budget harp player:
$100 JT30 bought on ebay, one of those deals where the element is in an unknown status. (I've bought a lot of JT's that worked that way)
$140 (or so) Lone wolf Harp Attack
$150 Some sort of delay. I like delays with stereo outs. It comes after the Lonewolf so pretty much anything you like will do
$150 And nice mixer to connect to your computer. Buy something used on ebay with a secondary bus.
No amp at all. When you go out you play through the PA with the Harp Break.
$?? Some other mic for going to open mics with. I never would take my fragile JT30 out of the house. Once you find a good one. Unless you find a bunch. I do have a bunch, but I still would not take them out. I don't like taking antique gear out of the house. So, maybe buy a newer Hohner version or something. I remember hearing good reviews on those.
At any rate, that Lonewolf Harp break sample you heard was straight to the board. Tone-wise, why try to improve on that?
Just as an aside, while I am chattering on, when I was playing the Harp Attack, when I the distortion turned out and used vibrato on the higher notes, it sounded just like the renaissance trumpet in "Penny Lane".
I have heard other people do that tone on harp with distortion for a few seconds (and then with a lot of harsh sounding sounds). But both Harp Break and Attack were so very musical in their tone. I felt like I really could have practiced it a bit and made that renaissance trumpet tone come out for an extended period of time, for the whole solo.
I know what you mean about being paralyzed by being unable to choose between the Break and the Attack. I was too, so I bought both using PayPal's pay later plan. There is no interest if you pay in full within 6 months. I still have not exactly paid for them yet. (cough) (turning head around making sure the wife is not reading this over my shoulder).
So I could sell one back on ebay and recoup some costs, but I want to keep it and play the guitar through it. Just imagine, those low strings voiced like a harmonica. Mmmmmmmmmmm.
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I guess it's worth saying that if you like playing in front of an amp with this chain:
mic -> delay -> amp
Then the lonewolf delay is what you want.
But if you are more like me and do
mic -> distortion pedal ->delay -> board or
mic -> distortion pedal -> delay -> amp
Then you can choose from a larger number of delays.
It is interesting to note that Lonewolf in his documentation suggests
mic ->delay -> distortion pedal -> amp
He flips the delay and distortion.
When you change the order you always get a different sound. I have to admit that I have not even tried his way of ordering things. I was really happy with my alternate order, so I had no motivation to try, especially since all I have are "guitar" delays and reverbs.
Don't you love it how you can talk endlessly about this stuff and never ever come to any real conclusion. Ha ha. It's like sharing ingredients for baking a cake.
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The great thing about Lone Wolf stuff is that it has high resale value. I've seen used LW pedals sell for more on eBay than Randy charges for them new.
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Harp by itself is cheap and fun to play. I started off with one in my pocket, a gift, playing it wherever I went. Molding notes/tone/sounds/melodies just for the pleasure of it - with different natural acoustics - in a tiled room, in a stand of rock by the river, a stairwell, gymnasium, empty rooms, rooms lined with books, next to a campfire, while walking down a street or a dirt road... playing into a cup, or a can, or while tapping spoons in one hand.
The first time I considered buying an amp was out of necessity when I started playing in crowds - but found that there was usually an amp available when I needed one. I looked around at mic's, because finding a mic that sounded good through what were all tube amps way back then ;) got me started on hardware after the first time I crunched the sound ("overloading the preamp") ::) But listening to people like Sonny Terry and Big Walter I knew that it wasn't the electronics that made the musician.
I bought a few more harps, but it didn't really start getting expensive until I started recording and listening to yooz guys ;D
-Eric
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Yeah, the good old days, sitting on a stoop with a pint and your $3.25 Hohner Marine Band in just tuning. Of course, I saw Led Zeppelin for $4.50, just for perspective. Gas was 30 cents a gallon. I made $2.00 an hour. It was 1970.
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Ha ha, I was just a little later than you Beelzebub. I bought my Hohner BluesHarps for $5 a shot.