Re: Satan's Wallwarts and so much more

[Jon Durant <74074.1316@CompuServe.COM>]

Hey gang,

I'm glad there's so much going on here in loop land, and I'd like to add my
coupla cents worth. OK, maybe a dollar.

First, thanks Kim for clarifying the origins of the wallwart. I was fairly
certain that it was Satan (not a bad guy, really. He's just 
misunderstood...)
but now I have good authority on it. And, yes, JamMan and Vortex both use 
the
beasts. The ultimate design is what's in the PCM 80, ie a switching 
transformer
that simply needs the right plug. Works great, and apparently all future 
Lex
products will use it. (Note that I said apparently...)

Now, about this Vortex thingy: Thanks to Dave for the very kind review. A 
couple
of notes about what it can do: It's basically a modulating delay. So 
you've got
chorusing, flanging, tremolo, rotary speaker-ish stuff, and that sort of 
thing.
(Gerneric useful stuff with odd names like Choir, Shimmer, Aerosol, 
Orbits) But
the hook is, as Dave noted, they're dynamic--they respond to your playing. 
(or
not, if you so choose) Then you have a whole host of ridiculously weird
effectoids. Bleen, Fractal, et al. These things do ring modulaty or looping
echoes with death flange that mutates into the oddest sorts of things. 
Useful on
a daily basis? You decide. On my first record (Three if by Air) this kind 
of
oddity is most clearly audible on the last cut where an e-bow driven 
guitar is
sent through a very odd pitch shift thing on the LXP-15 (Evil 3rds in the 
V2
software, my program) then sent through this bizzaro Vortex thing that I 
created
from Fractal and Bleen. The sound will rip your head off in headphones. Way
twisted.

The beauty of Vortex is how easily you make the sounds your own. The 
morphing
thing is really happening, and some of the halfway points are really fun.
There's a bunch of oddities on my next record (due in Fuebruary, will be 
mixed
by Mr. Torn) from the Vortex beast.

OK, now the Jamoisity: I'm now using two JamMen. One in front of 
effectoids, one
in back of effectoids. Generally, the front Jamperson is used as long echo,
wherin I'll play with the feedback control throughout the piece, sometimes
longer, sometimes shorter, depending on where I'm going. The second 
Jamperson is
the looper, where I'll be able to loop the effected stuff, and go beserk 
on top
of it. There are several pieces on the new record where this stuff will be 
in
evidence. Mostly, though it allows quite a bit of freedom. My single 
biggest
gripe with the JamMan is that you can't loop from within the Echo mode. A 
simple
request, but it didn't get done. So, this allows me to do something like 
it. You
can go to 100% feedback, but everything you play gets added in...

One other thing about storage of loops and ideas: I ALWAYS have mics set 
up in
front of my amps, which can go to a DAT or my DA 88. Anytime something 
happens
that I like, I record a couple of minutes of it, then if I want it again, 
I can
load it back in. Not perfect, but then again perfection isn't what I seek 
within
my music. I'm looking for vibes and space, and this works (perfectly) for 
that.
If nothing else, when you've got it recorded, you can listen to it, and you
should be able to recreate it.

Oh yeah, the memory on JamMan is PC Zip chips, and *don't* get 'em from 
Lexicon.
They bought in on very unfavorable terms and are stuck with 'em. But if 
you call
the marketing dept (as opposed to Customer Service who are in posession of 
the
big ticket items), they'll give you some 800 #s where you can find it 
cheaper.
Not cheap, unfortunately. (If they give you difficulty, let me know. I 
still
have some influence. Not much, but some...)

OK? Cool. Keep looping.
Jon Durant (ex Lex, now Alchemist)