The Z Files

The genesis of this one came when I was broken down in Wisconsin after Moestock last year. After much thought and not as much haggling, I brought my new Dodge Caliber home on Thursday. I’m still excited, and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. It rides beautifully, looks awesome, and sounds absolutely killer with the premium sound system. I’ve rediscovered my love for driving. Suddenly I have the urge to take a road trip. I have a bunch of Toronto trips coming up, along with a Cleveland trip, but those don’t really count. I’d love to do a big trip like I did last summer…the Cali is just that awesome. Anyway, here are a couple pics…much more in the way of pics and maybe even a video will be coming in the next several days.

A few weeks back, I took advantage of a sweet financing deal at Guitar Center to bag a pair of KRK RP5 studio monitors. Not only are they really nice for production work, but they’ve become my de facto computer speakers as well. I’d have a hard time going back to normal computer speakers.

My latest toy arrived on Friday: a DigiTech GSP2101 preamp/effects processor. I had been lusting after the 2101 for quite a while, and finally went for it when a guy on cyberjammin put his up for sale. It’s a nice preamp for recording, as it has a good hardware-based speaker simulator and decent tube distortion, which sounds really good when properly EQ’ed. I bought this unit for two reasons: 1. late-night playing isn’t exactly feasible with the Recto, unlike the 2101; and 2. to thicken up my recordings in conjunction with the Recto. Hopefully, I’ll have some 2101 recordings up soon.

Of course, gear begets gear, and now I find myself looking at FireWire audio interfaces because my rig is starting to outgrow my Tascam US-122. I probably won’t act on that immediately, though.