Carry the can

British Music Strings, purveyors of rather more than just strings to the great unwashed musical public of this fair land, have just announced a number of additions to their extensive range of products. Most quirkily there's The Can, a bright red plastic petrol can featuring a punchy little speaker on one side and a preamp section on the other. Separate bass, treble, and master controls are apparently capable of delivering a range of tones from clean to dirty, at higher volume levels than you might expect from such a buskable-sized gadget.

Perfect for those high-octane solos no doubt, running on batteries or mains rather than four-star. The Can will set you back a mere £44.95. If you want a guitar to plug into your Can, you could do a lot worse than pickup a Marlin Sidewinder — the range of budget guitars handled by BMS has been swelled by the addition of three new models. The K-32 is a traditionally styled 22-fret guitar (they mean it's a Strat copy) featuring a Maple neck, and three single coil pickups, the bridge position being a blade-type. The basic model with five-position selector switch and tremolo system and chrome-plated hardware is available in six finishes for £99.95. A special locking trem version is also available at £114.95.

Slightly flasher, the K-34 sports a gloss finish on the Maple neck, a high-quality Rosewood fingerboard, and a headstock colour matched to the body in any one of seven metallic finishes. Black scratchplates are standard, machine heads forged, and the bridge pickup is a coil-tapped twin-blade humbucker. Available with standard or locking trem, with black or chrome hardware, the K-34 ranges in price from £119.95 to £139.

At the top end of the market, you'll find Marlin's Master Class series, comprising two guitars and two basses. The ML-80 guitar features a graphite nut, Rosewood fingerboard, the 'Shift 2001' locking tremolo system, and three blade-type pickups, including a humbucker in the bridge position. The ML-80, with colour matched headstock and neck and black hardware as standard, is available in 'a wide range of striking finishes', and'll cost you £599. The ML-82, with a similar spec but including an inlaid body, retails at £775.

Watch out too for the top of the range Marlin Master Class series basses, finished to a high standard of quality. The basses (the MB-90, and MB92) feature such delights as carbon graphite necks, resin fingerboards, and Schaller pickups. The slightly more expensive MB-92 substitutes these for Seymour Duncan Actives. The MB-90, available in metallic red, black and white finish, complete with case will set you back £699, with the MB-92 a cool £999.

More details on all these products from British Music Strings, on (Contact Details).

Which Switch?

EMO Systems have just launched a new product called The Switcher, which at first glance doesn't seem that marketable. I quote from the press release:

'The product was developed primarily to enable non-technical personnel to switch audio systems on and off'.

Funny. I didn't think you had to be that technical to turn something on or off. After a little while, though, I began to see what they were getting at. Usually, any fairly large band's rig has to be turned on or off one amp at a time, sometimes on your hands and knees, groping around for plugs and sockets — and doing it in the wrong order can lead to potentially damaging power surges.

The Switcher simply brings everything to a single point, safeguarded by an individual numerical code which prevents prying hands mucking about with your stuff, and lets everything be turned on and off in any sequence you want, or need, to prevent damage to your system. Obviously not the kind of gadget your average garage band should bother investing in, but at £299.95 for the master rack, £117 for the slave, and £62.50 for the remote (all prices plus VAT), the Switcher could be making life a little simpler for Rock star roadies in the future. More info from EMO on: (Contact Details).

A1 up the road

A1 Music in Manchester has moved premises, but don't worry, it's only to next door! The new shop is much larger than the original store and the old shop is in the process of being integrated with the new one. Now that there's more space there's also more stock — stacks of it actually — and there's so much variation there's bound to be something to catch your eye. They stock Kramer and Washburn guitars, Peavey amplification, Roland and Yamaha keyboards and in the basement, which is the keyboard and drum department (for the time being), there is a room entirely devoted to Simmons. They also have an extensive range of secondhand gear from guitars through to a weird looking Dutch mixer covered in purple and orange knobs.

Spares and accessories are also catered for from strings and straps through to sticks and skins. Kahler whammy bars, Boss effects, you name it they've got it.

Displays by all your favourite dealers will also take place from time to time as they've even got a small stage in there. The 'they' in question are Graham and Anne Mellor who will be more than happy to help answer all those dreadful questions that people in music shops always ask.

If you haven't been there before it's worth checking out and you can find them at A1 Music, (Contact Details).

Tascam Twosome

Tascam have added two new cassette decks to their extensive range of recording gear. The 112 is a minimal-feature, high quality deck specifically designed for studio mastering. The rack-mounting unit features Dolby B, C and HX Pro headroom expansion, precision metering, a selectable MPX filter for extended response, inputs on front and rear, and cueing on fast forward and rewind. Yours for £399 + VAT. The 112R meanwhile offers a similar spec, but is a heavy duty Auto Reverse deck with a Master/Slave facility, allowing a chain of machines to play continuously all day, or for tape duplication purposes, one master to record onto a number of slaves. The remote control aspect of the deck also opens up the possibility of computer control for a broad variety of AV and similar applications.

More details on both machines from Harman UK on: (Contact Details).

Duet for Micros

An interesting development in the field of musical software: Music-Link, by Dinosaur Software, is a control programme enabling two BBC computers to be linked together via their RS 423 ports, and used simultaneously, doubling the number of on-board sound channels available for composition. Designed initially as a utility for Dinosaur's own musical education programme Musicpen, Music-Link can give a teacher and pupil 'dual control' of the same music programme. Since the Music-Link programme is itself transmitted down the connection lead, only one of the two linked computers need have a tape or disk drive. (The program is available in both formats.)

For the future though, Music-Link as a utility offers some interesting possibilities. Since its primary function is to sync each machine's internal clock it could perhaps be deployed as an 'add-on' to an existing pair of computer-based sequencing set-ups (like running two 24-track mixing desks in sync to get 48-tracks) thus doubling up a MIDI studio's potential? Who knows? But Music-Link could be the first link in a very interesting trend...

Further info on all the Dinosaur range from the company on: (0223) 322244.

Bass Culture

Technics have just announced an addition to their WS range of PA speakers which could be of particular interest to all you Reggae-types out there. The Ramsa WS-A250E is a specially designed sub-bass reflex enclosure designed for handling powerful bass sounds even at a maximum sound pressure of 100dB, a feat achieved by its 15" low-frequency driver.

Rated at 150WRMS, the A250E is designed to be compatible with the WS-A200E high power speaker, thus providing a powerful yet compact PA system of monitor quality. The A250E will set you back a cool £569.99 inc VAT, so I guess it's time to get a few more Blues Parties organised. Details from Technics on: (Contact Details).

Impress your friends

A new service for band musicians and small record labels has been launched by Presstige a Huddersfield-based PR agency. For a minimum charge of £30 Presstige will put together a 'pro' biog to accompany your demo tapes, and then send the whole package out to record companies, local radio stations and other well-known rungs on the ladder of success. For a larger fee, an extensive range of services can be provided to record labels. Your indie company can get everything from a one off record mailshot, to full PR back up for the life of a single or album. Sound interesting? More details from Presstige (yes, that is how they spell it) on (Contact Details).