MusicRadar

Novation's Nocturn offers powerful MIDI control at a low, low price.

View in gallery

Another NAMM, and another great excuse to get out of the freezing cold UK rain and swan around Orange County in a T-shirt and shades. In January. Amazing.

NAMM is the place where the big names unveil their big new gear and the world's music mags descend in search of big news. And covering the show for Future Music - if you can plug it in, we want to know about it - I had to do more than my share of legwork.

First thing a hi-tech journalist needs for a NAMM report is a pair of comfortable shoes - the show is vast, taking 20 minutes just to walk from one end to the other.

The next thing you need is an encyclopaedic knowledge of gear and an eagle eye for 'II's or 'SX's added to the back of familiar looking casings. Yes, seems the theme for Winter NAMM 2008 was evolution rather than revolution, with many staples undergoing minor tweaks to stay ahead of the pack.

We went in search of incredible new standards in synthesis and recording and came away with a bulging bag of new gear but very little in the way of genuine innovation.

The big names were perhaps those playing it safest. Yamaha chose NAMM to unveil a new Pocketrak 2G micro recorder for example. Excited yet? Meanwhile Korg showed off its M3-powered Pa2Xpro workstation and Pa500 songwriting station. Both great products but both focused on bringing established technology to new music makers.

Roland went the closest to 'new' with its new Fantom-G and new mid-range V-Tour V-Drums. And a special mention goes to its entirely kick-ass new V-Accordions. They can recreate the sound of any accordion. Don't laugh. Roland sells stacks of the things.

The most remarkable synth we saw was Access's Virus TI Snow - a stunning new mini Virus that packs a surprising amount of the original Virus TI's power into a tiny, sexy white 'n' walnut case. There's also its brilliant Atomiser program, which enabled Warp artist Richard Devine - resident on the Access stand throughout the show - to mangle his iTunes collection live before our ears. If I had a dollar for every time someone came up and asked me "What IS that?!?!"...

Similarly sexy are Euphonix's impossibly sleek MC Mix and MC Control consoles. We'll save the full jaw-drop for our massive NAMM report (coming up in the next issue of FM); suffice to say that you don't know that you want one yet... but you will.