What a messe
MUSIKMESSE 2015: The world's musical instrument and recording gear manufacturers have descended on Frankfurt this week to show off their latest products and innovations.
As you'd expect, MusicRadar is there too, and over the following slides you'll be able to see what we've been photographing on our cameras, phones and - if we're willing to look slightly ridiculous - tablets.
From the hottest new products to the weirdest oddities, if it's worth seeing, we'll try and show it to you here.
Roland JD-XA
Crowds have been flocking to witness a demo of Roland's new analogue/digital hybrid synth, which appears to have been positioned at the most uncomfortable playing angle possible.
Marshall booth
Marshall's booth looks more like a theatre than a trade show stand, though you don't have to buy a ticket to get in.
Marshall Astoria range
Inside the Marshall stand the stars of the show are definitely the handsome new Astoria Series amps.
Roland Aira Modular
Here's Roland's Aira Modular range all patched up and working: the System-1m at the top and the effects below. And what are those 500 series effects we see at the bottom of the rack..?
EBS Red Label pedals
Over at the EBS stand it was all about the Swedish pedal company's new Red Label range, which brings their bass expertise to guitar players.
Modal Electronics 001
As well as launching an 8-voice analogue polysynth in the shape of the 008, Modal Electronics has also unveiled the compact digital/analogue hybrid that is the 001.
Digitech Obscura
Digitech's promisingly deranged delay, the Obscura, offers four different delay modes, which you can mangle together to your mind-bending heart's content.
Boss SY-300 guitar synth
One of the early candidates for star of the show was the Boss SY-300, a groundbreaking guitar synth/processor that produces analog style sonics without the need for MIDI input - you can simply plug in your bog-standard electric and play.
We've now posted our SY-300 hands-on impressions, and it's fair to say we're impressed.
Slate Raven Z3
Slate's new multi-touch console looks like something off the Starship Enterprise. And with a $28000 starting price, we'd hope that it includes some kind of teleporting functionality.
Satriani art attack
It's our first in-the-flesh sighting of a JS25ART - one of a strictly limited run of Joe Satriani-signed and illustrated Ibanez JS Signature models.
Orange Bax Bangeetar
Orange's hotly-tipped Bax Bangeetar is billed as a “traditional stompbox, a standalone preamp, and a direct recording tool”. It's available in white and black finishes, this being the latter of them.
Martin LE HMS Dreadnought 2015
Our first in-the-flesh encounter with Martin's ever so slightly barmy centennial tribute to HMS Dreadnought, an historic Royal Navy battleship.
Epiphone Ltd Ed Tony Iommi Signature
In case you hadn’t heard, there’s a new Tony Iommi signature model on the way from Epiphone – but the finished article won’t quite be ready until July.
Fortunately, with a bit of cajoling, we managed to persuade the Gibson gang to let us take a few covert snaps of the Black Sabbath man’s latest signature – here’s what we found out…
Sound Magic
There's a sort of 'musical magicians' vibe at the Sound Magic stand. If only Jordan Rudess could have been there wearing his wizard's hat when we took our shot...
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