NAMM 2020

sdbrit68

Student Of The Blues
I noticed I have heard nada about Headrush stuff since the initial splash and when they released the smaller Gigboard. I have one of them but it's languishing in the carrybag for now because I realized I don't have a clue how to use it effectively and I'm better off with a proper knobby amp in front of me for now.

Was the HR unit such a flop that it's not even compared to this new stuff like the Helix is? I figured with 11R tech in it, it had to be on solid ground but maybe not?
I am still toying with the headrush, but now the line 6 has released the new unit at $499. hmmmmmmmmmmmm
 

Crossroads

Thump the Bottom
I noticed I have heard nada about Headrush stuff since the initial splash and when they released the smaller Gigboard. I have one of them but it's languishing in the carrybag for now because I realized I don't have a clue how to use it effectively and I'm better off with a proper knobby amp in front of me for now.

Was the HR unit such a flop that it's not even compared to this new stuff like the Helix is? I figured with 11R tech in it, it had to be on solid ground but maybe not?
Dunno? Haven't heard much about them lately.

Maybe when @cowboy returns from his cruise he can comment on how he is making out with his.
 

cowboy

Blues, Booze & BBQ
sorry to be late to the conversation...just got back from the cruise..love the HeadRush Gigboard...still getting into it...check out "Doctor McFarland" on youtube for fabulous videos on how to use it...they have helped my learning curve a ton...once you get used to where everything is, it's almost as easy as turning knobs on an amp BUT you can change the amp...I'm tempted to buy the big brother model for even more playtime...:whistle:...later.

cowboy
 

aleclee

Tribe of One
I'll be doing my 2020 NAMM writeup on TGP tomorrow but Wang Amps (https://www.wangmusicdesigns.com) seem pretty like pretty cool tube combos and that's coming from a guy who sold off his tube amps several years ago. They have Fender & Vox voices and a built-in variac-like function to create power amp distortion at any volume. They definitely sounded nice at NAMM-friendly volume.

I noticed I have heard nada about Headrush stuff since the initial splash and when they released the smaller Gigboard. I have one of them but it's languishing in the carrybag for now because I realized I don't have a clue how to use it effectively and I'm better off with a proper knobby amp in front of me for now.

Was the HR unit such a flop that it's not even compared to this new stuff like the Helix is? I figured with 11R tech in it, it had to be on solid ground but maybe not?
11R was introduced in 2009. It sounded good at the time but expectations of digital amps have changed since then. Avid doesn't seem interested in continuing enhancements the way the other major modeler companies do so combining 10-year-old algorithms with product management that's not committed to having an evolving platform and you get a product that doesn't hit the mark for a lot of people.
 

PapaRaptor

Father Vyvian O'Blivion
Staff member
11R was introduced in 2009. It sounded good at the time but expectations of digital amps have changed since then. Avid doesn't seem interested in continuing enhancements the way the other major modeler companies do so combining 10-year-old algorithms with product management that's not committed to having an evolving platform and you get a product that doesn't hit the mark for a lot of people.

I agree that Avid doesn't seem at all interested in that portion of the hardware market any longer. I guess the success of Pro-Tools might have something to do with that. Couple that with what I would consider the knuckleheaded marketing of pairing the 11r with Pro Tools for most of it's active product life and I see why they don't support it. One only had to look at the secondary market for them to get that. I don't know how many ads I saw from people who bought the ProTools/11r package just so they could get ProTools and recoup some of their cost by selling the Eleven Rack.

For anyone who wants to be on the cutting edge, surely an Eleven Rack is like being in the dark ages, and I get that.
Then again, there all of us old blues guys playing with 20+ year old Hot Rod Deluxes, 40+ year old Super Reverbs and 60+ year old tweed Bassman amps, so there is clearly room for just about everything.
 

MarkDyson

Blues Hound Wannabe
I guess my main point was I was surprised that, when new gear in this category shows up, the Headrush stuff doesn’t seem to merit even a mention in comparison. It’s like it doesn’t even exist in the minds of reviewers of the new stuff. I know Helix is the heaviest hitter in this ring, but still. Just find it surprising is all. :Beer:
 

OG_Blues

Guitar Geezer
I can't say that I have seen anything reported on from NAMM yet that has spurred any level of interest for me.
 

MarkDyson

Blues Hound Wannabe
I can't say that I have seen anything reported on from NAMM yet that has spurred any level of interest for me.

Quilter’s new Phantom Block interface box looks interesting to me. Useful to plug an electric right into PA that’s set up for acoustics. Can stick in a 9v battery and it’s like the next step in the evolution of these amp-less boxes getting ever smaller and more portable.
 

Al Holloway

Devizes UK
I guess my main point was I was surprised that, when new gear in this category shows up, the Headrush stuff doesn’t seem to merit even a mention in comparison. It’s like it doesn’t even exist in the minds of reviewers of the new stuff. I know Helix is the heaviest hitter in this ring, but still. Just find it surprising is all. :Beer:
Helix, Kemper, AxeFX and maybe fractual are the most hyped/talked about. Don't offen see Atomic mentioned either though most people who test it say the modeling is on a par as the main hitters at a fraction of the cost (hardly surprising as it uses Studio Devil software which I believe is used in a large number of pro studios). The interface is clunky and the effects not on a par with the others but for a pure amp modeller at this price it is a no brainer, but the same as headrush over loked in the comparisons.

cheers

Al.
 

aleclee

Tribe of One
I agree that Avid doesn't seem at all interested in that portion of the hardware market any longer. I guess the success of Pro-Tools might have something to do with that. Couple that with what I would consider the knuckleheaded marketing of pairing the 11r with Pro Tools for most of it's active product life and I see why they don't support it. One only had to look at the secondary market for them to get that. I don't know how many ads I saw from people who bought the ProTools/11r package just so they could get ProTools and recoup some of their cost by selling the Eleven Rack.

For anyone who wants to be on the cutting edge, surely an Eleven Rack is like being in the dark ages, and I get that.
Then again, there all of us old blues guys playing with 20+ year old Hot Rod Deluxes, 40+ year old Super Reverbs and 60+ year old tweed Bassman amps, so there is clearly room for just about everything.
Avid isn't doing HeadRush. While Avid owns the 11R tech, the HeadRush comes from inMusic, a company with very limited offerings in the guitar market. Most of inMusic's stuff is more in the pro audio space (Alto, Denon, M-Audio) with Akai being the only other inMusic brand that does any guitar-related products.

As for the older gear for blues guys comparison, the distinction I'd make is that a 20 year-old HRDx is arguably better than one from 2020 (if only because the construction was a bit more robust) while there's very little in the digital amp realm from that time frame that would hold up against today's offerings. 11R algorithms were "very good for their time" with the last three words being the key for a product sold in 2020. Not saying that HR sounds bad but its strengths lie more in ease of use than anything else. That's a major consideration but the fact that inMusic doesn't seem to be investing in the device the way the competitors do puts it at a disadvantage in the marketplace.
 

aleclee

Tribe of One
I guess my main point was I was surprised that, when new gear in this category shows up, the Headrush stuff doesn’t seem to merit even a mention in comparison. It’s like it doesn’t even exist in the minds of reviewers of the new stuff. I know Helix is the heaviest hitter in this ring, but still. Just find it surprising is all. :Beer:
I suspect that Neural DSP is looking to take Line 6's lunch money, at least as far as Helix is concerned. :) It's slicker, smaller, and (based on NDSP's plugins) very capable. Oh, and its gonna sell for less than Helix Floor, too. It's not due out until fall but this could be one to keep an eye on.

NEURAL_Quad-Cortex-v1.jpg


Back to HeadRush, since HeadRush was released in 2017, they have had four non-bugfix updates (1.1, 1.2, 2.0, 2.1). At the other end of the spectrum, the AxeFx III was introduced in 2018 and is on its 10th non-bugfix update. Neural DSP is talking about monthly updates/enhancements for their upcoming Quad Cortex. That's a lot but ongoing enhancements are pretty much the market's expectation of a modeling device that sells for >= $1,000 in 2020.
 

dwparker

Bluesologist
I can't say that I have seen anything reported on from NAMM yet that has spurred any level of interest for me.
I gotta agree with this. I am looking for a new amp and nothing released interests me in the least. The only new item that got me even remotely excited was the MXR mini Timmy pedal. I'm sure I'll buy one some day, but I really want an amp I'm not going to want to flip in a year because it doesn't tick the right boxes.
 

sdbrit68

Student Of The Blues
I gotta agree with this. I am looking for a new amp and nothing released interests me in the least. The only new item that got me even remotely excited was the MXR mini Timmy pedal. I'm sure I'll buy one some day, but I really want an amp I'm not going to want to flip in a year because it doesn't tick the right boxes.

Check out the Buggera 1990 infinium, I cant think of any box it couldnt check off..........funny thing though, it has gone in price, not lower
 

Cowboy Bob

Horse Player/Guitar Wrangler
I agree that Avid doesn't seem at all interested in that portion of the hardware market any longer. I guess the success of Pro-Tools might have something to do with that.

I agree. They seemed to have lost interest in the "Prosumer" market with respect to hardware. It was really a shame because they could have taken this much, much further. Same with the M-Box and M-Box Pro. But there are now a multitude of low cost, high quality interfaces.

Couple that with what I would consider the knuckleheaded marketing of pairing the 11r with Pro Tools for most of it's active product life and I see why they don't support it. One only had to look at the secondary market for them to get that. I don't know how many ads I saw from people who bought the ProTools/11r package just so they could get ProTools and recoup some of their cost by selling the Eleven Rack.

Can't argue that. But Digidesign even before they were bought by Avid, was "giving away" Pro Tools with hardware. That's how I wound up with like 4 perpetual licenses of Pro Tools. I'd get another license every time I bought an interface. At that point, you could only run Pro Tools if you had Digidesign or Avid hardware, (or M-Audio which was part of Digidesign at that time but you also needed an iLok and you got Pro Tools M-Powered. M-Audio and AIR was sold to In Music and the 11R tech was licensed by them.) Once Pro Tools was decoupled from Avid hardware, in version 9, people would but 11R either for the software and sell 11R to recoup their cost, or sell the software for the same reason. It was really against Avid's EULA but they never pursued it.

As far as the tight integration of 11R with Pro Tools, that was a huge selling point for 11R. Being able to easily record both DI and effected signal at the same time AND being able to embed the 11R settings right in the track of your session was a huge selling point. I still use that quite a bit. I't great when you are looking for sounds (that looks odd as I read it) and stumble upon just the right sound but fail to write down your settings, or what ever. Maybe you just need to add another part or something and you don't remember what rig you used. Anyway, that was a big deal. Along with the ease of re-amping.

Now, I don't use 11R as my main interface. I use it via S/PDIF, whcih works well for me. Re-amping is a little more complicated but not a huge deal.

For anyone who wants to be on the cutting edge, surely an Eleven Rack is like being in the dark ages, and I get that.
Then again, there all of us old blues guys playing with 20+ year old Hot Rod Deluxes, 40+ year old Super Reverbs and 60+ year old tweed Bassman amps, so there is clearly room for just about everything.

Absolutely. It was "old tech" when it was put into the 11R. It actually had its genesis in the M-Audio Black Box. Roger Lynn contributed to that product. Chris Townsend was the DSP chief.

Cutting edge it is not, but it does what it does remarkably well. Yes, I use in place of my vintage Twin Reverb and my Band Master to record. I even have one that travels with me when I play out, although I do find that I am using it less and using my GT 200 more, now that I have developed some rigs that suit me.
 

TwoNotesSolo

Student Of The Blues
always so much stuff, that when you're not looking for something specific it gets a little bit overwhelming.
As someone that got into the 11R right on the tail end, I feel a little burned by buying gear that gets obsolete so quickly (although papa makes a good point that it sounded good then and it still sounds the same). On the other hand the modeling/IR market seems to be where most of the innovation is, new guitar models, yet another distortion pedal, etc... are just a lot of noise about not much
 
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