The massive-noggined boffins at TC Electronics have just released an incremental version of PolyTune for iPhone.

You’ve probably all read about the PolyTune tuner pedal – the world’s first polyphonic tuner. Strum all strings together and the clever gubbins in the pedal shows the tuning situation of each of your six stings. You can easily tell if one or more strings is out of tune.

Not content with hammering all that cleverness into a stompbox, TC also ported it to the iPhone. And now, that app is at a 1.1 release. It’s all Retina display ready with snazzier graphics. It also has an interesting option to change the tuning graphics to yellow/blue for phone users with any red/green colour-blindness issues.

There’s lots of other stuff shoved in there but there’s no time to waste listening to me drone on. The PolyTune iPhone app is for sale from December 16th to 19th, 2010. During this time, you can get PolyTune for $0.99 (or local equivalent) from the app store.

I’ve got it and tried it and it’s good.

Off you go then. PolyTune for iPhone (iTunes link).

This is cool.

Peterson Tuners are (or at least, should be) ubiquitous in the world of professional guitar techs and luthiers. A Peterson strobe tuner – or, more recently, their Virtual Strobe – is the top of the heap when it comes to tuning accuracy. Most tuners that are available to the man (or lady) on the street are reasonably accurate. The emphasis must be on reasonably though. A strobe-type tuner allows you to ‘see’ finer increments of tuning than most LED or needle tuners can realistically display. This is the reason that a good tech will prefer a strobe tuner when performing a proper setup for instance.

This sort of accuracy comes at a price though and, although Peterson has continually introduced cheaper models, their price range still tends beyond what most are willing to pay for a tuner.

Then they released iStroboSoft for the iPhone a while back. At US$9.99, it was a pretty cheap way into the world of strobes.

Now they’ve gone one better and, for a limited time, you can get a copy of iStroboSoft (iTunes link) from the App Store for the not-so-princely sum of US$0.99 (or local equivalent). You’d be mad not to. It’s about the best tuner app in the Store.

iPhone people can use the built in mic (and this comes with an input boost facility which is nice) although using an adapter cable would probably be more accurate and easier. You can buy a cable from Peterson but I’d wager that you could get yourself something (¼” jack socket to 3.5mm stereo plug**) that will do the job in Radio Shack or your local equivalent. iPod Touch users will need an external mic.

Go. Get. Strobe.

**UPDATE: D’oh. I stupidly posted this info and my brain just assumed it was ok. I realised a couple of days later that it’s not. A 3.5mm stereo jack won’t do the trick as – to the best of my knowledge – the mic input for an iPhone is on one of the rings in a 4-way jack plug. A 4-way jack has a tip, two rings and a shaft and a stereo jack only has tip, ring, shaft. It’s still (probably) a relatively easy matter to knock-up an adapter cable – especially if you don’t listen to me. Sorry for any hassle.

OK, there’s no doubting that this is an interesting idea. Not just an amp in your pocket, it’s potentially a whole slew of amps, speaker cabs, microphones and stompboxes in your pocket.

That’s either a big pocket or AmpliTube’s clever new interface/app combo for iPhone.

The iRig is an external interface that plugs into the headphone socket of your iPhone.  It allows you to plug in a standard ¼ inch guitar lead and has a pass-through for your actual headphones.

You make noise on your guitar or bass, it gets processed in the iPhone and you listen on your headphones.

The actual processing bit happens in the AmpliTube app(s) for iPhone and they seem to pack a lot of AmpliTube goodness into a relatively small iPhone.

There are three versions. A free version will include one amp and cab model, two microphone choices and two stompboxes.  More than enough for a little jamming on the move.  An LE version adds a stompbox to the mix and costs €2.39 or $2.99.  The free and LE versions allow in-app purchases of more gear with extra amps/cabs costing €3.99 ($4.99) and additional stomps costing €2.39 ($2.99).

If adding-on isn’t your style, you can get yourself a fully-loaded version with 10 stompboxes, 5 amps/cabs and 2 microphones for €15.99 ($19.99).

To give you an idea, the fully-loaded version comes with these options:

10 Stompboxes

• Distortion
• Delay
• Chorus
• Wah
• Flanger
• Octave
• Envelope Filter
• Phazer
• Fuzz

5 Amps

• Clean
• Lead
• Crunch
• Metal
• Bass

5 Cabs

• 1×12
• 2×12
• 4x12A
• 4x12B
• 1×15

2 Mics

• Dynamic
• Condenser

AmpliTube for iPhone allows you to import tracks and play along with them.  You can save up to 36 presets and it comes with a tuner/metronome (in case you don’t already have four of them in other apps).

The iRig itself (the interface part) costs €29.99 ($39.99).  It will happily shove the signal from your guitar or bass into your iPhone and will even deal with line level signals from keyboards, synths or even mixers. Versatile. Likewise, the output – it can be output to your headphones, an amp, speakers or a mixer.

More info over at IK Multimedia.

Interesting one this.

Remember a while back, TC Electronics released their – rather clever – PolyTune Pedal that allowed you to see the tuning of all six of your guitar’s strings at once.  Picking one string at a time is so last year.

Well, now TC are porting their cleverness to the iPhone (and iPod Touch if you’ve got a mic thing attached).

It’s early days yet, but the PolyTune App sounds pretty interesting.  In fact, the days are so early that TC are looking for beta testers for the app.

Want to be in on the ground floor?  Want to see this before the common people?  Want to help TC make the app perfect?  Well, off you go and apply to be a beta tester.  You’ll get a pre-relase copy of the app in return for providing feedback on its operation (or lack thereof).

Pop to TC Electronics to apply to test PolyTune iPhone app.  They’ll select 50 testers from those that apply (the exclusivity just gives more license to lord it over your friends).

If you’re thinking of getting into recording your own music and are considering either, Record – the new recording application from Propellerhead – or a line 6 USB audio interface, you might want to read on.

For the month of December, if you purchase Propellerhead’s Record application, you can get a free Line 6 POD Studio GX (pictured left).

Propellerhead are the people responsible for the incredibly awesome Reason.  If you’ve used that, you’ll have a good idea how the new, audio recording, application looks and feels.  Record provides unlimited audio tracks and gives a new take on music recording.  The interface is very ‘Propellerhead’ and should prove intuitive.

Record retails for around the $250 mark and, if you buy it this month, you can claim your very own, free, POD Studio GX.  The GX is a small, USB audio interface but allows for low-noise and low-latency recording at up to 24-bit/96KHz.  It even comes with POD Farm included for extra POD-sound niceness.

All the info is here.  Offer is US only, I’m afraid.

Until November 29th, Line 6 are offering a complete set of their amp and effect tones for the POD, Pod Studio, TonePort or GuitarPort as a single download.  Basically, thats all model packs in one bundle.

Line 6 call this the Ultimate Model Pack Bundle and it includes:

• Power Pack – 20 vintage and modern amp tones and 26 effects.
• Collector Classics – 18 amp models based on boutique combos and rare vintage heads
• Metal Shop – 18 high-gain metal monster amps.
• FX Junkie – 35 effects including synths, filters, delays, choruses, etc.
• Bass Expansion – 28 bass amp models and 22 cabinet models.

Until Thanksgiving, this bundle is available for $99.95 – a saving of $75.

If you are involved in recording music, even in your bedroom, you either are, or you should be, aware of IK Multimedia’s T-RackS mastering suite.  It’s a suite of software that provides a number of tools to polish and fine-tune your masters.

If you’re based in the UK, you might want to have a go at signing up for their T-RackS Masterclass. Run by engineer and producer, Ben Fenner (whose credits include Radiohead, The Feeling, Brian Eno and more), the class will demonstrate T-Racks 3 Deluxe.

Ben will talk you through how the key features can be used in both production and mastering. You’ll also get to hear T-RackS emulations of the vintage Fairchild 670 and Pulteq EQP-1.

Sweet.

Obviously enough, there will be a Q&A session too.  Every registered participant will receive a free copy of T-RackS 3 Shell module and there will be other special offers on the day.

This is late notice as the sessions are on Tuesday, 24th November.  They’ll be held in Alchemea College of Audio Engineering, The Windsor Centre, Windsor Street, London, N1 8QG.

The first session is for Alchemea students only and the second (at 7:30PM) is open to those who register.

Space is very limited.  We only received word on this last night, however, so it’s worth a punt. Go here to register.

I mean really free.  Not a ‘might win if you enter this competition’ free.  Not ‘buy all this other stuff and then get this’ free.  Really free.

All you need to do for this free lunch is to signup for TC Electronic mailing list (which, if you’re picky about such things, you can unsubscribe from anytime you want).

The M30 Reverb is a plug-in, available in VST and AU formats, that normally retails for $79.  It takes the Hall reverb algorithm from TC’s M40 and makes it available on its own.  It’s fully editable and applicable to all types of instruments, although TC say it’s particularly good for vocals.

The M30 will run on Logic Pro 9, GarageBand, Cubase 4.5 and 5, Sonar and Live and, as it’s VST, it’s worth a punt if your app isn’t listed here as it may well work anyway.

One slight issue is that it’s not fully Snow Leopard compatible yet (it does weird noisy things) but if you download it while it’s available for free, TC will let you know when it’s ready for Snow Leopard.

Head off to TC Electronic and sign up for your freebie.

Year-end periods are often great times for good deals.  IK Multimedia already have a couple of great offers and now they’re adding more.

Until the end of the year, you can get some of their software plugin bundles for half-price.  Fifty percent off.  Not to be sneezed at.

Their Total Guitar & Bass Gear Bundle includes Amplitube, Ampeg SVX, and the Jimi Hendris, Metal and X-GEAR versions of Amplitube.  That’s five plugins and more than 150 gear models that you can use live or in the studio.

The offer also applies to their Total Studio 2 and Total Workstation 2 Instruments bundles – both of which include SampleTank as well as other synthy goodness.

What are you waiting for?  Get on over to IK and take a look-see.

iPhone guitar apps seem to be evolving into more and more complex utilities.  We’ve considered just a few of the guitar-related apps before and now we’re looking at Guitarist and Bassist from MooCow Music.

“Never be without your guitar again”, say MooCow Music.  It’s a slogan we here at Guitarless can get behind.

MooCow have released Guitarist and Bassist – instrument simulators for your iPhone.

The Guitarist app presents us with something new.  While we’ve seen virtual fretboards with strings that can be plucked or sounded before, MooCow go further.  Their basic ‘manual-fret’ interface allows you to move around the whole fretboard, right up to the 21st fret.  You fret the string where you want and then ‘strum’ it to sound it.  If you hold the string, it will sustain, and if you release it, the note will mute. Chords are possible although MooCow admit that the size of the screen – and touchscreen limitations – make complex chords difficult.

Their ‘hammer-on’ screen makes life easier by removing the need to strum the string manually.  When you press a string, it sounds.  This makes it easier to play faster, more complex scales and even solos.  You can even hammer-on or pull-off notes.  Vibrato is also possible.

The ‘tab’ guitar reverses the concept of the hammer-on screen by providing a tab interface instead of the fretboard.  The tabbed notes take care of the fretting for you and you pluck each string accordingly.  This seems a little less useful but certainly has applications as a learning aid.

Likewise, their ‘scale’ guitar could be a useful learning tool too. It allows you to run through a large number of scales in any given key.

That’s far from the full story however.

The app ships with a number of sampled instruments from acoustics to clean to distorted guitars.  Each instrument has its own effects bus where you can apply delay, wah or fuzz effects.

Still want more?

You can even record your compositions.  Two separate guitar types can be loaded at the same time and recorded together into a song.  The songs are actually ‘recorded’ as a list of notes rather than an audio file.  This obviously saves space but also makes it easy to erase mistakes or create overdubs.

Take a look at a video of Guitarist in action.

If you prefer your notes fatter, maybe you could consider the Bassist app.  It has some of the same features as Guitarist but less strings.  One or two less – depending on your preference, you can set up your virtual bass with four or five strings.    Bassist will even accommodate all your slapping needs.  Bassist seems not to be as full-featured as Guitarist, but it’s still an interesting app for the low-downers among us and it may well expand in the future.

Incidentally, if you want to get the rest of your band members involved.  MooCow Music also offer Pianist, Organist and Band apps.  The former are self-explanatory but the band app provides a little bit of everything – drums, piano, bass and guitar.  It even throws in an appreciative audience for you.

While these remain virtual instruments, they are fun and, in my opinion, are much, much better than and app where you simply have to click the right coloured buttons in order to play Smoke On The Water.

Go to MooCow Music to see them all in action and to get links to the App Store.