More details are out about the Gibson Powertune line of self-tuning guitars—for one, they’re now being peculiarly branded as “Robot” guitars. Whatever the name, I think we can all agree the new paint job is quite attractive. I’ll never have a reason to own one (at least until the point in the future when the self-tuning technology is standard issue stuff) but for pros it’s a neat trick.
If nothing else, it gives Create Digital Music‘s Peter Kirn a chance to slag guitarists:
My favorite line was this, from the press release: “Since the dawn of the instrument, musicians have come to accept the guitar’s imperfections and lack of tonal precision as necessary evils. Onstage and off, guitarists have fought to stay in tune. Every music lover and performer has had to suffer through the show–halting, mood-killing atonal droning of a loudly amped guitar being brought into tune.”Or, erm, not brought into tune, as the case may be. (Jump!)
I read that initially as “every music lover … had to suffer through the show,” and the whole passage makes it sound like pretty much everybody just has to suffer guitars. Boy, am I ever a Keyboard player.
The Robot guitar will be available December 9th. I’m on real crap internet right now so I’m having trouble discovering if they actually announced a MSRP yet. I’m sure, being Gibson, it’ll be a few thousand dollars for the whole rig.
Gibson to Launch Self-Tuning “Robot” Guitar [CreateDigitalMusic.com]
Previously: Gibson Powertune Self-Tuning Guitars [BBG]
Hey, in fairness, Gibson’s copy writers seemed to be the one taking the shot at guitarists, bizarrely! (The old technology has worked PRETTY well for the last however many years!)
Like I said before, some rich n00b is going to get this and only (badly) play Stairway to Heaven
This is a neat invention (though it solves a non-existent problem), but I don’t think I’ve ever seen any guitar gear this overhyped or (almost definitely) overpriced. Doing one fairly simple operation does not a robot-thing make.
This is like if you made a device to automatically crack eggs and named it “Robot Kitchen.”
Theoretically, it should be possible to do some not-so-simple operations, like switch between different tunings on the fly. Previously, that’s required having multiple guitars handy. That may not mean it isn’t still overpriced, of course, but there is definitely some use for this. What I’ve heard so far, though, is the on-the-fly tunings may not be as flexible as everyone would like …
It was only a matter of time. There’s already so many musicians who PLAY like robots…
Hey, when Sonic Youth use them, I’ll use them.
“Theoretically, it should be possible to do some not-so-simple operations, like switch between different tunings on the fly. Previously, that’s required having multiple guitars handy.”
Not necessarily. Hipshot (hipshotproducts.com) sells several different aftermarket mods designed to change tunings on the fly. The most interesting is the Trilogy bridge, which allows 3 different preset tunings for each string, for a combination of 700+ tunings.
I’m all for innovation, but it seems like Gibson could stuff more than an automatic tuning system into a guitar that’s almost guaranteed to cost more than $4k. Besides, we all know Steinberger is the original robot guitar.
Self tuning guitars have been around for years. And they were ridiculously expensive then.
I put hold money down on one Saturday and the price quoted was $2,199.99. This was at The Guitar Center. I’m looking forward to Dec 7. I believe it to be basically a Les Paul Studio with the obvious additions, and I do like the paint job.