Snark

I don't blog about gear very often as it's not really my thing (unlike Andy and Rob, I don't run to the letterbox every month when the postman delivers their subscription copies of Sound-On-Sound and I glaze over very quickly when they get talking about the minutiae of their latest piece of software or kit.)

However, I have discovered an amazing (and very cheap) bit of musical technology which I love so very much that I have to mention it on here.

Forget the wheel and the jet engine; never mind computers and t'internet and all that twaddle, for I now have a Snark.

We were at Regal Lane Studios in Camden a few weeks ago, when we noticed a handy little device being wielded by studio-owner, Ken Brake. It was a tuner. It had a clamp for attaching to an instrument. It could tune by vibration or microphone. It had a dial like a rev counter on a fast car. It glistened in the studio lights. It looked a bit like a character in a Pixar movie. It was called Snark.

We now have our own Snark and it is a wonderful thing. We were recording some 12-string last week for a song called Judas Unrepentant. Now, I love a bit of 12-string but they are fussy and frustrating instruments that require continual tuning-checks. However, with a Snark clamped to the headstock, staring at me with its turbo-charged eye, it was a breeze.