ADA Depot - A Forum To Support Users of ADA Amplification Gear

Miscellaneous => Discussions => Topic started by: MarshallJMP on January 09, 2017, 09:10:55 AM

Title: Todd Langner death
Post by: MarshallJMP on January 09, 2017, 09:10:55 AM
I got a mail from a guy called Stewart to inform us that Todd Langner died on June 2, 2016.This is really sad news. For me Todd was one of the best amp mod guys.

He also contributed to the making of the MP-1.So we have to thank him for that great sound he gave us !!!
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: vansinn on January 09, 2017, 11:51:27 AM
We all must go at some point in time, but this is really sad, just in his mid-50's.
Rest in Peace, Todd.
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Kim on January 09, 2017, 06:01:45 PM
RIP Todd.  Thank you for your knowledge and work on the ADA stuff.   :'(
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Iperfungus on January 10, 2017, 02:52:19 AM
Very sad, indeed.
R.I.P.

I'll never be grateful enough for the MP-1.
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: rnolan on January 10, 2017, 05:14:02 AM
 :'(
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Dante on January 11, 2017, 10:44:32 AM
I got the same email, with this link:

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/name/todd-langner-obituary?pid=1000000180260224

I asked Harley to write a quick note because I think he knew Todd better than the rest of us.

Dante
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: MarshallJMP on January 11, 2017, 01:29:39 PM
Very good idea Dante.
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: rnolan on January 12, 2017, 02:36:30 AM
Very good idea Dante.
+1  :facepalm:
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Harley Hexxe on February 19, 2017, 09:27:19 AM
Yes Dante, and thank you.

     My Apologies for being so late in posting here, I just found this post. Dante did forward Stewart's email to me, and learning of Todd's passing was very saddening indeed.
    Memories of the countless hours Todd and I spent on the phone talking about all sorts of things, (not just ADA gear), flooded my mind for the next several days. I just couldn't believe it, since he was a few years younger than I. Todd was full of life, energy, and imagination. A great combination, but on top of that he was one of the coolest personalities you'd ever want to meet.
   I first became aquainted with Todd when he was the head of ADA Service Dept. I spoke with him on several occasions over ADA effects I was having issues with, in particular one S-1000 delay that no one ever figured out what was wrong. At the time I was using the ADA effects, there was no MP-1 on the market yet, but Todd would drop teasers over the phone to me about something new that was coming out, and he thought I would like it. Todd knew at the time I was running my rack effects through my Gallien-Kruger, and I was digging the quality of sound I was getting. We would bounce ideas off each other more and more as we talked more frequently.
   Then the MP-1 was released in 1987.
    After I auditioned the MP-1, I went home and called Todd that afternoon and asked him if that was the new thing that he kept dropping hints about? He said it was, and so was the power amp that was built for it. I told him it was fantastic! He started laughing, and said I knew you'd like it, so...are you going to get one? I said Of Course!!! But, I had to sell my old Marshall and Orange amps to afford it since I could get all those tones from the MP-1. He said you could also sell your G-K, Vox, and Fender amps too because they are all in there as well! We went on talking for a few hours that day, and between the two of us, we put together (on paper), a full blown stage system for guitar which I was going to start building, and so began my journey with the rack systems that I still use today.
    It bears mentioning in this Forum, that it was Todd and I who came up with the concept of what eventually became my EMB Intelligent Wah-Panner. Todd introduced me to Matt Bacchi who did the actual building of the unit, and wrote the bell software for the Wah variations, and Todd also suggested that I send Matt my problematic S-1000, which he could modify to work with the foot controller, to not only bypass the effect, but also to control the LFO sweep manually that way. This became a reality after two more years, and I still own the effect, and it's the only one in the world like it.
    Now I also have to mention that shortly after I got my first ADA preamp, Todd began dropping hints again about something really exciting that he was doing with the MP-1, and this time, I wasn't going to let him off the hook. So I asked him directly, Okay, you strung me along for months before the MP-1 came out and never told me what it was...now, are you guys going to make a better version that will make mine obsolete when it's released? He laughed and said they were working on upgrades for the MP-1, but what he was doing was something totally different with the MP-1 and that probably wouldn't make it to the public. So I said, then why don't you share what the idea is? I'm not a technician, so I can't steal your idea and build it first if that's what your worried about! He started laughing and told me he was trying to add another tube stage to the preamp. I asked him what would that do, make it louder? No...he says, it'll make it RAUNCHIER! I told him that the MP-1 already had some pretty raunchy distortions in it now, and he promised it'll get even MORE! He was right. The birth of the 3TM.  I'll be keeping mine in honor of his memory.
     I have missed those stimulating conversations with Todd over the years, as he and I are both very imaginative people, so we had a lot of fun sharing ideas and coming up with the weird and exotic. Todd made many of his ideas become reality, and he helped and gave me the inspiration to make some of mine become reality too. I believe I am a better person today because of my friendship with Todd, just because it shows what humanity is capable of when we aren't fighting with each other. Todd showed me that we can make great things happen.
    He was one of the finest people to ever have lived among us, and he will be missed. So, if I don't see you no more in this world, I'll see you in the next one, don't be late.

   Rest in Peace my friend.

   Harley :'(
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: MarshallJMP on February 19, 2017, 11:16:19 AM
Wauw that was a great story. Seems Todd was a great guy to deal with.
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: DannyjoeCarter on February 19, 2017, 12:29:24 PM
Wow truly an amazing story Harley, thank you so much for sharing this, and so sorry for the loss of your friend.

 So I guess ADA never did officially do the 3TM version and that was an upgrade he did later on his own?  :)
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Dante on February 19, 2017, 02:01:49 PM
 :bow:

That's a very nice tribute to your ol' friend there Harley. Nicely done, thank you very much for sharing those stories.

Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Iperfungus on February 19, 2017, 02:45:59 PM
...just because it shows what humanity is capable of when we aren't fighting with each other. Todd showed me that we can make great things happen.
   

Thanks for the story, Harley.
Todd Langner was a sort of mythological figure when I was younger and reading guitar magazines, many years ago.

What I quoted, by the way, is basically what happens here, making The Depot a great place to be: sharing.
There's a lot of knowledge in this place and all the people who owns this knowledge simply shares it.

I'm thinking about people like you or Richard or MJMP over all...

I'm happy I wanted another ADA MP-1 after all these years and that this has brought me here.
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Iperfungus on February 19, 2017, 02:47:34 PM

 So I guess ADA never did officially do the 3TM version and that was an upgrade he did later on his own?  :)

That could have been called the MP-3!  :headbanger:
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: MarshallJMP on February 19, 2017, 03:08:07 PM
From what I could read in my "Todd" book he made a 3 tube design for the mp-1 but due to budget it never came and ADA went for a 2 tube design.
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Harley Hexxe on February 19, 2017, 05:19:01 PM
Hey Gang,

    I'm glad to have shared this story with all of you. I believe if Todd had ever had the time to get on a Forum like this one, that he would have loved this community.

    @ MJMP,
  Todd was a very great guy to deal with, and loved creative ideas. If you shared an idea with him, that you had, he would think of something else almost instantly, and share it with you too!  You would have loved dealing with him because he was a very creative person, and I know for a fact he would have loved talking with you too.

   @ Danny and MJMP,
  The 3TM was something Todd was still working on because it wasn't exactly what he was looking for. He was able to get the enhanced distortions from it that he wanted, but he was trying to get the clean tube sounds to become more enhanced as well. The problem was in the design of the circuitry. Todd was trying to come up with a daughter board to attach to the MP-1 to incorporate the additional circuits, and make the cleans more beefy. The original 3TM design would have ended up being a 2RU, and Dave Tarnowski wanted to keep the MP-1 and any other preamp design in a 1RU format. That was something Dave insisted on. The daughter board never became a reality because it was difficult to get it to fit in the MP-1 in the physical location where it needed to be, and also, from a marketing standpoint, the mod wasn't something the consumer could do. It wasn't practical from their point of view to have the MP-1's sent in to ADA to have the mod done, and they would lose money like that.
   But, the tones of the 3TM did inspire the team at ADA to come up with the MP-2, and that's when the design work began on that.

  @ Max,
   Todd was no mythical figure at all my friend, he was a very down to earth person, and very easy to talk with. I remember the feelings of excitement I would have after he and I would bounce ideas back and forth, and I could see some of the crazy ideas I had were actually very do-able. Todd had a way of taking an idea that seemed like a fantasy, and explaining how it could be done in reality. Which after I would get off the phone with him, I'd sit down at my desk, and draw out flow charts and exact diagrams, then I'd mail them to him. He would add new ideas to it, or suggest a better way of doing it and either mail it back if he had the time, or just call me and tell me about it.
   I'm flattered that you hold me in high regard with Philippe and Richard, but I don't deserve it. I'm just an ordinary guy who loves the Depot and all the cool people and ideas that happen here.

   @ Dante,
    I'm a bit surprised you never met Todd yourself. After all, he was a great guitar player, and his band, (Kamikaze), was very popular around the Bay area. Even though your playing styles are very different, I believe he would have liked your direction. He was very open-minded like that.

    Harley 8)
   
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Iperfungus on February 20, 2017, 03:00:45 AM
   @ Danny and MJMP,
  The 3TM was something Todd was still working on because it wasn't exactly what he was looking for. He was able to get the enhanced distortions from it that he wanted, but he was trying to get the clean tube sounds to become more enhanced as well. The problem was in the design of the circuitry. Todd was trying to come up with a daughter board to attach to the MP-1 to incorporate the additional circuits, and make the cleans more beefy. The original 3TM design would have ended up being a 2RU, and Dave Tarnowski wanted to keep the MP-1 and any other preamp design in a 1RU format. That was something Dave insisted on. The daughter board never became a reality because it was difficult to get it to fit in the MP-1 in the physical location where it needed to be, and also, from a marketing standpoint, the mod wasn't something the consumer could do. It wasn't practical from their point of view to have the MP-1's sent in to ADA to have the mod done, and they would lose money like that.
   But, the tones of the 3TM did inspire the team at ADA to come up with the MP-2, and that's when the design work began on that.

I love this stories!!!  :thumb-up:
To know what happened in background...
Should I look for a MP-2 then???  :lol: :lol: :lol:

  @ Max,
   Todd was no mythical figure at all my friend, he was a very down to earth person, and very easy to talk with. I remember the feelings of excitement I would have after he and I would bounce ideas back and forth, and I could see some of the crazy ideas I had were actually very do-able. Todd had a way of taking an idea that seemed like a fantasy, and explaining how it could be done in reality. Which after I would get off the phone with him, I'd sit down at my desk, and draw out flow charts and exact diagrams, then I'd mail them to him. He would add new ideas to it, or suggest a better way of doing it and either mail it back if he had the time, or just call me and tell me about it.
   I'm flattered that you hold me in high regard with Philippe and Richard, but I don't deserve it. I'm just an ordinary guy who loves the Depot and all the cool people and ideas that happen here.

Yep...now we know that...but more than 20 years ago...without Internet and all its stuff...it was different.
We just had paper magazines and no way to get in touch with such people.
In the past years I had the possibility to know in person some very good guys...italians or not italians...with the right attitude.
Some of them became friends to me (one is Carlo Sorasio from LAA Custom...who had great success at NAMM last year).
I spoke many times with people from Wampler pedals or Carl Martin or Jetter and with Peter Florance from Voodoo, for instance..and I always found down to earth sharing people.
I assume Todd was one of those guys.

About you, mate...you deserve it!
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Harley Hexxe on February 20, 2017, 06:15:14 AM
Hey Max,

    It's up to you if you want to get into the MP-2, I won't say no to that idea, and I know Richard will definitely tell you to go for it! :lol:
   If you do decide to take the plunge though, I will warn you to be prepared for an intense learning curve. The MP-2 is by no means as simple as the MP-1. It has no Solid State voice at all, but it has 10 tube voicings, from spanking clean to the raunchiest distortion and overdrives. It also has the Chorus effect in it and the stereo effects loops are independently adjustable as far as the wet/dry mix goes. It also has built in compression that is adjustable and a built in wah, and it has a built in noise gate and cab sims for direct recording or live mixing. The MP-2 also has full MIDI implementation that you can access and edit from the front panel and gives you what is commonly known as Midi Continuous Control, but in ADA language, it's referred to as "Real Time MIDI." i.e. expression pedals.
  So it's your call.

    Hey now, I was in the same situation as you 20-30 years ago, with magazines and a telephone, but I went to concerts and met a lot of people that way and got names and phone numbers. It's kind of funny in a way because I met Steve Schiller at a David Lee Roth concert backstage and found out about the EMB Wah Steve Vai was using that way. What was funny about it was when I talked with Todd the next time, I brought up that wah and told him about the idea I had for panning a wah effect across a stage. That was when Todd told me he knew the guy who built it and that they were friends. He gave me Matt's number, and it was all downhill from there. Todd and I came up with the crazy ideas and wrote down all the formats for it and then challenged Matt to build it! It took 18 months, but he did it  :lol: :lol: :lol:
    Matt swears he'll never do another one like that again, but I have this idea for another effect... >:D
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Iperfungus on February 20, 2017, 06:27:36 AM
Hey Max,

    It's up to you if you want to get into the MP-2, I won't say no to that idea, and I know Richard will definitely tell you to go for it! :lol:
   If you do decide to take the plunge though, I will warn you to be prepared for an intense learning curve. The MP-2 is by no means as simple as the MP-1. It has no Solid State voice at all, but it has 10 tube voicings, from spanking clean to the raunchiest distortion and overdrives. It also has the Chorus effect in it and the stereo effects loops are independently adjustable as far as the wet/dry mix goes. It also has built in compression that is adjustable and a built in wah, and it has a built in noise gate and cab sims for direct recording or live mixing. The MP-2 also has full MIDI implementation that you can access and edit from the front panel and gives you what is commonly known as Midi Continuous Control, but in ADA language, it's referred to as "Real Time MIDI." i.e. expression pedals.
  So it's your call.

I was just jocking....  :lol: :lol: :lol:
I would prefer to buy a 2nd MP-1 instead.

    Hey now, I was in the same situation as you 20-30 years ago, with magazines and a telephone, but I went to concerts and met a lot of people that way and got names and phone numbers. It's kind of funny in a way because I met Steve Schiller at a David Lee Roth concert backstage and found out about the EMB Wah Steve Vai was using that way. What was funny about it was when I talked with Todd the next time, I brought up that wah and told him about the idea I had for panning a wah effect across a stage. That was when Todd told me he knew the guy who built it and that they were friends. He gave me Matt's number, and it was all downhill from there. Todd and I came up with the crazy ideas and wrote down all the formats for it and then challenged Matt to build it! It took 18 months, but he did it  :lol: :lol: :lol:
    Matt swears he'll never do another one like that again, but I have this idea for another effect... >:D

Well...the main difference between me and you in those times is that you're from USA and I'm from Italy.  :lol:
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: MarshallJMP on February 20, 2017, 09:29:03 AM
Well you're absolutely right when you say that Todd was full of ideas.I can see that in his book I have.
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Iperfungus on February 20, 2017, 09:44:29 AM
Well you're absolutely right when you say that Todd was full of ideas.I can see that in his book I have.


 :bow: :bow: :bow:
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Harley Hexxe on February 20, 2017, 04:34:54 PM
Well you're absolutely right when you say that Todd was full of ideas.I can see that in his book I have.

    I would love to browse through that book and see how many of the things we talked about that he embellished on. He was good for that. It was like, if you had an idea that you shared with him, almost immediately, he was thinking of a way to enhance it or a way to use it.
    Maybe when we get on Skype, we can talk about that.

   Harley 8)
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: Dante on February 20, 2017, 07:43:54 PM
@ Dante,
    I'm a bit surprised you never met Todd yourself. After all, he was a great guitar player, and his band, (Kamikaze), was very popular around the Bay area. Even though your playing styles are very different, I believe he would have liked your direction. He was very open-minded like that.

I may have met him, or at least spoken to him on the phone  :dunno:   my memory - she is not so good. I did go to Emeryville (ADA HQ) more than once though, each time preceded by phone calls to orchestrate each saga, and it's entirely possible that we did meet. I just can't confirm it. I remember getting my original MP-1 fixed once, so I know I went there at least twice = once to drop it off, and once to pick it up :D I think I dropped in once (unannounced) because I happened to be in Oakland.
   
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: rnolan on February 21, 2017, 04:38:33 AM
RIP Todd  :wave: , Well the least we can do is do our best to keep the legacy alive  :thumb-up: The MP-1 changed my life and realised an idea (tube preamp SS poweramp) that I'd had many years earlier and discussed with Mick Sampson who designed and built BAEZ amps (in Newcastle Australia) (BTW if you ever see one of these (either guitar or bass) snap it up  >:D , first all tube (Marshall style but better made, PCB construction when Marshall were still using peg boards) with 2 channels both with mater vol  :whoohoo!: well that I'd seen in 1974, anyway I digress.

Mmm Max, MP2  >:D , you know you want one LoL.  As well as all the features Harley mentioned, they also have a nice tremolo, noise gate, room eq knob on the front to adjust easily between hard wooden reflective (toppy) stages/rooms and highly damped carpeted stages/rooms (works a treat). Then there the 9 band eq (not that I use it much, Van liked to play there).  Here's the real treat for you though, you can either run your MP1 in the MP2 stereo loop or just use the the MP2 loop returns to add cab sim to your MP1 for recording.  The one feature I'm most enamored with these days though is the midi CC controlled stereo master vol.  This is the whole unit master, not the patch. I find this almost indispensable these days.
Title: Re: Todd Langner death
Post by: MarshallJMP on February 21, 2017, 06:32:54 AM
Well you're absolutely right when you say that Todd was full of ideas.I can see that in his book I have.

    I would love to browse through that book and see how many of the things we talked about that he embellished on. He was good for that. It was like, if you had an idea that you shared with him, almost immediately, he was thinking of a way to enhance it or a way to use it.
    Maybe when we get on Skype, we can talk about that.

   Harley 8)

Yeah sure ,no problem :thumb-up:

It's full of random stuff, like what he did for ADA, stuff he would take to namm shows, design schematics,R&D stuff etc...