Gear We Liked at NAMM 2025

Gear We Liked at NAMM 2025

Here's some gear that caught our attention at the 2025 NAMM Show, in addition to a non-musical virus. 

Another NAMM is in the books, and in keeping with a tradition like no other, I have NAMMThrax, the weird cold that you just kind of get if you’re there longer than one day. Here’s hoping it’s not Bird Flu. 

It’s an interesting time in our industry. A lot of the founders that drove all the innovation at the turn of century have retired and sold their companies to fund that retirement, or are actively trying to, so there’s a lot of consolidation, and with most investment going into AI for products that we haven’t really seen yet, we’re in kind of a holding pattern. 

For a very long time our industry has basically been a tribute band to itself, re-releasing past hits, covering someone else’s past hits, or just adding on channels here and there as the technology allows. There was some genuinely out of box stuff like the Bitwig interface below, but for the most part, it was kind of the same. That said, there was cool stuff at NAMM this year, even if most of it wasn’t really paradigm shifting. Maybe that’s at Superbooth? Seems like a good excuse to go to Berlin. 

Here’s our list of 10 intriguing things we saw at NAMM this year, in alphabetical order–we’re not ranking things so don’t fight us. 

Behringer BX-1 

We'll admit that some of Behringer’s reissues have made us raise our eyebrows while feeling a bit torn, and while our ever changing ethical toleration of gear reissues testing the limits of our hypocrisy is not the subject of this blog, it’s safe to say that we don’t really get cranky about reissues of unobtanium. The BX-1 falls into that category. 

The Yamaha DX1 was a groundbreaking synthesizer, with cutting-edge FM synthesis and dual 6-operator engines for a brand new sound. These were as expensive as a small car and as a result Yamaha only made 140 of them, and there are even less survivors. Behringer got hold of one of them, and recreated it with a twist. 

The twist is CS-80 (another piece of unobtanium) multimode analog filters. This will give you a filter bank of 32 filters with an added LFO and modulation envelope. The multi-FX section gives you modulation effects, reverbs, and delays. It includes an SD card slot that will allow the transfer of SysEx and original DX patches.

Bitwig Connect 4/12

If you are a Bitwig user who also has modules, the potential here is massive. I’m not a Bitwig user and basically had to break away from the modular world to do things like go outside, so this is not for me, but I can instantly see what could be done. This is probably the best modular and DAW integration I’ve ever seen, because my biggest issue with modular workflow is that I had a really hard time actually crafting a song with them. This could change that. 

Black Lion Shure Level Loc 

 

https://www.shure.com/en-US/newsroom/shure-level-loc-returns

The original Shure Level Loc was a late 60’s compressor that like many audio legends, found its place in history when folks started using it for what it wasn’t designed for. Basically, if you overdrive these things, the distortion sounds spectacular, and even if you don’t drive them to breaking up, their compression has a very pleasing saturation. An original in very good condition is nearly impossible to find, so Shure worked with Black Lion to recreate it with a more modern and flexible feature set. Plus, it’s supposed to only be $500, which in the world of outboard gear, is on the more attainable side. 

Deft Audio Luma 1

The Luma 1 is a Roger Linn blessed and faithful recreation of the near impossible to find LM1. Because it’s using the same hardware, it’s not cheap, but it’s basically the same thing as the original. 

ESI X-Synth 

The X-Synth is a tiny instrument that’s a lot more than just a MIDI controller. It has 3 sample based ROM oscillators with the common waveforms but also more experimental sampled sounds to go down the sound design rabbit hole. It has 10 note polyphony so you can actually use it for pads, and with all its other features, it’s kind of crazy what you’ll be able to get out of such a small and affordable package (estimate $350-$400).  

Korg Handytraxx Series

This was actually released at CES, but it was at NAMM as well, so we’ll mention it. 

Working with the co-creator of the Vestax Handy Trax, Korg has resurrected a beloved portable turntable line for turntablists, enthusiasts and audiophiles.

The Handytraxx Play is for the turntablist with a bunch of features to go bananas with scratching and making something new. The Handytraxx Tube and Tube J have built in tubes with tone controls as well as upgraded cartridges. The Handytraxx 1-Bit goes even further allowing you to sample with pristine quality. 

Korg Multi/Poly M

We loved the Multi/Poly Analog Modeling Synthesizer, it was a compact beast and one of those digital emulations of analog synths that was good enough that we didn’t mind that it was digital. This is the rackmount version of it, which we’re also a big fan of because we have MIDI controllers and don’t aspire to an 80’s multi keyboard stack. 

Modal Carbon 8M

https://modalelectronics.com/carbon8m/

The original Carbon 8 is an incredible instrument, however, much like the Korg Multi/Poly, we already have a keyboard. The Carbon 8M puts all of that goodness into a module. It has two oscillators and 56 digital core waveforms, 34 filter types, and performance options, and works with the free MODALapp software (editor/librarian/updater) for Mac, PC, iOS, and Android as well as the AU/VST3 plugin version. It can also be racked, so there’s a lot of flexibility with this form factor. 

Nord Organ 3

Keyboard stankface is acceptable if you’re at a double decker combo organ, and why should those guitarists have all the fun with two necks? Nord has once again stepped into the void with an instrument that has second to none fit and finish as well as sound. It should be nice, because it’s not cheap, but it will also last you until the end of time. 

Wes Audio ngTubeComp

These guys are really into warmth. Like, REALLY into warmth. Give them a blanket. 

The ngTubeComp is a stereo tube compressor with digital recall and automation, bringing vari-mu compression to digital workflows. This thing is one of those best of both worlds devices. It has fully analog tube compression and saturation under digital control with seamless DAW integration. If you’re doing multiple mixes the recall and mixing abilities with this device will greatly speed up your workflow, which is good, because you'll need the work to pay for it.