It’s a saxophone! It’s a tuba! It’s a clarinet! It’s a kazoo! It’s none of these — it’s Saxxy! I can’t possible top the ad copy to describe this, so let’s just read and enjoy:

“Saxxyâ„¢ is the fun new kazoo — a sophisticated electronic musical instrument that makes it easy for anyone to play a horn! All you do is hum into the mouthpiece and patented Vocoloâ„¢ technology responds with accurately synthesized digital sounds of a saxophone, a tuba or a clarinet. Just press a button to pick your horn . . .”

“With the graceful Saxxy in your hands, you’ll enjoy the satisfying feel of playing an actual instrument — intimately controlling the pitch and volume of notes with fine nuances of voice or humming . . . Select one of three lively synthesized backbeats.
. . . Generate sounds of bebop or big band, marching or Motown, swing or salsa, and more! . . .”

I bought one . . . so should you! (Yes, this has been around a while, via Sharper Image, but the good news — it’s on sale for US$15 via the link below.)

Saxxy [Sharper Image clearance sale]

(via the Aqualung tour log which has some other fun non-musical toys — yes, Aqualung endorses the pop-up hot dog cooker!

Well, it's another gripping poll going here at CDM headquarters. Here are the stats so far:

• Guitars are beating keyboards, 46% to 35%.
• None of you plays the kazoo as your primary instrument.
• This site has 26 readers. (meaning, based on our server logs, a sampler error margin of about 5,000%)

Now, obviously, none of that can possibly be true. Yeah, yeah,
everybody is a winner with music. Whatever. So please: let's get a
little competitive, and vote early, vote often to skew the results
toward your instrument. Sorry, guitarists, but I can't write for Keyboard Magazine and watch guitarists win. I'm pulling for the pyrophone.

It's almost as though no one noticed you can vote more than once for this poll.

The poll can be found on the homepage. If you see a category I missed (okay, almost all of them) feel free to elaborate on 'other' here in comments.