Leaderboard

This just turned up this morning... oh my god its incredible. Can't wait to get home and plug it in!! Check out the gloss fingerboard

I took up bass to see what a bass does and to learn what it adds to music. I cannot think of a single song that made me think, I will have to learn to play bass. I discovered that I love playing bass but to get the best out of it, I took on a music theory course and this led me to learn to play chords on a piano. The bass re-ignited my love of and interest in playing my six strings.... I might be slightly against the grain here by suggesting that the bass is not a lead instrument. It is much more important than that. Drums and bass provide the foundation for the song, for the music being played by the band. I hear music as the total sound created by the band and not the individual members contributions to the sound. On balance if the song requires simple root notes, then I play root notes. Boring? Possibly but the overall sound is what matters, my ego has to be put aside in favour of the song.

Been lucky enough to never have anything truly terrible, but three that stick out: Pub cover band going through a few lineup changes for a variety of reasons. During guitar auditions one guy arrived in triple denim with a guitar worth more than my car and a strap with so much brass on it looked like it was pinched from the wall of a country pub. Widdled badly away to himself regardless of the song, and decided to sit AC/DC out because (quote) "it wouldn't sound right with two guitars". During drum auditions for the same band a chap turned up who was friendly enough but struggled for time and just didn't have the chops - seemed like he was super rusty rather than just bad but we wanted to gig so didn't want to wait a year for him to get up to scratch, but... He was planning our futures the second he walked in, most of which seemed to centre around renaming the band Oi Oi Saveloy..?.. profit. He was genuinely nice though, hope he sorted something. Finally, a drummer audition in the current originals band. A week or so of talking between BL and drummer on joinmyband sorting out mp3s and organising a date. When the audition rolls round the drummer arrives, sets up his cymbals, then tells us he didn't have time to learn anything. Annoying, but the drumming is weird timing and technical so we give him the benefit of the doubt and ask what songs he knows so we can jam along if we know it and hear him play. "I don't really know any covers". In a last-ditch effort to salvage anything of the evening, we suggest putting on a simple enough song that he should be able to muddle through to some extent (it was something like buck rogers by feeder) - "yeah I don't really play anything I don't know." We then try to figure out why he even bothered answering the ad as we watch him awkwardly pack away his cymbals and leave, having not played a thing. Even more awkwardly, 2 days later he served me and my girlfriend in a shop in town and pretended he didn't know me after I said hello. People are odd.

The last couple of years before retiring I squeezed a double pedal under my desk, with a bass drum trigger pad. I would spend the working day doing stuff (in fact, very little, being the IT Boss, so delegating what little needed doing, as all had already been done...), whilst pedalling away with rudiments, basically much like snare exercises. It lasted for over a year before the Director asked me, politely, to desist, as he felt it gave the wrong signals to some of the staff. I was getting quite good at double paradiddles, flams and the like, but complied for the sake of peace. It's a pity that the relative expertise developed in this way has not, as yet, evolved into a workable addition to my playing with the full kit. Occasional 'blast beats' (the climatic ending to RATM's Killing In The Name Of', for instance, and some moderate success adding triplet 'patters' to Buckley's 'Grace'), but not really at ease for much else. Old dog, new tricks, I suppose...

Yes, that'll be me then. I'm not currently with them, apart from a one off this weekend at Tunes in the dunes, the wonderful luke Palmer has been the bassist for the last few years, and yes he plays a squire....very well. I also played a squire for most of my time with them, an extremely playable red CV precision which had a great relic job done by Al Knight, I later installed a darkstar copy pickup called a nu-sonic made by a guy in Brighton, stuck on some TI flats, left them on for four years, and there you have it...... I later had a copy made by Al, in white with a matching headstock. The amp was indeed a GB streamliner 900 through a barefaced super fifteen, with the FOH signal split through a REDDI and a Sansamp VTDI. The Squire will be at home this weekend though as I'll be using a recently acquired JMJ mustang..... what a killer bass ! Anyway, I have to say, it's very nice to get a mention on these hallowed pages. Cheers John Lee-Man, we should get together for a bass pint, i'm in Notts, as I think a few others here are. A pub based bass bash if you will.

If it helps...

I should not come here, too GAS inducing. I have zero Vigiers, but I do have 3 Bogarts which have a very similar "feel", 80's modern, graphite galore, great tight sound etc. I just really dig the shape of the Passions.. want one...

Nothing to do with speed, but the difference in sound is clear. I've seen good bass players switch between pick and fingers between songs, or even mid-song, to get the right tone or attack. I can only play with a pick (right elbow RSI, limited use of my fingers) so I've explored that a bit and it's striking how much difference in sound one can get from different picks. Stone sounds different to wood sounds different to resin. Sharp sounds different to rounded sounds different to blunt. Atm I'm mostly using sharp hardwood with my electric fretted main squeeze, sharp stone with my flat-strung fretless, and blunt resin with my fretted acoustic. And they're rather lovely things...

I usually build through necks and always physically draw the key neck angle points full size, and always using the actual bridge intended to be fitted. I measure the bridge saddle at lowest and highest, mark the neck angle fulcrum, then the fretboard and fret height, the planned action height and set the neck angle to allow some wiggle room either way. As it happens, with the Schaller bridge and my thickness of fretboard and fret-height, the neck will be zero angle: Then I can cut the slot: Once the body demarcation veneer has been added, this will be spot on. Because the angle is zero, then I don't have to allow for the apex that normally the fretboard end has to be sunk into. You can see here above the pencil line on the maple of how thin the neck will be cut to. And finally the components in their respective positions: Tomorrow should see the backs prepared, the neck blank cut to basic plan and side-view profile and then the backs glued to the neck....

just come in from seeing the Ramonas, both the guitarist and Bass player played down strokes all night, I couldn't do it, but it captured the essence of the Ramones

Hi Pete, Agreed to a degree. A dedicated sound and lighting tech would be considered Overkill for bar and pub gigs by most. I'm spoiled as a result of my personal situation. Our band leaders husband happens to run our sound and lights. I will say bringing in sound & lights separates us from our competitors and gives us a more professional sound. But most bar bands are just fine without it. We also probably use more pedal effects than most bands. You do some pretty cool stuff with today's pedals.Like sending presents from my phone. Blue PS: New Live CD is finished

Not sure that’s necessaryily a bad thing, some basslines sound much better as all downstrokes, particularly alt rock, punk, metal etc. It’s a subtle difference but a significant one.

That rather assumes they know what was in the bag - it may have been an opportunistic passing scrote that saw the gig bag. The sad option may be they realise too late they will struggle to move it on, and damage it 😞

I use Imgur....no problems with it....I'm hoping that the Photobucket fiasco will mean that other hosting sites won't be so quick to dive in with the "give us yer money" ploy by trying to hold our pics to ransom.

Same bank here, my daughter had similar and was refunded and then had the refund withdran because the bank's insurance company for these things decided it was her fault because she'd provided her details to the company. Our nice adviser gave it all back again and a bit more for her trouble but that part is another story.😊

Although a very late starter myself I didn't pick up a Bass until I was nearly 40, there are 2 songs that I used to love the bassline too, the first that grabbed me was Blue Turk from Schools Out by Alice Cooper also Moondance by Van Morrison must have a thing about walking basslines both cracking songs there are many more but they were the first 2 that started the ball rolling.

A full crossover really isn't called for, as this isn't a sub/midbass arrangement as you have with PA. In order to make best use of it I'd set the sub low pass between 200 and 500Hz, whatever sounds best. There won't be any phase issues between the sub and the 112s with the sub only working that high, it's only above 800Hz or so where phase interactions between different drivers operating in the same pass band can cause more harm than good.

Thanks dude, pleasure to deal with you too!

https://www.thomann.de/gb/keith_mcmillen_12_step.htm Good enough for Billy Sheehan...

Neck blank cut: The demarcation veneer I will be using on this one for the top/back, the back/neck and neck/fretboard is Redwood (and it is indeed red wood!). It will darken slightly with the finish but should tone nicely with the brownish hue of the poplar figuring. Here are the veneers being glued to the back joins: It's a while before the top gets glued on - in the meantime I'll try a couple of samples with just this veneer as the main back/top, or triple it up with two redwood veneers and a contrasting one (probably ebony to link with the hardware) in the middle. Might look a little fussy when the top carve cuts through, but you never know unless you try it!

Good Stuff indeed..! ^^ Nice 'hats', too. With a touch more production it'd not disgrace a NIN album. I'll not declare it an automatic 'Winner of the Month', but the track that beats it will have to be very good indeed..! On another note, I may have to dip out this month. I've started, but Stuff is getting in the way (not feeling well doesn't help...). I may yet squeeze past the post, but don't hold up the voting waiting on me.

If your amp has a line out, you should be able to get what you want by connecting the sub to that. However, depending on where in the signal path the line out is situated, you may find the input volume on the head, rather than the output volume, will control the level sent to the sub. I'd ask Ashdown's advice.

Oh wow, does that chime with me! My mum's favoured instruments of torture were Mendelssohn's Four Seasons and South Pacific; and both my parents insisted that popular music (anything from about 1949 onwards!) was just rubbish and people who played electric instruments were not real musicians. That was at the back of my mind for years and gave rise to a head vs heart conflict that was only resolved when I finally picked up a bass. And when I got to the stage of being able to play rock songs with other musicians, I knew I'd finally arrived. It took a while, but better late than never. Now I'm busily making up for lost time!

The E string certainly shouldn't sound dull. Glad you like the NYXL as a general rule! Drop me a PM, we'll get this sorted. Adam.

Agreed. I play for fun, any money earned beyond expenses is a bonus. If I like the people and I like the music than that's it.

Without wanting to start a major derail of this thread there are a lot of assertions here that are at least debatable. One thing however stick out as just being wrong, that rectangular vents give more "woof" and ducts are more hi-fi. Whilst the shape of the ports will change the port resonances and changing that shape will also alter the point at which turbulence sets in the idea that different shaped ports of the same length and cross sectional area will have vastly different sounds isn't something with any evidence or mathematical proof that I've seen. I'm interested in what you mean by Line Array. The first of what we currently consider line array systems appeared in PA systems in the 1990's. A series of identical cabs with the mid and high frequency drivers vertically aligned to control dispersion. The idea of 'line source' has been around a lot longer, single cabs with vertically aligned drivers. The original paper on that was published in the 1950's but the phenomenon was known a long time before that and I remember churches with line source speakers fitted probably back before WW2 plus designs published in old books before Olsen's paper. I can't think of anyone using Line Array for bass, though the Genzler Bass Array cabs look interesting.

Won’t the court award compensation?

I use both Flickr and Imgur. The first for its nice album arrangement (but I have to edit the BBCode link, which is a pain...), the second for ease of linking, but has less good album stability. Imgur stores animated Gif files better, too... Hope this helps.

Tuners & that truss adjustment aren't something you'd find on any 70s MIJ bass. Looks recent to me.

I don't remember a bass in this colour for sale in this condition, so, if you want one this could well be your only opportunity. Atb's stock generally doesn't hang around. I remember Andy Baxter had a metallic gold flake '64 for sale in similar condition a few years ago for £15k, which also seemed expensive, but doesn't now. As with any market, it is only supply and demand that dictates price, nothing else. I'm not sure of the number of truly collector grade 90%+ original pre cbs basses that change hands in the uk each year but I would expect that it is a low number. Fender serial numbers up to 1965 add up to 200,000 for all types of instrument, so the numbers of basses existing in collector condition will still be in the many thousands- plenty of pent-up supply. The cutting edge of the market changing hands each year I would think is a small percentage of the existing stock. It may well be that, when owners reach an age where they want to rid themselves of possessions that increased supply might coincide with a diminished demand from a smaller pool of potential buyers, less interested in music featuring electric bass, causing prices to drop. This change in taste has certainly been the case with many areas of collecting. I think a widening of available information, removing the mystique, has diminished the attraction of some areas of collecting, particularly where it has demonstrated large production numbers. Who knows? one thing I can be certain about. The hour I spent playing my original custom colour 1962 jazz bass earlier this evening was the best hour I spent today.

I think I sat up and listened when I heard the break at the end of Sweet's 'Rock and Roll Disgrace', the b-side of Ballroom Blitz.

For studio work also consider a quality mic pre with instrument input: I picked up one of these secondhand. The 'gain trim' feature gives superb warmth/grit/fuzz/drive tweaking, plus of course you can use it for a quality vocal take too! https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/dizengoff-audio-d4

Yeah never leave anything in a car, it’s a recipe for disaster. My girlfriend left a scruffy old bag in my car last summer, couple of hours later, window smashed, wallet gone, other contents scattered all over the local park. British towns are absolutely teeming with opportunistic smackheads, and supporting a £200 a day habit is no laughing matter. Anything that looks like it can be traded for heroin will get snapped up in no time.

I'm 65 and gigging more than ever. I just happened to join the right band with the right infrastructure 7 years ago. Opportunities with bands with consistent bookings are hard to come by regardless of where you live. Blue

Not quite into Monique territory! Think Chris Chaney swears by the 1073

Mega (and I mean MEGA) expensive but the BAE 1073 is apparently incredible. http://www.baeaudio.com/products/1073dmp

I seem to be the only one getting this. But I don't need a Ric...

I frequently do a lot of proaudio gear shootouts with my students, the obvious DI comparison amongst many others (I teach audio engineering). My personal conclusion is that the simple and not too expensive BSS DI box is pretty good on an absolute level and unbeaten in it´s pricerange. You´d need to pay x4 the price to get a clear improvement. The above mentioned Bo Hansen DI (it´s a DIY project, not available prebuilt) is better that the BSS, but it depends a lot on the parts used for it. I made eight of them for myself in several versions and each of them cost me app. 100€. If you occasionally need to use the DI for piezo pickups (e.g. double bass PUs, classical guitar, etc.) then the Radial PZ DI is the best option. It offers a 10MOhm input impedance which 5-10x higher than all the other DIs. That makes all the difference for piezo PUs. There´s no better option available in this application. In case you want to chase the last 3% of sound quality, then there are other options. Many people rate the Avalon U5 in this league, but I don´t. On occasions it sounded great, on others it has been beaten by the BSS, Bo Hansen, or a few others in my tests, even by a cheapo passive DOD DI. But it has a few advantages which should be mentioned: It has a preset EQ (if you´re into that - I´m not, I have better options) which may be helpful if you want to track with EQ, it looks expensive since it is expensive which helps half-educated people to nod their head and say "wow, an Avalon DI" while ignoring what they are hearing, it has a line-level output (you won´t need a micpreamp to amplify the signal from mic-level at the DI output to line-level while (the sound of most DIs depend a lot on which micpreamp will amplify their signal). The king and unbeaten DI in my book is the Gyraf G9 tube microphone preamp. Unfortunately it´s stereo, so if you want only one DI then you have another one left over. But since it´s a micpre after all you can use the second channel to mic your bassamp. The micpres are some of the best ever made and cheap compared to other offerings in the same quality range. They beat my Siemens V72 preamps and many others lefthanded all day long. And that´s a statement... http://gyraf.dk/product/g9/

Nice to hear this, glad you all like our little community. It’s been a pleasure to run and has been a massive part of my life.

In the 16 years that I've been a member of Bassworld, Basstalk and Basschat buying and selling kit or selling cables I've never had a problem. I even had a BCer send me a Sadowsky Metro from Poland without payment until I had checked it out. However I recently advertised for something I wanted and received a PM from a just registered new member who wanted my email address so they could send details and pictures. I declined and suggested they put them in the PM. I've heard nothing since so it pays to be wary.

Welcome! Not a name I know, but I'll look out for it now - nice looking bass!

I think my first audition made the band giggle. They're a covers band that will cover anything from gossip to audioslave to GnR. I had never been in a band before, and was terrified turning up to the audition. I'd played the bass for years, at home.... When I get there the bassist before me was just tearing down his 2 4x10 rig with Trace head and I immediately thought "shi what am I doing?" I place my 25 watt peavey practice combo next to it and tell the other bassist I was ready to bring the thunder - we have a laugh. I take my guitar out of its bag. Did I forget to mention I didn't actually own my own bass? It's my sister's that I stole years ago and it still has pink ribbons on the case. Anyway... I play my heart out and barely get heard over the thunderous drums. I place my tiny amp in a corner at head height to allow us to just about hear me and somehow I get the gig! We've just booked our 8th gig in July in front of 200 festival goers.