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What have I discovered and what can I share? These are just common sense and have been in many threads on Basschat in the last 10 years. Effective bass lines are the best. Simple bass lines are the most effective. A good "Adam Clayton" is worth his weight in gold. An almost good "Jaco" misses by a mile. Your groove is more important than your sound. Obviously don't sound bad, but what you play beats the sound of your gear every time. The audience or your mates might tell you you sound good, but if you're a good player you'll be asked to join bands. Get the basics right. Second nature, so you can't play it wrong. Then you can focus on the good stuff. Learn to keep good time. Don't count but feel the beats. Play every note exactly in time.The basic difference between the world's best and semi pro is the quality of the timing. If you're going to stand in front of an audience, bring your best game. Every time. It doesn't matter if they are not listening or there is one man and a dog. Go home knowing that you couldn't have given any more, even if you were playing the Albert Hall. Learn to sing. Bv's are a bare minimum and will make you more valuable to your band.

It's been posted before, but both Chas and Dave played on this ...which was later sampled by Dr Dre for Eminem's breakthrough single 'My Name Is'. So, in conclusion, RIP Chas Hodges, international hip hop superstar.

The R-400's getting a WB-100-ish facelift... pics just posted on FB:

Worst gig ever was a band showcase, or at least that’s what it was billed as, at a Country Club/ hotel type place. We were told there would be travelling expenses plus food and drink for all the acts. Arrived at venue to be told that travelling expenses info was incorrect, not really an issue as it was only half an hour or so away from us. We were a originals rock band, all hair and Ibanez guitars (as was the thing back then), we then get told we were on between the magician and the Neil Diamond impersonator, alarm bells are starting to ring. Go to the backstage room, here’s the free food and drink, a huge bowl of stale crisps and a crate of out of date light ale! Get through the gig, being largely ignored or frowned at, and as we’re packing guitars away in the backstage area, the organiser comes in and says “well done lads, you finished second, Neil Diamond won”. Feeling very deflated by now, our guitarist pipes up to try and cheer us up and says “ah well, he was very good, at least we came second” at which point our drummer walks in and says “turns out only three acts turned up, and while we were getting ready backstage, the magician tried to saw his assistant in half but the table broke and she fell off the stage and fractured her wrist, and we only beat him by one vote”! Luckily no one else wanted the light ale so at least we could drink enough to see the funny side of it all!

RIP indeed. Great player.

All wired up and making a noise!! I fitted an EMG 35DC and 2 band EMG preamp in the end.... A few little things left to do but the end is in sight!! Will post some more pictures later.

I caught the gig at the Jam House this week and as a big fan of Gil Scott Heron & Brian’s collaborations it was great to see him. I’ve now seen them both live. Anyway Yolanda was on bass and she is great. She captured the vibe both tonally and with her note choices and fills so with that and the fender rhodes it was back to that authentic 70’s vibe. She was playing a fender jazz bass 5 string and usually when i hear bass players on these basses playing notes on the low B string they generally sound disconnected from the other strings but this wasn’t the case this time. She uses the B string a lot rather than just to drop a low note here and there, and even when she was digging in or doing a bit of slapping on it everything was consistent in tone, weight and volume. Could be a compressor in the signal path or just good technique on her part or both but whatever it was, it was a pleasure. I look forward to catching her gigging with her own band at some point. A superb musician

Like most ‘debates’ on Internet forums it’s a case of If you like it buy it if you don’t don’t. We can rationalise opinion or choice but ultimately the chat was about cost. We’ve had the Warwick price hike chat, the EBMM price chat, the new Fender Pro price chat. Sandberg are pretty market appropriate in their ‘regular’ range price before heat and vibration treatment, relic’ing etc. They make as strong and reliable a product as EBMM or other non fender brands. Have the detractors played one? Compared one to their fav brand? Had some actual time playing one of just decided they don’t like it? The internet eh! Proper ball ache!

Down the rehearsal space/gig venue this morning - I swear the new finish makes it sound better! The Marshall has decided it - white piping coming soon.

Well this is really something.

Spoken to Lee At Gallaghers in Grimsby. Hes found out that ALL the last batch of 12 to 18 RPBXs have come with the wrong necks but marked up correctly and been sent out to retailers. Another batch coming in October but because they are en route they cant check for correct necks. Im waiting and if they come with P necks, swapping mine for one of that batch. Lee's always a great guy to deal with and keen on price too. If anyone wants this J bass with double P pups, talk to me!!!

I saw a 'stealth' telecaster bass that I really like the look of and I haven't got a black bass so I think I might give it a go 🤔

Aye, but can ye trust t'rod..? ...

If you want to here the SuperLight Sandberg go to 20mins in this video.. Sandberg - Thomann/Studio Chimiel. Sounds fantastic. If you’re a Jazz Bass and Slapper, you’ll love this.

Give your guide dog a pat and a biscuit from me.

Been playing for 40 years and if there's one thing I've learned playing in a band it's, don't get yourself in a position where you are being 'told' what to do by a guitarist or a singer. If you do, you may as well become a session player and earn some money! The real fulfilling part of it all is - you will be the only one that is! The realistic future for those that 'tell' others what to do is loneliness as everyone will eventually have enough and leave. Same as any relationship!

i was never bitter about it , after years of thought , decades it could be the whole idea of show biz & fame ? ,, the ruthless effect it has on people ,, during those 5 weeks they tried every guy around who knew 4 strings ,, one week out of the 5 was cancelled , live music , but no jam session ,, maybe its true ,, if i only played the 1st note & bar ,,could it be , they had to stop it , ? WKD a bar down the road used to hand me the bass as soon as i walked in , yeah , so the whole thing made me completely not interested ,, in how good / big name / look at me musician , some people are , not all , you tube changed all that ,, we started to see few brilliant bedroom musicians taking on the pros ,, quite happy on you tube

I’ve got one from back when I was a DJ during the rave days in the early 90s, this is really embarrassing. I used to play at illegal parties in disused warehouses and squats, rickety old buildings, dirt and broken glass everywhere etc. One night, just before my DJ set, I’m up on the rooftop of a particularly dirty burnt out building, chatting up some girls and trying really hard to look cool, going on about my DJing skills and impressing them with some very boring ‘rave’ stories. I look at my watch and tell them “it’s time for me to hit the decks, ladies”, and with a wink and a smile, I turn the wrong way, trip and fall off the roof. I fall about 25 feet and land on my àrse with a loud crescendo. It’s chucking it down with rain, and I land on a pile of wet cardboard boxes filled with garbage. One of the girls is screaming, the other one is pointing at me and pìssing herself laughing. Somehow I am unharmed and there’s not a scratch on me. It takes me a good 20 minutes to find a way to climb back into the building, and I then spend the rest of the night drenched, with a huge brown muddy wet patch on the àrse of my bright yellow ‘rave’ trousers, stinking of garbage and hiding from the hot girls on the roof.

Looks like "reasonable travel time" varies a lot.I play in two bands that rehearse an hour away from me and both bands rehearse weekly.Gigs(15-20) are also also at least an hour away.I also have played in pit bands for musicals that also require an hour each way.Unfortunately things always seem to be on different days/evenings due to work/family/other musical groups ,especially in the 7 piece swing band. I live in Northern Ontario in Canada where nasty winter weather is just part of life and sometimes the drive to rehearsal is a bit more of an adventure than I would like but I'm smart enough now to know when to stay home on really bad days/nights.I'm 72 and still working part time as well as my band commitments but as was said above "being in a band at all is golden" and even though I figure it actually costs me money to play in the bands it is worth the time and money to me.I have gear(BG,EUB,DB,amp) that works for me and is paid for and currently have no GAS,well,nothing serious. As I have said before, we are so lucky to have music in our lives and be a able share it with bandmates and audiences.I am fortunate at my stage of life to not have some of the responsibilities that many of you have but I also realize my time is running out and I want to use it musically as much as I can,I'm contemplating finding a DB teacher(also an hour away of course) to help me with my DB skills and augment the teaching vids on the net.I live in a very rural area so any type of public transportation is out of the question...remember this is Canada. I'm lucky I get to play lots of different types of music with very good musicians and at this point I'm willing to make time for it and my playing is improving as I try to keep up with them.Making music is magic.

I struggled to get this one together. I've gone through a lot of variations on it before finding a small part that I liked then built the track around it. Hope you enjoy.

For fake wear on fake fenders? Yeah, why not? 😀

It’s one of their “Masterpiece Aged” models. Looks like you’re paying an extra grand or so to have someone ruin a perfectly nice £1-2k bass for you.

Hi everyone, (Mods - I hope this is okay) It has just been announced that one of Norwich's most important music venues The Brickmakers will be closing its doors at the end of January as the owners - Enterprise Inns (EI Publican Partnerships) - are demanding an extra 12% to renew the leasehold - which the current landladies simply can't afford. This is probably the only dedicated live music pub left in Norwich (not to mention being named UK live music pub of the year in 2011) and is a real hub for the local live music scene. There is also a second room (The B2) which is one of the only venues in the area devoted to original bands. It also happens to be where I first met my beautiful wife 🙂. I've no idea if this petition will do any good but it's at least better than doing nothing so if any of you would be kind enough to sign it then I (and I'm sure the rest of Norfolk's musical community) would be very grateful. https://www.change.org/p/ei-publican-partnerships-save-the-brickmakers-norwich?recruiter=27439545&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_initial.pacific_abi_gmail_send.variation.pacific_abi_select_all_contacts.select_all.pacific_email_copy_en_gb_4.v2.pacific_email_copy_en_us_4.control.pacific_email_copy_en_us_3.control.lightning_share_by_medium.share_by_medium.lightning_share_by_medium_message.control.lightning_2primary_share_options.variant.lightning_2primary_share_options_more.variant

Evening all, I'm new here so be nice Been playing for getting on 15 years, not amazingly well but good enough for what I need. Mainly rock covers bands at the moment but do a bit of big band stuff from time to time. Playiny a diy fender jazz, jag and ibanez fretless currently putting together a p copy as and when funds allow.

How come? They have couriers in Poland 🙂

Not quite the same, but I've got a Maruszczyk Jake with a Delano P-style and Humbucker. I think humbucker selection and placement are crucial, what you have to watch out for is that the humbucker sounds fat because it's a humbucker, and the P bass pickup sounds fat because of it's placement further from the bridge, so you can end with a surprisingly similar sound. Neither of them sounds like a J at the neck (though you might be able to tap a humbucker to do that?). I don't mind that, because I've got an Elwood as well with Huassel J pups, and my Jake is my play-with-a-pick rock out bass.

I live near Jack and can confirm that this is my experience as well.

Adrian is a great guy - and lives in cider country (Frome in Somerset)

When I was around 10 years old my dad worked with Chas and Dave as a recording engineer at some gig in London. I managed to quite badly injure my finger (almost severed the tip of my right-hand middle finger - that would have made playing the bass unlikely) and they were incredibly caring as was the support act Natasha England I was looked after amazingly and sent a bunch of records as well as multiple phone calls over the next few weeks to check I was OK. Truly above and beyond as my mum just said to me on the phone. RIP Chas.

They will get back a bit of top end but the only times I have ever snapped strings has been after boiling. Many years ago when I was young and poor.

you Sir, are a sage.

Agreed. That black burst with the super-straight grain is a very cool look. Especially with a plain maple neck (no dots or blocks). Really classy, naked sorta look. Love it.

On 14th August 1965 I was an 8-year-old wanting to be taken to the public swimming pool. I had no clue what a bass guitar was.

As it's your birthday, I guess we need to cut you some slack...

Incredibly, Mick, it's telescopic! The other examples show it with the pin slid into the body.

Sorry for the poor quality but I clipped this from an old photo of our living room. Our cats had ruined the grill cloth on my Heco Superiors. Their back feet would hit the front during the flying leaps they'd make to reach their favourite perching point on top of either cab. As they reached maturity, their claws were starting to leave witness marks on the front baffle behind the cloth. I feared that the drivers would be punctured. The cloth had to go. To replace it, I bought a roll of galvanised wire mesh from one of the DIY suppliers locally and wrapped it around the grill frame. The cats have passed on but the speakers have survived. For a cab that is intended for gigging, I'd suggest a heavier grade of wire mesh than mine but if steam punk is your thing*, a similar plan may work for you. * I'd never heard the term steam punk when I did this twenty years ago and I disassociate myself totally from the term.

Send it back. Don't take any risks, These things don't happen really.

Ah right. I use D’Addario XL.

It would be a possibility for sure, i will look into that as a half drop of water type of cover shape ( attached w/ velcro ? much thinner double faced tape ?..) would definitely ensure the hit would be against a softly curved surface instead of the angular/edgy jacks. Big plus ? It would definitely save the preamp's board from getting it.. in my book that makes it a win win for little effort/expense. Well done Norris, as far as i'm concerned you totally won this thread 😉 Cheers

Wow. Epic truss rod fail. Be prepared ...Fender may well compound this situation by replacing it!

Not quite. In Cyrillic what we with the Roman alphabet would perceive as an "H" is actually pronounced "n", and what we see as "u" is actually a lower case "i". Therefore MOHuKa would actually be Monika (assuming the first letter is M which is the same in both the Roman and Cyrillic alphabet, as is the o, the k, and the a.) I live in Bulgaria and they invented the Cyrillic alphabet. 😉

80s, but not the good 80s; the kinda naff, spandex-driven 80s... We're the By Jovi band I've alluded to in the Audition From Hell thread a while ago, we'd achieved a functioning drummer, and decided to embark on a UK Tour in installments...basically, we'd been through the back of Kerrang, listed the pubs/venues that other folk were playing, and phoned them up. The furthest North was a place in Stirling, which, of course, we couldn't manage to hang another gig off, so we were going to have to drive up and back in a day. Oh good. Singist blags a Merc van off his Dad, which was certainly big enough for all the gear, if a little elderly. Guitarist turns up with his mate, whose reputation had preceded him as a Proper Roadie. As he and I are the only driving license holders in the entourage, it's decided I'll drive up and he'll drive back, as I've spent the morning in work, and I'm clearly going to be far too fatigued with playing and then fighting off the attentions of adoring fans and almost certainly herds of groupies to drive back. Off we go. 400 yards later Proper Roadie demands a comfort break, an event which he repeats at depressingly frequent intervals during the 250-mile journey, hinting at early-onset incontinence issues. The trip is made even more depressing by the realisation that the van's 50mph top speed isn't quite enough, even with all the windows down in the rain, to expel all the carbon monoxide which the broken exhaust is depositing into the cab. The van's also doing about 8mpg, but at least that means we get to stagger out, coughing and wheezing and doing that wafting thing, at every services between Manchester and Stirling. By teatime we're at the venue, all is suspiciously quiet, and the total lack of any of the posters we'd sent should have set warning bells ringing. The landlord, who in hindsight had been just a bit too keen to get us to play this particular weekend (I might add here we were doing this for a fee based on 'Either what you can take on the door, or 10% of the bar, boys' i.e. nowt from the landlord himself) welcomes us with a beaming smile and cheerful predictions that 'the place'll be rammed very soon, boys'. Predictions he seems happy to repeat throughout the evening, despite increasingly overwhelming evidence to the contrary. And so, chanting the hopeless mantra 'Well, we're here now, we may as well...' we set up and soundcheck. Proper Roadie, his heavy lifting duties discharged for the time being, returns from the bar beaming and holding a pint "This Drybrough's Heavy* is good stuff. I'll just have a couple, I'll be right as rain by the time you're finished." I should really have paid closer attention, but right then we were more tasked wondering where the the adoring fans were all meeting prior to turning up en masse. We settle down to a couple of hours of taking it in turns to wander outside to look up and down the street, eyes peeled for any signs of the crowd, before eventually deciding that we'll go on and start, because then the siren-song of, erm our songs will inevitably draw the punters in... I might add at this point that in the three hours we've been at the venue no-one, and I mean no-one, has even looked in the door, and the sole other occupant is the landlord, who has disppeared to his back room, and has taken to just popping his head round the door every now and then, giving us a two-thumbs-up, pulling another pint for Proper Roadie (I did say I should have been paying closer attention) and disappearing again. After some tense negotiation, we decide that a door take might scare off the potential punters, and we'll settle for 10% of the bar take, relying on some last-minute hard-drinking Scottish rock fans to take the edge off the diesel bill to get home. Off we go, all staring at the door, willing the punters in. Nothing. Not a Scottish sausage. Another scout of the postcode in the break reveals a deserted neighbourhood, with nary a punter to be seen. Spirits are low, with the exception of Proper Roadie, who is very happy indeed, about something or other. As I've said before, I wasn't paying much attention... Then, in the middle of the second set, two ladies wander in and up to the bar. Our somewhat listless performance jumps up several gears, anticipating the late surge of fans, and many unwise shapes are thrown for their benefit. Perhaps understandably, given the desperately pirouetting, lungeing and eyebrow-waggling idiots on stage all trying to catch their eye, they drink up quick and leave. Are they rushing off to bring all their friends? No, they aren't. We finish the second set, not even able to face playing an encore to ourselves, and start to break the kit down. The singist, always a man of infinite resource when there's things to be lifted which might be heavier than his mike stand, volunteers himself to seek out the landlord. He returns holding aloft our earnings for the day, the princely sum of 15p. He shows us a piece of paper on which the landlord has helpfully detailed the important financial transaction: '2 x halves of lager @ 75p each = £1.50 x 10% = 15p. Cheers boys.' We look up. The landlord is once again absent. 'Read it again' says the drummer, squinting like Peter Grant looking for the catch in a new contract... 'We could raffle it' says the guitarist, ever the optimist/cretin. It is by now gone midnight, and we've the really big PA boxes to shift, and now, far, far too late, I'm looking for Proper Roadie. He is eventually found out in the beer garden slumped in a pool of...let's just say 'his own making' and leave it there. Drybrough's finest (or at least Heaviest) appears to have snuck up on him somewhat. We take an arm each, and without getting too close at any point, give him a cursory rinse under the outside tap before depositing him damply in the back with the gear. And so it's down to me to drive us all home, dispirited, unadored and possibly even more tragically, un-Groupie'd. I've been awake for twenty hours so far, have participated in loading up, out, setup, played, and loaded it all back again. With added Comatose Proper Soggy Roadie. And now another six or seven hours before bed. Showing splendid soldarity in the face of adversity, everyone is snoring by the end of the road, and only my lung-busting coughing is keeping me awake. Somewhere in the Borders and the Wee Small Hours I succumb into the arms of Morpheus and we have a refreshingly exciting 150-yard off-road excursion up an embankment of a dual carriageway, eventually thumping back onto the road with miraculously little damage, although Proper Roadie in the back sounds like he might have to have a stand removed from a body cavity when we finally get back home. I pull over at the next layby and kill the engine. Some more tense negotiation reveals the fact that the drummer has a Provisional license, and is willing to consider a spot of Deserted Dual Carriageway Driving. We convince him it'll be good practice. As his de facto supervising license holder and guiding presence, I immediately get into the back bench seat and go to sleep, albeit in a supervisory and possibly guidey manner. We got home just after lunch the next day. Proper Roadie never roadied for us again. We never did find out why Stirling was deserted on a Saturday night. Oh, and I've just rememberd the Battle Of The Bands thing we did at the (then kinda big) Willows Variety Centre in Salford, hosted by none other than the brother of Johnny 'What's Another Year' Logan, erstwhile Eurovision Song Contest winner (where's the Hobnobbing With The Stars thread?), who made a point of telling us he was wearing the very jacket that Johnny won in...his breathless pause for gasps of awe came and went without remark, which seemed to disappoint him. We came third to a children's steel band and a vent act. That wasn't a great afternoon but, like facing a firing squad, at least it didn't take long. * For the Caledonian Quaffing Cognescenti, this'll date it a treat, given that Google tells me Drybough & Co were Borg'd and shut down by Allied in 1987...

Lightweight Rig. Amp 2,5 Kg, Cab 2x12", 600W 8Ohm 102db, 17,8 Kg

I’ve found amp designer to be very versatile.

At the end of the day it's simulated damage, and you could do that to a Status or a Steinberger; my point being it would seem odd on a non-vintage type of bass (tho ironically both makers have basses out there which are decades old), and so to me it seems odd to simulate decades of wear on a make/model of bass that couldn't possibly be that old... Mojo (aka real, actual wear) doesn't seem to be an issue with secondhand EBMMs, not so much with Rickys (possibly because they conceivably have a rep for being a little more, erm, fragile*), so yeah, it must be a manufacturers decision. I still smile at secondhand ads for reliced instruments that describe them as in 'Good cosmetic condition', tho... 😁 * Don't write in, Ricky owners...I'm thinking truss rods, binding and tail lift - they might be a real issues, they might just be rumours and falsehoods, either way, it's out there...