Truckstop

[quote name='tobiewharton' timestamp='1450101392' post='2929543'] Hi SaxyBassist, The Genz is mine. I'll be visiting family in St. Albans, Herts for around a week from 28th if that helps? The combo is 500W at 4 ohms and 300W at 8 ohms into the cab's two 10'' drivers. It's a great sounding, loud combo. Cheers, Tobie [/quote] I live in St. Albans. If you'd like me to hold it for you until you can get to St. A or deliver it to you in Essex I can do it if you need? Alex

I have two! Great bags for the money and look really smart too. I also penned a review for them in the review section. Very happy and I wouldn't hesitate to buy another one if I needed to!

I play keyboards and bass and I'm better at bass but can definitely work my way around a tune on a keyboard. Having been to a few auditions and worked for a couple of bands as a keyboardist, I actually think that a lot of the ire that keyboard players get is quite unfounded! No-one is ever happy with the sounds that you select. Even if you're just using a grand piano sound, it'll be too tinny or too bassy or too much reverb or too jaunty or too bright or just generally wrong. When being directed, people always use terms that no keyboard player would ever understand. "Maybe try some long stabs in that part", "can you kind of play less but we want loads of pads UNDERNEATH everything else", "don't you have any Skrillex sounds?", "could you sound more Elton John-y but not boogie woogie and more jazzy?" and people always mime to illustrate how they think a certain part should be played. Doesn't work! It's constant! No-one is ever happy with how the keyboard player sounds because everyone has different ideas of how the keys should sound in a band context and I think we genuinely get less respect than other band members. Like, keyboards somehow aren't an integral part of a bands sound and apparently anyone can pick up in a few minutes.

J East Pre-amps are very very powerful. I had a J-retro for a while and kept it in passive mode because I found the active mode a bit too intimidating!

[quote name='TheGreek' timestamp='1450015588' post='2928778'] This is for sale here: http://basschat.co.uk/topic/274800-gk-backline-112-bass-combo-for-sale/ I have the 10" version, rated at 70w which packs a lot of punch for it's size. I lent it to one of my mates who gigged it in a local pub without any issues. You could do worse. [/quote] Plus one. Plenty of grunt for what you need it for and only costs £100 and will be worth £100 when you move it on again in the future. Worth bearing in mind if you don't really take to bass in the way that you wanted to.

See if you can find the Tesseract bass tracks on YouTube. Dude has incredible tone and technique!

Waking Aida - Glow Coin Puts you in a good mood straight away!

Daltrey had the best voice, but I think that the famous Beatle harmonies are just so recognisable and evocative of an era that it's impossible to ignore their quality and strength. I find McCartney and Lennons voices quite bland individually though.

Waking Aida - Full Heal Mesmerising throughout!

+1 on the SWR!

I have a Fender Rumble 100 and I'm really happy with it. Small enough to keep at home and loud enough to take to pub gigs. It's got all the features that you need to make life easy; aux-in and headphones for quiet practice, it's got three parametric EQ settings and an overdrive circuit (which I don't really like tbh). All for less than £250 new. And it weighs nothing at all! I chose it over the TC Electronic combos purely because I don't like the look of them. I've also used the Hartke 120 and quite impressed with it. Looks a bit utilitarian but very good quality amp.

Once you've done ten or so passes with the oil (sanding back with wet and dry each time) you can finish with a few coats of beeswax for a little extra protection and a lovely satin finish. If you just leave it as Danish Oil, you could end up with shiny patches where your arms comes into contact with the body. Personally, I'd be expecting to spend around two months getting the finish right. At least a day on each coat of Danish oil and a few days for each coat of wax too. Time consuming, but you'll never feel more proud of your beautiful finish!

If massive power's not necessary then the Vox Valvetronix combos are awesome and really good value! Try one out if you can. Remarkably flexible.

As above it'll sound different but it's up to you whether you prefer it or not. Best practice is to match your cabs (as you currently have) to avoid things like phase cancellation and other stuff that I don't really understand. Also, 15" speakers don't necessarily 'go lower' than 10" speakers. Can't hurt to try it though, you might like it!

They all sound the same. Vintage Fenders are no better than modern Fenders. It's a myth and, in fact, according to Basschats very own tests, the Mark Hoppus J/P Signature is the best Precision around. Invest the money on a good rig. That'll get you on your way to the sound in your head more than a vintage instrument ever will. Play a £2k instrument through a £50 amp and it'll sound just as rubbish as an EBay beginner bass does. Best of luck!

Hmmm, I suppose 5150 might be a bit to hard to come across but honestly, if you find one, you won't need another amp! If your friend is happy with a combo, Laney VC-30's can push some serious noise with a great overdriven tone and the bonus is that they have killer clean tone too. New, they're about £500-£550. Can pick up second hand models for around £250-300. Grab an extension cab and you'll be able to play anywhere! Mikael Akerfeldt uses VC-30's in the studio and he know his way around great tone.

Second hand!

Peavey 5150! Any 2x12 cab!

Technique is everything with slap. I'm no slap monster, but whenever I try a bit of slap on different basses I generally sound the same which leads me to believe that anything will do the job as long as you can slap well. If you're a great slap player, you'll make anything sound good. For what it's worth, the best slap tone I ever heard was from a Precision.

To be honest, anything that won't distort will do. I remember seeing a blues band use an old Peavey keyboard combo that they bought for £30 as a monitor for vocals and saxophone. Essentially that combo is an 'active monitor'. Just took a line from the aux-out of the mixer straight into the instrument input in the combo. Simples.

Find a Yamaha BB414 and buy it. They tend to be around £150 or so second hand. P and J pups, outstanding build quality and finishing for the money, and sound great.

An active monitor (or PA speaker for that matter) is a speaker with its own amplifier built in. It is self-powered. So it's a box with a speaker AND an amp in it. You can plug a microphone or the signal from the mixer straight into it. A passive monitor would simply be a speaker in a box. You would need to run a separate out-board power amp with which you would need to power it from. You would need to plug the signal from the mixer into the power amp, and from there into the monitor.

We just have 4 individual warm white par cans when we play pubs. Two pointing at the drum kit from each side (to make it look nice and shiny) which are on constantly and two more on stands (one each side) pointing down onto the stage area. They're set to slow fade in/out. It's rare in pubs that you'll be able to get 4x Par Cans T-Bars high enough to be effective and everyone just ends up looking like ghosts bathed in purple or green light. If you must use RGBW cans, one or two cans either side is plenty. For larger shows like weddings and parties, we'll use 8xRGBW par cans (4 each side on T Bars) set as high as possible as well as a couple of white cans pointing at the drum kit. We have a paid of moving heads but don't really play anywhere large enough to make it worth using them. Effect gets lost without plenty of fog and a dark room. For pubs, you just need to be lit brighter than the room. No need for anything else!

[quote name='Graham' timestamp='1449425507' post='2923430'] Weight by Isis, beautifully builds to a wonderful crescendo http://youtu.be/PUAhfyMf59s [/quote] Incredible band! Grinning Mouths from Panopticon also gets me going