darkandrew

I've always been a fan of Simon Gallup and Robert Smith of The Cure's interplay between Simon's 4 string (Musicman Stingray?) and Robert's 6 string Fender Bass VI parts. Does anybody have (or had) a Fender Bass VI and what are your thoughts about it?

Kind of bridging two topics here in one ... when I played bass in an industrial band in the early 90s we had a lot of sequenced bass stuff and lots of other low frequency stuff on backing tape for me to play around. If you listen to what Peter Hook did in New Order and Joy Division, quite often he'd play around sequenced bass lines or synth pads and find melodies to either counter or compliment them (eg Joy Division's "Atmosphere"). Another good example of where this works really well is the Cure's "Disintegration" album - lots of low frequency synth pads with interplaying melodic bass parts twisting around them (eg. "The Same Deep Water As You"). Have fun!

[quote name='mrtcat' timestamp='1477231330' post='3160711'] It's all about context though. A band with bass, guitars, drums, keys and two vocals using track to add a little something on a big arrangement like a 70s disco tune is completely different to one man with an acoustic guitar using tracks for bass, drums, keys, horns, electric guitar etc etc. [/quote] Again, I absolutely agree. When I was gigging - in the Brit Pop band we used to play absolutely everything live but in my industrial band we used to use backing tracks, mainly for sound effects, additional keyboard parts and other "atmospherics" - this was in the early 1990s and the backing track was on a Tascam 4 track Portastudio but I suppose if I was doing it now, I'd have a laptop (running either Cubase, Protools or something similar) with complete multitrack recordings of all the songs on it so that I could mute the parts that we were playing live and have the rest played from hard disk / SSD.

I don't think it's that unusual these days - I recently came back from a holiday in South West France and nearly all the bands playing in the bars, cafes and in the street used backing tracks. I guess a lot of people are so used to over produced songs, with even home recordings containing as many tracks as a studio recording of 20 years ago, that a simple bass / guitar / drums setup sounds lightweight to them by comparison.

When you buy a set of EMG active pickups, by default they come with a single, simple tone pot.

I have a number of humbucker equipped guitars, two of which are an ESP Eclipse with BKP Crawlers and a Fender Showmaster superstrat with a BKP Rebel Yell / VHII combo. In split coil mode either of these guitars can do a fairly good funk rhythm tone (think of Nile Rodgers' typical rhythm playing but with about 1/10th of his skill) but would there be much to gain from getting a "proper" single coil equipped guitar (eg hardtail Strat, Tele or Asat) for this sort of thing?

[quote name='MacDaddy' timestamp='1476362916' post='3153648'] who, Sisters of Mercy? Eldritch was always particularly scathing about WGW when they have been previously asked to do it. [/quote] When I looked, it had Heaven 17 and The Mission as the headliners for the two days.

Ernie Ball have put quite a good video online on how to do the neck yourself. Basically you wipe the neck with some oil soap (or you can use EB fret board Wonder Wipes), followed by a little tru oil on a rag and then a couple of light coats of some gunstock wax. The Wonder Wipes cost about £5 for a pack of 6 and the tru oil and gunstock wax cost about £10 each. It was quite simple to do but you need to be careful to not over do the tru oil as it's more of a varnish than an oil and you want to use the smallest amount possible.

I used to gig regularly in my Brit Pop days through my early 20s, trying to "make it" but never did. Pretty much gave it all up in my late 20s / early 30s but then rediscovered the "fun" in playing again in my late 30s and although I now play mainly at home, to unwind after a day's teaching, I have played the occasional song at school concerts, etc. I have recently thought about meeting up with the guys from my old band but that's probably just the irrational thoughts of a mid-life crisis.

For steel strings, I usually go for Warwick EMP coated strings - they have a nice "thump" to them with a strong fundamental and fewer harmonics. Otherwise I use DR Silver Stars (coated nickel), except for my EBMM Sterling where I use Ernie Ball hybrid Slinkies.

I know the MEC preamp in my Warwick SS1 has a trim pot, as do the newer Tone Pumps as used in Spector Euros (but be careful, the older ones don't and are super hot!).

An interesting bass related story here about the recording of one of the tracks on "It's My Life": http://www.philspalding.com/music-and-mayhem/story/talk-talk-its-my-life

I like Black Beauties and their Silver Stars siblings. What I like most about them is their punch. They're not boomy nor are they metallic and zingy - to me they are the perfectly balanced string. I've never had a problem with them until I recently bought an EBMM Sterling - firstly the windings are a little longer than some other strings (such as Ernie Ball) and are a bit too long for that bass (the thicker wound section of the bottom string ends up being wound on the tuning post) and secondly, the coating on the string appears to prevent it gripping the tuning post propely on these particular tuners and can result in occasional slipping - although I've used these strings for years and never had this problem with any other basses.

I have a Warwick Streamer Stage 1 which came with MEC PJ pups. I swapped these out for an EMG PJ-X set, hoping to find a bit more bottom, more punch and the elusive "warmth" that you refer to. Unfortunately I didn't find any of these and after about 6 months changed these for a standard EMG PJ set. Comparing the PJ-X to the standard EMG PJ, the X series J is a lot lower in output and very neutral in character - no extended bass or highs, just flat and boring. The X series P is a louder than the J but still not as big or as full as the standard P, it's a little brighter than the standard one but lacks its punch and heft. Overall I'd say the standard series is a lot more compressed and "full on" than the X series which to me sounded weak and unexciting by comparison.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1475532790' post='3146788'] They are headlining at WGW this year. [/quote] Just had a look on the WGW website and it looks like we've got Heaven 17 headlining Friday and The Mission headlining Saturday. Sounds pretty good.

[quote name='Dandelion' timestamp='1475399181' post='3145557'] Totally underrated and overlooked. The master of the genre. [/quote] I think in this country, alternative rock and its sub-genres are not given the respect they deserve. In the US for example, alternative rock / college rock has a much higher profile and many British bands and artists have been very influential in this area over the years (The Cure, The Cult, Bauhaus, Gary Numan, etc) and enjoy more recognition of their talent there than at home. I'm not sure if the Sisters of Mercy or The Mission ever made it big over in the states but despite being fairly well established over here and in Europe, Craig Adams or his playing rarely gets a mention.

I've just been listening to the new Mission album, which is very good by the way, and wondered what people thought of Craig Adams?

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' timestamp='1475263937' post='3144609'] Why do people always skew these sort of statements one way? Why compare them against a back street garage rather than a well equipped workshop with experienced craftsmen (women, my last repair was done by a lady luthier a few weeks ago)? [/quote] It wasn't actually meant to be that incendiary ... I am genuinely asking if a one person operation, ie. a luthier, really does produce a better product than one that has the backing of a considerable R&D budget and state of the art production facilities. As for my analogy of cars ... a lot of people love and enthuse about British sports cars, they are undoubtedly things of great beauty, but if I was going on a 1000+ mile trip across Europe I'd rather take a VW Golf.

Are "Luther built" basses any better than those produced by larger manufacturers? I wouldn't necessarily expect a guy in a backstreet garage to build a better car than a well known manuacturer in a multimillion pound factory.

[quote name='6v6' timestamp='1475173847' post='3143801'] I'd try raising the action a bit, had the same problem on my p bass and this cured it. [/quote] Similarly, the nut could be cut too low. Did they re-cut the nut when they set it up?

A guy at work is also a bass player and was recently looking for a new bass. He was recommended a G&L but despite playing bass for more than 40 years had never heard of them before and had to ask me about them.

Following on from a question asked in here about G&L basses not getting the respect they deserve, I was wondering how the development timeline of these basses goes. I know the Fender Precision came first but what happened next?

[quote name='rushbo' timestamp='1474408556' post='3137882'] Can I vote for Kraftwerk? Their influence on early Hip-Hop via Afrika Bambaataa amongst others, is huge. [/quote] If we're going electronic music, would you say that Giorgio Moroder by turning an avant-garde genre into commercial pop and dance music was any less influential?

[quote name='Grangur' timestamp='1474387271' post='3137586'] Not knowing the cultural influence of either/both in all parts of the world I'm ill-equipped to vote on this. If you could narrow this to Europe, or the English-speaking world, then I might stand a chance. I like both equally, but that means nothin' [/quote] Do you think that The Beatles' influence and legacy is limited to white, English speaking cultures any more than Bob Marley's is limited to black, Afro-Caribbean cultures? Maybe Bob Marley's biggest strength was his ability to appeal across racial, cultural and socio-economic divides? Is anyone here from Africa or Latin America? Did The Beatles ever make it big in these countries?