darkandrew

I follow Nile Rodgers on Facebook and he's posted loads of stuff over the last year about the development of his signature Fender Strat. I don't know about other artist's signature models but Nile appears to have been very hands on with the development of his.

[quote name='51m0n' timestamp='1387548987' post='2313257'] What is the definition of modern sounding? Because anything in that sounds classic 80's (Rio for example) sounds immensely dated to me. In comparison Autobahn by Kraftwerk (1974) sounds infinitely more modern and hasn't aged in the same way at all to my ear..... [/quote] I'm thinking in terms of the qualities of the actual recording itself rather than in terms of musical style as such. There's no doubt that albums like Rio or Michael Jackson's "Thriller" have dated in terms of the songs themselves and have more than a sprinkling of 80's cheese on them but sonically (to my ears anyway) the gap between them and the recordings of 10 years earlier is a larger leap in sound quality than a 10 year jump in the other direction.

[quote name='4 Strings' timestamp='1387457705' post='2312151'] I'm not an analogue freak or anything (my cd sounds better than my record deck!), but I find I enjoy the sound quality of older recordings more often than recent recordings. In the 'old days' it seemed to be the aim to get that recording sounding as near the source as possible. We then went through the 80s etc when it was considered necessary to 'enhance' the natural sound and we have those over-compressed, scooped sounding recordings typified by 'Celebrate Good Times'. It appears we're coming through that with more enthusiasm for returning to a producing a natural sound from recordings. I'm hearing more bass drums that sound like a bass drum and less like a depth charge with click. I am therefore also not sure what a 'modern' sounding recording is. Certainly with classical recordings my favourites (in terms of recording quality) are Deccas from the 60s and 70s, some are extraordinary, particularly many of those of Britten. I suppose, with music types likely to feature bass guitars, older recordings are more likely to have actual musical instruments recorded rather than digital samples which, I'm sure, adds to their quality. [/quote] I think there was a point in the mid to late 80's and through into the 90's when recordings became too sterile - every snare hit in a song sounded identical (probably because it was the same sample being played over and over again) but thankfully with the general music audience's newly found taste for all things retro we've found a happier medium between technical excellence and a musical performance.

[quote name='cytania' timestamp='1387459411' post='2312180'] The modern sound begins with drums coming to the fore of the mix. I think XTC's English Settlement was one of the first productions to get this treatment. Hugh Padham was behind that so it may be his work with Peter Gabriel was earlier (at work so no time to check this!). [/quote] Yes, I think that it probably is the recording of the drums that makes it. Listening to recordings from the 60s and early 70s, the drums are often fairly low in the mix and have about as much resonance as a telephone directory being hit with slipper.

[quote name='noelk27' timestamp='1387407267' post='2311753'] What's your definition of " 'modern' sounding"? [/quote] That's hard to say - listen to say Bowie's "Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust" and sonically it's very much of its time, it just lacks the clarity and richness of sound that you find in recordings of a decade later. But compare Duran Duran's "Rio", for example, to a recording of ten years later and sonically there's not much to choose between them. It's hard to put your finger on it - it's like describing a Fender Precision as "vintage" sounding and a Spector NS4 as "modern" sounding, you kind of know what the difference is but its hard to put into words.

A few days ago I ordered Pink Floyd's "The Dark Side Of the Moon" (2011 James Guthrie remaster - for the sake of technical completeness) from Amazon and so tonight having listened to it properly and in its entirety for the first time (I've previously listened to tracks from it on compilations, etc) I'm left with a high regard for the song writing, musicianship, etc but a slight feeling of being underwhelmed by the recording itself. Yes, I know it was recorded 40 years ago but to me it wasn't the epiphany that I expected, for example compare it to Roxy Music's "Manifesto" from the same decade and sonically the two are poles apart, allow yourself to move ever so slightly into the 80's and you have Roxy's "Flesh And Blood" and Ultravox's "Vienna" of 1980, or a little further still, and you have ABC's "Lexicon of Love" from '83, all a million miles away from DSotM in terms of sound and production. Obviously a lot changed in terms of recording technology in the ten years that span these albums, from 1973 to 1983, and somewhere in that ten year span was probably born the first "modern" sounding recording by today's standards but what would you say that recording was?

... I've just picked up my Spector Euro 5LX after not playing it for a few months (I've been playing my Warwick SS1 recently instead) and remembered what a great bass it is.

[quote name='Roland Rock' timestamp='1386113532' post='2296132'] I'm used to mine. As I look at the bass whilst playing it: - EQ Knobs: max is 11, midway is 6 and min is 1 - Pup blend: neck pup is 11, 50/50 is 6 and bridge pup is 1 No angles, just straight up, perpendicular to the neck. [/quote] But seriously, I have three basses and I've just realised that all three are different. I suppose 6 o'clock as the centre position makes sense for the indented ones, however it's the volume knobs that aren't so straight forward - I guess (looking down at the bass) 11 o'clock for max and 1 o'clock for minimum also makes sense. I wonder if this is the most common way of having it? I know it really makes no difference, just a little OCD kicking in I suppose.

Cheers, I tried to Google "Warwick Bass Knobs" but all I got was pictures of Adam Clayton?!

I was just wondering how you like your knobs? For example, if you have a blend or active tone knob with a centre indent, do you like it so that the marker (if it has one) is in the up position, down position, at an angle facing you, or some other position when at that centre position?. Similarly where do you like the marker to point at max/min volume?

I remember once playing a new venue near the halls of Goldsmiths College in South London (I can't remember its name) - we too were promised a pub full of punters. Anyway, we sound checked then hung around a bit and it soon became apparent with half an hour to go that the only people in the bar were us, the landlord and the bar staff. We quickly ran around the halls giving out flyers but it was too little too late. You've just got to put things like that down to experience and hopefully learn from it.

It's not really that much of a massive shock, didn't he play on a lot of Gary Numan's stuff in the early 80's and Gary Numan is a personal friend of Trent Resnor (it was Trent that sponsored his visa to relocate to the USA).

[quote name='pierreganseman' timestamp='1383139728' post='2260637'] I personally will not refund, I think the buyer has a millions chances to listen to what the pedal does with youtube.Com or I can provide sound clips of any basses. If the Buyer has a change of heart it is not my problem. [/quote] If an item is sold with a fixed price (ie. not an auction) and at distance (eg. over the internet) in the UK then the transaction is governed by the Distance Selling Regulations. The DSR states that if the buyer changes their mind within 7 working days of receiving the item then they are entitled to return it for a full refund, further the seller is responsible for the cost of recovering the item. Like most bits of legislation, however, there are some exceptions: The DSR do not cover private sales but an item advertised publicly and sold on a public website such as ebay is not considered to be a private sale (and I would assume sales through Bass Chat will be viewed in the same light as they are in a public area of the forum). The DSR do not cover purchases made by businesses. The DSR do not allow for custom made items to be returned (although the seller may accept it back if they wish as an act of goodwill). The seller is not allowed by law to include a disclaimer renouncing the DSR (eg. No returns / No refunds / Sold as seen) and expect the buyer to honour it as this would constitute an unfair contract, the seller is however permitted to advise the buyer at the time of purchase that if they wish to return the item under the DSR then it is at their own cost - if they fail to do this then, as stated above, the seller will not only have to refund the full original cost (including postage) but also have to foot the bill for returning the item. That just about covers the main the points, if you want further information Google "Distance Selling Regulations 2000"

I'm surprised at all the John Giblin references, to my mind Derek Forbes was the better bass player of the two and probably the one above all others who most influenced me. My other influences would have to include John Taylor, Bernard Edwards and Simon Gallup.

Giving credit where it's due, I had a bit of a sticky nut (?!) on one of my guitars and gave this stuff a go ... problem sorted.

Thanks for the advice so far. [color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]"Are you going from Komplete 6 to Komplete 9 [Upgrade] ? [/font][/color][color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]Or Komplete 6 to Komplete 9 [/font][/color][b]Ultimate [/b][color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif][Crossgrade] ?" - I'm going from Komplete 6 to Komplete 9 (standard, not Ultimate), which should make it an upgrade.[/font][/color] [color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]"To be honest, the guys over at NI are pretty good to deal with on the phone. [/font][/color][url="http://www.native-instruments.com/en/company/contact-ni/"]http://www.native-in...any/contact-ni/[/url]" - Unfortunately they don't appear to have a UK telephone support number and are only open for pretty much the same hours that I'm at work, and I don't think my work will be too impressed with me making phone calls to Germany. "[color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]Have you spoken to GAK?" / "[/font][/color][color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]Go back to GAK" - I have contacted GAK and they in turn gave me a contact email for NI's distributors in the UK (2-Twenty-2) but they have so far failed to respond to my email so I have now emailed GAK back saying that as I see it, NI are not interested in helping and NI's UK distributors have not replied so please can they sort it out. I've only just sent that email and will hopefully hear back from them in the next day or two.[/font][/color] [color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]In many years of using music software, I've never had any real problems so this is all quite new to me and a bit of an eye opener. Anyway, fingers crossed that GAK sort it all out.[/font][/color]

Recently I decided to update my copy of NI Komplete 6 to the latest version (Komplete 9) and so bought the update product from GAK. After 3-4 hours of installing the DVDs I finally got to the online authorisation procedure, entered the serial number that was enclosed in the box and ... sorry this serial number is invalid (or words to that effect). So I email NI using their online help expecting them to say something like "sorry, our mistake we'll sort it for you" but instead I get a reply saying that I have bought a cross grade product and the serial number isn't valid unless I give them some more money to buy another product from them, despite a big sticker on the box saying "Update for all previous versions of Komplete". Anyway, I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and assumed they had misunderstood my original email (as they are in Germany) and replied back telling them that I had not bought the wrong product, please sort it out but I have not received a reply to this and I'm not sure that I will as their first email was extremely dismissive and for all intents and purposes was them washing their hands of the problem. So I think it's now time to take it up a bit but I cannot find any UK contact numbers or direct email addresses for them online and am hoping that someone here can help on that score.

I recently read Nile Rodgers' autobiography, an interesting read and quite moving in alot of places - especially the bit on Bernard Edwards' death.

[quote name='darkandrew' timestamp='1368376698' post='2076272'] And here's my SB-1000 JT, bought direct from Aria UK around 2004/5 (Oak finish, ash body, maple and mahogany neck, ebony fret-board and strung with DR Black Beauties) : [/quote] Now gone to a new home. I hope you enjoy it Steve.

Just got back from completing the sale of my SB1000JT to Steve. Top guy and I'm pleased to know that my bass is going to a good home.

And here's my SB-1000 JT, bought direct from Aria UK around 2004/5 (Oak finish, ash body, maple and mahogany neck, ebony fret-board and strung with DR Black Beauties) :

"has anybody got any products in mind that they would like reviewed?" The usual argument about strings springs to mind - maybe you could run a side-by-side comparison of different strings on the same bass, amp, etc. That might prove to be useful (if tedious to make). Similarly, a comparison of pre-amps and pickups in the same bass, etc, would be useful if more difficult and expensive to produce.