Skol303

[quote name='timmo' timestamp='1455545826' post='2980035'] I can`t believe he thinks he is more worthwhile have a billion dollars instead of a school in Africa. [/quote] Indeed. And neither can I believe that he named his son North. I think it's important to remember that fact when judging anything he does. It's a crucial indicator of the man's thought processes (or process? I don't want to exaggerate here). [i]"North West. Hahaha! Imagine if you called him North? North West. Haha, that's funny. What, that really is his name? You weren't joking? Oh, okay. My bad. North West. Yeah. Cool. That's all cool".[/i] It's like when some friends of mine were thinking about naming their son Zeus, with the surname Lee. Zeus Lee. We all laughed at that one. A kind of Greco-Chinese martial arts star in the making. They weren't joking either. Kind of awkward. But fortunately it turned out to be a girl.

[b]Quick question:[/b] the version I have (as yet unwatched) is an NTSC coded "all regions" DVD. Anyone else have this copy - and did it play ok? I'm asking 'cos I always thought NTSC DVDs didn't work on European (PAL 2) players. Seems as though some people on Amazon are having problems with this.

Brilliant. It reads like drunk Tweeting Kanye certainly [i]is[/i] a colossal… ..end. But I also find him strangely entertaining. Not his music (although I do quite like Gold Digger and Stronger), just his bemusingly laughable cartoon persona. It’s like the mind of a 7 year-old boy transported into the body of a grown man.

[quote name='xgsjx' timestamp='1455483563' post='2979546'] I now have my head tilted to the left by 17˚. [/quote]

I was pondering the same question myself recently - and I ended up with the Rockbass Standard (in my case a 5 string fretless). The Deluxe has a better bridge - metal, rather than bridge pins. It also has more controls on the pre-amp and a built-in tuner. I figured I didn't need those upgrades as I was only ever going to use it for noodling at home, so I opted for the Standard. It's great My only concern was that bridge pins obviously limit the set up options, but thankfully mine is just right (now strung with LaBella tape wound). The action is low for an acoustic; I literally just fitted the new strings and it's been perfect ever since. No adjustments needed. £150 isn't a huge hike for a better bridge and more knobs on the pre-amp with the Deluxe. So worth considering but not essential IMO. Either way, they're very good basses for the money. Mine's definitely a keeper

[quote name='wombatboter' timestamp='1455266151' post='2977548'] Well played but the arrangement takes over the song... [/quote] Perfectly put. I agree.

[quote name='ambient' timestamp='1455277973' post='2977687'] I love soundcloud. People do look through it. I was approached by the national sound archive to supply them with some music. That was through soundcloud... I found Reverbnation to be a total waste of time and absolute pain.[/quote] [quote name='ambient' timestamp='1455283233' post='2977765'] I've never had anything from Soundcloud, in the 2 years that I've used them.[/quote] ^ Ditto, that's also been my experience of SoundCloud. I love it. Zero advertising, zero spam and a [i]really[/i] good platform for collaborating with others. What other system allows you add detailed, time-specific comments to other people's tracks? Nearly all of my collaborative and (limited) commercial work has happened through SoundCloud. I have something like 20,000 individual listens to date. But... if you're a band wanting space for biographies, gig listings, video clips, moody photos of middle-aged guys in sunglasses stood against brick walls, then it's not for you. I'd say Bandcamp probably does that better than anyone - but that's the only other platform I'm familiar with. It'll be a real shame if SoundCloud disappears. But it'll leave a gap in the market that something else will fill very quickly, I'm sure. I'm now wondering whether to update my subscription or wait for a definite outcome. Trouble is, if everyone does the same it won't help matters! Damn

[quote name='xgsjx' timestamp='1455280011' post='2977722'] Does it work with headphones? It's a good excuse for me to buy a pair of monitors. [/quote] Actually yes, it does! In fact you should try it on headphones and then compare with your monitors... once you've bought some, that is

[i]“Yes and no”[/i] for me… in that I obviously do have a process (everyone does), but it’s not a conscious thing that I follow methodically, step by step, because I understand what works (I don’t!). Which is how I imagine trained songwriters and composers go about writing music. In terms of inspiration, my approach goes something like this: [list] [*][i]“An idea popping into any head”[/i] I know, very scientific! I’m lucky, perhaps, in that I find it very easy to visualise (auralise?) musical ideas. Touch wood, there’s no shortage of inspiration in my noggin. It’s more a lack of time to get everything out and written/recorded. I tend to have something playing on a loop in my head nearly all the time. It’s a bit like tinnitus (which I also have): I only really notice it when I think about it, or when in a quiet room. I’ve read that it can be linked to the same part of the brain that triggers schizophrenia (phantom voices) and is reassuringly very common. For me, it’s a great asset and means I’ve never stumped for ideas. [/list][list] [*][i]“Hearing something I like and then trying to mimic it”[/i]. I try to grab influences from everywhere. I’m keenly interested in electronic music (it’s still a new frontier with huge scope), but I’ll also [s]steal[/s] borrow ideas from pop, rock, funk, jazz, classical, whatever. I like trying to mimic the sounds of different genres - it teaches me about both the compositional and technical aspects of music - and it means that I don’t get stuck in any one rut, which is when ideas tend to dry up. So I use a lot of reference material when making music: I’ll choose a few tracks that I want to sound like and then use those as a ‘palette’ when selecting sounds, making mixing decisions, etc. [/list] What I definitely [i]don’t[/i] do is think about chords, keys, scales or apply any sense of music theory whatsoever - for no reason other than my own ignorance. I just don’t know about any of that stuff. So I simply write what sounds good to me. Obviously, this is underpinned by music theory but I’m blissfully unaware of it. In terms of actual production process, my approach is probably very similar to many other people: [list=1] [*]I sketch out my idea in MIDI, not worrying about choice of sounds to start with - just getting down the basic arrangement. [*]I then record any ‘live’ parts that are needed - for me that’s bass, guitar, vocal and occasionally piano. [*]Follow that, I then start on the more detailed work - selecting the right sounds for any MIDI tracks; adding dynamic FX and other processing; gain staging and producing a first rough mix. [*]Once everything is sounding right, I then concentrate on finishing the mix. [*]Finally, I bounce the mix down to a single audio file (high resolution .wav) and do my best to master it (applying bus FX and bumping the loudness if the genre warrants it). [*]I then upload it to SoundCloud and go do some housework to placate my dear wife. [/list] Job done

Here’s a handy thing I found online for testing the stereo image of studio monitors. It’s called the LEDR test: [i]Listening Environment Diagnostic Recording.[/i] [url="http://www.audiocheck.net/audiotests_ledr.php"]http://www.audiochec...otests_ledr.php[/url] All very easy. Follow the instructions, play the audio files and listen to how the sound ‘moves’ up, between and behind your monitors. My own set up - a room with fairly decent acoustic treatment - replicates all of the files as they’re supposed to sound apart from the vertical test, which it fails on quite miserably. I think it's probably due to my monitors being on the large side (8” woofers) and positioned close to my listening position. So I'm going to try shifting the placement of my monitors to improve on it. But anyway. Don’t panic if your own system doesn’t produce the sounds as its supposed to. The test is typically used by mastering studios and home audiophiles to position monitors inch perfect. Try it for yourself. And then try tweaking the position of your monitors and check how it affects the results. Hours of fun. Really

6/10 More metal than meat. Just.

[i]"All your base are belong to"...[/i] Looks like something from Scrapheap Challenge. But with a silent 'S'.

Just shy of 14K on my iPhone ear buds. After that it gets swamped by my tinnitus. 41 years. Teens spent head-banging to metal; twenties spent raving; thirties onwards spent a little more sensibly [i](but only a little).[/i] Tried the test mentioned by Twincam above ([url="http://myhearingtest.net"]http://myhearingtest.net[/url]) and got "mild hearing loss" above 8K. Everything else "normal". Can't complain really. I actually count myself lucky it's not a lot worse!

Yep, as above. I've long been toying with the idea of buying a hardware mixer, often lusting after things like the [url="http://www.allen-heath.com/ahproducts/zed-r16/"]Allen & Heath ZED R-16[/url]. But... it would be pretty much redundant, for me at least. I can do everything that a hardware mixer can achieve via software: quicker, easier, with instant recall, etc, etc. The only thing I can't do with software is easily connect any hardware devices; compressors and the like. But I don't own any - and have software that does the same job to as-near-as-dammit the same quality (sufficient that I'd wager nobody could [i]really[/i] tell the difference with any consistency). So for me, the era of lovely hardware devices has passed by. I'd love some sliders and knobs to play with [i](oo-err)[/i], but I really don't [i]need[/i] them. And I'd wager that in time, you won't [i]need[/i] your hardware synths either - you'll have one controller keyboard to "rule them all". But that's another discussion for another day

Just to add a ’gal’… I used to work as a music journo and by far my favourite celeb encounter was Bjork. Mad as a bag of otters but equally down to earth and thoroughly lovely. Had plenty of time to chat and wasn’t afraid to share lots of personal insights. I met her again after a performance and she was amidst a load of fans, sharing banter, signing stuff, and again being delightfully bonkers. Top lass and a rare example of the ‘stage persona’ being [i]bona fide[/i], rather than just an act. Boy George is another genuinely good egg. Had lots to say, good sense of humour, no pretensions (despite how he's sometimes portrayed) and was happy to speak very candidly about his personal life - much to the annoyance of his PR rep who tried desperately to 'manage' our meeting. The photoshoot on the streets of Manchester kept getting interrupted by passers-by wanting to pose for selfies with him - he obliged without a hint of annoyance. Nice guy. ...all of this being many years ago. I now have a less interesting job, but it pays the mortgage

Mrs Skol has bought me a copy for my birthday. Have to wait until next month. [i][size=2]...so no spoilers please! Yeah, that's a joke in poor taste.[/size][/i]

If you mean bass of the stringed variety then yeah, shedloads. I'm into plenty of electronic music that features no stringed instruments whatsoever. But then there are huge swathes of electronic music where bass features predominantly (much more so than in guitar-based genres), sometimes as the 'lead' instrument. Reminds me of when I first saw LFO at the Sheffield Octagon, early 90s. They played their signature track at the time, "LFO", and I remember watching some of the bottles behind the bar come loose and smash on the floor. Now [i]that[/i] was bass it quite literally shook the room. Here's the track for anyone interested. Sounds dated now, but the subs are still as ferocious as ever - although you'll need some hefty speakers to hear them... [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HROMVIHGpLE[/media]

[quote name='Leonard Smalls' timestamp='1455006357' post='2974853'] 2 entries is cheating? Oops! [/quote] Not cheating... very welcome!... but I'll need you to pick which recording you'd like to enter into the voting. This is simply to avoid people going ape and submitting oodles of noodles

[quote name='Japhet' timestamp='1454945215' post='2974461'] You should really contact the owner of the shop to let him/her know how crap the staff have been. People often work extremely hard to build up a business but the staff they employ really couldn't give a toss. [/quote] This. I am that person who writes letters of complaint when I suffer from poor service - and I often receive discounted and/or free stuff in return. Nine times out of ten, the business owners are very keen to rectify these things. You just need to give them opportunity to do so.

[quote name='xgsjx' timestamp='1454948359' post='2974501'] I had played with the Evoc Vocoder a couple of days ago, but opted not to. I'm gonna try a monotone vocal & try again. [/quote] The choice of synth that you use to modulate the vocoder effect also makes a big difference (I'm speaking here form using Reason, which allows any synth to be connected as the modulation source - I assume it's the same in Logic). I find it often works best with with an analog type subtractive synth. But as always, experiment!

[quote name='xgsjx' timestamp='1454935560' post='2974298'] Vocoder is a good shout. I'll give it a try. [/quote] Always worth experimenting with. I’m using one myself the month - so for anyone listening [i]“you heard it here first and xgsjx is definitely copying me, not t’other way around”[/i] Of course I’m using it purely for artistic reasons, what with me having the voice of an angel [size=2](with chronic laryngitis).[/size]

A few photos from the listing on the GBBL website, for anyone interested: http://greatbritishbasslounge.com/product/cort-gb75-rithimic-v-jeff-berlin-signature/ I'll post up some sound clips shortly... too busy noodling at the moment. I need to hit 'record'

I’ve made a start! Earlier than usual for me. Bass, guitar and vocals recorded; drums and synth lines written in MIDI, so the foundations have been laid. Started off aiming for a summery, lazy beach vibe. Ended up with something a touch more melancholy. I think the weather outside has crept into my musical subconscious, or something. Currently sounding “a bit French” a la Daft Punk. Could very easily turn out altogether different once I get round to the actual mixing and production… [quote name='xgsjx' timestamp='1454927568' post='2974159'] I'm still trying to get the Mrs to sing. I tried, but I really sound awful. Even with pitch correction! [/quote] A possibly useful tip - or possibly not! Try singing completely flat - i.e. monotone - and then use a pitch shifter to ‘sing’ the melody by writing it in MIDI, just like you would a synth line. It will sound very unnatural but can equally sound very cool if you get it right (often more luck than judgement in my experience). I plan to use a vocoder and various pitch tricks myself this month, so I’m in that zone

[quote name='ras52' timestamp='1454927469' post='2974157'] Interesting right-hand technique too... he seems to alternate between anchoring the thumb and plucking with [b]i[/b] and [b]m[/b], and anchoring with [b]a[/b] and/or the little finger and plucking with [b]p[/b] and [b]i[/b] (and probably [b]m[/b]). Nice! [/quote] Yeah, made my head hurt a little watching him do that! Doesn't seem to be the most efficient way of playing. But what the heck, it clearly works for him.

[quote name='CamdenRob' timestamp='1454876426' post='2973872'] Great stuff... I might do something slapity next month in honour of all the guys trying out gear at the London bass guitar show. [/quote] [quote name='FuNkShUi' timestamp='1454915819' post='2974036'] I could also be persuaded.... [/quote] ...and for the full LBGS experience, I'd recommend listening to each entry simultaneously on separate hi-fi systems, dialled loud, whilst trying to maintain a conversation about "tone woods" with someone in the next room PS: loving the entries so far.