fretmeister

I like pimping my basses - but there has to be enough right with it in the first place. For me the neck profile and the balance of the instrument is vital. No amount of reasonably priced pimping will sort out a neck that isn't comfy. Balance can sometimes be pimped - If an otherwise comfortable bass is a bit neck heavy but has old fashioned tuners on it then a set of Hipshot Ultra-lites can cure the problem. On a 5 string bass with trad tuners (Fender, Sandberg, Musicman etc) a change to Ultra-lites can save 1/2 pound. And that 1/2 pound is all saved from the headstock. The difference can be amazing. I'm about to do a pickup swap in my Stingray5. I love the feel of the bass and the neck profile, but I find the sound a bit too aggressive for my current needs. But I'm not afraid to get the router out if it will make an already brilliant bass perfect!

Wow! I need to start saving so I can have something that light when I'm old and knackered.

5.7lb!!!!! What the smeg is it? Is it a U-Bass?

[quote name='patrikmarky' timestamp='1427745464' post='2733842'] My local pmt told me they or any other branch can get ernie ball on sale or return from there distributors ..might be worth a call [/quote] That could be useful. Thank you.

I've been trawling through the official stockists to try and find a 4 string Sterling to try. Loads of places have plenty of Stingrays with a variety of pickup and fingerboard options - but no Sterlings! It's the neck shape I'm most interested to try as the Ray 4 string is a bit chunky for me. Anyone seen a USA Sterling anywhere in the East Mids / Beds / Bucks / Northants area?

Empress Compressor. Best I've ever found, and I'm a compression junkie.

I'm rusty but I play sax. Great instrument.

For big loud gigs I prefer to rehearse with the exact set up I will be performing with. For woodwind based ensembles then I'm almost happy within anything as long as I've got my small pedal board (tuner, compressor, VT-Bass-DI)

The Little Marks are not class d. They are class C. The F1 is D.

I use my Shuttle 9.2 as a power amp. Works well.

[quote name='wateroftyne' timestamp='1426704989' post='2721121'] Ooof... what a player...! [/quote] MUSIC STANDS! Clearly he's crap!!

She got a Roland and is very happy with it. As I mentioned above - 10 year olds and AER are not a mix that dad would approve of!

I started reading a couple of years ago when I joined my daughters local music trust orchestra. I've been playing for almost 30 years and that ear & jam experience was generally useless when I had sheet music thrown at me every week - especially when it wasn't in the original key but had been transposed and re-arranged to take into account the very wide ability range of the kids that attend, and often to edit long tunes down to 5 mins or so. It really has opened up my musical world - not just about the dots themselves but also the subtleties of proper notation, the dynamics and feel that tab can't do. My kids' music teacher uses the 'Abracadabra' books so I bought the Double bass versions. I'm ignoring all the bow stuff of course and I'm following the learning progression / reading 1 exercise at a time. My kids do 10 mins practice a day so I try to do the same. The improvement of the 'little and often' approach really seems to work.

I have no idea how to assess my ability. I can play 'Colorado Bulldog' but trying to sight read anything over Grade 2 makes my brain collapse. I can learn almost anything by ear if it is in 3/4 or 4/4 (even though I couldn't read above Grade 2) but as soon as we get into 6/8 or proper weird sh*t I might as well just unplug. I suppose I'm competent at things I am most familiar with and bloody awful on the rest!

I've always played both I can't say that one has helped the other. In fact as I've recently (2 years or so) started to read music jumping between the Clefs is doing my head in to the point that I'm thinking of concentrating one 1 instrument only.

Julius Seizure.

I like it. It's especially useful if your basses live in a rack and get dusty. It gets all the dust out of the string grooves.

A: 15 B: 12 C: 10 But it could really be anything. I've got 12s that can be light and punchy and super deep and low. Speaker size may well have been a big factor on sound bit it isn't anymore.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1426522790' post='2718802'] I'd be just turning the input gain on my amp up to compensate. [/quote] At the time I had a Hartke LH500. No input gain control!

[quote name='toneknob' timestamp='1426511528' post='2718613'] ...and it's a huge improvement on this [/quote] That's far nicer than another Jazz.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1426506781' post='2718539'] What's wrong with the tone controls on your amp? [/quote] Depends on the amp and where the EQ is in the chain. I had a passive ABZ5 and the output was a little low to get my amp sounding how I wanted. So it was more of a preamp drive issue than an EQ issue really. For me anyway.

[quote name='LukeFRC' timestamp='1426271610' post='2716496'] I had a GK 1001rb for a short while... if the amp is anything like it... turn the master output volume up near full and use the gain to control the volume and see what that sounds like. [/quote] This. Use the amp the "wrong" way round.

I have an odd method. I write the music first. Then I hum a vocal melody along to it. At various points in the humming a word pops into my head that just fits perfectly in that space. Then I see what goes with that word. I never plan the subject matter of a song as I find that too restricting. That's why I have songs about politics,assassination, favourite films and.... radiator repairmen!

I bought a Hipshot d-Tuner from Monckyman and the deal couldn't have been easier. Top marks!