51m0n

I think that looks excellent - especially the DIY bit, creative bit of business strategy that, you have no idea how many times I've done a bit of sly tracking in an at best halfway decent sounding rehearsal room to help friends out etc etc, knowing the room is going to sound excellent wouldnt half help!

[quote name='neptunehealer' timestamp='1358344664' post='1937343'] Another thing, i can never hear any slap i do in the mix, it always thins out and goes very quiet. Does the blame lie with my 4x10 Laney cab? [/quote] That could be a whole bunch of things. I used to suffer this with slapping as well a bit: I had a Laney rig years ago, a G300 and two 410s, it was heavy, but worked I guess, but it isnt the Laney cab thats doing this I think. I've found that getting a reasonable tone and volume when going to and from fingerstyle and slap is a lot to do with your eq habits. I find that with slapping the low end of the note is more in the low mid region of the frequency spectrum, whilst with fingerstyle its deeper. This means that if I eq the typical slap sound (all scooped mids and what have you) then in a mix when you go fingerstyle you get way to much low end. If you eq for a fingerstyle solo sound (scoop out the low mid mud) then when you go to slap it just looses all its punch. I now eq in a tiny bit of low end, to extend the bottom off my bass/rig just a bit, and often boost a little low mid as well, the high mid gets a tiny cut if I want to sound big and smooth, and the treble is flat unless my strings are truly shot (which I dont let happen). Anything like a smiley face eq is going to wreck your ability to hear bass in a mix, if you dont like the sound of your bass pretty flat then you need a differnt instrumetn, because if you are eqing heavily to get 'your sound' for one technique it tends (IME) to adversely affect the sound when you change to a different technique. The only other thing I always have going on is some carefully set up transparent compression, which can also hel pto keep the bass nice and up front in the mix. Moving up to a BF 212T or similar quality cab is going to really really help you to no tneed so much EQ IMO.

Recently bought a new pair of headphones to go with my venerable Sennheiser HD595s (which are frankly worn out, the top end doesnt extend as far as it once did, and I've worn them for about 7 hours a day, 5 days a week since about 2001, they are truly knackered!). Having had a look around, and being a total cheapskate I went for some Studiospares M1000s. Initially thoughts on getting the box delivered was "What the heck is this" it turned up next day on very reasonable postage and packing charges. They come in a carry case (nicely done) with an extra pair of the muff bits (do the ones it came with wear out really quickly or not??) and a really nice cable (that detaches in a fairly standard way from the cans themselves). The cans themselves certainly look the part, very solid construction, you wouldnt think they were £60 new, thats for sure. The headband is pretty tight on my head, but all the reviews seem to think this will ease off over time to end up very comfy. They are very nicely padded though and give a huge sense of isolation over the sennheisers (which are open backed, the M1000s are closed backed, so this is only to be expected). They also dont leak at all, at even quite loud volumes, which will be great for tracking mic'ed up 'stuff'. The sound is pin sharp without being too trebly, however they are at present somewhat light in the bottom octave or two, there is a definite roll off down there (especially compared to the sennheisers). However, if I run some 25Hz through them for a while they open up in the low end significantly, so it may well be a case that they just need some time to really wear in. I certainly hope so, as I do love to have that bottom octave right there. The drivers can produce these frequencies fine (a little eqing does wonders) but I'd prefer them to not need it. I intend to use them for tracking stuff at home mainly (although they will be fine for location recording too) and have been using the RME UCX to drive them exclusively - its headphone out is superb, so if they didnt sound great off that then they would have been gash. Certainly good value for rmoney though, and if they last as well as they look like they should I shall be using them for years...

Just make sure that the shock mount will accept that size mic. Studiospares are pretty good though, phone them and ask them to recommend you one if you arent sure...

Yeah, and I'm well into punch, punch and more punch rather than big deep bass, and yet I'm still tearing down walls in the rehearsal room. Part of it is the sound is still so damned great off my rig at that volume that everyone enjoys it (its clean as a whistle unless I add fx, just loaded with yumminess if you know what I mean ). Never had to be this loud in the covers band I was in, and I was up against a hamond as well there, and percussion, and a really loud (if he was allowed to) guitarist, and the loudest drummer I've ever worked with - it was blues/soul covers mainly....

Janek Gwizdala's free albums (well a couple of them), rather good really, bit solotastic, but not nearly as full tilt in yer face jazzgasmic as I was expecting....

I've had a few rejections, in genres I prefer too. But for some really weird reasons - my favourite was I didnt play a Fender so obviously wasnt really into funk (wtf??) Don't worry about it (although it is hard not too!), hasnt stopped me ending up in the best band I've ever been in at the moment

Its funny hearing people say they can run their rig at 3 on the dial or whatever and it fitst the mix though. I think that is massively genre dependant. And rock and punk arent the most demanding genres for bass at all IME, As long as you have some nice grind going on - be it from some kind of overdriveyness or just bright strings hit hard with a pick to push the pups and pres nicely - then you can cut into a rock/punk mix without massive level, even with a pretty massive drummer. However even in my band - which is a three piece with a very dynamic drummer, he can play at whisper level and still groove like mad (never ever met a drummer who could do that anywhere near as convincingly, he is a real eye openeer) right up to road work volumes) I always end up with my rig at real war volumes in rehearsal, and I stand right in fornt of it with it stood on another 410. Its not a quiet cab, its not a quiet amp, its just the rest of the band want to hear more bass (always) which is kinda cool, but I would think maybe a little unusual? I mean its genuinely LOUD in there (ear plugs are [i]required[/i]), but it doesnt half feel good when you let rip and can feel it in your chest and your eyes wobble a bit Still sounds fantastic on the rehearsal recordings we do so I'm not worrying, just enjoying it - I certainly wouldnt need to be louder on a gig though!

A few compressor pedals that arent the average ones would be cool:- Cali76 (w. transformer) Effectrode PC-2a Joemeek FloorQ Empress Effects compressor All top quality items you never ever ever see in actual shops.....

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1358271570' post='1936096'] Ooh, a spoiler button! Now that is neat. I'm going to resist clicking it until I've re-listened to them all voted myself. But buttons are very tempting, especially one marked 'spoiler'. Must. Resist. Pressing. Button... Ok I'm outta here before my willpower fails Nice idea though, Charic. I'll jot down some notes myself and post them once I'm done. PS: when does the voting end? [/quote] Hehe yeah I keep having to drag my mouse off that button too I havent voted yet, I'm waiting for some "special alone time" to get busy with them all. However I want to listen to them on the big speakers and that means waiting for everyone to be out (for their sanity if nothing else). I want to hear how everyone dealt with the bass end of things as well as the top end, and my new headphones are a little bass shy at the moment (pumping 25Hz into them for an hour helps to get them going a bit better, but I'm pretty sure the cold isnt helping the new drivers to loosen up at all). I'm not sure when we'll end the voting, some time in the last week of Jan I huess to give the winner time to choose their favourite track from butlerk02's bands new album, and for him to get the stems up on line for download. I just had a really evil idea for a track to get everyone to have a go at, but its not mine, I would need permission, and some people's machines and heads may get fried just trying to render it - plus I've already mixed it so it wouldnt exactly be fair

Markbass cabs are marmite - some people love them (Lozz does a lot) some people really don't. I think they are OK, but last time I looked at the prices I thought they were a tad expensive for what they do myself....

Nothing wrong with lots of tone shaping options, the older larger MB heads had a lot of tone shaping options (4 band semi paramteric eq plus two filters and a tube compressor all in one box for instance), thing is if you get the right cabs you dont need as much eq in the amp IME...

I like the idea of that a lot!

So similar priced to a new Bergantino cab then, if you can get them (hint the only importer is [url="http://www.bassdirect.co.uk/bass_guitar_specialists/Berg_HD_112_210_410_212.html"]bassdirect[/url]) Either way these cabs will do the job for you.

How many tracks do you have to choose from butlerk02?? If you have more than one, then maybe the winner this month could have the choice of which of yours to have a go at? That way there is some continuity? Just a thought....

Save your money and your back. Dont bother getting a 115 and a 410. There are many solutions now that will blow your head clean off with a 500w markbass head. You would do well to go for a high quality 212, like a Barefaced Super12T or a Berg HD212 or various others that people on hear have tried and can attest to the quality of. The Barefaced 212T keeps up with my Berg ae410 (which is a very high quality 410) in terms of grunt and tone. Highly recommended and it weighs less than a sparrow's fart.....

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1358206871' post='1935042'] Nice one! PS: might be an idea to list all the SoundCloud links separately beneath the poll (like Charic does with the monthly composition challanges), just so they're convenient to click on. [/quote] Smarty pants

Please have a listen to the efforts of your forum mates in mixing RedStriper's band's track for the January Mix competition. I know a lot of you don't go near the Recording section much, but anyone bothering to listen and make a choice will be considered very very splendid indeed [url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/192016-mixing-competitionlearning-resource-january-poll-added/"]Poll can be found here[/url]

Right I'll take that as a yes then - poll now up! Good luck to you all

Ok one last sanity check then I have the following entries:- redstriper http://soundcloud.com/tacsiband/no-2nd-chance 51m0n https://soundcloud.com/51m0n-1/no-2nd-chance/s-6Tbvx OldG https://soundcloud.com/lucy-hastings/bc-mix-final RockfordStone https://soundcloud.com/robslusarmusic/no-2nd-chance Skol303 http://soundcloud.com/skol-mixes/second-chance-by-tacsi butlerk02 https://soundcloud.com/butlerk02/2nd-chance lurksalot https://soundcloud.com/lurksalot/no-second-chance-again charic https://soundcloud.com/thebrokensky/no-second-chance-bc-mix-comp Did I miss anyone???

OK, so listening to this its not nearly as hard to let flow over me than maybe Nigel's comments would have had me believe. Reminds me a little of the Flecktones older stuff in a couple of places (a bit, bear with me here ) Not too shabby and far more groove going on than I was expecting. Yes there is masses of soloing and what have you, but its only made me go cross eyed once or wice, maybe experimentations in dissonance a step to far for my gentle brain to cope with, but I'm sure I'll get over it Thanks again...

Ohhh yeah baby, grooving my fat butt off. Ta muchly!

I'm downloading Doddy's recommended ones. To be honest there is no way I'd go out and buy one of his albums right now - I've only heard tiny bits of his stuff and nothing really got me excited. However, if he's willing to give it away, then I will listen to it, and if I like it I may well get into it and buy something later or go and see his band. Without this possibility of hearing his stuff I just wouldn't. So from that perspective he is doign a good thing for his chances of repeat business as it were. Its not like he is going to get much in the way of radio play after all!

Hey it was [url="http://basschat.co.uk/user/969-butlerk02/"]butlerk02[/url]'s idea, I've just got a big mouth