stewblack

You my friend have thrown down the gauntlet... to be continued

One of the singers in the band turns out to be a handy bassist too, which is awesome as the dep is therefore 'in house' as it were. I leant her an amp and cab and she did the business for me when I was double booked. She's decided to invest in some bass gear and I have a very common enquiry with a twist. She is slight of build and lives up four flights of stairs, big long flights of stairs, I know I carried the gear for her. So what do we think is the best weight-to-power ratio cab and head? She said she wanted a combo ideally but I assumed a barefaced 1 X 12 would be the way to go and afaik BF don't do combos. The twist? Well she also plays acoustic g****r and "Can I just play through the same amp?". I can see no reason why not, maybe buy a GEQ to stick between the acoustic and the head, or perhaps a preamp and just use the power amp stage of the head. A bit out of my depth on this part but she'll only be playing rhythm guitar in a 7 piece band so I can't see it being a huge issue. In a nutshell (assume a healthy budget) very light and small cab, pocket head but good enough for reasonably big pub gigs. Or uber light combo. Go for it Bass Hive Mind.

Oh you're in the right place!

That is just amazing. The whole thing. I think CWs reaction says it all. And that guy can play, if JD ever got sick they have quite a capable dep right there.

Timely thread. I'd just decided to listen to some Rush. Two reasons; my mate (and first drummer) has always been a huge fan and I didn't get it but promised that I would try one day (see also Yes), and the way some of you lot go on about the bass player, well I thought I ought to check them out. As I can't name one song never mind album I shall see what the BC consensus is. So far, as a fan of Edward Hopper the cover of the Windows one has caught my eye.

in AA we have a saying - if you spend long enough in a library you'll end up reading a book.

+1 Currently getting rid of pj basses to make room and raise funds for 'proper' p-basses. Don't have to be Fender, Squier is fine too. My favourite is my Bruce Thomas Profile. It's literally perfect.

Yeah! This is what I like to see. Overkill!

Yes - this is exactly it. I shifted a lot of very good heavy old gear and went Markbass and Barefaced. And somehow I find a behemoth of a Trace Elliot rig looming over two all valve heads one of which I seriously contemplated buying an engine hoist to move. You see, this is not about the rational. Oh no.

Far too sensible, logical, and therefore not GAS related. Sorry.

My latest GAS has been for the EHX Tri Parallel Mixer. Convinced myself I can't possibly perform without it. Bear in mind until 6 months ago I used no pedals at all. It's been an interesting experience. The GAS attack began as my bank account hit actual zero. So I have sat, as it were, outside of myself, observing the flow and ebb of GAS. First few days were spent just pouring fuel onto the fire, watching videos, sketching out ideas for pedal configurations, reading about it. Then as the reality dawned that I need to borrow petrol money to get to gigs, the flames slowly died down. By yesterday morning a moment of clarity! I did not need this pedal, at all. How ridiculous to imagine that I did! Then I look through the Show Us Your Pedalboard thread on Basschat and boom 🤯 there is woodyratm 's utterly beautiful IKEA pedal board with the EHX TPM sitting proudly in the upper circle. And, well, you can guess the rest...

Not quite 'snap' but we are coming at this from a similar angle.

I thought looking at pedals was what I did when the gas ran out. I realise now as I gaze down at my three pedal boards that was wishful thinking. It's all the same thing. Whether it's instruments this month and cabs the next, it's always stuff I don't really need. But convince myself I can't possibly manage without.

Whenever I try to buy from G4M the product seems to be in Sweden and delivery adds about £30 to the price. Am I doing something wrong?

The main reason I've not gone back to a combo is back up. My last combo I ended up separating the amp from the cab so if it went down I could plug in a spare head. But if you're DI into the desk and coming through the foldback then even if your amp goes phut you can finish the gig. The whole in ears / amp debate doesn't interest me at all. A band I dep for are all in ears and wireless as they like a clean tidy stage - if I got the gig full time with them I'd happily invest in some. But I also love a big pile of backline. It makes me happy. Not either/ or for me.

Minor breakthrough today (reading rather than writing so a tad off topic) I remembered how when I used to do downhill mountain biking the mantra was always look through the trail not down your forks. The idea being you should process what's coming up and not what's happening right now. Once your front wheel is on the tree root it's too late you should have gotten into position earlier. I applied the same thinking to a line I'm reading and it flowed, it really did. Weirdest sensation looking at and analysing a series of notes while my hands are playing the bar before. Really strange and strangely exhilarating. I want more! The other thought, which has crossed the old bean before, was am I really reading or is this simply muscle memory having played the thing so many times? Simple test, close the book and try to play along. I actually knew very little. Which is either great - my reading skills are developing, or crap - my memory is collapsing like a flan in a cupboard. I'll take the former.

Yes please. Didn't realise that was an option

I only want to write out bass lines as I work them out and have them good enough to quickly relearn a song if I've not needed it for a while. Ultimately it would be great to be able to share them with others but I need the software just to play back what I've written so I can hear if it's correct. I struggle to translate what I hear to the correct note length / rest length unless it's very straight forward of course. That's all I would use it for. Correcting those timing errors.

I have a markbass amp in the loft as I face precisely the same conundrum.

Thank you.