neepheid

A bit of cable tidy up, only a couple of bulky connectors to go... also got some of those footswitch topper things - makes pressing those upper two way easier!

Paid rehearsal last night at the Balaclava in Fraserburgh. Too many trick or treat sweeties consumed perhaps - I know I feel pretty peculiar these days if I consume too many Tangfastics in one sitting... Anyway, despite there being no more than a dozen folk in the bar at any one time, we cracked on regardless - if only for the lovely older couple who stayed the whole night and seemed to enjoy it in their own, quiet way. Later on we had an enthusiastic gentleman who was enjoying the heavier stuff in the second set. Both he and a lassie at the bar clearly knew their Iron Maiden so we gave them two Maiden numbers - Wasted Years (which we usually play after Teenage Dirtbag - duh!) and because they were digging it we did Hallowed Be Thy Name too. A quiet one, but it doesn't take much audience interaction to still make these nights fun. The worst is when you play to a bunch of indifferent so-and-sos who, all things being equal, would rather you weren't there in the first place. Gear: Epiphone Les Paul Standard (revision 3) then Reverend Triad into the usual yellow and black boxes

I think they still have the fridge. If I remember, I will confirm tomorrow!

See you in 4 years - my oldest bass is my 1978 Yamaha BB1200...

Aye, I wouldn't record with it, but in a live mix, it's useable enough. Even so, I wouldn't dare go lower than -3. Up the way isn't so bad - I sometimes use mine as an octave up to fill out the sound because we only have 1 guitarist. Because it has independent dry/wet levels, I don't drown it with the upper octave, just a sprinkle.

"Can we drop this song a couple of semitones?" "2 secs" OK, go! (other pitch shifter pedals are available - Digitech Drop, EHX Pitchfork, EHX Intelligent Harmony Machine etc. but none of these are less than £50 new)

Being in Aberdeen, I think this is more a case of "look, I'm doing official stuff" more than anything else, but here goes: Tonight - Nine Lives at the Balaclava in Fraserburgh Tomorrow night - The Inevitable Teaspoons at Krakatoa in Aberdeen

We make an addition or two a month on average. Some then go in the spares box, and some disappear, if audiences have been indifferent.

I hear what you're saying, and I must confess I found it unusual at first. But it's no different to a '51/'54 P - they're also uncovered pickups so your thumb rests on the bobbin/flatwork of the pickup, it's just that the pickups on the Triad present a flat edge rather than the curve of the single coil P pickup. I ended up really liking it - I moved away from feeling like my thumb was resting on a tightrope and it grew into a quite positive feel for me. Just might take a bit of getting used to. I don't even notice it now.

A couple of additions necessitated a wee rearrange of things on my wee pedalboard. Please excuse the massive interconnects, they're the only ones I could find right now - will replace with wee pancake ones when I get them... Path is TU-2 > Hotone Harmony > Bass Sweeper > Bass Synth Wah > comp > Monomyth

Ask a mod/admin?

So, I did this before bed last night... The jury is very much out on this sticker business - looks OK in that photo but I went a bit wonky on 7 and really quite a lot wonky on 9 - not centred side to side and very noticeable (to me anyway) when the strings went back on. Also it's pretty obvious they're stickers - not so much the edges but you can see little depressions in the stickers of where the dots are underneath in the light. I'll wait until the black pickguard arrives before deciding whether or not to keep them (in which case I might order another set and redo 7 and 9) - or just lift them all and go back to the stock dots.

No, it's the CAP double humbucker from the ATK200/810/1200 etc. Yes, I'm aware of the triple coil and initially I thought I was dealing with the same beast - the three mouldings on the top of the casing are very misleading as you have pointed out! So it's just a simple quad coil bruiser. I like it - especially in series mode! If you've ever attacked some drywall with a club hammer, this pickup, centrally located, makes me think of that each time I hit a note. Because it's centrally mounted, I think it could probably do P bass-ish without trickery, but I honestly don't pay much attention to these things. If I'm ordered to provide a P bass sound, I'll play my G&L Tribute LB-100. I want all my basses to be themselves, and I treat them as such. I have a loosely defined notion in my head of what "good" sounds like, and that's as far down the rabbit hole as I'm willing to go.

Prep for some cosmetic treatment - fret polish time... Mmm, shiny frets r gud frets...

It's good to get it off your chest. I don't have much to add, apart from the usual "don't give up, mate" type platitudes - if you're still fit to play gigs (and you still want to) then I hope you find an outlet for that. The part I highlighted in your original post struck a chord with me. We had to change singers at the end of last year and what a gaggle of muppets, morons, and wastes of space and time did we encounter in our search! From no-shows at auditions, to people being all "I know all your songs" only to be found out at the audition, to folk with all the gear and no idea, to people who were overconfident to the point of either announcing that they were our new singer before we'd even said anything about it to them, to control freaks who could sing well enough but had a list of demands as long as your arm, trying to get folk to join the band before they'd even joined. We had it all - it was MONTHS of hell during which time we entertained thoughts of jacking it all in. TL:DR - I feel some of your pain, but stick in there, if we can find someone eventually in the wilds of NE Scotland, I'm sure you'll be fine in the end.

Full deets here: https://www.basschat.co.uk/topic/503167-squier-jaguar-h-a-good-start-but-what-if The wunkay never disappoints. What an awesome bass. Simple AND effective, just a tad more flexible than a P bass, and loads of great sounds to be had. Bridge pickups be damned!

Yesterday afternoon, a bit more progress. Got the electronics sorted - VT with a three way switch for parallel, single, series options. Don't have any pics of it fully wired before assembly, was too keen to get it in and tested. To my amazement, it worked first time! Then I felt cocky so I took it and played it at a 3 hour gig. This passed flawlessly. This has done my confidence the world of good - the last time I did a full rewire (to be fair it was a more complex wiring job - 2 pickups, VVTT with series parallel push/push pots on both tones and a pickup selector switch) I made a complete hash of it and was so dispirited that I handed it over to the local guitar shop to bail me out. This time I went super methodical, putting pen through wires on a diagram as I did them, checking continuity as I went after every few solder joints. The only thing that tripped me up was that orange drop capacitor and the less than capacious control cavity on this bass - I thought I was being neat and tidy putting it alongside the three way switch but where it sat it was sticking out just too much for the control plate to go down and line up with the screw holes. Baws! Thankfully there was some latitude to squish it harder up against the switch and then it just made it. Phew! Delighted with the results - that Ibanez CAP dual humbucker is a beast - especially in series mode. What a thump it delivers, but not muddy, clear and punchy, loads of authority. I love it! Some cosmetics to do, but then I'm going to call this one done.

Eerily prescient - see below! A weekend of gigs to report on. Friday night with Nine Lives at The Leathan in Portlethen, near Aberdeen. It's an odd place to play - hard floor, low ceiling, band area walled in on both sides half way up. Caused a plethora of sound issues to be worked around, we were a few mins late starting. From gremlins with the singer's wireless mic (a lot of hiss for some reason - went wired in the end), to having to drop the bass down a lot because too much boom. But when we did get going, we had a good time, sound got better in the second half, probably because it got a bit busier. It was a good night - a small crowd but lots of enthusiastic dancing makes it worth double. Gear was Sire Z7 then G&L wunkay into the usual Markbass tone cubes. Saturday afternoon I did some wiring work on my Squier Jag H, was feeling cocky so I took it to the gig at night (with a backup, of course). Saturday night was at Gray's Inn in Mastrick, Aberdeen, again with Nine Lives. What a difference a room makes - wide open space, carpeted floor, high ceiling. Setup was a breeze and the drummer (who has taken up the challenge of being main sound guy, as well as being a sound guy!) nailed the levels almost right away. A less busy time, but we still had a few folk up dancing. I went walkabout through to the other bit of the bar where people were being shy and took 25% of the show to them. You can run, but you can't hide when the bass player's wireless! The Squier Jag H performed flawlessly, what a glorious sound in series mode! I was having so much fun I played it for the whole night (sorry you left the house for nothing, Triad). Modified Squier Jag H all night into the yellow and black modular bringer of boom.

Ah ken fit's fit.

You'll have to catch me first, lawman!

I use a set of Lekato WS-70 - UHF, so neither 2.4GHz or 5.8GHz. I've had great results with these - gone on walkabouts round the entire pub before. Lasts a 3 hour gig on a full charge no problem (I think the full life is 7 hours per charge, but I wouldn't like to risk playing 2 gigs back to back without charging in between). Seems to handle active basses OK (I've used them with my Sire Z7 in active mode without issue). Also can be had for anything between £30 and £60 depending on where you look. I bought these for a first stab at going wireless and honestly I don't think I need to "upgrade" as these have been doing the business for me for the last 6 months or so. If anything went wrong with them, at these prices I'd probably just buy another pair.