Ed_S

As much as the big boards on here are great fun to look at, I don't really need 'proper' effects and the only pedal I want to be operating mid-gig is a tuner. My main board (top one) has been doing very well for the last couple of years, so I just put the bottom one together this morning out of some languishing bits. It's intended to be a backup/spare/alternative, and is just another variation on the theme I know works for me, but has a bit more drive available. I'll have to wait a couple of weeks until I can get it all dialled-in at a rehearsal, but it should be very similar to the main one, and I think I can safely get rid of the few other remaining pedals that are still lying around now.

I've always half-joked that the best way to get me to sell a bass is to put flats on it; I'll enjoy it for a couple of days but then the novelty will wear off and I'll stop playing it for long enough to justify pushing it out of the door. I do still try some every now and then, and I think the Ernie Ball 2816 cobalt 'slinky' and 2810 stainless 'group' 5 string sets have been the most successful so far. I've currently got the steels on a cheap but pimped P-bass (that'll be safe as it's just not worth selling!) and they're doing better than average - especially as the combination of instrument and strings is quite loud and pleasingly bassy when noodling unplugged - but I couldn't see myself playing a heavy rock gig on them... that's still definitely rounds territory for me.

I can't give the perfect answer as I haven't owned the Barefaced Four10, but I've got a Two10 and two One10s, and used to have both a Markbass 104HR and an Ashdown ABM410T. The ABM410 was a solid cab and sounded fine but was heavier than I wanted to keep carting round so it got relegated to the rehearsal room. The 104HR was much lighter and sounded marginally better, but I even got fed up of the bulk of that eventually so it replaced the ABM in the rehearsal room. The pair of One10s now lives in a flightcase in the gear store at the rehearsal room and adequately covers everything that the 4x10 cabs did as long as you give them enough juice. If I wanted a cab to sit in a rehearsal space that I'd never need to move, I'd buy an ABM and keep my money for other things... like maybe a Two10 to keep at home and take to gigs. If I wanted one cab for everything that just happened to spend most of its time at the rehearsal room, I'd buy a Two10 as it's more than enough for rehearsals, plenty for most gigs and not a pain to shift. If I absolutely had to choose one of the two cabs you're considering, I'd buy the Markbass as it's cheaper, still a great cab, and just as heavy and bulky as the Barefaced.

One of our guitarists who most would see as the de facto band leader got so annoyed with the other guitarist constantly having to change strings on stage, he decreed that "if you don't bring a backup, you don't play". So yeah, they both bring two. We have since played a gig where he managed to break strings on both, but only once.

I'm still fine with my gen 2 Barefaced Super Twelve and Midget cabs, and haven't been tempted to replace them with any of their newer 12" designs. I think just about everything else that I've owned for any length of time has been considered for its recyclable monetary value at some point along the way, but honourable mentions go to the TU-2 tuner that could only be replaced by a TU-3, the SansAmp BDDI v1 preamp that could only be replaced by a BDDI v2 and the Line 6 G30 wireless that I wouldn't mind replacing with something that works at 5GHz but can't find anything comparable yet.

Last night was my second dep with a really good local band that has a guitarist in common with my main band - both power/operatic metal originals, ours a bit heavier with two guitars - theirs a bit lighter with guitar and keyboard. The first dep was an acoustic-ish birthday party set as they were missing drummer and bassist, so got me in to play a 50/50 mix of covers and their lighter originals. This one was another private party, but a full electric gig with only their bassist absent. It all looked like it might not happen as the planned venue had an unforeseeable problem so had to pull out at the last minute, but another nearby venue stepped in to host and it all went ahead just a short walk down the road. Then one of the bands pulled out of the gig as they were travelling in and didn't fancy the idea of getting stuck on the way back due to the weather - again, perfectly reasonable. So we ended up all taking longer sets, which is fine if you know the full back catalogue of the band due to being... well.. in the band, but I'd only learned one spare original so we ended up adding a cover that they recorded and released their version of during lockdown, and which I'd done acoustically at the previous gig so had no problem rocking back up. 45 minutes passed very quickly and I don't actually think I messed anything up. There were a couple of bits where somebody else came in early, and a missed cue for a guitar solo that resulted in another loop through the chords before commencing, both of which I spotted and adjusted accordingly. I wouldn't normally congratulate myself for such basic musicianship but they're original songs that move at a fair pace, so I was quite pleased not to get tripped up. I did forget to put in my earplugs for the first song, which was interesting as it showed me just how much top end detail the Doc's ProPlugs take away, and how I might like to have some of it back to a safe level. I shall have to try some different ones and see if there's something a bit better for me out there. The other bands on the bill were great and I was able to have a few drinks and enjoy them as we were opening the night and I was getting a lift. Got home just in time to see the snow start settling, so I reckon the band that decided it was a bad idea to travel 100 miles each way made the right call. Signal chain for the evening... Ibanez SR1105B -> [G30 wireless -> TU3 tuner -> Thumpinator -> MXR M87 compressor -> SansAmp BDDI v2] -> GK MB500 -> Blackstar house cab - might have been a Unity Elite 115C Tuner operated using a pair of Skechers Industrial Workshire boots - to say they're safety boots they make even moderately damp surfaces feel like well greased glass, but they're black and comfy.

After a fair bit of trial and error I've worked out that there are some build specs for scale length, board radius, nut width, string spacing and overall weight that give a really strong prediction as to what I'll find comfortable. Of course it's a given that some people will favour different numbers, some people probably just won't notice or care, and sometimes you'll pick up a bass that 'should' suit and it just doesn't - or vice versa. That said, I've found it a reliable enough indication that my advice would be to visit a shop where you can try a few different instruments without worrying too much about what they look like or cost, and just see if something stands out as being instantly comfortable. If it does, then look up the numbers and see what's similarly constructed and in-budget. My own recommendation would be to see if you could hunt down a deal on an Ibanez SR605e as it's what I personally call comfy, and I think the 'big break' pickups sound great.. even if the name has me humming the theme to the 90s TV show.

Anything other than 'normal' intervals between all the strings is just an out of tune bass to me, so I'd have no option but to drop the lot half a step and re-work the lines. Well, I guess technically I wouldn't have been able to play the out of tune 4 string to learn the existing lines in the first place, but you get what I mean. 🙂 I've had 5ers in nonstandard-standard tuning half and full steps both down and up over the years to suit different singers, so yeah, I'd do that.

Now you're talking! I had one of those, and I still miss just how very pink it was.

No probs at all! If it's any further use to you (or anyone else) I just found the spoils bag that's got all the removed stuff in it - tuners, string tree, bridge, neck plate, knobs, strap buttons, all related screws and bushings, as well as the wiring loom and pickup. Everything that's not the wood or the pickguard comes to 950g, so you can maybe get a feel for how much weight you might be able to shave off if you were fitting your own bits and pieces. Only other thing of note; I found the pickup to be... the thing that most reflects the price point, let's say, and I couldn't find anything commercially available that was the same size to avoid replacing the guard as well.

I ended up with two being sent to me in error, and there was a full half kilo difference between them - one was 3.8kg, the other 4.3kg. Having removed all the factory hardware and replaced it with bits I prefer, the lighter one which I kept now weighs 3.6kg (or pretty much 8lb exactly) which I find very comfortable indeed.

I must be, too. I've heard plenty of other bassists say that even before they played, they listened out for the basslines in songs they heard during their formative years... I never did (and still don't) so it makes it hard to cite influences. If I twist the task slightly to be "pick 5-ish albums that made you want to play music in general, then look up who the bassist was", I get to... Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow - Craig Gruber Bat Out of Hell - Kasim Sulton (also Dead Ringer - Steve Buslowe) Brothers in Arms / Making Movies - John Illsley 12 Gold Bars - Alan Lancaster Out of the Blue - Kelly Groucutt

The only recent 'problem' I've had with Bax was them sending me too much stuff - I got two of the same bass instead of just the one I paid for, which wasn't really a 'problem' as one was much lighter than the other and I got the choice. I rang them and asked for a label to post one back, and the RMA slip you print off and put in the box explained that it was "sent in error - do not refund". So of course then the refund arrived anyway, meaning I'd essentially no longer paid for the one I kept. I rang them again and asked for a payment link to return their money, and now we're all square. Both of the calls I made were answered quickly and the people I spoke to were friendly, so I'd still use and recommend them as there are some UK based shops where every time I've had occasion to contact them they've been abrasive at best. Regarding delivery, most things I've had from Bax have arrived on time or at most one day later than estimated. Those times have usually corresponded with bad weather, Black Friday, the run-up to Christmas etc.

Glad it's not just me with that. Weight of me, stones and pounds, but weight of basses very definitely kilograms. Then scale and board radius are in inches, but action and pickup height are in millimetres. And even though the rest of the neck measurements are in inches, the nut width is in millimetres. I measure all my basses in the same daft mixture of metric and imperial units irrespective of their value. (read: no idea 🙂)

Indeed! I don't know how I'd go on with being a drummer... aside from the minor strength, fitness and limb co-ordination issues, the idea of buying nice, shiny, expensive things intending to hit them repeatedly with a stick just doesn't sit right with me at all. GAS certainly has to be factored in. I keep having thoughts about a trip to Bass Direct so I can try an Alusonic, as they seem to be light and built to comfy neck measurements. I have to keep reminding myself that if I liked one so much that I left with it, that'd be unhelpful as it's well into 'expensive toy' territory... so it's better that I just don't bother.

The problem, for me, comes when I start to add it all together. My gear is decent but nothing rare or out of the ordinary, and still if I add up amps and cabs, pedals and power supplies, cables and straps, boards, cases and bags used for a standard gig, I'm at around £3500 before I even choose which two basses I want to take. Being primarily on the metal originals scene, the people I meet are some of the nicest and least likely to ever wilfully damage or steal anything, but my gigs are usually the £0 variety. Don't get me wrong, though, I fully support anyone enjoying using their rare and/or expensive basses and equipment exactly where, when and how they please.

Completely forgot I wrote all that back in '21, but to carry on the list where I left off with some basses that went soon after... Fender MIJ Classic Series 70s P (white) - Great bass; light and comfortable, and sounded just like a P should. Sold due to moving back to 5s - hope its new owner is enjoying it! Squier VM P (white) - Pretty decent for what it cost. Set up as a BEAD bass, but moving back to 5s meant it wasn't needed any more. Shuker double-P (white) - Too heavy, too many niggles, not what I hoped it would be, and a staggering loss on resale. An important experience, never to repeat. Fender-ish bitsa P (white) - MIM body, MightyMite neck, Wilkinson hardware and a quarter-pounder. Sturdy and sounded great - hope it found an appreciative home. Ibanez TMB30 Talman (black) - Bought by my mum as she used to play guitar and fancied a bass! Sadly arthritis meant it didn't work for her, so I used it for a while. Fun thing. Ibanez GSR180 (black) - A cheap gigging backup. Never needed to use it, but elected to do so a few times at rehearsals and it always sounded much better than its money. Ibanez GSR200b (walnut) - Bought on a whim because it was incredibly light and had great fretwork. Genuinely nice bass, and one I considered keeping but eventually moved on. Spector Rebop 5 dlx (tr. red) (tr. black) - Had a pair of these and liked the looks and sound, but they weren't the most comfortable basses and the Spector bridge is not my idea of fun. Maruszczyk Jake L4p+ (white) - Very light, very nicely made, sounded and felt great... maybe the perfect P-bass, but just not enough strings when it came to the crunch. Sandberg Cali 2 TT SL (black) - Very light, but very easy to damage. Fortunately I'd not added too many dings when the return to 5s meant it was time to move it on. Sandberg Cali 2 TM SL (red burst) - Similarly light and frangible. Never sounded as good as the TT, but wasn't around for long enough to work out which one of us was to blame. Ibanez SR506e (mahogany) - A fun return to owning a 6 for a while. Eventually it became apparent that I don't need a 6 so there wasn't much point it taking up space. Fender American Pro 1 Jazz 5 (black) - I made good on my earlier threat to get the MIA Jazz 5. It was alright, but the wrong nut width and board radius to be comfortable. Nice pickups. Ibanez SR305 (weathered black) - Intended to be the new gigging backup, but just never sounded that good and I didn't want to spend the money on trying to make it. Ibanez SR1305sb ('magic wave') - The bass that the 305 was meant to back up. Sounded great, but I learned that I don't like the feel of very open-grain wood on the back of a neck. Sandberg Cali 2 Central 5 (anthracite) - Having failed to learn my lesson about 35" scale basses, this was the one to hammer it home that I don't really find them that comfortable to play.

I'm one of those who doesn't like taking basses that cost too much out to gig with. I realise that 'they're tools to do a job' etc. but I get too preoccupied with their safety to enjoy the outing, so I play mid-value (£500-£1k) instruments out and have a couple of slightly more expensive toys to play at home, just for my enjoyment. I guess that makes my answer "both". Cheaper copies can also be subjectively better if they're built to more personally comfortable specs than the originals. The nut is too wide and the board radius too small for my liking on a 'proper' Fender 5 string P-bass, but much cheaper copies are out there with measurements that I find just right, so a couple of those (modded and fettled as required) are what I have.

I used to kick myself for more obvious (to me) mistakes, but then I saw a live festival set from a band I like, where the bassist butchered the key change at the end of the encore song. It was obvious and they literally only got it back on the held last note. As uncomfortable as I found it to listen to, and as much as I felt a bit bad for the guy, I'm glad they didn't just cut the encore off that video because it hammered home to me that not only can you still royally stuff up a song you've played at every gig for the last 12 years, it can be the fist-in-the-air moment, it can be recorded in HD and viewed over 650,000 times, and even then nobody will give a damn enough to say anything about it in the comments. I've found it quite freeing to know that I'll try to go easy on myself for any mistakes I make going forward. Last gig I played was a really solid one for me personally, but the band as a whole had a couple of blips. One where the keys were still on transpose, which made no difference to me as I play by ear, but all I could do was give the guitarist the 'watch out' look and play index-finger-only for a couple of bars to try and show him where we'd ended up before he had to come in ...and then hope the singers were still ok 4 semitones up. Went fine, but would have been an instant wreck (seemingly of my making) had I stuck doggedly to playing it where we'd rehearsed it. The other was an intro that for some reason one singer just couldn't pitch so she was perfectly out of tune for the first verse. Every fibre of me wanted to follow her and make it sound right, but the keys were sticking doggedly to playing it where we'd rehearsed it, so that one just had to be a bit clenchy until the other singer came in. Some you can cover.. some you can't.

A minor resurrection to pass comment on a rehearsal a couple of evenings ago that I'm still smiling about. An operatic metal band I recently helped out with a slightly out-of-character acoustic covers set asked whether I fancied doing a proper originals gig with them early in the new year while their bassist is still on holiday. They're genuinely nice people and a great band, so of course I said yes and duly received the 5 song / half hour set list - one of them is a 12 minute epic! I checked that I had some latitude to play them 'as myself' rather than trying to mimic their recorded material, which was fine with them, so I spent a few hours committing the songs to memory and then half my lunch hour for the next week just playing through the full set to really make sure I'd got them. Monday night was the first rehearsal and it went really pleasingly smoothly. Turned up to find that the borrowable cab in their space was a perfectly nice old Hartke VX215, plugged in my GK instead of the usual Markbass gear as I thought it'd be more fitting with their sound, and hit a near-perfect run-through of the set. They commented that it was a shame they'd not asked me to learn another particular song, but it just so happened that I'd seen they often used that one as a closer/encore so decided I'd learn it just in case (you know.. turn up to the gig and find out a band couldn't make it so everyone just gets a slightly longer set to cover) so I was able to play it there and then, which went down well. They all seemed really happy with how it had gone, the keyboardist complimented my tone for sitting perfectly in the band, and the drummer who I was meeting for the first time said he'd really enjoyed playing alongside me. All in all, one of those sessions you can walk away from feeling like you've done your job and the bit of extra effort in preparation really paid off. I'm not somebody who does dep gigs normally, but I actually wouldn't mind being their go-to. Anyway, even if it's just a one-off I'm looking forward to another quick run-through closer to the gig, and then showtime. For the gear-enthusiasts, simple but effective clean rig with a bit of edge... Ibanez SR1105B -> [G30 wireless -> TU3 tuner -> Thumpinator -> MXR M87 compressor -> SansAmp BDDI v2] -> GK MB500 -> Hartke VX215

I wouldn't have called myself a composer, but I guess I fit 'improviser' to a certain extent in that even though I play written songs (originals and covers) rather than improvised jams, I never have a completely set idea of what I'm going to play when I get on stage. I don't use manuscript, tab or charts, I don't consciously employ any theory beyond 'what my ears know', and I don't even know what any of the notes I'm playing are unless my tuner tells me, so as long as the bass is tuned 'correctly' (conventional intervals between the strings - don't care what the actual notes are) I can use it to play what I hear in my head. The oversimplified way I've put it before is that I use the bass to be able to play any song I've committed to memory in a standard manner, where some appear to commit a selection of songs to memory in a specific manner so as to be able to play the bass. I wouldn't say I practise.. but I play every day. And the point? I'll use what I have available, so if you give me a 4 then I'll still be able to play something to anything I know - it just might not be what I would have preferred. If that 4 is tuned BEAD then that's fine - it'll just be a different something and again might not be what I would have preferred. If you give me a 5 then I have the amount of room to manoeuvre that I like, and it gives me scope to play exactly what I want to in the moment. 5 has always been 'home' for me, but I limited myself to 4 for some specific reasons (covered in my earlier post) until it made sense to return. When I have a 6, I generally have to force myself to use the highest string; it rarely figures naturally in what I want to hear, so that's the musical basis on which I classify it as broadly unnecessary for me. What I have no concept of is choosing a bass with a certain number of strings to play a set of songs, knowing exactly what the correct lines are and that I won't need any note below an E to play them. I'll play what I play, and if I have a 5 then it'll be what I wanted to play. If I have a 4 in either direction it might be partly what I had to play ...and if I have a 6 it'll be what I had to stretch a bit further over to play. On balance, I don't think it makes sense to limit yourself to a lower number of strings than you personally find optimal if you're a 'make it up as you go along' type like me, unless/until you're doing it for non-musical reasons. Of course this all works for me and might not work for anybody else, and that's fine.

Wouldn't say it's cheating at all - I thought the Digi Drop was great for up to 3 semitones down when I was gigging 4s. Admittedly anything lower and it started to sound just a bit chorussy, but in a live mix it was close enough for many genres and, indeed, good for metal.

I've mentioned before on here that I spent my first 10 years predominantly playing 5s, then switched back to 4s for 10 years, and now I'm a few years back into exclusively playing 5s. When I switched back to 4s, my reasons were... - I had back problems and lightweight 5s within my budget were happy accidents. To be honest so were lightweight 4s, but there were many more 4s out there to dig through and find a light one. - Sound techs at the kinds of gigs we played seemed to be at home with a 4 string P-bass. Playing a 5 string Warlock would reliably get your FoH sound butchered; the low notes weren't worth the aggro. - I could work around the missing low notes easily enough anyway, and started using a BEAD tuned bass or a Digitech Drop pedal to get round the very few songs that really sounded wrong without them. - The feel of playing a 4 was more 'energetic'. People rightly point out the economy of motion you can enjoy with 5s, but I actually enjoy playing up and down the neck. Yeah, you can still do it on a 5, and I do, but it's a decision rather than a necessity and the extra width of the neck means it feels different. - I like to have fresh strings, and sets of 4 are generally cheaper! I've tried 6s a couple of times, and whilst I like them - mostly for the novelty - I don't really need the extra width, weight, expense etc. enough to justify playing them all the time. Beyond the novelty, the one thing I do like is that there's another string between what I'll lazily call the G and the edge of the fretboard. I've just never liked the feel of playing on the thinnest string at the edge of the board, so to have another one that I really don't need, just as a spacer, was kinda nice. Not nice enough, though.

Just measured a few of mine, all of which get set up by look and feel rather than measurements. It seems that what I consider normal is 3.5mm at the 12th for all strings, and what I think of as low is 2.5mm. The 'measurements' are oddly precise, too.

I think I have a tendency to only consider low-to-mid priced basses that impress me by not needing any work at all to be 'magic', as more expensive ones should be magic to justify their price tag. To that end, mine would have to be an Ibanez SR655 from 2018 which is just great despite not being a premium model and only having 'designed by' pickups etc. I changed the tuners as a prefer the shape of the keys on GB707s - there was nothing wrong with the stock ones, I just had a set of nicer-looking ones spare.