ardi100

Hi all, I did the unthinkable (for me) yesterday and broke the A string on my school's double bass! I've never done that before. The bass is an old clanger and the strings are probably the originals. The music department has no money to buy a new set (or single string) so I'll buy it for them. The question is, is an £8 ebay special worth messing around with or not? I don't have enough to buy a good set, so the string will be unmatched anyway. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

I wouldn't buy a bass blind but I've bought amps. The Warwick ProFet 3.2 worked well for me and I was happy with my Roland DB500. I did extensive research which boils down to believing people you trust and disregarding the loonies and loosers. I do belive that testing in a shop has limited value, you'll never really know how it sounds with a band. Or in a particular room.

I left my DB in the car during the day for a rehearsal after work. Twas Australia in summer. Took my bass out of the case and couldn't work out why the strings were flopping around the fingerboard! The bass bar had collapsed in the heat. It was replaced (at great cost) and sounded a million times better afterwards. Expensive lessons learned. Hector, I imagine it's a relatively easy fix. Don't quote me, though!

I think it depends where you look. Ebay and the like are busy and sellers know what they can get. I bought mine from my school (which had 3 and no students, so I didn't deprive any learners!) which was happy to get some money for something that was just taking up room. I paid £150 and then spent £350 + pickup getting it sorted by a luthier but it's been well worth it. It was certainly playable when I bought it, just not 'lovely'. I say try and be creative when looking. Junk sales, clearouts etc could all be fruitfull. Good luck. PS Did I see you posting on an android forum recently? Got a Hero?

[quote name='Jean-Luc Pickguard' post='709343' date='Jan 11 2010, 08:41 PM']I used to use one with my dean pace EUB. I threw it in with the pace when I sold it, but missed it so much I bought another one. I mostly use it to get a much classier acoustic guitar sound out of my stratacoustic than I would otherwise. I will probably be using it to DI my ABG into the PA at a jam night tomorrow - not sure how that'll go. I'd imagine that the sweepable mid wouldn't be much use for taming feedback, but its so cheap it has to worth a punt - if it doesn't help with the feedback I'm sure you'll get your money's worth of eq. The [url="http://www.dv247.com/studio-equipment/behringer-shark-dsp110-multi-function-signal-processor--13084"]behringer shark[/url] might be worth a look for a dedicated auto feedback buster.[/quote] Thanks, I was thinking if the feedback came from mids I could isolate the frequencey and shut it down. I might have to have a play with one and see.

Hi all, Just wondering if anyone uses the above as a preamp? I'm looking for something to tame feedback and the sweepable mids looked encouraging. Any ideas?

I've used a few and been really impressed. More recently used a 700RB with my double bass and was very happy with the sound. It has filters or contour or something which I could set to keep all the nasty low frequencey feedback at bay. If I ever need a big rig again I'll definitely look at them.

Hi, I was always skeptical about 100w for gigging but a band that supported us used one and it sounded pretty good. The gig was the Proud Gallery in Camden so it's a decent sized room. He had it DI'd (not sure if there's one on the amp) but his sound was nice. What's your budget? If you can stretch it, head and cab will be more versatile in the future.

My first pub gig (17) let loads of underagers in so we packed the place. The rider was limitless so I was smashed. Result? Passed out between sets but managed to do the gig. Repeat for about 3 gigs until I got my license. First gig driving and I couldn't believe how much better I played sober!! Stayed ( mostly) that way since! As for stoned, I once started messing around while wasted and thought it sounded AMAZING. My mate recorded it on his 8 track because he thought it sounded AMAZING. Had a listen the next day. Guess what? It really didn't sound amazing at all. Rubbish, actually!

Sorted, Have a bow as recommended by bythesea. Thanks Dougal for the offer, too. Adrian

[quote name='chrkelly' post='547383' date='Jul 22 2009, 10:35 AM']hi Funky, I'm based in Catford if that's any use. My tour finishes this weekend so should be free after that. Cheers, Chris[/quote] I'll vouch for Chris. Very patient and helpful. Also not a taskmaster (casual, if you know what I mean?).

Nice!

[quote name='Major-Minor' post='543064' date='Jul 17 2009, 11:35 AM']Hi Adrian There are some amazing deals on ebay for bows. I bought 2 Chinese bows last year for £40 each including shipping. And they are perfectly usable. If then you decide to buy a better quality bow, you would then have a spare ! And IMO all DB players should learn to use a bow even if you rarely perform with it. They are great for checking intonation. The Major[/quote] Thanks Major, Do you know what brand they were? I'll check them out. Adrian

Hi, As I'll have 7 weeks off for summer, I want to have a go at bowing. I'd really like to try it out before committing to buying one so I'm wondering if anyone has a spare one floating around that they could lend. I'm expecting it would be a cheap one (maybe a first one that you've since upgraded) and not a work of art. If I'm out of order, please let me know. I'm in SE London but can travel to get it. Thanks. Adrian

Whilst recording I had the engineer comment that my £170 Warwick Profet 3.2 was 'top end valve kit'!! I smiled deeply at that.

I've got an Underwood I could be persuaded to let go!

[quote name='alexclaber' post='521734' date='Jun 23 2009, 02:34 PM']You do realise you've used the wrong spelling of butt in the thread title don't you? I wouldn't have said anything but as you're a secondary school ENGLISH teacher... Alex[/quote] I stand corrected!!

[quote name='BigBeatNut' post='517872' date='Jun 18 2009, 09:48 PM']I've also used a 700RB in combo form (1x15) and was very happy with it. For BG though, not DB or EUB. For a 1x15 very clear bottom end. Only reason I don't have it any more is that I have a smaller AND more powerful MarkBass CMD120P (?) ... the 1x12 combo anyway. Andy[/quote] I tried a LM250 through a MB 4x10 in a different room in the same studio. Wasn't that happy with the results. I ended up switching back to me own combo. I didn't have a good play with the filters, though.

As for right hand, I thought just using the same right hand fingering from EB would do. Not so. You need to get as much 'meat' of your finger as you can on to the strings to get a nice tone. I've now got a lovely callous on the side of my first finger, near the second knuckle. I never expected that!

That's amazing!!

Thanks for the suggestions, guys. I will talk to the teacher. He might not have known about the things I've noticed (left hand thumb position and right hand middle finger use) and I'll just flag it up. I don't want to teach bass, I'm flat out trying to teach English as it is! I do play in the Jazz band with them and I'll continue to support bass students as and when. Cheers again.

[quote name='Mr Fudge' post='518110' date='Jun 19 2009, 09:30 AM']The problem is you will also leave with an industrial amount of tea lights, a toast rack and some of those plastic wedge things that maintain the shape of your shoes when you are not wearing them.[/quote] And a hatred of humanity.

Sledgehamer, Peter Gabriel. Should be a piece of piss but I had real trouble.

Hi, I'm a secondary school teacher and have joined the school's jazz band, initially to get some practice reading and playing standards but more importantly to mentor the kids playing the bass. They get lessons at school of the guitar teacher(!). I didn't really question this at first but the longer I've played with them the more I'm noticing how bad their technique is. I'm no technocrat and mine leaves a bit to be desired (especially on the double bass that I'm playing in the Jazz band), but I'm noticing really basic mistakes that could really hold them back if they keep at it. I've thought about talking to the head of music about this but I'm reluctant to for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I'm not a trained music or bass teacher and don't feel 'qualified' to criticise someone's professionalism. Secondly, it's the teacher's livelihood at stake and I don't want to be responsible for any loss of his earnings. I just learned yesterday that a kid is learning the double bass (hurrauh) off the violin teacher (huh??)! Even the head of music thought that was 'wierd'. What should I do? I fell like I should 'do' something but I'm not sure what. Any thoughts or suggerstions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Hi, I rehearsed in a studio last night with a GK 400RB through a Hartke VX 4x10. I always take my amp (Roland DB500 combo) so I know how to adjust my sound but I thought I'd just plug in for a quick comparison. Ooohh, it sounded so nice. Deep, thick bass with as much mids and tops as I wanted. The strangest thing was feedback. Or lack of it. I'm really fighting it with my amp but with the GK it just disappeared. It got really loud too. It was so good I unplugged immediately, sat my amp on top of it and promised never to think about another amp again!