Wolverinebass

In my own collection I funnily enough used the metaphor of cars to describe the differences to my brother who is a massive petrolhead. My first bass was a Fenix Young Chang. Passive with one humbucker. I thought it was a Vectra. A to B. No frils. The Alembic is definitely a Porsche. The 8 string Explorer is probably an amoured personnel carrier or half track. The Hamer Chapparal is most definitely a Panzer tank. However, last (but by no means least) the Status Buzzard is quite simply - The Batmobile.

Maybe they'll sell Hamer. Then at least you'd be able to buy a 12 string bass in this country as oppose to being patronisingly told by Fender UK "you can't." As far as I'm concerned, as Noelk27 says the massive hikes in prices and the fact that they really haven't changed their models in almost 60 years is reasonable grounds for if not laughing, certainly saying that we told you so.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1330617992' post='1560496'] Are you sure that you are not building a swimming pool? [/quote] Ha!! I was wondering myself. It was just mental. I couldn't believe how wet it was when I set it up. Even after all the frost and stuff. All 4 of the walls were just soaked as was the concrete base. I thought it'd never dry out at one point and I'd have to leave it until April. Thankfully, it's all done now. I would imagine that it'd be usable in about 3 weeks.

Well, finally after seemingly months of head/brick wall interfaces, work has resumed. There was much, much more water in the room than I'd thought due to that week of rain before the roof went on. I had to run a dehumidifier for a whole week and it took out more than 200 litres of water. It was just mental. Basically due to the cold snap I held off getting it until the weather warmed a bit. However, at present, the guys are putting in the studwork. Hopefully that'll be done in the next few days then all the cables can get run for the electrics at the beginning of next week before the insulation and plasterboard gets booted in. Will post some photos soon.

Ha!! I got it when it came out for £30!! Result!! The only downside is it's pre-Status so it only goes up to the modulus buzzard era. It is interesting that some of the basses he owned were just stupidly good, yet he never played them live. One of the lines I found incredibly funny was him describing a Wal of some description "I could never figure out the controls so I just left it alone" or something like that. Priceless.

[quote name='warwickhunt' timestamp='1329326277' post='1540742'] I assume your B12 is the double cut model as opposed to the SC 'acoustic-look'? Can't believe Fender, that is so cr*p that it is too similar to their models! I'm keeping my eyes open for a Tom Petersson model (Hamer or otherwise) and funnily enough I have someone who will likely want this Galveston when I do. [/quote] My B12 is the Chaparral USA version [url="http://www.hamerguitars.com/uk/?fa=detail&mid=395"]http://www.hamerguit...=detail&mid=395[/url] the one which isn't semi acoustic. It's a bit more sculpted than a precision or jazz, but as Fender own Kamen who own Hamer, they can do what they want. They just did themself out of £4K for everyone who has wanted one in the last 3 years as that's what it is for a new Chapparal USA. According to their 2009 price list. Ouch. I have heard good things about the Waterstone TP models, and they're quite reasonably priced for what you get. At least I think so. Good luck in your quest!!

[quote name='warwickhunt' timestamp='1329322284' post='1540654'] I prefer the feel/tone of nickels so I'll not likely look a steels. Yes it is that Galveston; it has a wide flat neck (I'd not have expected a lesser wide neck considering what has to fit across it) and there is a little bit of neck dive but it isn't that bad and a wide (non-slip) strap virtually sorts that. The action on arrival was a bit much for me but I've now got it set up so that it isn't any more than my 4 strings. Intonation looks like it'll be OK to do (separate saddles for the drone/octave strings) but the little nut that sits the other end of the adjuster screw needs to be gripped while adjusting... not easily done with all of the strings on, so when I fit new strings I'll try and get it as close to what I expect before I string it and bring it up to tension. Research seems to show that the Galveston is made in the same factory as a lot of these cheaper 12s and the bridge unit is the same on all of them inc Dean basses. Just need to find a 'real-I-am' Hamer B12 now! [/quote] A 12 does take a bit of time to get used to and I toyed with getting a cheaper 12 then changed my mind and just took the plunge with the Hamer. Took me a few days to get used to the 3 strings at once, but it wasn't that different from playing an 8. After that, I then had the action lowered to virtually zero so it plays really fast now. You'll be reasonably lucky to get a Hamer as thanks to Fender you won't get a new Hamer B12L in the UK at all. Apparently they're "too similar" to current Fender models. An easier definition of "total crap" has never been quicker to hand. That quote is not made up. If you phone up Fender UK they'll probably say something equally spurious and similar. It's just another reason why I wouldn't buy one of their instruments which haven't changed design in any significant way for the last 60 years. However, I digress.... I got my Hamer 2nd hand from a place in Germany. Apparently it was made in 1998, but it still plays great.

I use the D'addario's on my Hamer. Very nice and not bad for £28. Ironically they cost less than my Rotosound 8 string sets I get.... [url="http://www.soundunlimited.co.uk/product_743_DAddario_EXL170-12_45-100.html"]http://www.soundunlimited.co.uk/product_743_DAddario_EXL170-12_45-100.html[/url] On a personal level, I'd always prefer steel strings to nickel, but finding them at a reasonable price for a 12 string.... You might as well try and find strings made out of crystalised unicorn tears. I assume you got that Galveston that was advertised on here a few weeks ago? Just out of curiosity, how does it play? Thin/fat neck? Neck dive? Decent EQ?

[quote name='charic' timestamp='1328088012' post='1521460'] I have to admit I'm rather jealous. Coming together nicely [/quote] There is nothing to be jealous of my dear boy. I'm more envious of folk that are actually in a band as I just miss playing live. After some of the experiences I've had over the last 2 years, I almost jacked it all in. People just being moronic timewasters. In fact, I actually haven't even went for a jam since June last year because of it. To make matters worse, I think I only went for a jam 5 times last year. My guitarist mate was skint all the time and seemingly trying to get a side project going was impossible just as much as it was impossible to find folk who were either on the same level or join a band where at least one or more member wasn't a complete control freak idiot. It always appeared to be the most talentless member of the band as well that was that way inclined to "No, that's not how you do it, you play bass like this..." Over a period of time, the inactivity has eaten me away more than the dealing with morons and I need to do stuff on a regular basis. So, this reasonable sized building is me attempting to get round this problem.

Anyways, after about 4 days of nothing due it almost constantly raining, the guys came round and put the roof on and torched it in a day. Get in!! [attachment=98837:IMAG0071.jpg] At the moment, the guys are fitting the outside door and then it'll be trying to dry out the inside with a dehumidifier for a day or so. Hopefully after that, we can get all the stud work in. It's taking it's time really thanks to the weather.

[quote name='charic' timestamp='1327589792' post='1513853'] How selfish of you! We all know alcohol makes you play better [/quote] If that were true, I'd be the best bass player in the history of the universe. Sadly, not though. It certainly made me play "differently" if that's a reasonable euphemism to use.

[quote name='rk7' timestamp='1327525527' post='1513001'] Are you having a mini-bar at all? [/quote] Sadly not. I don't drink anymore. [quote name='Houtoe' timestamp='1327583185' post='1513689'] Resilient bars are good, even if just for decoupling. used in roof and walls to great effect. Have you thought of floating the floor inside? I have an outer wall with 2 inches of rockwool, resilient bars,2 layers of acoustic plasterboard with acoustic membrane between them, followed by a 2 inch + air gap all the way round (no parallel walls) floating inner room with acoustic plasterboard on outside, 2 inch's of rockwool followed by resilient bars, and another sandwich of acoustic plasterboard and membrane and found the results quite effective and did it all on budget of around £2800 or so. [/quote] Thanks for the advice mate. I just wondered if they made that much difference. As well as doing the non-parallel walls, a mate has rather kindly donated me some sound treatment tiles (on premise that his band can record at my house every so often). Should come in handy. Things have slowed down insanely this week, just as I figured when I saw the weather forecast. Stop raining!!

There will most certainly be air conditioning (both heating and cooling) as of course in the summer it'll be brutally warm. I know what you mean about the foundations. The blokes who did mine had to cut down a few trees and they had to burn them to stop them freezing to death. At least that's what they said to me. All the instruments will be staying indoors, but my rig will be going out along with a few other things. Things are going to slow down a bit this week, but hopefully the roof will be on and the place will be watertight by the end of the week.

I'd rather not say how much this is for now. Not until it's fully done. My builders might be reading this and they could come round tomorrow and suck teeth and say "that's gonna cost ya..." Let's just say that I'm appalling at DIY, so most of this is getting done by other people. Some of it for mate's rates, some not. Plus a major difference between mine and Blademan's is that mine is double skinned (albeit block which is cheaper than brick, but nevertheless it's still 2 layers). Also, Blademan's hasn't got any sound insulation in it. So you can make your own judgement on what he paid, plus take into account he very, very cleverly did most of it himself. And it was 5 years ago. Thanks for the advice on lighting chaps. I'm basically trying to figure out a way of making the minimum holes in the plasterboards. Before anyone suggests it, I won't be using strip lights as it'll give everyone headaches.

[quote name='EdwardHimself' timestamp='1327160979' post='1507240'] I remember there was a website I saw a couple of years back that specialised in acoustic products. They had special acoustic dampeners for downlighters. Might be worth a look? [/quote] I know exactly what you mean. The problem is that they're not cheap. About £10 a pop I think. Besides I'm not entirely convinced that they'll return the performance of the plasterboard to "within 1dB" of what it originally was as it states in the product info. I was hoping not to use them until I found something else or people that had used them before for first hand info.

Okay then, so more stuff going on. Taken from the upstairs bedroom. [attachment=97865:IMAG0063.jpg] Most of the roof struts are on. Hopefully in the next week it'll be watertight and I can start getting the stud walls in. Blademan is quite lucky. In my case there is at least 50 feet between the building and the nearest house but I'm not trusting that everything will just dissapate. As much noise as I can reduce the better. So, it's double block skin, firedoors, stud walls with RWA45 and double acoustic plasterboard. Probably that in the ceiling too. The guy who's doing most of the internal and "handyman" type stuff thinks I'm going waaaay too far, but I didn't fancy the noise leaking and the council coming round or the leakage becoming a magnet for burglars. For anyone that's done this did anyone use resiliant bars on either the ceilings or walls? [url="http://buildingmaterials.co.uk/Resilient-Bar/p~1027~027_210_001-Resilient-Bar-x-3000.html?utm_source=GoogleBase&utm_medium=Product+Search"]http://buildingmater...=Product+Search[/url] My question is do they make that much difference? I'm struggling with lighting though. Naturally, downlighters are going to be a pain in terms of leakage, so does anyone have any suggestions? A few of my mates said uplighters on the walls but I think that might leave the middle of the room a bit too dim. Mrs Wolverine suggested spot lights on a bar. Something like below. [url="http://www.lightingstyles.co.uk/Kitchen/spotlights/black_chrome_4_bar_ceiling_spot_light.htm"]http://www.lightings..._spot_light.htm[/url] Truth be told, that's a blind spot for me. I never did really decide on lighting at all. All advice gratefully received.

Yeah, exactly like that. It'll be one room. At the moment, the roof struts are going on and hopefully the roof will be waterproof by Monday or Tuesday. More pics to come tomorrow. Incidentally, I only did the Cockney joke as I live in SE London and find that quote from the beginning of Dangermouse hilarious for some reason. I'm actually Scottish. However, I digress.

London. Home of the cockney (I've always wanted to start off a post like that). Last year when Mrs Wolverine and I moved house one of the principal things on the menu (aside from a 3rd bedroom for baby Wolverine) was that I'd have an outside space where I could have rehearsals and record my own stuff. After much thought and planning and some very helpful advice from our very own 51m0n (a lovely man) we decided to crack on. Here, we have the site a few days after WW1 has commenced. [attachment=97634:IMAG0043.jpg] And here we are a few days later with most of the blockwork done. [attachment=97635:IMAG0061.jpg] Ultimately the size is about 5.7m x 6m. Naturally that will become somewhat smaller once the stud wall and double plasterboard is put in. Will post some more photos soon.

[quote name='sykilz' timestamp='1326624224' post='1499551'] Yeah, Was at Brixton,great gig,Mr Hagar was in fine voice,never seen him live was very impressed. Best of all looked like they were all having a real blast,all laughing together,looked like a BAND should do,only gripe was the bass was a bit ill defined were I stood,but thats prob down to the P.A and my position. Enjoyable night. [/quote] So was I. The bass sound was rubbish which is a pity as I like Michael Anthony. Thanks Brixton Academy (again!!). I was standing reasonably near the back and I saw the master EQ for the engineer. ALL the bass was torn out and it was still a boomy mess with the kick and bass merging into one massive messly glob. Every time I go to that place the bass has always sounded crap. With the notable exception of seeing Alice in Chains that is. It;s the venue I think. How rubbish were the support act?!! (Red White and Blues). Myself and my mate were laughing so hard we thought our eyeballs might fall out.

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1326105466' post='1492216'] beign able to do widdly w***y stuff is the reward for learning good clean technique. hopefully some people see the fiddly stuff and are inspired to put the time in to learn to play their instrument. Instead they probably go 'Pshh, I could play that if I had a Fodera'. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATub40Npxik [/quote] Damn right. If you don't have clean technique you'll never be able to do stuff like this regardless whether you hate it or not. I'm not saying I like or dislike VW or that type of insane-o fast as I can slappy slap stuff. More often it doesn't do too much for me but everything has its place. On the other hand, I remember the evening. 5th November 2000 at the SECC in Glasgow. It was the night I saw the Who and it literally changed my life. I was okay at bass at the time and was quite nicely sitting in the sort of Simon Jones of the Verve level of proficiency or style. II thought I was okay and was happy resting on my musical laurels so to speak. Then Entwistle piles in and does that 515 solo. It almost melted my face. Now I appreciate that he is an equally acquired taste, but it inspired me to play and learn all that I could. The fact that my own playing has progressed infinitely in the last few years is case in point. I'll never in a million years get the opportunity to use most of it in a band context unless the band was primarily geared to me showing off and I must admit, I'd find that really tedious because the songs would be rubbish. If the audience put up with it for more than 2 minutes I'd be really surprised. I never ever thought that getting a Fodera/Wal/Alembic/Status/ whatever would make it possible to play things that were light years ahead of me in terms of technique. I always thought it was down to practice.

Some of these are sickening. I turned down a signed band about 10 years ago. I won't bother to name names and they were pretty successful. I just didn't think I'd be that into it. Can one get any more idiotic? The arrogance of youth. I promised myself that I'd never do the same thing again if there was even a chance that I might enjoy it. It could be easy for one to become bitter and twisted and if you've been brushed (however lightly) by the fickle hand of fame. Playing on the same bill with bands that became famous and were utterly crap (and seriously up themselves to boot) on the night.It does make one question the default setting of the universe in terms of sanity. The only opportunity that I'd have been gutted to have turned down would have been taking the bass slot in The Who instead of Palladino. Sadly, that wasn't to be as disappointingly I wasn't asked!!

[quote name='silddx' timestamp='1323872515' post='1468065'] I'd just like to say that I didn't say it was total crap, just that it bored the sh*t out of me, and that I find it of little merit. [/quote] Without meaning to sound any thicker than I actually am, is the above statement [i]not[/i] saying it's crap?!!

I agree with Chris and Silddx. It's total crap and dare I say it, sounds like music that got rejected out of Casino Royale (the spoof original) for being too lounge or boring. Whilst I don't necessarily think that there's much to be discovered that's "original" per se, that stuff is so insipid that for it to be called the future of anything except the lift music at Dignitas leaves me somewhat perplexed.

Thanks for the replies chaps. It sounds like the direction you all suggest is the Barefaced Big Twin, Extended Audio Design or an Acme of some description. Not that I'd object to owning any of them!! However, the problem I have is basically that the treble content of the signal is totally uncontrollable thanks to the tweeters which kind of defeats the purpose of having them in the first place. Using just a DI signal I can easily get what I would consider "normal" settings and things are great. Use a cab and then cut everything above 4.5kHz down to nothing to get the same sound and the DI sounds truly awful.Turning the tweeter down to slightly below half reduces the cut available to zero especially when I'm using a 4 string. According to Markbass, the crossover is set at 3.5kHz. In truth, I probably missed a trick with these as I've only gigged them twice and used them at rehearsals twice. Other than that I've only used the 15 at very, very low practice volumes. More research should have been done methinks.... The other problem is that I don't want to re-set the tweeter when I change basses. I'm not the most technically minded and to be fair, I'd have to get someone to do any repairs/alterations for me. Whether it's worth it I wonder.