BigRedX

Part of the problem is that politicians are too stupid to be able to tell the difference between the actual charger (the plug bit that plugs into the mains socket) and the cable which has a load of other uses as well as that of suppling power to the device for the purposes of charging the battery. Some personal observations. 1. All my chargers (the plug bits) are already standardised with USB A sockets. In fact it's been a very long time (more than 10 years) since I bought any consumer device which, if it did come with a charger, came with a different connector. Even the last two desk lamps I bought from Ikea are powered from a plug with a USB A socket on it. 2. As I said in my previous post I'm already standardised for my cables, they are all USB A to Lightning (apart from the laptop which requires a chunkier PSU and cable anyway). 3. The lifespan of the cable used to connect these devices to the charger as well as other devices DOES NOT EQUAL the lifespan of the device. I'm very careful with my cables, but at best they still only last a couple of years. Most people I know have to replace their cables at least every 6 months either because they get lost or damaged. 4. I need a cable (and PSU) for every device that needs charging because usually they all need charging at the the same time. 5. It will be a long time before I need to replace every chargeable device I currently own that doesn't have a USB C cable for charging (or data transfer), and I suspect that by that time USB C will already be obsolete and have replaced by something else, so I doubt I will ever see the "benefits" of this policy.

Depends on your viewpoint. I'm already standardised on one charger cable and have been for over 5 years - USB A to Lightning.

I love all of Jens Ritters designs except for the very slightly angled pickups which always look wrong to me. Since they are under covers, surely it would be no big deal to make the covers slightly bigger so they could be straightened up (but still have angled pickups hidden underneath). Although does that very slight angle actually make any difference to the sound?

Please don't ruin this thread as well by posting quotes. If you have something to say, then say something that you have come up with yourself. Anyone can post a quote. It requires no real thought, and although it looks "intellectual" it's no better than posting a meme. So if you have an actual opinion of your own, then lets hear it.

I can't remember ever seeing a careers adviser whilst I was at school. That might have been because it was in the 70s and such people didn't yet exist; because I went to a posh school where it was assumed that you would go to university and your choice of subject there would dictate your career; or I did, but at the time I thought I knew what I wanted to do (be a marine biologist) and therefore my interview lasted 30 seconds and I have forgotten it ever took place. The reality was that I had absolutely no idea what I really wanted to do with my life, and even less so once I worked out that the direction that school, my parents, and society in general were trying to push me in was non-mandatory... TBH my academic progress was pretty much laid out for me by my teachers and parents, and by the time I was 14 I was far more interested in playing music and happy to coast through the subjects I was good at with the minimum of effort. IIRC my only choice of 'O' Levels boiled down to whether I wanted to take History or Geography as my 10th subject, and I chose History because I hated the teacher who would have taught me Geography. When It came to 'A' levels I picked the three subjects I thought would be best based on my 'O' Levels mostly because I wanted an easy life and more time to spend in the woodwork shop where I was making an electric guitar. The guitar took up more of my time than any one of my 'A' Level subjects and I only just scraped into University which I hated, and after 3 years and two different courses at two different universities I dropped out when it looked as though my band was going to get signed by a major record label. I got into my "career" of graphic design/artwork entirely by accident and entirely through my musical activities rather than any formal education.

I thought the Jack Casady Bass was essentially a rebadged Les Paul Signature Bass? The low impedance pickup was certainly something that Les Paul was championing - they are are in all the later guitars and basses that bear his name.

In that case give the Newtone strings a go. They're currently just under £20 a set and at the moment if you buy two sets you'll get 10% off. That's considerably cheaper than either the LaBella's or the GHS Hooky set.

The problem that compression has is that unlike other effects most of the time if you can hear it working then you haven't set it up right. But, like other aspects of the bass guitar sound it's one that really needs to be adjusted while playing with the rest of the band.

If you want heavier strings, then from lightest to heaviest there are: LaBella Bass VI (26-95), Newtone Axion (24-100), and GHS Eastwood Hooky (30-105). The Newtones are about half the price of the other two and from experience will fit just about any Bass VI, since they are designed with the Fender/Squier models and their vibrato systems in mind. Don't be fooled by the lighter high E, its the low A and E that normally need beefing up from the strings supplied with these basses. The Eastwood Hooky's might not fit on a Bass VI 6 in-line headstock as there is very little spare string to cut off when fitting these to the D and G machine heads of the Eastwood Hooky Bass. Next time I change stings on mine I'll measure the length, as it might be useful for others.

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There are two things working against you. Firstly the scale length. Unfortunately long scale basses have difficulty getting a decent tone out of the lighter gauge strings. Most 6 string basses tuned E-E are 30" scale and the tonal benefit is noticeable. I had a go with tuning E-C on one of my 5-string 34" scale basses and couldn't get a decent sound out of the high C - it always sounded to me like bad jazz guitar, and was eventually abandoned in favour of a more conventional B-G tuning. The other factor is that you string gauges appear to be quite light. On my 30" scale basses tuned E-E to the high E is either 24 or 30 and again the benefits from the heavier gauge strings is very noticeable. Can you get a decent tone for the notes you would normally play on the highest two string from the D and G played further up the neck? You haven't said what you bass is or what sort of a neck joints has. This can also be a factor, and it might simply be that your particular bass simply doesn't lend itself to getting a decent tone out of the highest strings.

Why isn't the guitarist doing this with a talkbox? This is such an integral part of the sound of the song that if you can't get it spot on right it you might as well not bother.

By whom? Anyone whose opinion actually matters?

I have a Music Area bag that came with my Eastwood Hooky Bass. It's a very nice bag, but nowhere near as well made or padded as the Mono M80. However it is much more comfortable to wear.

Saturday in Leeds to see The Last Cry at Carpe Noctum at The Lending Room. It was their last ever gig and quite emotional... My head is just visible down the front at the far side of the stage!

The right position for the saddles is when the octave harmonic is exactly in tune with the note fretted at the 12th. Where the saddles actually end up will depend on the string gauge(s) and construction, the action, and the neck relief. Intonation adjustments are always done last (or in conjunction with setting the action) as all the other changes will affect the position the saddles need to be in for the harmonic and fretted note to be the same. Also always check that you are fretting the 12th fret note properly. IME there is a tendency to pull the note sharp when you fret it, so check by bending the string that you have the lowest pitch note and adjust to that. Also there is no technical reason why the differences between each pair of adjacent saddles should be the same.

For those of you complaining that you didn't like your recorded bass sound, were you simply sessions musicians providing a bass part for someone else's musical vision, or a creative part of the band. If it's the former then you need to suck it up. If you are there simply to play a bass line for someone else, then you don't really get a say. On the other hand if your contribution is part of the band's overall creative process, then did you attend the mix session(s)? If you did, did the bass sound OK while the mix was being done? If you didn't, then not why not? Personally I would never allow anyone other than my bandmates and the mix engineer to hear anything I wasn't 100% happy with. Any mix that isn't done with me personally in attendance, is done on the understanding that the mix engineer will continue to work on the track at the studio's expense until I (and the rest of the band) am 100% happy with the result.

This article was linked to another forum and makes interesting reading regarding why you shouldn't be using standby switches at all...

I was under the impression that "Stand By" kept the valve heaters on, which kind of defeats the object. However I've never owned a valve amp with fans.

Still can't get in. The email link just stalls on "loading". No response so far from Line 6....

In that case all you can say is that you like the sound of the two P-Basses you mentioned and you don't like the sound of that particular Jazz. There is absolutely no way of knowing what part the age of the wood on its own has played in the current sound of the instrument, and even less way of knowing if any of these other processes will be able to replicate the qualities of the sound that you like. My completely unscientific method is to treat every instrument individually and simply decide whether or not I like the sound of each one. That's the best that anyone can hope for.

The problem here is that you are trying to apply attributes to a single characteristic of an instrument, without considering all the other things that might be contributing. Even though you say the amplified and unamplified sounds of the instruments you have tried have similar characteristics you haven't considered all the other differences that may be present. First of all you are comparing two different body shapes. Can you say for sure that the shape of a body has zero influence on the tone? Secondly how many pieces of wood is each body made out of? So many variables here that unless all the bodies were made from the same number of pieces and joined in the someway and the same places (and then see point one). It may be (and more likely be) that your 80s Jazz simply isn't made out of pieces of wood suitable for a solid electric instrument. After all ever piece of wood is different. Even pieces from the same log can produce very different sounding instruments. Remember that at any age it was always recommended that you try multiple examples of an instrument before picking the one you like the best. That advice was just as true 50-60 years ago as it is today. Finally you don't know what these instruments sounded when they were new. In relative terms there's not that much age difference now between a 70s and 80s bass. I would suggest that the 70s basses sound good now, because they sounded good when they were new. Back then Basses that didn't sound good would have modified until they did, or they would have ended up donating the parts that were good to make other instruments. These days if an instrument doesn't sound good we simply replace it with one that does. Finally you sample size of three basses is scientifically meaningless.

Except all the discussions I found about using 3rd party expression pedals, said to use a standard TS cable with them. I'm hoping that the ring connection is for the switch under the pedal, but I won't get a chance to experiment for myself until next week.

Then it really depends on how portable a system you want. Unless you already have an iPad to use, I go for a Mac laptop, as you will less likely to outgrow it, and has been said you can always add a second screen if you need it (if you get reasonably serious about home recording you will soon discover you can never have too much screen real-estate). Have you decided on a DAW to use with this? If not start with Garageband which comes free with the Mac, and if you get serious then you can simply upgrade to Logic which will import all your old Garageband projects.

Having registered for a Line6 IdeaScale account, I have received my moderator approval and a link to "Complete My Profile". Except that it leads to a 404 page. When I try and log in from the Line6 IdeaScale home page I get a message telling that my verification failed and I might be a robot... There's not even a way to contact anyone on IdeaScale without being logged in :-((( The email comes from a "No Reply" address, and I have just tried to access the profile page from 2 other browsers without success, so I doubt it's my fault that I can't log in.