BigRedX

We argue this forever, but my personal experience both with my own bands and working on recordings for other people is that the bass guitar and drums are the first to be augmented or replaced if the end result requires it. One of the bands I'm currently playing with recorded their last album with Gavin Monahagn (Editors, Goldblade etc.) producing. The "bass guitar" parts were written and recorded by the two guitarists, and because they had all the stems from the album they were able to give me the individual bass tracks to help me learn the songs. At the first rehearsal I had with them it became obvious that their producer had done a lot of extra work on the bass parts since they were originally tracked. Many of them had significant changes to both the timing and the notes being played and I kept being asked what I was playing, to which my reply was "What is on the recordings you gave me". I don't know exactly what had been done between the tracking and the final mix but a lot of the time what I learnt from the recording was not what the rest of the band was expecting to hear in the rehearsal room where the bass guitar was more obvious than on the album.

1. But as the owner of a bass close-up is where I'll mostly be looking at it, and I don't like the look. 2. A volute is not at all necessary for necks with the truss rod adjustment at the headstock. None of my Gus Basses or Guitar have a volute. Even Fender don't shape their necks any differently to accommodate a headstock end truss rod adjustment. 3. I'm sure you could but why would you want to? Does having the truss-rod adjustment point at the body end of the neck have any real advantage ergonomically, allow a better range of adjustment, or is it easier to fit? In fact would the luthiers/manufacturers on here care to comment? So: @skelf @Andyjr1515 @Manton Customs @Chownybass @Dolando @RIM Basses @paulflan0151 @Christine @Jabba_the_gut @blablas Which method of adjusting the truss rod do you favour and why? Thanks!

The compressor is one of those devices that you shouldn't be able to hear having an effect until you turn it off.

The last time I played around with Touch Tracks, Logic was on V4, so this might not be completely accurate anymore... It's best for creating new arrangements from pre- programmed or recorded parts rather than creating something completely from scratch live. IIRC you simply assign a MIDI note or key on your QWERTY keyboard to a region (MIDI or audio data) and pressing that key will cause the region to play. If you need multiple regions to play simultaneously from a single command then you need to put them all into a folder and assign the command to the folder. If you are intending to build up your performance from scratch live then you will probably be better off using a looper.

That may well be but it's well documented that The Sweet didn't play on the A sides of any of their singles until they were fairly well established. I would have thought it was much the same with the other Chinnichap and Mickey Most acts.

True. But when the goal of making a commercial record (i.e. one paid for by a record label) is to make it sound as good as possible for the least financial outlay, why bother with a bass guitarist (or drummer) when they can be easily and cheaply replaced by electronics, and the vast majority of people listening to the recording will never know?

And most likely played by some session player rather than the person seen wearing the bass guitar on TotP.

No. It's speculation. But.. given the nature of Bruno Mars' music I doubt I'm wrong.

Is this Punk Rock enough for you? All recorded and played live using a variety of 5-string basses. EDIT: I made more use of the extended range and position possibilities of the 5-string bass in The Terrortones than I did in any of my previous bands, despite the relatively more "conventional" nature of the music.

There's a very good reason why you need a 5-string bass to re-create all these bass lines live. In the studio they were originally payed by keyboards and sequencers where the limitations of the bass guitar were not an issue.

Because the bass part was made with synths and samples in ProTools.

Anyone who has ever done any serious recording (i.e. anything that hasn't been wholly financed by the band themselves) will know that what was recorded in the studio during tracking and what is actually audible on the final release of those recordings are two entirely different things. Lets face it, when a large number of people on here couldn't even tell that a prominent, high in the mix, bass line like "Black Velvet" by Alannah Myles was produced by synthesisers, what chance have you got with average low in the mix rumble of the typical modern (by which I mean anything recorded this century) bass part? The job of a producer on a recording is to make the artist sound as good as possible (that's what they are being paid for after all), and in oder to do that, they will use everything they can within the budget. In the 50, 60s and 70s that generally meant replacing the band with the best season players they could afford. Since the mid-80s the technology has allowed them to do the same but much more cost-effectively by substituting or augmenting the bass guitar part with synthesised or sampled sounds. Why hire in lots a session musicians to play all the different instruments, when a single good programmer can cover drums, bass, keyboards, and synthesisers as well as comp'ing together the definitive performances for the vocals and guitars? When the song is played live there may well be a musician on stage with a bass guitar, but on the definitive version - the one made in the studio - synthesis, sampling and digital editing will have played just as much as part (and frequently much more) as any bass guitar (with any number of strings). IMO the only way anybody can categorically state that a recorded bass line on a commercial recording was 100% created by a bass guitar, would be if they were present for every minute of the tracking, mixing an mastering of the recording and knew exactly what had and what had not been used from the first guide tracks to to the final production master.

I have not been able to detect a significant difference between Warwick Red Label Strings and Warwick Black Label Strings. However getting a 5-string Red Label set with a taper-wound low-B string is almost impossible, so I find it easier to buy Black Labels sets which all seem to come with taper-wound Bs. If I was playing a 4-sting bass Red Label would be fine.

While changing the bridge could make a difference to the sound of the bass (although like all these things is it possible to state 100% that it is the new bridge that has made the difference and not one of the other things that may have been intentionally or unintentionally changed at the same time?), IME it's never pronounced enough to be noticeable in the context of a band mix. For me so long as the bridge doesn't move during playing, yet is easy to adjust when needed, that's all that is required.

You can do similar things to Ableton Live in Logic using Touch Tracks.

The standard ESP Viper bass has a bolt-on neck. However if you go through all the Signature Models you'll probably find someone who has a neck through version.

1. Because it looks ugly. 2. Because it's just as easy to put the truss rod adjustment behind the nut. 3. Because not every bass has a bolt-on neck.

I have yet to come across a sound engineer who has asked me to do this in almost 40 years of gigging.

No it screws onto the arm of a boom stand in the same way.

If Luminlays are bright enough for you, then that's what you need. Otherwise it's going to have to go off to Sims Custom for the full LED treatment. I know from experience that anything drawn or stuck on will wear off at the most inconvenient moment.

So it does. I'd never noticed that. Weird I can't see any reason for the plug only not to include an earth contact unless the two versions are deliberately engineered that way so you have an easy way of choosing whether or not to have an earth connection to the PSU. In which case I would have thought it would be mentioned somewhere in the literature that accompanies the macBooks.

Problem #1 the volume control. Using a volume pedal most likely designed for instrument level signals on a line-level output is probably never going to be great. What you should be using is a pedal that sends MIDI messages directly to MainStage. CC#07 is the controller number for MIDI volume. Problem #2 Earthing. Are you actually getting earth hum? It should be the same with either plug/cable as with the cable version while the lead itself has an earth connection the PSU that it plugs in to only has live and neutral contacts. How are you connecting the Mac to the stage box? I use an ART DTI box between the audio interface and the PA which completely isolates it and kills any earth hum.

Probably because the profanity filter ruined your search terms.

Very nice!

I'm not a Dingwall over but when I tried one a few years ago it took me less than 30 seconds to get used to the fans-frets. Unless your technique includes lots of chords high up on the neck I can't see it being a problem.