BigRedX

[quote name='grayn' timestamp='1483709633' post='3209419'] It's almost certainly a rubbish bass but I like it's retro styling. Cool! [/quote] Actually it appears to share many construction features with the Burns Sonic Bass which came out later the same year, in which case it will most likely be quite a good instrument. There was fair bit of variation in body and scratch plate shapes on these (and the guitar versions) due to the fact that they were largely hand-made.

Unless something happens that physically prevents me from playing music I think I'll probably be doing it until I drop. Most people my age (mid 50s) are heading towards being child and mortgage-free (if they are not already) and retirement so those of us who are still interested in playing in a band will have more time and energy for it than at any time since their mid-20s.

It's a Burns-Weill RP1B Streamline Bass, from 1960. Would have cost about £50 at the time.

[quote name='EBS_freak' timestamp='1483549577' post='3208154'] Exhibit A. Nicky Wire. Somebody that could give less sh1ts about dispersion. Don't think it's held him back. [/quote] Putting aside the fact that there's probably nothing in those cabs, when your on-stage monitoring is at worst a combination of wedge monitors and side-fills and more likely in-ears and FoH is handled entirely by the PA, I don't think the dispersion characteristics of the bass rig are even remotely relevant.

Very adjustable, but a complete pain to set up. I'd go for the Schaller 3D design over this provided that it offers enough adjustment for you needs.

£2K for a bass essentially based on a design that has been around for over 60 years now. It should be perfect.

IMO shims are fine if you are making up a bitsa, or want to do something radical with the angle between the body and the neck for playing comfort, but on a brand new instrument that should have been made with modern manufacturing tolerances it's just a nasty bodge. Besides I would think that changing the angle between the neck and the body would negate the effectiveness of the plek setup. I'd send the bass back and get another one that has been made properly.

[quote name='chriswareham' timestamp='1483609012' post='3208577'] I'm thinking of going the Peter Hook route, and using a G string tuned up to C - Hooky does something similar with the strings on his six string bass as it gives him a much better tone than using conventional guages for the high strings. He says in his recent book that he had to experiment with different gauges until he found some that didn't snap or were so over-tension as to be unplayable. [/quote] IIRC the Shergold is a short scale (30") which IME makes a massive difference to the sound (and feel) of the higher strings. I have the Squier VM Bass VI and the high B and E strings on it are perfectly useable, which definitely wasn't the case when I was experimenting with high C on my 5-string basses. Having said that, even though the Squier is voiced more like a guitar in it's choice of pickups and their placement, if I was going to spend most of my time playing in those registers I'd probably use one of my guitars as they still sound better. I've recently joined a post-punk influenced band and have been busy channeling my inner Peter Hook, but I'm finding I prefer the sound of my Gus bass played high up on the neck to that of the Squier and at a recent recording session that ended up being the best choice in the context of the overall sound of the band.

As I said in the other thread I could never get a tone I liked out of the high C string. I tried several different sets of strings when I experimented with it a few years ago and without exception the C string had all the character of a cheap and nasty guitar. The same notes played on the G or D strings always had a lot more authority, so I've stuck with B - G on my 5-strings.

[quote name='lowhand_mike' timestamp='1483546276' post='3208113'] i'm sure i read somewhere that if you stack 2 2x10s vertically (so kinda 1x4) you get better dispersion due to no phase cancellation (think thats right) from speakers being horizontal to each other. that said my 4x10 has done a great job so far and its no boutique. [/quote] You do still get dispersion issues with vertical stacking, but it's only noticeable if you move up and down rather than from side to side. So as long as you're not pogoing frantically in front of your rig you'll be fine.

I dabbled with high C some years ago, but I really didn't like the tone. To me it always sounded like a cheap and nasty guitar. The same notes always sounded better played on the G or D strings.

[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1483540788' post='3208055'] Wouldn't you use that page to sign up to a musicians wanted page? [/quote] TBH I wouldn't use Facebook at all. If I was answering a band ad, I'd let them know what I'd done musically in the past, and send some links where they could hear some recent and maybe some musically appropriate songs I'd done previously. I was assuming that someone was then looking me up on Facebook from name and location.

Sand it down and get it resprayed. No-one wants to see a tatty old bass anyway ;-)

AFAICS whether or not promotional picks are actually usable very much depends on what sort of a pick you favour. I've got a selection that I've acquired from gigs and as promotional freebies over the years, but other than using as an occasional alternative to my preferred picks for the guitar when I've looking for a different type of string attack, I haven't found any that I would want to use full time. On the bass where I am a Herco Flex 75 user of over 35 years, I've not come across any promotional pick that would be even a close substitute.

[quote name='NancyJohnson' timestamp='1483436816' post='3207032'] Obviously with the prevalence of social media, it is quite routine to do some online checking to support any credentials - just a few minutes ago I read a Facebook entry on a musicians wanted page where some guy said he's played 'over a thousand gigs in the last ten years'. Clicking on his photos showed up loads of photos of trees and his dog, but not one of the guy playing with anything other than a football. What does that say? [/quote] If you looked at my Facebook page all you'd find is interior design ideas and some cat stuff posted by my girlfriend. All my music posts are on a separate Terrortones persona page.

[quote name='JapanAxe' timestamp='1482706784' post='3202305'] Mystery solved. Inputs 5 and 6 actually refer to the unit's 'Loopback' function, which allows you to send the signal that's being sent to your audio outputs [i]back[/i] into the input for recording. This is perfect for capturing streamed internet broadcasts etc. For example, if I play a YouTube video and set Reaper to record via inputs 5 and 6, the audio is recorded into Reaper. Previously I had to use Soundflower to do this, which meant switching back and forth between settings in the Audio Devices dialog box. I have now ditched Soundflower (it is no longer supported anyway) as this is a much more elegant solution. Win win! [/quote] That seems like a bit of a faff, when you could simply use Audio HiJack to save the output of any audio stream from any application as a file.

Had to go through three pages of sales ads before I found one I as even remotely interested in trying, so the answer is probably no.

Spotify IME is very limited in choice once you step outside of mainstream or recent releases. My new band are doing a series of playlists on Spotify as part of our interaction with our fans. I was going to do either a J-pop or post-punk electronic set but most of the songs I wanted to include aren't available. It's not as though the songs are massively obscure either. Most of the J-pop artists are on major labels, and all of the electronic stuff was regularly featured on John Peel's show back in the day.

[quote name='Telebass' timestamp='1482483485' post='3200876'] For me, then, if I don't convert, I need a 5er with a nut width not exceeding 1.75". Any such thing? [/quote] I'm always intrigued when musicians quote absolute measurements as being a strict requirement for an instrument, especially when they only for a small part of the overall picture. So is your 1.75" the width of the neck at the nut? or the width from the centre of the B string to the centre of the G string? And is 1.75" a definite absolute, or could you get away with 1.76"? How about 1.78"? What about the string spacing at the bridge? I ask because my Yamaha BJ5B 5-string would have probably met your requirements (or been very close) but at the bridge it had the typical very wide Yamaha string spacing of 18-19mm between string centres. Would that have been acceptable? I've given up worrying about instrument measurements. If I'm interested I pick it up and play it. It will soon become obvious whether or not I can get on with it.

[quote name='BassTractor' timestamp='1482446489' post='3200753'] Maybe I've overstepped here, but I footloosely meant that people reacted as if their toes had been trodden by someone. [/quote] At the moment as far as I can see the only instances of the word "toetroddenly" are in this thread. I think it would make a great addition to the English language and vow to use it from now on whenever I can!

[quote name='SpondonBassed' timestamp='1482360756' post='3199970'] @ Beer of the Bass, I can accept that there is a pitch change which although barely perceptible, would have a noticeable effect. Sort of like low level "wow-and flutter" as we called it in days of vinyl and affordable turntables. [/quote] Because the doppler effect of the Leslie cabinet is created by moving the sound source (the speaker) relative to the listener, you get both vibrato and tremolo in equal measures as can be heard on any of the Hammond and Leslie clips available on YouTube.

There's plenty of music in it, and you can pause, so it can be broken up into a two or more sessions, if you can't find time for the whole thing in one go.

AFAICS this hasn't been posted yet. [url="http://www.nts.live/shows/trevorjackson/episodes/trevor-jackson-trevor-horn-in-conversation-16th-december-2016"]In-depth Trevor Horn interview[/url] by Trevor Jackson on the NTS web site. It's 3 hours long and covers his career from his first gigs depping on bass for his dad in dance bands, right up to the early 90s. Lots of interesting stuff and plenty of his production and remix work with a few secrets given away!

Very few guitars have active electronics so why are we bass players so obsessed with them? Some observations: 1. Most don't do anything you can't already do much better with the controls on your amp. 2. The volume and blend on the cheaper models are nearly always passive, which to me seems stupid as these are the two functions that would benefit most from being properly buffered from the pickups and the amp input so that they work smoothly and consistently through their range. 3. Most on-board pre-amps are generic circuits that have been shoe-horned into their instruments without any thought for the type and position of the pickups feeding them or the original acoustic sonic character of the bass. Music Man seem to be the only mainstream exception to this.

So how do you tell if a song is in C or A minor? And does it matter?