BigRedX

That's a lot of money for a 70s Fender bass in that horrible unfinished see-through white.

Interesting. Do you think that all those fiddly PSU connections will be suitably gig-proof? How warm to the PSU modules get after a couple of hours use? I've looked at doing this to my rig a couple of times but the thing that puts me off is how much extra messing about it will add to my setup time. I'd consider it, if it was possible to mount the PSU inside the cabs, fit a standard IEC socket to the back panel and then use a normal mains lead to daisy chain off the back of my rack for the power.

[quote name='bartelby' timestamp='1443116895' post='2872410'] I don't think there's been a day in the last 20 years that I haven't listened to music. [/quote] This is true for me as well. However, I can go for several days where the only music I listen to is my own band - either working on writing new songs or listening to new mixes/masters/test pressings/video edits in order to make sure they are right. As I said in my first post in this thread, the more involved and excited I am about the the music of the band I'm currently playing in the less time and inclination I have to listen to other people's music.

CMI - Cleartone Musical Instruments were an offshoot of Marshall - mostly imports although there were some home-grown amps with that name. I think you'll find that the imported instruments like the example in the OP came from whichever Japanese factory was offering the best deal for a particular quality of instrument at the time. No doubt Bassassin will be along to enlighten us soon.

I've used OMF once to transfer stuff into Logic. It's pretty good at retaining regions and edits which I'm guessing your tutors will want to see as part of the composition process, but obviously plug-ins don't really translate across - but then IMO they are mostly part of the production process and shouldn't really be needed for a composition course. I don't see hows they expect you to do any serious MIDI composition work in ProTools. It's still by far the weakest DAW when it comes to manipulation of MIDI data. I'd also be asking about their contingency for iLok issues right at the start of the course so that you have a definitive answer from the college rather than hoping for their goodwill should any problems occur.

[quote name='ambient' timestamp='1443102365' post='2872230'] No, I'd hope they'd understand if there was a genuine reason. For some reason, I don't actually like Avid. I know people don't like Apple, but they're pretty good for students and education. And Logic Pro is an absolute bargain. [/quote] I personally won't use any software that requires iLok. I don't regard it as a professional system. Since the course is about composition rather than production I find it strange that ProTools is the required software, since despite all the refinements over the years it is still basically a recording and production tool rather than a creative composition tool. BTW what's to stop you working in Logic and then transferring the audio and MIDI files into ProTools for assessment using something like OMF?

Have the college said what they will do if you are unable to hand in work due to problems with the iLok protection system? There have been at least 2 major issues with iLok in the last few years that left users without access to their software for several weeks in some cases.

How good is the monitoring on your PA? Unless it's excellent I'd go for the spare amp route.

[quote name='fretmeister' timestamp='1443017647' post='2871485'] I use Allianz Mainly because I use their other policies and they've paid out when I need them to. [/quote] Have they paid out on a musical equipment claim?

The only recommendations worth taking are from someone who has made a successful claim on their insurance in the last year. The last time I looked at serious musical instrument insurance, by the time I had gone through all the exclusion clauses it looked as though the only time it was actually covered was whilst I was playing it on stage. Even our rehearsal room which was on the 3rd floor in a facility that wasn't shared with other users and had 4 secure lockable doors between the actual room where the gear was and the street was excluded unless we fitted bars on the window!

[quote name='yondergo' timestamp='1442950008' post='2870918'] good chat [/quote] OK I'll explain despite the fact that IMO this is just another inverse snobbery trolling thread. When I first started playing all I could afford were cheap instruments - my first guitar was £10 out of a catalogue, my first electric guitar was something I cobbled together myself in the school woodwork shop and my first bass was a heavily abused Burns Sonic that cost £60 including the hard case and a Fender branded strap. Right up until the early 90s these were the instruments that I played. All had serious limitations in pretty much every aspect but I couldn't afford anything else so I made do. Then I finally had a decent job and some disposable income and found myself in my local musical instrument emporium trying an Overwater Original bass. After a lot of consideration a bought it. Owning that bass was a complete revelation. I suddenly realised that the only thing holding back what I could do with it was my own lack of playing skills and technique. Unlike the previous instruments I had owned, there was nothing in the instrument itself that was impeding my ability to play. Because of that I'm more inspired to play and I actually play better. Since then, I've owned a lot of basses and guitars all at various price points. However the ones I keep coming back to are the ones that don't place any limitations on me. Unsurprisingly they are all instruments with a new RRP in excess of £1500. I have owned expensive basses that I couldn't get on with and couple of the cheaper ones that weren't bad, but over the last 2 years I've cleared out all the instruments that I wasn't using regularly and they all got sold. I can imagine that if you favour Fender type designs, then it would be possible to find cheaper versions that suit you better than the "real thing" - after all the whole philosophy behind the original Fenders were that they could be made inexpensively using the affordable technology of the late 40s and relatively unskilled (when it comes to making musical instruments) labour, so it shouldn't be surprising that in the 21st century those instruments can now be made for a fraction of their original cost in real terms. In the end though you should play the instruments that you like, and provide that you can afford them the cost is irrelevant.

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1442949564' post='2870911'] Very true. But other than treating the room or drastically shifting the PA/back line around, EQ is pretty much all you have to try and tackle it in 99% of small clubs and pubs. [/quote] Fair enough, but you have to acknowledge that using EQ to try and fix this problem is only really going to be effective in a couple of places in the room (where the PA desk is and anywhere that shares most of the same nodes) and everywhere else you are probably going to make the sound worse.

No

I personally wouldn't trust any of these small stands to hold a bass securely on stage while the band is performing. The centre of gravity is simply too high for it to be stable enough. For a guitar at home it will be ok, but in a gigging environment forget it.

The shop that I helped out in during the late 70s had loads of Fenders in that horrible partly see-through white that looked as though the sprayers had knocked off early on Friday without doing the last couple of coats.

[quote name='Spoombung' timestamp='1442335977' post='2866173'] More people should quit. [/quote] Exactly! Too may useless time wasters clogging up the wanted ads.

I got my Tokai Talbo Jr Guitar from a small music shop off the beaten track in Osaka. Less than half the price and a far superior finish to the casting of the aluminium body of any of those I'd seen for sale in the UK.

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1442924749' post='2870556'] Mixing is all about compromise and in my [i](albeit limited)[/i] experience, mixing bass is one of the more tricky balancing acts to get right A lot of it depends on the room you're playing in. It's very easy to end up with gigantic 'standing waves' that can result in huge build-ups of muddy bass that can easily swamp the rest of the mix. Sometimes these can be tamed with a little surgical EQ'ing; other times you need to break out the chainsaw and carve big chunks out of the bass frequencies to get anywhere near a decent sound (especially if the room isn't set up for live music, which is typical of most local pubs). So it's not always the sound guy/girl's fault... more often than not you're both fighting the same common 'enemy' - that being a crappy room. [/quote] But big standing waves are a time domain problem - they manifest differently in different parts of the room. Using a frequency domain solution (EQ) to try and cure them is never going to be truly effective.

[quote name='bassjim' timestamp='1442850039' post='2869988'] ...any time i find myself either depping or in the company of experienced musicians (you know..the others...guitarists and drummers and keys and all of them) that have never seen or heard me before they all seem to have a look of worried to now relaxed "ah....phew...good start...hes got a fender.............." as soon as I get it out of the case. im a bit the same way when i get a guitar dep turn up for a band I play in regularly, and he/she gets a fender strat out. I'm usually thinking to myself ..."ah ...good start......most likely they have done their tone seaking suffering elswhere and will now just get on with it and sound good" and I'm usually right about that one. [/quote] Luckily for me I've never encountered the apprehension of other musicians when I pull something that isn't a Fender out of the case. A previous band used to love it when I seemed to bring a different bass to almost every rehearsal and, as others have said, remarkably they all sounded like bass guitars. Because almost every band I've been in the visuals/image have been just as important as the music, I'm the other way around, and my heart always sinks when I see a Strat or (heaven forbid) a Tele (the world's most boring looking guitar) come out of a case. I'm sure that they sound and play perfectly well but these days when there is such a massive range of instruments available I just wish that I'd see something a bit more fabulous. Our current guitarist went out and bought a big semi-acoustic DeArmond guitar because he knew his indie-boy Tele simply wasn't going to look right in this band.

[quote name='Conan' timestamp='1442838864' post='2869852'] I suspect that is a big part of the appeal. We are used to hearing (and seeing) Fenders. Just watch any of the BBC's reruns of music from the sixties onwards, and virtually every bassist will be using a P or a J (usually in 3TSB, but's that's another story!) [/quote] My impression from watching TotP and TOGWT in the 70s, was that Fender basses were no more or less common than Rickenbackers or Gibsons. Maybe it was just that I found the design of the Fender basses so dull (for me the iconic basses of the time were the 4001 and the Thunderbird) that I just ignored them.

Just seen the rough cut of the video. Looking very good indeed. Watch this space...

[quote name='neepheid' timestamp='1442835243' post='2869795'] A Precision may be all I need, but it's not anything close to what I want. [/quote] This would probably be my position as well.

[quote name='Billy Apple' timestamp='1442772475' post='2869360'] Well, by your logic most P and J basses must be firewood! [/quote] Well they are ;-)

I think a lot of it is down to what you as a player are used to. I would hazard a guess that most people here started off with something vaguely P or J-bass like, and if you did and spent some time getting used to it so a "real" Fender will feel much the same but hopefully better. In my case I spent 25 years playing basses that owed little to Leo's designs other than they were stringed instruments for playing low notes on, that by the time I came to own my first Fender-type bass (a Squier VMJ fretless) it just felt so wrong that I simply couldn't get on with it. Added to the fact that it was (for me) less suitable in almost every way than the £70 home defretted acrylic Wesley bass it was supposed to replace - it didn't sound as good, it didn't play as well and IMO it didn't look as good - that's it's unsurprising that I sold it on fairly quickly (and eventually found a Pedulla Buzz that did do all the things that I wanted). I don't think that there was anything wrong with the particular J-bass I had. AFAIK the current owner of it is still mighty pleased with it, it just didn't suit me in almost every way. Also until I started hanging out on internet bass forums I never realised that there was supposed to be anything intrinsically superior about Fender basses. When I was getting into music in the early 70s, the bass players in my favourite bands nearly all played Rickenbackers and Gibsons, so I thought you chose a bass brand in much the same way as a guitarist would chose a Les Paul or a Strat - they were all quality instruments and you picked the one that you liked best for sounds, playability and looks. Also I don't think it helped to someone who gre up on 70s glam and punk that the Fender designs looked so dull and anonymous. That's not to say I wouldn't ever rule out owning another Fender. I have a hankering for a Bass VI, and if Fender were to make a long-scale 5-string version of the Starcaster or Coronado bass I'd most certainly want to try it out. However a P or a J? Not for me.

I find that the busier my band is the less I listen to other people's music. In the last 5 years I've been to less than 10 gigs where I wasn't actually playing myself, and the majority of CDs and vinyl I've bought have been from bands we've shared the bill with. Because of the nature of my work I rarely have music on as I find it too distracting and the rest of the time I'm too busy working on music for the Terrortones to spend any serious time listening to other artists. Since I passed 24, my big music consuming phases all happen when I'm between bands.