JohnFitzgerald

For guitarist calling up patches, replace with. Drummer fannying about with individual pad sensitivity settings on V drum module. It goes from no trigger at all -/ low tom blows the back wall out. You'd think it would be set and forget. I've already spoken to one of the other guys and he's fine with my thoughts.

I'll go forward with my original approach then. Clairfy things to everyone, but with a degree of tact. To my mind, the upper mid range is critical in giving instruments a real voice. I think that's what they're not quite getting. As a slight asides, when we played friday night, I stuck completely with the bridge pickup on my jazz. That will maybe tell you of the part of the audio spectrum that [i]I [/i]was trying to live in. You can't beat that upper mid honk for poking its nose through the mud.

Talk about late to the party..... Yep, we do young hearts at weddings. People generally miss that line. All they hear is 'young hearts, run free' and assume you must be talking about them. So it seems anyway. It's never failed to fill the dance floor. Not once. We live in Scotland, we're weird that way.

I do have another ace up my sleeve. I've been recording all the gigs... I've got a pair of Adats slaved together and I'm recording it all via the direct outs onto individual tracks, so I can mix later. I then import it into Sonar via my RME DIGI9636 sound card (16 simultaneous ins via lightpipe form the adats.) Anyway, playing with these recordings tells me that there's an overabundance of stuff happening below 400hz. The minute I filter that out, it all becomes clear and you can hear individual parts. I'll may go for that approach. Here's how it does sound / here's how it can sound. Thanks for the input so far chaps.

I've been one of those idiots who takes on the job of doing the live sound for quite some time now. (Since about 1992 or so.) I've never ever professed to be an expert, but my methods are very simple and it usually serves me well. 1) Not too loud on stage. 2) Keep it simple with the EQ, the less tweaking the better. 3) Use quality gear and let it do its job. Current band I'm in, I'm on the point of distraction. New lead guitarist, new drummer. Both great players, both sound lads, but I think they're contributing to the problems I'm having. I have some theories that I want to put to them but wouldn't mind putting them to you before I do so. Quick rundown on what we've got. Mackie CFX12, EV ND767 mics, Crown XLS602s, Logic System LS12s, Logic System LS115 subs. All good enough kit. My problem is what I would describe is low mid mud. Drummer has a Roland TD12 kit and he likes his tom sound low and loose. Fair enough. Lead player plays Les Pauls through a Marshall TSL and 1936 2x12" cab. He likes a big chunky sound with a fair old bottom end crunch. Both fair enough in themselves. Add in that I've been trying to wean the lead singer off the proximity effect for as long as I've known him and it's all starting to get a bit congested. Add in that the drummer fancies himself as being knowledgable about live sound. The graphic on the mixer, I generally leave flat. If it's there for anything, it's to maybe fix a problem frequency. If we're on a wooden floor, I'll maybe take 2-3db out at 250hz to get rid of the boom from mic stands. Other than that, the graphic's doing nothing. The drummer's decided that smiley faces are a good idea. It's all ended up as a big pile of low mid mud. I want the graphic back to flat. I want the guitarist to lose a bit of the bottom end thud from his sound. I want the drummer to lose some of the bottom end off the toms. I want the drummer to leave the graphic the f**k alone. I'll continue to deprive the singer of proximity effect low end macho sound. Does any of the above sound reasonable ? I have long preached the following maxims. 1) If someone else is playing something in a certain part of the bar (timing wise), you need to find a space elsewhere. 2) If someone else is playing a part at a specific part of the audio spectrum, again you need to find a space elswhere. I think the above is all reasonable. Lose the low mid congestion. Thoughts anyone, before I wade in and spout forth. Cheers JF

I'm very much a Jazz bass fan. As well as the current Squier 5er, I've also had a MIM Jazz deluxe 5er. If it isn't a Sunburst Jazz, I'm probably not interested and as above, I've had two 5 strings now. I did get one of them in the States and did a bit of chasing around for the other, but they're not impossible to find. They just look right to me.

Going out tonight to do a gig and also a bit of quick and dirty recording. Have just installed an RME DIGI9636 to the desktop machine and Sonar likes it. Tonight's job, go out with the ADAT and grab the channels right off the live desk. Thankfully the drummer has a TD12. Everything else will have its own channel. I'll also be taking a master mix for room etc. on a minidisc. Tomorrow morning, with a bit of luck, this stuff will all be making its way onto the PC via lightpipe and the aforementioned RME card. We'll see how it turns out. How hard can it be.... All going well, I'll do the same again next week, but with a pair of slaved ADATs for 16 track.

I've no experience of it myself Mike, but it does seem to be pretty much a de facto standard, so I hop I won't go wrong. As I understand it, they card takes the burden of processing all the audio and the CPU takes little to do with it. We'll see. We had a little run through last night with an ADAT and our Mackie CFX12 using the inserts as direct outs and it worked exactly as planned. Running the channel gain as hot as you would realistically want, the ADAT was quite happy with the same level. So, it's all flightcased up with a loom plugged in, ready to be sat next to the mixer, plugged in, then hit record at the relevant moment. Should be good :-) I'm very excited by it all !

Had a bit of a plonk on a Roscoe 5 string today. Lovely lovely finished bass, with stunning bookmatched to centre walnut top. It belongs to the manager of Kenny's music in Dunfermline ( which was still sound Control last time I was in). Great store with a nice range and a go on a true high end bass was a real treat. We spoke fretless and without me prompting, he recommended a Squier Jazz VM. That was cool too, seeing it's already my chosen axe should the opportunity arise.

Well It's now resolved, I think. I had made my mind up on an Alesis IO26, which give two ADAT 8 channel inputs, 8 mic line ins plus a couple of phono ins, I make that 24 genuinely useful inputs. That was going to cost £285. Whilst having a wee look see on ebay earlier, I had a bit of a find. An RME DIGI9636/52. It doesn't have the expansion board, so it's two adat optical ins giving 16 channels of digital input with the option to go up to 3 ins totally 24 channels. It was on for £75 + £20 P&P After an exchange of emails, I got it for £70 all up inc. P&P. So, that's us pretty much good to go. As an asides, we've also snagged another ADAT machine too, so live 16 channel recording is very much a reality for us now, with the option to take it him and do as required in the computer. Chuffed :-)

Too right there Norris. In fact, I was forced to get the 5er out last night and sat them side by side. Yes, I did get a little bit proud to see two lovely basses sitting there side by side. All the bass I need. Not that I won't keep wanting the dearer stuff too.

Finally got my hands on it today. Really, not a mark on it. still got the protective film on the scratchplate. Serial number confirms it as being a 2006 bass, so it's not exactly done much in its 6 years. The truss rod needed a bit of a tinkering to get that sitting nice, but all is now good. There's only one slight issue. It's years sonce I've played a 4 string jazz and i had forgotten just how skinny the neck is at the nut. I feel as if I could wrap my fingers around it 3 times. I'll get used to it I suppose.

As all of the others have said, you'll never truly emulate a fretless sound on a fretted instrument. However ! If you use a light plucking hand technique, you can remove a fair bit of the attack from the note. Creep up on the notes rather than attack them. Couple that with a slow and wide fingering hand vibrato style and you can derive a sound which whilst not quite fretless is at least beginning to use that slightly softer and, dare I say it, more lyrical approach.

Yeah, quite right there. My existing 5er wears its Squier logo with pride. Tell me more about your Squier Jazz Fretless.

I'm looking forward to it. Couple if gigs next two weeks, so it'll get a run out.

[quote name='LukeFRC' timestamp='1328483176' post='1527996'] another £80 and a pair of pliers.... [/quote] I really shouldn't... No, this one is red. Any fretless must be sunburst.

I never really paid much attention to the Sandberg stuff to be honest. I know I keep banging on about it, but I really couldn't be happier with the Squier, so the only think I would really like is the same only fretless. I only bought the 4 string Squier Jazz, because I got it for £80. Couldn't really knock it back at that price I don't think.

Would you believe, I almost bought a Trace combo which they had on for £599. Full retail was, I think £1,100. I said to them, "you do know this is the 500W one, not the smaller one with the similar name." It seemed they didn't. It's now on at a couple of hundred quid more. I only told them after I had happily bought a S/H Trace head.

Hi In answer to all of the above. Jimmy Egypt has a pretty well known reputation for repairing stuff for names. Jack's just joining a long list there. LukeFRC. Yep, the Tokai Jazz is still there. Quite a cool bass. My opinion on their pricing. I go there in the full knowledge that it's very likely I could get better pricing elsewwere. However, and this is the biggy. They'll usually price match and if they can't or won't, it's more than made up for because we've been using this shop for a very long time. Everyone who has built up a long relationship with a store will know what I'm saying that showing you're their customer and will always use them sometimes gets you benfits that go far far beyond mere price. Our relationship with CC Music gets us a level of service that no faceless internet supplier could ever begin to compete with. That's worth a premium to me. Everyone who's got a similar relationship with their local shop knows what I'm tlaking about here. You want to take it away for a week and try before you buy ? Yeah ok. Where else might I get that ? That's my take on it.

Nice looking bass there. I do like black with a contrasting scratchplate. I have great great faith in Squiers to do the job and it seems your finding were pretty similar. Although, I had a plonk on a black Fender P with gold anodised scratchplate last week. Lovely looking thing, but when he told me the price tag started with a 9, I stopped listening. He must have been guessing the price, it was one of these. [url="http://www.nevadamusic.co.uk/bass/bass-guitars/fender-deluxe-active-p-bass-special-black?utm_source=google&utm_medium=GoogleShopping&utm_campaign=googlebase"]http://www.nevadamusic.co.uk/bass/bass-guitars/fender-deluxe-active-p-bass-special-black?utm_source=google&utm_medium=GoogleShopping&utm_campaign=googlebase[/url] I like the way the J pickup kind of disappears on that. Anyway, yours is a cracking bass - enjoy.

Cheers Mike I had kinda arrived at that concluion myself. The 1212M, having an ADAT connection seems like a good call. The fact that it's pretty low cost kinda helps too. If there's a little extra cash, I might actually bin it all and get a Zoom R16. 16 track, but able to record on 8 at a time via combo xlr / jack inputs. Also works as an audio interface to the PC via USB 2.0 and again gives 8 discreet ins to the laptop. That would cost £275, so not a fortune. Thanks again. JF

I couldn't honestly say. I'll ask Jimmy next time I'm in. Even for those who don't neccesarily like Jack's sound, it's such a modern iconic image of bass playing, Jack Bruce with a Warwick. For me it's not far off a picture of Jaco with the bass of doom, or Stanley Clarke with an Alembic.