D.I. Joe

I could get my whole stack, pedals, lead bag and two basses into my old Micra, with room to take a plus one in the front. Now I have a Mk2 Clio and I can do the same without putting the seats down! Last week I had a half stack, four basses and a trombone in there, and the Mrs in the front. You don't need a huge car really unless you have an 8x10 or something of the like.

Cool I'll check those out when I get a few minutes. Is there such thing as a compact(ish) overdrive with a valve onboard?

[quote name='paul_5' timestamp='1352406386' post='1862753'] if I hadn't fallen head over heels with my DHA pedal then that's one that I'd have kept. Sounds brilliant and looks awesome. Fairly mahoosive footprint though. [/quote] Sorry to back track the thread somewhat but I'm thinking of looking for an alternative to mine. I have the VT1-bass-drive-eq and the tone is fantastic but its so huge! I'm thinking I might swap it for a smaller DHA or maybe a different more compact valve overdrive, if anybody could recommend one?

The website just seems to go on about the colour of the strings and not the tone or construction etc that you normally see on string sites. Not really selling it to me

Nice one Lozz! I don't have Sky unfortunately but I'll get my better half to record it

My advice would be to start at medium and see how they feel, then you've got options either way, though there are many, many string companies out there all producing different sets of strings which feel and sound completely different, so experiment a bit! Don't be too preoccupied about strings while you are learning though, they can be quite expensive! Also, if you are down tuning a lot then you'll probably find heavy strings best to deal with, unless you don't mind spending the money for some DR DDTs and the lik. Hope this helps

I prefer passive generally. A lot of actives sound clinical almost to the point of being antiseptic to me, and I find that passive pickups are more responsive to the way that I play. Also, as a friend of mine pointed out - however you set your bass compromises your pedals, which in turn compromise your amp, so I like to keep things simple where I can.

Where are you playing on the 29th? Might as well pop put and hear it in action!

Looking good Dean! Don't suppose I could have a go at some point?

[quote name='irvined' timestamp='1354884619' post='1891578'] Hi, Here's a pic of my £21 DIY fretless (hopefully!). I filled with veneer and then applied a really hard varnish. Using roundwounds and the fretboard is standing up o.k. (so far) Cheers, Doug [/quote] Looking good! I still haven't got round to taking any decent photos of mine! I didn't even think about varnishing though... The bass sounds fine but I guess I'll wait and see how much serious use it gets before I varnish. Hopefully it won't need it with flats. Welcome to Basschat btw

Here here! Though I wouldn't necessarily call it 'specialist' personally, but then I suppose I do it about 50% of the time. You just can't get the same attack with fingers and a lot of songs (not necessarily limited to Rock) just need that edge - not just to the sound but it also brings a different feel to the part. All this talk of 'real bassists' using fingers or slap or whatever - Bollocks! Real bassists do whatever fits the music best, regardless.

Seem to be having trouble uploading photos at the moment :-\

Finished it off yesterday and it worked pretty well! Went down the filler route in the end as I figured that veneers would be so much unneccessary time and hassle for what is a tear-up-a-£60-bass-and-see-what-happens kind of job. Got a tube of (rather suspicios looking...) darkwood filler from B&Q for the fret slots, left it to dry overnight and then sanded it off with a power sander - a few times over with 60p, then a couple of times with 100p, then a little 150p and finished off with a once over with wet and dry. Spent a good chunk of the afternoon sliding harmonics Pics to follow...

The only snag with trying DRs is that they are really expensive. If you can afford to risk the money to try strings then carry on, but if like me you're a bit tight then keep an eye on the Classifieds section as they pop up occasionally - as new a lot of the time as well!

[quote name='Commando Jack' timestamp='1343746336' post='1754526'] The other reason might be if you're playing with a horn section it might make it easier for them (e.g. some Stevie Wonder tracks). [/quote] I think you're right, a lot of Motown recordings are in flat keys. In Stevie Wonder's case though - I believe most of his songs are in flat keys because the black keys are much easier for him to find. In Fragile Sanity we play in Eb for the sake of vocals, but we play some songs in their native key - and not just the ones that are originally in Eb tuning!

[quote name='Joker2807' timestamp='1354123110' post='1882393'] Im torn between the rotos and the sunbeams.. not sure which id prefer [/quote] I'm digging both at the moment. I think my soreness may be down to how unnaturally hard I was playing them rather than the strings themselves but all the same - Sunbeams feel great! Have you tried them before or are you just thinking about trying them?

Precision sounds great but... OWW!! It's been so long since I used these strings that I forgot how rough they are! I know there will be a lot of people who think I should just man the f**k up but I don't think they'll be staying on for too long. Might get some nice soft Nickels on, or maybe some barbed wire... I know the old issue of Rotosounds has been bashed about so many times already, so the question is - What is most important in a string - feel or tone? Going by recent sets I've tried I'm really liking Sunbeams at the moment for their feel, and Fender NPS feel and sound really nice to me to, so I'd be more inclined to say feel over tone - though both are important parts of the whole. Thoughts below:

I never make mistakes, however I am prone to a little real-time-on-the-fly-improvised-artistic-interpretation

Tesco?! Pfft!! I only buy my basses from Harrods

[quote name='iiipopes' timestamp='1353802261' post='1878673'] The reason veneer strips the same thickness as the fret tang are used is for structural stability. There are those luthiers who, going the other way, actually cut their fret slots narrow so when all the frets are seated there is some natural backbow, taking stress off the truss rod. Without the veneer inserts in the fret tang slots, your neck is at risk of folding up like a pretzel, in spite of a good truss rod. [/quote] Really? I didn't think that the depth of the fret slots would be sufficient enough to make a real difference.

Greetings fellow Low-End Lotharios! Having pulled the frets out of my cheapo Shine 5 string today, just wondering from your guys' experience what would be the best way fill (or otherwise) the gaps where the frets once were. According to the Fender Bass Manual you should use veneer strips, but could you just use wood filler? I could follow APA's method of applying a thin layer on top of the fingerboard, but this bass has funky planet inlays and I'd like to keep them on display if possible. What do we reckon? Joe

There is a friend of mine playing bass in a local garagey rock band and IMO his fretless sounds better in the mix than his fretted basses. Not saying this is necessarily the case for everyone though. I don't think instruments of any kind should be confined to specific genres as a rule - they are all musical instruments, so you can use any them to make music. Simples

Liking the demonic eyes in my photo by the way!

Great stuff today guys! Very informative session from Jo, and it was great to meet everyone and try out some interesting gear - I was most impressed by the Sandbergs! I do think that I should have brought my Precision along to try and even the numbers though! Thanks for organising it guys, hopefully we'll have another meet in the not-to-distant future!

An interesting conversation that I had at an open mic last week... According to the chap I was speaking to, you are more likely to blow a speaker by using an under-powered amp than by using an over-powered amp. I guess in the context of power ratings - whereby, say, a 1200w amp could happily power a 600w speaker at a reasonable volume whereas if the values are reversed, the amp tops out and sends a heavily clipped signal which causes the speaker to fail. I'll point out now that I do not know a great deal about the mechanics of speakers and PA systems. I know some basic principles, but don't know much about crossing/loading etc. and I guess the impedance rating of the speakers would play a part as well. I can see the logic - a speaker emitting a squared wave pattern will be moving more violently than one which is producing a sine wave. Thoughts anyone? Joe