peteb

Triple post!

Double post

I'm not sure if this is addressed to me, but if so... First of all, I've used a SVT3 a few times, but never actually owned one. I've used a SVT4 more often, as that is the standard hire-in house rig for most of the bigger multi-band festival gigs that I do from time to time. I believe that they have a similar EQ section and I have owned the Mesa Boogie equivalent for many years. I always have the gain just at the point where it starts to break up, usually at about one o'clock. This thickens the sound out with it just having a slight hint of overdrive, but not distorted. If you want to put more hair on the note then turn the gain up, or turn it down if you want a sweeter, more transparent top end. Then you set the master to determine the volume. Of course, there are some (mainly guitar) players who will do it the other way round, especially guitarists who want to get a SRV type sound...! Starting with all the tone controls to the left is just drastically cutting the volume of those frequency points (by 15db on the Boogie). I would suggest everything at 12 o'clock (flat) to start, although personally I will generally slightly boost the lo-mids and slightly notch the hi-mids. Remember that you want to hear the full range of the instrument and that a little goes a long way when boosting or cutting frequencies. it is possible to very quickly go beyond the realm of a balanced musical tone and blow holes in your sound if you excessively cut or boost frequencies.

Is that in the manual? That is certainly not how I have ever used an Ampeg or similar amp.

I've put electrical fault (once a battery and a couple of wiring / jack issues), but I have broken a string once (maybe twice). Over 45 years gigging, I've only needed a spare on four or five occasions - but it always seems to happen on big or important gigs! I take a spare whenever its feasible...

I thought that a Harley was the bike that guys get when they get to our age...!

I used to share a house with JV's son for a few years, back in the 90s . He was a fine bass player in his day.

To be fair, I am talking about gigs in the late 90s / early 00s. The biker crowd seems to have aged like everyone else. While there are some younger guys around to replace the older ones, certainly not enough to keep the numbers up to the same level.

I've played a few biker festivals where ladies tops suddenly seemed to be inadequate for their intended purpose, although I'm pretty sure that the reason for this was quite deliberate...!

Great little theatre in Wimborne, with the added benefit that the average age of the audience when we played there in February made the band feel young (and we're no spring chickens)! Good to see @King Tut playing bass in a band with my old housemate's dad...!

You do know that there is a knob on the right hand side that lets you control how loud they are? The volume was fine for an outdoor stage, but the eight speakers working together in one box just make them sound really thick and solid. As I said, great fun to play through...

Not sure where you're going with this mate. A SVT4 and an 810 is pretty much the standard house rig you get at most festival type gigs.

Very much this. I don't use MB for gigs these days, but I've had a couple of combos in the past and they always worked just fine live.

We were lucky enough to headline the John Bonham 75th birthday memorial event in his hometown of Redditch last night. There was a great crowd and a really good set of bands playing, not to mention that I got to play through the usual hire-in rig of a SVT4 & fridge, which I don't get to do too often these days. All great fun...

Just played the John Bonham memorial event last night. There was the usual hire-in rig of a SVT4 & fridge. I generally don't cart a rack and an 810 around these days, but you forget how much fun they are and great they sound...

But do you think that punters can't see through that one?? I did a gig yesterday with a few bands on the bill (a John Bonham memorial in his home town). One of the support bands were a bluesy type act, but a bit different with loads of BVs, and there were definitely a lot of cowboy hats on stage! But they got away with it because: a) they were very good, and b) they looked pretty cool anyway and didn't really need to hats to cover any barnet deficiencies! The exception to the last point was the singer, who was an older gent who had a fake ponytail attached to his cowboy hat. However he owned this by keeping doffing his hat (including ponytail) to one and all, and generally not caring that he was a little follically challenged. The main thing was that they pulled it off as it was all part of their image and that they were really good...

I don't see the reason for this aversion to hats comes from - if you think that you look cool in a hat, then wear one... The problem is that people who look good wearing hats are, generally, the same people who look cool without a hat...!

I would have thought that the most notable example of a guy who only uses downstrokes is Cliff Williams of AC/DC, who has got it down to a fine art...!

It seems that MK's brother is no slouch as a bass player...

1966 Precision on eBay for £8k - looks great, but if anything, a little too perfect for its age... https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/225503035266?_trkparms=amclksrc%3DITM%26aid%3D1110013%26algo%3DHOMESPLICE.SIMRXI%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D249160%26meid%3Da8d3f388519c400e92751bc7eb7c52f1%26pid%3D101196%26rk%3D4%26rkt%3D4%26sd%3D285293132600%26itm%3D225503035266%26pmt%3D1%26noa%3D0%26pg%3D2047675%26algv%3DPromotedRVI%26brand%3DFender&_trksid=p2047675.c101196.m2219&amdata=cksum%3A225503035266a8d3f388519c400e92751bc7eb7c52f1|enc%3AAQAIAAAA8BFMeJ9vNoeV5R6diewUBS1xpEetK6xNI5xYg%2BwrzQBg%2FEveImGFYjHgcWxBv2QULo19cjlrd4Oehz4PLatGfdw%2BwpMLc36I7Y48bQC0vT%2BglFa5UpxKwoECp2Osa0OmzppYmrxliCEPKEiqdO%2B4zSrrqrv1%2FIbd80T3qUajVOJeaxotxYmPCtgZQc6uDtor%2FqnTQpqwPbR6ru0wOsC%2Fu2L5dTcVLoej9SoRVpSaDe8eUkeca6%2BPW%2BwU37Xowk%2BB7Y4UmJxLEOHFj%2B0p1I2Rnu6E1z6CASZPzateG%2BBjSGDm9dvd3nbVNNzI9qrReD2t2w%3D%3D|ampid%3APL_CLK|clp%3A2047675

I saw them playing at a bike rally about ten years or so ago. Completely different band apart from the aforementioned Rocky Shades on vocals. Much better band (i.e. they could play), but still unmistakably Wrathchild, for better or worse...

I once did a gig supporting Wrathchild in a packed out rock club in Birmingham in the 80s. We did our set and went down really well and were in the dressing room getting changed and having a beer when our sound engineer came in saying, 'you've got to see this'. We went out front to see that the area in front of the stage had cleared and the bass player had a cut above his eye where someone had thrown a glass or whatever at him, although he carried on playing like a trooper. There were a couple of guys on the edge of the dancefloor still shouting abuse at the band. It got to a point in the show where the guitar player did (what we shall call for the sake of argument) a guitar solo and Rocky Shades (the WC lead vocalist) hopped off the stage, sauntered across the dancefloor to these guys, decked one of them with a single punch and jumped back on stage to carry on throwing shapes and 'singing'! It turns out that he was a karate black belt, a lot tougher than he looked and really not someone to upset or throw a glass at one of his mates...!

Going way off topic, but I know a guy whose dad played bass on Kung Foo Fighting...! He was a session player and been on a date playing in the brass section. After the session had finished, the producer said he had another track if they wanted to get paid double. However, the bass player had to get off as he had a date or something, so Frank said 'I play bass' and consequently ended up playing on a pop-funk track with no vocals, lyrics, etc. The next time he heard it, it had been released as a single complete with vocals and went on to be an iconic hit...

Yea, but you don't know him as well as the OP... 🙂

To be fair, there's an interview out there with a post fame Eddie Clarke and Phil Taylor, where they said pretty much the same thing about Motorhead...!