uk_lefty

I like how they've avoided the (IMO) ugly pickguard you usually see on five string Stingrays. Lovely!

Must have been a bad one I tried a while back. This is just quality all over. I've had Japanese Fenders and a Mexican Fender before, they're way behind this. My measure for quality is my Stingray which is from 2018, this Fender might even be ahead of that. I wasn't sure about the colour but decided to just go for it. I haven't had more than five minutes with it plugged in but I have spent a long time just playing it unplugged. Band practice tomorrow evening will be the first proper outing. The guitarist has already said he will cry if I bring it in a soft case!

Loving the colour and the feel. Really impressed with this. I tried one in a shop ages ago and wasn't impressed but the feel of the neck, tuners and the overall quality of finish has really impressed me so far. Once the kids are asleep will get it through the amp!

I'm the same! But I don't think I've got hearing damage, I've had tests done and my hearing is fine... In my case I'm investigating whether it's some other condition to do with how my brain interprets and reacts to things...

Be warned... They only find you a price with a courier, if anything goes wrong you are completely on your own. Eurosender don't give a sh!t, their terms and conditions basically say "cry me a river, sucker!" and the courier finds it difficult to help you because they don't know you from Adam, their contract is with Eurosender, who won't do sh!t to help.

The evolution continues... Off went the Fender Downtown Express. I needed a compressor and this just didn't work for me. I was ok with the EQ and distortion, it was a good pedal but I found myself mainly using it for the mute. I wanted to have something at the front of my chain so added a Behringer clone of the Boss LMB-3. I'm using this as a limiter to try and even out the volume spikes, it's a pain when we are running our own PA. I also knew that getting rid of the Fender DTE meant I could do with a distortion. I got the Marshall Guvnor 2, it can do everything from just a volume boost to cranking the gain all the way for a guitar like overdrive, think the lead guitar intro to Paranoid. This will be really useful for me. Then I knew I wanted a DI as a safety net in case I have amp issues. I bought a Behringer BDI21 and thought it was awful. It was noisy but even if it wasn't I couldn't stand the sound. I got an MXR M80, I had no time to test it, my first use was Friday nights gig! It held up very well. All these new pedals means more power needed. I could daisy chain off the wireless but I wanted isolated power, so my caline power pack is now mounted under the board and on the board I have a Donner power pack with a ton of free slots. This board is almost overkill, there's some gigs where I won't use the wah pedal or Octave, and the Reverb is used very sparingly unless I'm on fretless, which is rare on gigs. However, I'm happy I've got most sounds I could ever want covered adequately and can upgrade some of the cheaper pedals and bits over time if I see the benefit.

I felt the same, and at home it does definitely take some of the oomph out of the sound. Live, though, I appreciated it on Friday. The interesting thing will be when playing a venue with an in-house PA. I had a good chat with a sound guy at one of the venues we play regularly and he's an ex bassist. This was before I got the limiter and started using the amp compressor. His view was that he puts a bit of compression on the signal at the PA end but he prefers me to be un-compressed so that the playing dynamics come through. I suppose that's ok if you've got someone attending the desk and they can preserve dynamics but manage volume so you're not overpowering the other instruments, but when we run our own PA it can be trial and error, song by song, when playing a new venue where we don't have settings saved.

I've got the HB fretless jazz. It's very good, excellent value, I have gigged it and will again. All components could be made 10% better but I don't see the need to fit a preamp when a preamp pedal can do you the same job. If you want an active fretless there's the Site V7 which does look very nice with the coated fretboard and the pre is fantastic.

Various ways to do this... EQ pedal or a preamp pedal could be used, then you can take out any boominess if it's an issue. I had an Ashdown boost pedal before that did the job, there's plenty of alternatives too and they aren't expensive. Distortion and overdrive pedals with an EQ section could work too: I recently got a Marshall Guvnor guitar pedal that has a decent EQ as well as gain and volume controls, I press on that for passages where the bass needs to be more prominent and can have it clean or driven like a 70s guitar. I need this for things like the bass only part of the Hives 'Hate to Say I Told You So' and playing the intro on my own for the dreaded 7 Nation Army (or as I call it, Fisher Price's My First Bassline)

Used the compressor on mine this weekend.... I generally didn't like the Ashdown ABM onboard compressor for home practice but on gigs where we are supplying our own PA I need to have much more control of the dynamics. Last gig with our own PA my tendency to change from fingers to pick caused big volume spikes despite me rolling down the bass' onboard volume control. To combat this I did some effects changes and put a limiter at the start of my effects chain and now added the ABM compression always on at 9 o'clock. I got a rounder and softer sound than I usually do but the dynamics felt far, far smoother. The guitarist uses IEMs and it's the first time since going to in-ears that he's commented on my bass sound except to say "too quiet" or "too loud"; he said that the clarity across lows mids and highs was great and even the clank of the strings and pick attack was all nicely clear without any harshness, I'm very pleased with that. I EQ'd more low mid in and rolled down the bass rotary too. Overall I was pleased with the sound and will stick with this going forward. Next gig we will have in house soundman and PA so will have a chat... It's interesting what various sound persons have to say about your sound and setup, and the one I speak to most is a former bass player!

I had one for ages and used the recommended settings in the manual: enhance for fretless and limiter for fretted. I recently had issues with big changes in volume when running our own PA and switching from fingers to pick. I don't get on with a lot of compressors, they can often make your bass sound like you're hitting a mattress with a mallet, but for me the LMB-3 just adds that little bit of control. I bought the Behringer clone to have at the front of my pedal board and used the Boss recommended settings, it worked really well last night for evening out the dynamics.

A bit of a longshot.... Has anyone got one of these? Have been looking out for one for a long time, half heartedly at least. Would be interested to know anyone's experiences. I missed out on one a few years back and am still kicking myself.

I would prefer to spend the day listening to Physical Presence than watching the product of centuries of inbreeding stumble into an unearned position of ceremonial authority. Also, Mark King would be far more entertaining.

Simple solution: get a luthier to put flats on it for you. Then faffing with the stock bridge is someone else's problem, the bass gets new strings and a set up and you don't have the frustration. Using flats = strings for life. Simples, as the Meerkat once said. *I'm sort of joking, but also not.

I'll gig mine on Friday night and get some high gain distortion (Marshall Guvnor, sounds like a 70s lead guitar type overdrive) in a rock club, so it will be loud but controlled volume... I'll "feedback" to you on it later

If you have some face melting distortion going through it in a cramped rehearsal room it can feedback. I've not had feedback problems with mine on gigs because I don't have my stage amp at huge volumes and don't put high gain distortion on. I do use it with fuzz but if you're controlling volumes and distances to the amp then you're fine. The JC is a superb gigging bass. Nice and light, lovely feel and you know what you're getting from it sound-wise. It can sound muddy on some settings but with flats on mine is nice, big, thick, old-school bassy, such a solid tone that I don't bother using effects on some tracks just because I'm enjoying the raw bass tone so much.

Don't know if it's still relevant but I noticed a Boss GT10-B for sale on here last week at a steal of a price. It's a great unit if you get the software that some bloke in the US made to manage it. While it's a big b*gger by today's standards the sounds are excellent and plentiful. I have no affiliation to the seller, I just think they sound great.

Regardless of the noise, I didn't like the sound it was supposed to make! I'm going to turn off notifications from this post now.

Yes. And it was plugged in to an isolated power supply. It's all irrelevant now anyway. Even without the noise I didn't like the sound.

I've returned it and got a refund. For me, it sounded awful and introduced noise to my signal chain. Appreciate for others it's a great pedal, but I also can't stand Orange bass amps etc. Whereas other people can get phenomenal sounds from them... Each to their own. I've got an MXR M80 on the way so will see if that gives me what I'm looking for.

Some people swear by it.. I was a bit wary because I don't really like the Sansamp sound anyway.... But I'll get this returned. I managed to sell off some stuff and make enough to buy an MXR preamp that has a distortion and noise gate as well as XLR out so will see if that does anything for me... Failing that I'll go for the £11 passive DI!

I downloaded it for free. It involved getting my laptop out and going on the website, then I found a whole pile of pretty decent presets made by other users. I agree it's pretty hard to work out what you get for free Vs what needs paying for. Changing effects via the app is really limited, but I've downloaded presets that have other effects somehow... I guess if I spent time on it I could work it out but as it's my practice amp for occasional home use I just don't have time. Because I'm an absolutely awful six string guitar player I find it more than adequate for my electric guitar needs.

I got the BDI21 for £35 but so far I don't think it's usable. I could keep it for emergencies but even then it's noisy and for me doesn't sound very good. I'd rather have something else that if I need to use it I'll be happy with.

I was scrolling through Facebook and thought "that's a nice Sandberg..." Then I saw this thread. And that they do them in left handed. And I want a 4 string jazz at the moment, if that's slightly "better" than the JB fretless jazz I just bought it will be a bargain at £265...

Does anyone here carry around a passive DI box instead of using a dedicated preamp/ DI pedal? I don't really have use for a dedicated preamp/ DI pedal but having that safety net of an option to DI off the board is comforting in case my amp packs in. Which has never happened, but I don't want to tempt fate. Just trying to weigh up pros and cons before parting with cash. I did just buy a Behringer BDI21 but I'm not exactly impressed with it. I thought I'd have it on my board as a drive/ boost but so far I think it might just be best staying in the gig bag as a cheap backup for emergencies... I'd just rather have something useful.