MiltyG565

[quote name='throwoff' timestamp='1429286357' post='2750083']
Nothing in the instrument makes a single bit of difference to the tone other than pickups and electronics.
[/quote]

Largely, yes. But other components do contribute a small amount to the overall tone. But it's not like you'd change the frets and play a gig and have a regular come up and say "What have you done to your bass since the last time, it sounds incredible!", but it likely has made some small difference to tone.

But for the exclusion of doubt - sustain and tone aren't the same thing.

[quote name='Raggy' timestamp='1429264492' post='2749767']
I like them and fit them to most of my P basses, I play like a thug and they are much stronger than a BBOT, but do not feel they improve tone or sustain (whatever sustain is )
[/quote]

But they do improve sustain.

[quote name='3below' timestamp='1429205568' post='2749266']
Time for the 'sustainer changer' bridge, lever adjustable either way
[/quote]

Ha! Like on lawnmowers, with the rabbit at one end and the tortoise at the other!

[quote name='Funky Dunky' timestamp='1429206394' post='2749279']
Thanks guys, I am using the nickel Dunlops as I want minimal handling noise and minimal fret damage. I had looked at the ProSteels and was interested. How are they for handling noise?

My technique is fairly light on both hands, but I like a little leeway to dig in on occasions without flap/ping that light strings often produce. My concern about movig up a gauge was how quickly my hands would fatigue.
[/quote]

Perhaps you should look at it as more of an opportunity to improve your hand strength and speed. If you can play a heavy string competently, you have gained a new skill and expanded your abilities

Not sure how the ProSteels compare to the Dunlops for "handling noise". Being a bright string, you can get a few more clanks and screeches out of them, but I've never found it excessing or bothersome. YMMV, I guess.

[quote name='3below' timestamp='1429204592' post='2749249']
Many is the time when I would have liked a sustain reducing bridge, I have even tried rubber shim in neck pocket to achieve this effect - did not make much difference. Was back to the good old sponge under the strings method.
[/quote]

Reducing sustain is much easier than increasing it. There are times when I've been crying out for sustain on slower songs.

[quote name='HowieBass' timestamp='1429203118' post='2749223']
My thinking on this is that you want to keep as much of the string vibration stuck inside the strings for as long as possible if sustain is important to you - transmission of energy beyond the fixed ends of a vibrating string, at the nut into the headstock, and at the bridge saddles into the body are, from a physics point of view, just dumping energy into heatsinks. Effectively both nut and bridge should act as mirrors. Bridge rigidity is more important in this context than sheer mass. I also believe that neck rigidity has a big part to play in sustain. Again, all in my humble opinion.
[/quote]

I absolutely agree. I've never given credence to a bridge's ability to increase sustain based on it's mass. The Babicz FCH ones are good because you tighten the saddles down which gets rid of a lot of the losses associated with the BBOT bridges.

[quote name='juliusmonk' timestamp='1429172877' post='2748681']
D'addarios last longer as well. Elixirs much longer, but they start with a little less zing when fresh
[/quote]

Many people don't like the "zing" of fresh strings. D'Addario and Elixirs both do have some zing when fresh (which I personally love), but they hold they tone very evenly over a longer period of time than some other brands.

A friend of mine put one on his Fender Aerodyne Jazz. Tonally different? Not really (from what I recall), but it did increase the sustain a great deal.

The thing is that on the standard Fender hardware, they have very small contact points, which are just the bottom of the alan-headed screws for adjusting the saddle. When you play a note, it's purely a vibration. Losses mean that a vibration won't sustain for as long. Of course, there will always be losses (because physics), but the easiest way to minimise losses on a bass is to have a bridge with less "play" in it. The BBOT bridges have a lot of play in them.

[quote name='Funky Dunky' timestamp='1429174875' post='2748706']
I could use help with this because I currently use Dunlop Super Brights .45-.105 but they are balanced tension and I find I could do with a bit more resistance as they're a little bit flappy. They don't do a heavier gauge, so I'm wondering if the best bet is just to get the same gauge from a different manufacturer which aren't balanced tension? Price is a massive factor too unfortunately, and while I'd love to try a set of DR, Elixir or Thomastik, I ain't shelling out that kind of dough for four lengths of wire. I saw GHS Boomers at a reasonable price but was a little put off by a reviewer who said he hated the feel of them.

As someone said in another thread, strings are a "minefield" and it could take years of trial and error to find the perfect strings for me. Would be a lot less painful if they weren't so darned expensive, but at roughly £20 for a cheapish set, it"s not something you can experiment with over a few weeks.
[/quote]

HowieBass has the right idea in suggesting that you get a set of D'Addario ProSteels - Very bright, good clarity, lovely rounded tone, they last reasonably long. They do feel a bit different to the Nickel Wound strings. They feel slightly more coarse, I suppose, but they are a very well made/finished string. The coarser feel has never really bothered me a great deal. I find Nickel Strings often a bit too "slippy".

[quote name='HowieBass' timestamp='1429178753' post='2748747']
You don't say whether you're using steel or nickel Dunlops (I believe they do both in the Super Bright range). D'Addario do 50 - 110 sets in both steel and nickel; in fact the EXL230 nickels look to be a bit of a bargain on Amazon at the moment at only £13.99 with free P&P [url="http://www.amazon.co.uk/DAddario-EXL230-050-110-Electric-Strings/dp/B000OR8BP0"]http://www.amazon.co...s/dp/B000OR8BP0[/url] (in fact I'm tempted to get a spare set in myself) and the EPS230 steels are £17.99 with free P&P from Strings Direct [url="http://www.stringsdirect.co.uk/strings-c1/daddario-daddario-4-string-eps230-prosteel-stainless-steel-55-110-long-scale-heavy-bass-strings-p1201"]http://www.stringsdi...s-strings-p1201[/url]

HTH
[/quote]

I'm not allowed to advertise on here, but suffice it to say that there is another online string retailer which sells EPS230 for less than £17.99 and includes free delivery.

Yes, it's a muscle...

[quote name='kristinaelias' timestamp='1428699581' post='2743981']
Happy to report that the answer is Rotosound RS77s 40-90s!
[/quote]

Good stuff!

[quote name='Mornats' timestamp='1426349892' post='2717227']
I have guitar leads, mic leads and headphones hanging around in a pile underneath my midi keyboard. They look like they're involved in some mass mating ritual and are all wrapped around each other. It's no better when I take more than one cable out to a gig or practice.

Anyone have any tips on both storing half a dozen cables and transporting a few without them getting deeply involved with each other? I had a look on Thomann for cable bags but such a thing does seem to exist.
[/quote]

D'Addario cable ties - http://www.daddario.com/pwProductDetail.Page?ActiveID=4115&productid=25&sid=f481b79b-4fb4-4127-8c38-a0986f6a7789

Then just throw them into a box. They shouldn't get tangled

[quote name='throwoff' timestamp='1428499223' post='2741834']
We had a thread like this years back, it is surprising how many BC'ers know off by heart what brands have what silks.
[/quote]

I can usually identify a string by how it's wound at the ball end. Each brand has its own distinctive look... unless it's a white-label product, then they all look the same.

The silk colour, IMO, really doesn't help, as so many have used different colours over the years, and currently many use the same colour, as we know from these threads cropping up every so often, there's normally 3 or 4 suggestions based on colour.

[quote name='kristinaelias' timestamp='1425406956' post='2707036']
Hi folks,
I bought my lovely Longhorn with flatwounds already fitted, but I don't know which brand they are. I've ruled out d'Addarios as the ball ends are brass and the silks are too pale, & I think Rotosounds have red silks.
So sky blue silks both ends, short scale, 48-98, & brass ball ends, guesses please!
[/quote]

At the bridge end, it looks very like a Rotosound string, but at the headstock, it looks more like GHS or possibly Warwick.

Unfortunately, the silk colour confuses more than it helps, really. So many strings use different colours at different times, so when doing an image search, it's hard to tell whether the image is contemporaneous, or just an old image of a previous manufacture method of the same string.

But Rotosound, GHS, and potentially Warwick, are the 3 companies I would look into. My money would be on GHS TBH. I think their pressure wounds have a blue silk on them.

[quote name='NoRhino' timestamp='1426013640' post='2713467']
My strings of choice - or habit - are 45 - 105 on a P bass.

What will be the most noticeable difference in changing to a heavier gauge?
[/quote]

The biggest difference is likely to be in the feel of the string. The next biggest thing will be the tone, which might not be massively different (assuming it's just a heavier gauge set of the string you already use), but there will be a perceptible increase on your bass end.

If you're changing brand, all bets are off, though.

[quote name='chrismuzz' timestamp='1427383382' post='2729715']
I'm actually gonna give that a go!
[/quote]

Go for it It looks like a good job! If I was more of an amp/electronics man, I'd be applying too.

Just to let all here know - Barnes and Mullins, Peavey's new UK Distributor, are looking to hire somebody as a National Sales Manager for the Peavey range.

http://www.mi-pro.co.uk/jobs/read/national-sales-manager-peavey-uk/0400

[quote name='gelfin' timestamp='1427207919' post='2727165']
Many good suggestions above.

This is my way of being certain that the hanger will be secure with no damage to the plasterboard.

[url="http://s970.photobucket.com/user/gelfin5959/media/Wall%20hanger_zpsbcycgtfr.jpg.html"][/url]
[/quote]

Option B is probably the easiest solution, and therefore the best. I hadn't even considered using spacers!

Don't screw too tight if you're going into the masonry. The pull from the screws could crack your plasterboard. Equally a concern with weight-loading IMO.

[quote name='Iain' timestamp='1427026307' post='2724782']
Worth noting that the article is from 2010 and I'm fairly certain there was some fuss recently over a recent set of changes to their agreements that gave tehm more control over what you do with content posted to YT and who can make money from it.
[/quote]

True. They wanted musicians and artists to sign agreements that YouTube would be either the first host of their music, or at least on there are the same time as their music is released to the public, and there was also some stuff in it about how YouTube could use their music, and how they could make money from it.

But, I'm not surprised. I never use YouTube for listening to music (it's a video sharing site, and the audio quality is nothing to pee your pants about), but it is apparently one of the largest sectors of the website, and accounts for a massive amount of traffic and content. YouTube still isn't a money-maker for Google, so I suppose it's inevitable that they'll try to further push money-making policies and agreements onto the people who create content for the website (or to give them their w***y corporate name which strips them of any artistic or expressive merit - content creators).

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1427020737' post='2724690']
An arranger is never the owner of the song. That's why they get paid a fee and not royalties.

But I thought it was OK to steal peoples songs these days, in our online world. YouTube is built on people taking songs without permission.

Ironic that someone who nicked the songs in the first place is complaining that what he's nicked has been nicked from him.
[/quote]

It's very hard to use songs that aren't your own on Youtube. They blocked one of my videos when I used a song from McNach's band, Sea Bass Kid. Unfortunately, Sea Bass Kid aren't one of these globe-trotting mega-bands with millions of album sales, so I was quite surprised to find that their work was picked up on by the fraud filter.

And I had asked for permission before using it anyway, so they had no need to block it.

[quote name='ambient' timestamp='1426887805' post='2723259']
Surely all the copyrights belong to the original composer/songwriter ?
[/quote]

Do they, though?

I'm subscribed on Youtube to this guy that does 8-bit remixes of popular songs, and today he has uploaded this video explaining how the BBC used his version of Get Lucky without permission or even a request for permission.

The question that springs to my mind is - Does the BBC need permission for this? I do hope that a big corporation like the BBC, with possibly the most experience in the world in "clearing", would have correctly assessed whether they needed to seek permission for the use of this song, but perhaps I'm being naive.

IIRC, the BBC has long-standing agreements with a lot of big record labels so that they can use their music with permission implicit.

Video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6N6hx-JtoSA

[quote name='leschirons' timestamp='1425568178' post='2708692']
So, now I can't decide whether this thread is about Newbiephobia or doughnuts. Doh!
[/quote]

Why not about both?

I hate them there newbies. They never bring donuts!