thisnameistaken

I've never deliberately copied anyone. When I was 18 I'd ended up with a lot of Jaco's trademark sound from listening to him too much, but apart from that I don't think I've ever sounded much like one particular player. I think the biggest influence on me were the disco, punk, 2Tone, post-punk, "new romantic", electro, old-school hip-hop and acid-jazz bands. All stuff from before I actually picked up a bass.

TBH I think the setup and the strings are the main thing - get those right and most basses will sound good. Of course, like any acoustic instrument, when you spend more money you can hear what you're paying for and I can totally understand why a great bassist (or intermediate / aspiring great bassist) would want a beautifully voiced carved bass. But for me, I would be doing it a disservice, and doing it a fair amount of damage in the mean time. It's best that I have a used ply bass that's already had the finish scraped off on every bout. The sound is still impressive to me - I don't really know any better.

[quote name='fxpedal.co.uk' post='852135' date='May 30 2010, 09:13 PM']For the money, the Bad Monkey works extremely well on bass. Yes, it can be improved by modding, but it's still a good pedal in its standard tune.[/quote] +1. I had one last year, it was dirt cheap and really good. AFAIK it's just a Tubescreamer clone but it is cheap and it works great on bass, definitely a good first choice for dipping your toe into using overdrive. I only sold mine because I literally never used overdrive, then a couple of nights ago I could've really used it for a new song and I think I'll be buying another one. You can buy a pedal for just one song when they're thirty quid.

The L-2000 has excellent electronics. Visually they're pretty uninspiring (unless you like boring-looking basses) and they feel like P basses (which is why I don't have one), but there are so many sounds available, if you liked it you probably wouldn't need another solid-body bass.

I'm a self-starter and work well as part of a team. Motivated and proactive, good interpersonal skills, glass is half-full, PMA, GSOH, like dancing, long walks, nights in, don't smoke, drink socially, would like to meet similar but with knockers of beach ball proportions, preferably mute.

I'm certainly no expert, but... [quote name='fatback' post='870349' date='Jun 17 2010, 11:00 PM']Steevedie reckons slap and piz can be ok on the same bass, so that's one doubt laid to rest, although I imagine that the higher tension of the jazz setup would make for some painful slapping?.[/quote] I've got hybrid strings ('orchestral' or so they say) on my bass which to me feel fairly stiff, they sound good bowed and plucked but I don't like the slap sound. My guitarist slaps it more than I do and he gets by but it doesn't sound great and he runs out of stamina pretty quickly with these strings. [quote name='fatback' post='870349' date='Jun 17 2010, 11:00 PM']What about humidity and carved basses? And the business of suitability for outdoor playing / busking? I'd probably prefer to trade off quality a bit in exchange for less worry and hassle.[/quote] I bought a ply bass because I decided it would be a fair while before I'd be making any beautiful noises with a double bass, and I was intending to use it for busking and playing old soul/rocksteady tunes more than jazz or whatever. So I thought if it sounds fairly good and I'm not going to wince every time I crack it on a door jamb or scrape it on a flag stone then that's what I need. Humidity is less of an issue for ply basses apparently. Carved basses - from what I've heard - can and do crack with heartbreaking regularity, especially if they aren't kept moist enough. But it's the bass drying out that is the biggest worry - winter is when the damage happens.

I've never got on with them, the necks feel too chunky to me and they tend to have quite obvious dead spots. Keep meaning to try a Sterling but I've still never even seen one.

It depends what you're going for, there are a lot of different synth sounds. Yes octavers and fuzzes are useful, blending two (or more) channels to stack octaves is also useful, pitch-tracking oscillators (square wave esp.) are nice to have but tend to cause technical problems. Don't forget modulation effects - adding a chorus or vibrato or a stepped filter can make a big difference. Using fretless bass can give you a lot of freedom to ape synth players too. Filters, generally, are very important. The more the merrier (unless you have a good programmable one [or two]).

I didn't like Jaco's Cliff Huxtable period.

[quote name='teej' post='847882' date='May 25 2010, 08:23 PM']Red Jackson in Brighton...[/quote] Very cool, that little nipper is in the zone! I still haven't managed to get any busking done with my upright (work has gone mental and I am snowed under - typical it happens when the weather is nice!), we've got about 45 minutes of material waiting to go.

Translucent teal finish, flamed maple top, gold hardware, it's got pretty much everything a rich middle-aged guitar buyer could wish for.

It definitely needs some mid boost before it sounds "flat" to me, there's a scoop to it with everything set on 5. But then I'm mostly plugging a Thumb bass into mine so I'm not short of mids to begin with, and when I plug in the Jazz I'm usually shooting for a more vintage sound so I'm rarely chasing mids. Fecking loud though aren't they?

Nice one. Don't take any sh*t from Bon Jovi he can be a real dick.

Yeah it does seem difficult to get good advice about strings. I hear what you're saying about focusing on playing but I feel like I've got a problem with the strings on the bass that is actually making playing more difficult for me (the intonation issue) so I don't think this can be classed as gear-head behaviour. Not that I buy/sell a lot of gear anyway.

[quote name='clauster' post='861047' date='Jun 8 2010, 02:38 PM']I'd be willing to lend it if asked nicely, but no-one ever has. More often than not, someone else on the bill will see what I've got and offer to let me use their rig instead [/quote] I sometimes get this when I turn up with my little Schroeder cab, often a charitable bassist will offer the use of his 410 but I always decline because I much prefer the sound of my Schroeder for backline. Last gig we played all the other bands were using an Ashdown 810, I put my wee Schroeder infront of it for our set which made it look even smaller. One plus is that it suggests to all the bands and gig-goers around here that I must have an impossibly large penis.

[quote name='urbanx' post='860994' date='Jun 8 2010, 01:59 PM']I realise this situation will come up time and time again. And I will be put in the awkward position (again) of "If they can't use your amp, no other bands can play".[/quote] Tell them to call up their local rehearsal room and see if they can loan gear from them. You are not a gear hire company, nor did you tell anyone you were a gear hire company, tell them to get ****ed. [quote name='urbanx' post='860994' date='Jun 8 2010, 01:59 PM']It's got to me so much, I have gone out and bought another amp, one which I am willing to lend out. So I can keep my rig for myself, [i]and [/i]provide a combi for anyone that needs to borrow.[/quote] Dude that is wrong, you shouldn't be taking gear specifically for other people.

I bought a double bass and grew muscles for precisely this kind of scenario. And I still want more volume... Acoustic bass guitars simply don't produce enough bass in my experience, they just sound like folk guitars tuned lower. Maybe a [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guitarr%C3%B3n_mexicano"]guitarron[/url] might be worth a look!

The pups make that jazz!

I imagine the Bass Micro Synth would be the closest you'll get with a cheap FX unit. Crank the first two voice sliders, turn the others off, trigger off, find the sweet spot on the Stop slider and that's about the best you'll manage. I don't think there's an envelope effect on there but there's definitely a bandy-sounding filter in the verses and an analogue octaver, so the BMS is a fairly good choice for it.

If I'm on a bill with bands I know and trust, they can use my gear. If it's bands I don't know or don't trust, they can't. Unless I decide I can trust them, in which case they can. If it comes down to it they can always play without backline can't they? It's not like anyone is going to have to pull out. And ultimately that's what you're going to get if you take on a gig that you can't get your amp to, and you look like an untrustworthy person. Realistically: Usually if a band directly asks me if they can borrow my gear I say sure, show them around, explain what I'd rather they didn't do, etc., and it's all fine. If a "promoter" (trans. c*** who takes money from bands in return for nothing) asks, I say no, you can't take a risk on my gear in return for nothing. Give me a deposit for the value of my gear and you can do what you want with it.

[quote name='ahpook' post='858956' date='Jun 6 2010, 03:44 PM']i've got a pearl octaver and i reckon, with care, it'll track to the A on the E-string...but it starting to struggle. it doesn't 'hunt' for the first octave at that point....it's just starting to find it hard to replicate the note and sounds slightly detuned.[/quote] This is what I mean - with careful playing any quality analogue octaver will achieve this performance, so it's really about what sound you want. If you've never had an analogue octaver before then the MXR Bass Octave Deluxe is worth trying because it has a couple of tonal options. Personally I stuck with the Boss OC-2 because I like its '80s sound and never found anything that tracked any better. Oh and, top tracking tip: Try flatwounds. Night and day difference, no joke.