thepurpleblob

I played Xylophone in the Royal Albert Hall about 20 years ago. There's not much call for it. I play bass now

[quote name='Barking Spiders' timestamp='1508834766' post='3394649']
Yeah and I'm also perplexed why anyone in the online world is surprised that women can be as good as men on bass, drums, electric guitar whatever. After all no one is surprised to see female virtuosos on piano, violin, cello etc
[/quote]

I don't think anybody is surprised. There's no shortage of incredibly accomplished female bass players (slap or otherwise). However, it is still a male dominated sport. Which I don't think is a good thing at all.

Nothing against slap but the world might be a better place with a little less of it

String bending? There's something else I don't know how to do...

I used to use a Line6 Bass Pod XT. These have USB connectivity, headphone sockets and lots of other gimmicks. The also have a pretty good bass preamp. You can't give them away these days so they can make a good value headphone amp for practice.

I use a small mixer - it has a USB input which connects to my iMac so I can play along with things if I want to. Output is headphones or through a small (domestic) amp to a couple of Tannoy speakers. Does the job.

Again, I wasn't really complaining about the slap per se (although it usually is slap). It's the unwarranted virtuoso performance to open the video. It's become a 'thing'. I get it, you can play... now show me how to play Mustang Sally

[quote name='TheGreek' timestamp='1506085181' post='3376364']
I detect some "[i]Slappism[/i]" going on here - the belief that slapping a Bass is in some way NOT the way to play them.

This is becoming far too prevalent on this forum...
[/quote]

Replace 'slap' with any other genre of excessively showy playing. No slappism intended or implied

It's not really slap I object to - well a bit, but there's a time and a place for everything - it's having to wait or poke about with the slider to find the stuff you came for.

It's not just music videos to be fair. I'm into classic cars and there are lots of useful youtube videos for specialist jobs - almost always prefaced by some oily bloke telling you their life history. I don't care who you are, I just want to know how to change the chain guides on a BMW M62 engine!!

No... don't... stop it...

That is all

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' timestamp='1505818612' post='3374491']
You could move the conversation further forward and say "why bother with the EQ on your amp when there's a better one on the PA desk?".
[/quote]

I'm not sure that's true. The EQ on a bass amp or preamp is designed for a bass guitar whereas the desk EQ is very much general purpose.

A small bump......

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1505692017' post='3373636']
Why do away with something just because you don't understand it?

Work out how to operate your EQ's and you'll be fine.
[/quote]

It wasn't really my point. Or it sort of was. Two many adjustments. Or... why do we invest so much effort in EQ on the instrument when we have even more EQ further up the signal chain?

I used to have one. Lovely neck but I could never get on with the narrow spacing. It's quite similar to the StingRay 5-string in many ways. Which I also didn't get on with. It was after those two that I realised I only liked 19mm spacing!

I guess so... I was just thinking that's it common to have three (or more even) EQ stages between our fingers and the audience. I don't have the best ear for setting up EQ as it is (twiddle randomly until it sounds something like - that'll do) and more stages means more room for screwing it up.

....discuss?

A serious question... I have several basses all with weird and wonderful (and different) EQs. Most of which I don't understand. My SansAmp RBI I mostly do. It would save a lot of bother if the EQs on the basses where not there. Am I mad... or missing something?

The last band van I had, we put vinyls on the side saying "Security - Dog Section" down the side.

It never got nicked... not sure if that proves anything!

Great... thanks for the advice

Thanks Alan... I feel a bit guilty now. It's a great bass but I'm a "set it flat" sort of guy at heart.

[quote name='skelf' timestamp='1504625373' post='3366150']
You could change the preamp.
[/quote]

I'm honestly not sure what to do for the best. I could. I have a SansAmp RBI which I sort-of understand but the ACG preamp is a complete mystery (yes I have read the instructions). That doesn't make it bad - I just set all the knobs in the middle because I don't know what they do

Had a bit of a change of heart. After a bunch of new songs showed up I'm back playing 5-strings. I'm thinking the mad EQ is a bit much for me so half-heartedly looking for something a bit simpler.

When did we (in the UK) become American and start saying "dating"? I'm not even sure what that is... I've been married too long

In my "practice room" I have a couple of second hand Tannoy speakers, an Akai amp and a small mixing desk with a USB input. Whole lot probably didn't exceed 200 quid (just skipping over the 2 grand Mac laptop) and more than does the job for me.

Having said that, I'm surprised how often I'm sitting on the train listening to something on cheap Sony earbuds and think, "I missed that run there" or similar. I honestly, don't think that's the sound quality it's more my brain pretending it hasn't heard the hard bits when I'm learning a song

[quote name='blue' timestamp='1504554825' post='3365684']
When I win an audition and I'm offered a job before I accept the offer I ask several questions.

One of those questions will be, how does the money work, how and when do I get paid and how much can I expect to make each month?

Blue
[/quote]

Yeh - but I've only ever played in bands where we cover our expenses. I certainly have no problem with people looking for an income from singing. My point was really that I put in Gumtree, "it's not about the money" and still got a load of "how much will I get paid" responses. They're just going to be trouble

I live in Scotland. I have a 4x4!

The band has a Transit van, however...