NancyJohnson

While I don't have any current love for Laney, a long time ago I used to run a rig - 2x15, 2x10, big old DP150 head (I couldn't afford the DP300). I'd never loved whatever was passing for the affordable/budget end of bass playing back then...people just too obsessed with Marshalls to be honest. Anyhow this was my set up. It was furiously loud and I never ran it more than about halfway.

I suppose my methodology or what I wanted was too simplistic for one cabinet. Bear in mind this was pre-GED2112; at this point I was running a BDDI for lows and a GT2 for dirt into a pair of cabinets to try and emulate the Geddy Lee and Dug Pinnick tone. Alex is pretty passionate about what he makes and part of the argument was that the frequencies would get muddied, so I kind of accepted this as is, but still have this nagging doubt in my head that switching the cabinet in this manner shouldn't be insurmountable; on a much smaller scale I was running an Arcam bi-amped hi-fi years ago, feeding the driver and the tweeter of a pair of rudimentary B&W 601s with different signals, OK, yes, I appreciate the volumes and frequency ranges are vastly different with bass, but ultimately when I switched back to running the 601s from a single amp, it was just a matter of bridging the +/- terminals, so why not on a Super Twin? I guess at the end of the day, I'll just try and source a pair of matched cabinets, be them Barefaced, TKS, whatever. I'd like them to be Barefaced...I'm very happy with the Big One, there's an ethic about the business I like.

Incidentally, Andy/Wolverine and I had a long conversation with Alex from Barefaced at one of the bass bashes about whether he could build a switchable 2x12/Big Twin (ie to run each driver independently or the two drivers together). I thought it was genius, a challenge of sorts, the laying down of a gauntlet if you like. Alex said it just wouldn't work. Booo.

This ^^^

I think it's just been more a case of evolution rather than anything else; the RBI is great and either that or the BDDI formed the backbone of my tone for quite a while. The GED2112 is wonderful...to my ears it just expands on what the RBI does and betters it all round, but that said, it's a personal thing. To take things a step further, the dUg takes things further still. If the GED2112 is an RBI on steroids, the dUg is an RBI on steroids, a full belly of vindaloo and a few pints of heavy. It's a fantastic thing.

I'll try and keep this brief! I'm currently running a 4U rack set up (Gator), that tuner aside contains a 2U Matrix stereo poweramp and a Tech 21 GED2112 pre-stage; I also have a couple of other Tech21 units (BDDI/dUg). Whilst it's a dual channel pre-stage, the GED2112 is hardwire tweaked (see elsewhere) to output in mono and the poweramp is bridged to allow a single feed to a Barefaced Big One. All is peachy; I like the tone I get from all this stuff, but I've got this itch I can't scratch and really want to try running the GED2112 in dual channel mode into either i) a pair of decent 1x12"s or ii) a 1x15" and a 1x12". I would also like to be able daisychain the cabinets to get a pseudo 2x12" or 1x15"/1x12" as well. So I'm after suggestions, but there's some underlying fulfilment criteria outside of how they sound; size/weight and visual aesthetic. We all know about the weight thing...nobody really wants to lug a 75lb cabinet into a gig and load it out afterwards and visually, I want the cabinets to line up from a width perspective (see below) and I don't want the rack to overhang the cabinets (giving the appearance of a T), so either the height or width needs to exceed 20". I've already given some consideration to a pair of Barefaced BB2s or pairing a BB2 with a Super Compact; the frequency range of the BB2 should allow for a bit more bottom wobble and top end rattle over the Super Compact, plus the horn is tuneable, but at £1.5K for a pair of new G3/BB2s it'll need to be a used purchase. Anyone care to weigh in here?

The Lemonheads - It's A Shame About Ray. I've never listened to it before.

The way it works here is you seed the thought that you want something. Wife insists you sell/make space first. I just make noises along the lines of, 'Yes, yes, that's fine,' all the while singing the Meowmix song in my head and ignoring her 100%. New bit of kit arrives and I just rack it up. Wife none the wiser.

Does Catrin know about the dozen stashed in my garage?

No stinky poo!

My first love was Thunderbirds, but I adored the Rickenbacker tone ever since I heard those early Sweet b-sides and some of my brothers Yes albums (and yes, I know Steve Priest, like Geddy Lee, also used Jazz basses). That tone was there right out of the case, it is amazing that you can emulate your heroes tone fairly easily. I got a close approximation out of the Thunderbirds, but not spot on, I did consider buying some Rickenbacker pickups and dropping them into a Thunderbird, but life is too short. My only real groan about the 4003 was the taperless neck profile; pretty much the same for it's full length. A bit strange, but not an insurmountable problem.

They're expensive new, but secondhand they're way more reasonable and owners seem to take care of them, so it's not difficult to find a good one. Insofar as them being poorly made or being one trick ponies, well nah on both counts. OK, they're a two pickup bass with independent volume and tones for each pickup, plus the ability to select either pickup via a switch, plus the newer ones have an additional tone circuit, so far from one trick. Build quality on mine was fine...robust even. The only bad bit was the bridge, which IMO was worse than a three-pointer, if that was feasibly possible. The worst thing about a 4003? It was a thief-magnet. These b'stards know what it is and I had two occasions where someone tried to steal it.

If we're going the gif route:

Well, let's initially just consider that Matsumoku were producing a lot of guitars for several companies, so it is feasible that parts could have gotten mixed up/shared during production. They were producing Aria Pro II, Vantage, some Greco basses. When I was researching my 1978, insofar as the serial number goes, I read yonks ago that the month of production is designated by the letter, A for January, B for February and so on, with the next two numbers being the year (1977) and the rest are the production number, so it's April 1977. I don't think it's an Aria Pro II from that year...the 12th fret dots are too far apart (see below, this isn't mine BTW); they did go wider, but not for a couple of years. Yours also has a skunk stripe on the back of the neck too (Arias from this period tended to be one-piece, with glued in pieces to allow for the Fender style headstock). However, the bridge does look the same as the one that came off mine - with the two additional screws at the front. Are you able to get a shot of the front of the headstock? There's evidence of basses coming out of the factory without a logo...if the face of the headstock has been sanded, there's a reasonable chance that the facia will still carry an echo of what was on there originally (the wood behind the long gone logo will be lighter than the rest of the headstock colour).

Or these. I'm just waiting for someone to start advertising their Gibson as pre-Chapter 11, or whatever.

Please let's not say these three words again, eh?

I've never owned a Stingray and I doubt I will any time soon, but in the unlikely event Sterling called up and said, 'Hey Paul, we love what you're doing, go ahead and pick a bass,' I think I'd have to go with a 4HH in the black and ebony combination (I just pulled this off the configurator): ...interestingly, there's a bass shown on the current EB Stingray promo that has blocks on the neck, so those over dots please. The 5-stringers have never done it for me...I've often wondered why MusicMan have a different design set for the 5; the champfers, that monstrous scratchplate. Why can't they just make a 5-string version of the 4-string?

You saw the Johnsons...nearly every gig prior to my departure was quantified as being an extra rehearsal. There's really not a thriving live music scene in London, especially where original material is concerned.

Josi is a top bloke. I've used his stuff in upgrades. His humbucker sized P90s are fantastic. Frankly couldn't care less where they're made (or the price point), they're just so damn good.

The problem with this is that the posting up of venues and promoters who are terrible/crooks does have this way about bouncing back at you and biting you in the donkey. There's a few promoters/venues in and around London that network to such a degree that they can blacklist you from playing places pretty easily.

From memory, they had a couple of very bright LED lights on stage; the one on my side was under six feet from my face and if you looked forward you just got a face of red light. This was one of the worst gigs I've ever played.

About a year ago, my old band played the St Moritz on Wardour Street, Landaan. Our singer said it would look good on our CV. Hmm. Journey up was fine, got parked north of Oxford Street, half-mile walk to the venue (locked on arrival), easyish load in. The venue is a basement (a warren of rooms) under a cheese/fondue restaurant. It reeked of cheese, old beer, old sweat, old smoke and god knows whatever else. It was like an oven in there. Stage was maybe eight feet square - barely wide enough for a small drum kit, our amps were set up angled as there was no space and seven feet high (of course our singer insisted on standing on the stage). There was an air conditioner (off, I mean why would it be on?) attached to the ceiling in the middle of the stage (cue head bumpage). The venue didn't promote it, we didn't get paid (nor even offered a beer) but they asked us back. Err, no. I remember me and the drummer stopped at a McDonalds on the way home and for some reason I sniffed the upper arm of the shirt that I was wearing and it stank of cheese.