NancyJohnson

If there's one thing we should learn from the last 20 months, it's that the virus doesn't care how many fingers you stick up at it. I stuck many fingers up at it and it got me last month; just be careful.

I will use it, yep. Don't know what on, mind. All my kit gets used in some capacity/rotation.

I need a John East Uni-Pre5 for a project, but that's about it. I spent too much this year, way too much. We all know how this goes though. I might say I only need the East, but if, well, you know.

If they did one in high gloss flamed black (so like the blue one, but black). I'd be giving it some consideration. The only thing in my head is that the desire for a Spectorbird was more about the desire/ownership of something made in very small numbers (if that makes sense). Aside from a EuroLT, none of my (current) flock of basses are particularly mainstream, high volumes. The desire to own one of these may wane when every Tom, Richard or Harry is using them.

When I'm recording at home, someone else's home or studios generally, the process really isn't that much different. The more recent stuff I've been doing involves me basically plugging into a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 , the bigger studio I've used recently (at Miloco, but now relocated to Canning Town) just utilises a bigger Scarlett (18i20), so effectively the same. I will try to record two streams at one time by routing a signal into two channels and assign these to their own virtual track; so, one clean/dry and the other effected (either a Tech21 dUg or GED-2112DI) - as I said earlier, my live tone is generally quite gnarly, so I want to hear that while I record. Engineers however prefer a clean bass that they can effect later. I'll shoot these to different channels which gives the engineer the facility to either go with the dry recording or effected. Or both. Or just use the dry track and apply a VST* to it in post. I would never expect my bass work to just pass through without any work being done to it, so I would expect it to be EQ'd, comped etc. I would not record with any compression. *VSTs (as you asked). Just on the subject of these, most of the guys I know use the TSE BOD plug-in for bass. It's a very close approximation of the Sansamp BDDI and it's free. The Canning Town studio uses the Ampeg Suite VST (or maybe its predecessor Ampeg SVX), so with that you can take the dry signal and emulate different cabs/heads/microphones/effects. Interestingly, the old SVX VST used to allow you to simulate various mics, distance from the cabs, size of room.

Final pre-Chrimbo update. I'm not going to do more on the paint... it's not a museum piece and I'm okay with it. Started assembly. I'm waiting on a replacement J-pick, but this is where we're at. Neck isn't bolted on yet. More soon. Happy Christmas.

I'll just throw something else in here. You can easily assign bass to one track and use VSTs after. My tone is best described as gnarly; I do have a problem envisaging the end product if I record clean, but there's some great VSTs out there, many free, that can shape your vision.

Doris Day. I'm listening to Doris Day

I didn't say she was vegan. I just used her as a point of reference. Keep up, bonny lad.

We live in a society where there appears to be this big social engineering experiment going on; (just like Mr Benn) you can be whatever you want to be and we're told we need to be accept that and be respectful of people's religion/gender and be non-discriminating/sexist/ageist etc. I'm of the mindset that the whole respect element (in some cases) is a one way street; I'll respect someone's choice to be vegan, but it works the other way too; I don't need to be on the end of a lecture if it's my choice to eat a burger. (Yes, it's happened...bleedin' guitarists, tsk.) Getting off my soapbox, do you want a decent vocal performance from a carnivore or some Yoko Ono type screeching because it ticks a box? I just don't get it.

Both stomps on is fine. Ground hum issues maybe?

Already have one ABY. Cheaper to buy another one.

This is probably quite an easy question if you're in the know. Is it possible to link up two pedals like this? As the ABYs are effectively reversable, I'm assuming the ABY pre-stomps would feed both pedals constantly and the ABY post-stomps would be the one that allows switching. I just want a solution where I can just hit one footswitch button to change the tone.

My eyes! Jeebus.

I'm weirdly interested in this. Does anyone know whether the high and low pass filters work as well as a crossover?

As the Bass Centre operate as the UK/European distributor for Brian May guitars, when I was picking up my EUB, I asked Barry how often he has contact with Brian May and he replied, 'Oh, just this morning. There were a few signed guitars in open cases going out to collectors. (BM lives in Windlesham, barely five minutes drive from the Bass Centre location.) Red Special guitars aside, they also distribute the Arielle; these are the brightly coloured Firebird-ish models with the same guts as the BM model.

Shiny machines aside, I'm just waiting on some Crimson guitar finishing polish and I'll bolt it back together. I'm 100% on the John East unit, so will order this (chrome knobbage) after Christmas. Will need to wait for a replacement J-pickup. All good.

Bejeebus. I just used it on the machines. I'm assuming there's a chemical reaction going on (because the paper towel was black), but they came up super shiny. Kudos to you!

From a home studio perspective, I'll always attempt to capture two audio streams, one clean, one with what I desire the bass to sound like. Easy enough to achieve, I've got a couple of Tech21 DI stomps (dUg/Ged) and splitters; just assign the output feeds to different tracks, easy. I also loop takes...I find that I'm not in the pocket until I've run the loop several times. Also, sometimes it's good to keep some of the happy mistakes we make and use these. If you want to hear some weirdness, have a listen to 'Light 'em All Up' by Lutz. It's on Spotify. The producer was just shouting, 'Play some strange sh*t!'. Which is what I did.

On the subject of cheap basses, there's a well documented thread within these hallowed pages about the Gumtree job-lot I picked up a few years back; two guitars, a bass and a little practice amp for £50.00. The bass is an Aria Pro-II Primary Bass, essentially a '78 Japanese Precision on bass copy and I still own it. It's undeniably undergone a ton of work since I got it, but the strong thing here is that the body, neck (well, after some fettling) and the machines (replacement Schallers) were all sound, which just gave me a platform for upgrading bridge and electrics. There are bargains out there to be had. I think I just got lucky.

I'm listening to some Floridian pop/punk; band called Cider. (I know terrible name.)

I watched about half of it and gave up. Wife endured the whole thing. I just found it horribly slow. After four hours of viewing, I feel everything they needed to get over could have been done in half the time. Just considering the opening hour or two, it's no wonder that the Twickenham sessions were so unproductive; they seem to have been surrounded by so many people, so many cigar-smoking non-musical people, with differing agendas that weren't conducive to creating music. Why was it necessary for Harrison to have Hare-Krishnas in there? (At this point, my wife asked me what it would have been like if this had happened in bands I'd been in.) It's clear Lennon and Ono were besotted with each other, but realistically the key moment for me was when McCartney made the 'When people watch this in 50 years...' comment along with the quote alluding to lack of managerial direction (it was something about him referring to leaving the girls at home). Nah.

I have an old Trabant. I'm thinking of putting a new engine in it, maybe some fuel injected thing. New wheels. I have interior from a BMW that'll fit. Might reshape the roof as it doesn't look like a Porsche. Not happy with the brown colour either, so I'll paint it as well. Might put a Ferrari decal on it, too. Money well spent.

I'm really not a fan of doing covers, but we are pushing some content up to streaming services shortly. We've recorded 'That's When I Reach For My Revolver' (Mission of Burma) and are considering 'Game of Pricks,' (Guided By Voices).

I'm listening to the Charlie Sexton Sextet. I've been a huge fan of Charlie since the first album (Pictures For Pleasure), but I love the Sextet album. 5/5.