Al Krow

That's really nicely put! I love the different tones on my bases - they all have their own personality. Whereas when my missus first heard the KS she described the tone as having a greater clarity than any of the other basses in my herd and considered it to be head and shoulders better than the rest; which, given how much these buggers cost, was very reassuring to hear! But what she heard does very much tie in with what you're saying and seemingly what KS was seeking to create.

If a Sire, which can range in price £250 to £1,000+ (and around £450 to £550 new is pretty usual) are Skodas, what would that make a true budget work horse bass e.g. a Harley Benton? This concept of an "aspirational bass" is defo a new one to me: my only criteria is whether it's a great bass to play.

Nah - the truth is some folk have a high turnover of basses and others don't. It's no more complicated than that. Yup, exactly.

For live use, a key feature of any EQ is surely being able to adjust on the fly? Old fashioned slidey things will definitely have an advantage on that score. It is useful to have preset EQs to recall though. Fortunately I get that functionality for no extra cost on my multifxs.

And I haven't sold mine after 2 to 3 months. So what? It's just daft to go around making bald statements that almost everyone sells their Sires after 2 to 3 months.

Sounds good! You able to share a link to the product?

Agreed, particularly for the money. By "almost everyone" would be like 9 out of 10 you're suggesting sell after 2 to 3 months? Really?

But were those complaints just about the old series 1 ie effectively teething issues, and all sorted on the upgraded v2s?

Their PJ basses (and a few JJs) covered off in this thread, which is one of the more comprehensive ones on the topic of Sires. A slappingly good bass, I think you'll find! Won the shoot out for best first bass too 😊

Yeah, that's completely fair: most non musicians won't necessarily appreciate the techniques used on most instruments, whilst being able to appreciate the sounds and experience being created. Mention "double tonguing" to a non woodwind player...

You could easily apply that sentiment to pretty much every topic we chew over at length on basschat! But that's certainly not been my experience over the years: punters are not as thick as you might want to paint them. Audiences can be very appreciative of quality and entertaining bass-playing. Slap is just another technique in a bass players' arsenal and it can certainly add to both the groove and the entertainment when it's done well. Maybe give it a try before slapping it down?

In @krispn's defence he seems to have loosely summarised his earlier post, no doubt after or during a late night NHS shift. [Haha - just seen we're in full agreement on this]. Gotta be validly arguable that many audiences won't be partial to slap. But IMO it's definitely not the case that most rock / pop audiences will dislike it and even be enthusiastic about it - particularly when it's done as well as some of the examples we've had on this thread. I, for one, would be delighted to play that Dua Lipa track as well as Juliaplaysgroove. Damn it she's even got me looking at MM basses - I thought you'd need a P bass to get that tone 😁

I tend to associate a boutique bass with the direct involvement of the "named" founder - it's his reputation and brand that we're buying into. That would certainly be true of a Shuker or an ACG, and clearly boutique basses are not mass produced a la Fender, Yamaha or Ibanez etc. But Wal has successfully continued since the departure of Ian Waller in 1988 and more recently since co-founder Pete Steven's death in 2011. It's great that it continues to thrive. I guess a brand doesn't need to fold the moment it's original creative inspiration leaves the field of play - surely that's what creating a successful legacy is all about. And there's no greater example of leaving a massively successful legacy, albeit only partly in the world of music, than that provided by Steve Jobs.

Ah ok no worries. Mr @dave_bass5 has provided me with a cunning plan to make use of the soundcard on my Focusrite Scarlett and by-pass the one on the PC for PC sound output. I'll see if I can hear any improvement on that using my Creative T40s at some point over the coming week. I do now need to find out a bit more about your two covers bands though! You got any uploaded YT material?

Nah - read back exactly what you wrote. It's what I quoted in my earlier post. But no biggie: if you meant "many" rather than "most" then fair enough, nothing to debate and I certainly wouldn't have commented.

Lol, me too. So you're basically my BC twin. Right, enough thread de-rail. Apologies to the OP!

Haha, yes those too! Covers bands?

Ah good Q - in which case I misunderstood the question. But maybe in that case Muppet has answered it.

Spooky. Same brand amp, same Creative T40 speakers. You'll be telling me that you're a bassist next 😂 Btw - did you spot my follow up query on the Compact Speaker thread?

I can save you the bother of contacting Doug - although his team are super helpful, whenever I've needed to contact them. Even to the extent of sending me a free footswitch, because the v2 amp I bought second hand didn't have one and they weren't being sold separately. Didn't even charge me for P&P! If you read dB's post (third one down) in the attached thread, you'll see he's confirmed that they have addressed this point and Danny goes onto to explain how it all works in the new set up.

The alternative where everyone agrees on something objectively correct would be mind bogglingly dull... "My bass has 5 strings." "Agreed." 😁

Frank please point me to any that are not! 😁

Ah ok - if you had originally said "many" audiences, there would be nothing at all for me to disagree with; that is a self-evidently true point.

Another Focusrite Scarlett fanboi here, but have recenlty been thinking about the general sound quality output - actually in the context of improving on my budget but reasonably decent desktop monitors. But I'm guessing the limitations of a PC soundcard are likely to significantly reduce the benefit of any such additional spend. Had a really useful tip from @dave_bass5 about by-passing the PC soundcard entirely and using the Scarlett's soundcard, instead, for output from the PC e.g. for YouTube clips etc. I suspect that won't be news to most of you more experienced folk but was a really helpful pointer to a novice like me! That tip and this thread has got me thinking about how good the Scarlett's sound quality compares to other interfaces. I've come across this really helpful review: https://www.audiomentor.com/reviews/top-10-best-audio-interfaces-for-serious-music-production. I was struck by the following comment, which certainly got my attention! Not sure how fair or balanced a comment it is, but it's certainly quite a vote in favour of the Audient kit: "If you think the Focusrite Scarlett sounds decent, wait till you listen to the Audient interfaces. The Audient line-up of interfaces features Audient’s console microphone preamp and the JFET DI built in. Why does Audient simply sound better? That’s because the components used to build them are of superior quality. You get better sounding AD & DA converters and mic pre-amps."

For me DrT put it really well when he said: My emphasis in bold to address the point at hand, but his whole post is worth re-reading for its balance and thoughtfulness.