Al Krow

Sounds sophisticated? Is there a pedal that does the same thing?

Outstanding suggestion. I think it would only work if they switched the power to the rails off though, which would make sense, but...

Yup both points covered earlier, but cheers anyway. We're gonna give the humbucker suggestion approach a shot next time around.

Good question! I guess the suggestion here is that a humbucker style pup may help?

I was wondering whether wireless might help and I can certainly take along a couple of "bugs" for the guitarist to use. My concern was that initially folk were saying "no easy remedy because electric guitar pick-ups are designed to convert a modulated magnetic field into an electrical signal and then amplify it." But thinking this through what's likely happening is that the guitar pups are picking up the vibration of the strings above them (obviously a good thing, haha!) and also picking up the ambient EM field from the railway lines. I guess if we were desperate to use the studio then we could try some shielding over the strings a bit like what Rickenbackers have? Unfortunately our regular guitarist is the least keen on the new venue as it's a bit less convenient for him, so maybe difficult to get him to think about such a mod. Are there any guitars with such shielding over the pups as standard?

Yeah the bass seemed to be fine - it's an active bass. I was going through a provided amp whereas the guitarist was going through the PA (which is what we were going to do for everyone at the gigs the following weekend - and which were thankfully really fine). We wondered whether it might have been the PA, but he got the same interference going through my bass amp with his guitar.

We rehearsed recently in a rehearsal studio in Elephant & Castle located below a railway arch with an active railway line overhead. There was unfortunately a lot of interference for the guitarist. The venue would otherwise be great for the band, being centrally located for us and accessible by public transport. My understanding is that electric guitar pick-ups convert a modulated magnetic field being generated by the overhead railway lines into an electrical signal and then amplify it, and will be made worse if long leads, which act as an aerial, are being used. Is there a piece of kit that a guitarist could use to neutralise the impact of the overhead railway line (other than playing acoustically, haha)? Cheers, Al

@Rosie C - the VE8 looks like a cool piece of kit! Are you singing as well as playing bass? Have you used any other vocal harmony pedals before landing on the Boss?

Just following up on the above - the DJ at the venue we were playing at last night suggested we go through his PA as he was already be set up and so we just plugged our desk into his. He was using a pair of RCF 705 subs with KV2 EX10s on top and applying an 80Hz crossover. I think I maybe would have benefitted from 12" tops as I am HPF-ing the bass to leave low-end space around 60-80Hz the kick i.e. from a purely bass perspective I prefer our 912As or 732As to his set up. But the drums sounded fantastic and overall that meant the band sounded noticeably better.

Tried the Nux 5.8 GHz out in anger today at a couple of function gigs. Worked really well. These are in £100 to £150 range and seem to provide the combination of quality and value for money I'm comfortable with for a wireless. So I can't see any particular need to spend another £400 on a bulkier Shure GLDX16+ system and it seems my wireless journey, which has so far taken me from significant use of the Smoothhound 2.4 GHz via the Boss WL-20 2.4 GHz now to the Nux 5.8 GHz is, at least temporarily, over. Many thanks to @thisisswanbon for the recommendation on the first page of this thread. For the record, it would be daft to argue that the GLXD16 / 16+ is the "best" wireless. There are plenty of higher-end systems available, even from Shure. But it's great there are so many contended users of these units, which is a very good recommendation to anyone thinking about getting one.

I agree about the transmitter and receiver logos being tiny Lozz, but there's a super-easy fix which will cost you a few pennies tops, and will have saved you £400 upgrading to a GLXD16+...😊 You're right about the pads though... You've definitely got the zeal of a convert, for Shure! 😅

Tony bought a set of Lekato wireless off me. Prompt payment, excellent and friendly comms - all good! Enjoy the hopefully drop-out-free liberation with your band 🙂 Cheers, Bas

I think the main beneficiary to a band's sounds from decent subs is actually for the kick drum in the 60 to 80 Hz range and not for the bass. In fact, no need for the bass to be occupying that same low-end space in competition with the kick as that's likely only going to muddy the sound, so recommend HPF'ing the bass accordingly. We get by just fine without subs, but in comparison to eg @bassfan's crew 24K, it's undoubtedly a thinner sound than they are delivering on similar gigs. At a pub no biggie, but for function work at bigger venues and with a more party/dance vibe, I would personally lean to 24K's bigger sound with subs, over ours without.

Really good run through of wireless systems generally: In terms of 5.8GHz systems - he gives a big thumbs up to the Nux (14.20) and also recommends the Lekato (14.44) as a more budget option. My own experience is that the Nux works better with my active basses (apparently it's advertised as being designed for active bass compatibility) and doesn't have the distortion that the Lekato had when digging in. With the Nux, I'm finding that if you max the treble EQ and with certain directions / positions of Nux transmitter you can get a high-pitched whine, but having the treble at normal settings and lining the transmitter bug either towards or away from the very bottom of the bass, depending on which bass and where the preamp is located, pretty much eliminates that whine. PS - liked his point that we're never going to eliminate the risk of drop-outs with wireless, even Metallica with some of the highest end gear on the planet and large sound crews suffer from occasional wireless drop-outs!

Are you using your Lekato 5.8 Ghz with an active or passive bass (in terms of preamp)?

Cheers Russ - the ZS10s have absolutely been a gateway IEM and proved the concept to my band for relatively minimal outlay (we managed to pick up a pack of 4 for £100 for the full band from AliExpress). To that end they've certainly proved their value and done the job.

What's been the key that's made you return to the fold?

For these purposes, anything with a strong beat. Starting with Disco I guess (rather than 50s/60s rock'n' roll).

I think the key part of that is "a good pair of 12s". In which case, sure, definitely perfectly decent for most pub gigs. Having said that when I've heard bands with decent subs added to good 12" tops, it's definitely been a "bigger" sound, and if the vibe is dance music rather than "listen to" music then that bigger sound can make quite a difference.

Thanks for sharing that. Oooh, that's going to put the cat amongst the pigeons! He's not at all keen on the BC goto KZ ZS10s!! (at 12.33+) Interesting that he rates the single driver Moondrop Aria and Dunu Titan S much more highly that the 5 driver KZs and says that number of drivers does not necessarily equate to quality of sound, which goes against the received wisdom we may have bought into. If you get the Moondrops - please do let us know how they stack up against your KZs.

Did you manage to get any improvement on the IEM sound? I guess we've been pretty content with our KZ ZS10 Pros for monitoring, which coincidentally we are also using with the Xvive U4 wireless system (decent value and very compact), as we can hear each other pretty clearly, albeit I do boost the bass on my individual mix! Tbh I've not really expected that the sound from the £50 KZ IEM headphones should be on a par with what our RCF 912A (£1k) or 735A (£1.5k) PA speakers are delivering FoH. But maybe I would if I had invested £650+ for the UE6 or similar high-end IEM headphones. The fairer comparison would be with the £200 monitor we previously used and the IEMs are decently on a par with that and obviously present us with less feedback issues. Out of interest what channels did you settle on for Xvive U4s? Singer and I are using 1 and 5 respectively, which seem to be working fine.