Beer of the Bass

Looks good, but is also a bit larger than my vehicle situation needs. I'm not sure extended high frequency response agrees with fuzz pedals either.

[quote name='ShergoldSnickers' timestamp='1320048984' post='1421493'] To this day I am known to position my finger twixt lips and wibble them about whilst verbally fishing for a cup o' char from the kids. They do not understand. Nor do they make any tea. Bastards. Mike Howlett - I remember Master Builder (I think) on the 'You' album as a good example of his art. [/quote] Ha! My 12 year old stepson sings the bit from Flying Teapot when making tea. Have a cuppa tea, have another one, lovely cuppa tea! Never makes me one though...

I've emailed TC to see if they have a 1w/1m sensitivity figure for the BC212 - I wonder what they'll say? The Ashdown LB212 might also be worth a shot if I can find one. They don't publish any specs for it, but if it was designed to be used with the 30 watt LB head I presume the designers would have been going for efficiency above all else...

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1319933647' post='1420377'] Excursion is no issue with a 100w head, it is the thing that matters if you puish power. All about sensitivity. A Barefaced Vintage or Super 15 will be really loud with 100w. I have a 100w Carlsbro and a S15, so could probably demo how loud. Reckon the fact my 70w Burman is loud enough is sufficient though. [/quote] Cheers for the real-world perspective - most speaker reviews I can find are from people using higher powered solid state heads,. We probably have different standards of "loud" though - no Doom required here! I'm loud enough with my current 1x15, so the main thing is not to be less sensitive than that. As far as I can gather from playing around with WinISD, the Kappa 15 in my enclosure has pretty decent efficiency for a 1x15 (around 100dB 1w/1m IIRC), I'd just like it to weigh less. I'm also the only driver in the band, so if I had something like a 2x15", we'd have to rent a van for every gig rather than using a car. As it is, we can squeeze into an estate car. The only efficiency specs I can find for the cabs listed above are 95dB for the Laney NX115 and 100dB for the GK212MBE.

Are the sensitivity figures quoted by most manufacturers meaningful, though? I've no idea if they're rated in any kind of consistent way between manufacturers.

My current setup with my band is a Carlsbro 100 watt valve PA head, paired with an old Peavey 1x15" cabinet which is loaded with an Eminence Kappa 15 driver. I get plenty of volume for my needs out of this, but I would like to change the cabinet for something a bit lighter, as carting a ~30kg cabinet up to my flat at 2am is not much fun and I'm sure I'll do my back in eventually. It also has a bit less upper mid response than I'd like. I'm looking at several modern, lighter cabinets, and I'm looking to spend £200-£300 ideally, or could stretch to about £350. My band isn't incredibly loud - the drummer can be quite rocky but he has decent dynamics, and the guitarist is using a little 1x12" Fender combo. I play a mixture of fingerstyle and pick, like to use overdrive and fuzz pedals on some songs and play a five string, but I'm not too heavy on the lower range. I'm considering the following options: -Buying a TC BC212 and possibly disconnecting the tweeter -Ashdown LB212, if anyone still has them in stock -Laney NX115, though I'm wondering if it'll have high enough sensitivity with a 100 watt amp. Are there any other options people would suggest, or opinions on the cabs above? I don't actually need to be louder than my current speaker, though a bit lighter would be nice. Most 4x10" cabs would be heavier than I want. Unfortunately, my budget doesn't stretch to things like the Barefaced cabs, and I don't have the work space for DIY.

I've only discovered them recently, starting with this performance. I stumbled across it as I have an old Hohner Pianet, like Hammill is playing here, and was looking for examples of them. His delivery does remind me of Withnail on occasion, but there's a genuine intensity about it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzoaWrRYg98

[quote name='silddx' timestamp='1319879396' post='1419528'] Mr Hillside got on well with Jimmy Pursey. Jimmy ASKED Steve to play with Sham 69 at Reading when they met a few months earlier. There's some hippie-punk on the 4th side of Live Herald, and some on Open. [/quote] I have a copy of Planet Gong's Floating Anarchy 1977, a post Gong Daevid Allen project. That's pure hippy-punk too! I guess Gong and co were genuinely underground and far enough outside the mainstream that punk didn't seem like a threat to them. I think my favourite actual Gong album is Camembert Electrique, as it's somehow a bit spikier sounding than the later stuff, though I love the Radio Gnome trilogy as well. I saw them live last time they were touring, and it was great. I like the way Daevid Allen is still really going for it, but doesn't try to look like a young man. A good example for other aging musicians to follow!

I had this happen at a festival in May. The house amp (curiously enough, another Marshall) died two songs into the set and wasn't coming back, but my DI was in front of it, and the gig was already running late, so I kept playing. We could sense some bass from the FOH, but it was completely indistinct. According to friends in the audience, it was fine out front. It wouldn't have worked on a double bass gig!

There is a "report" button for this sort of thing.

I see a few places still have them in stock. I bet one of these would work well with my 100 watt Carlsbro valve head, especially as I'm not a fan of tweeters. I've been looking for something lighter than my old peavey 1x15 (about 27kg), as I live up stairs. I wonder if that 14kg weight is correct?

I tend to dip into the early sections when I feel I need to work on specific things. Anyone used the Ray Brown book? That has some good stuff too, once you get past the pages and pages of non musical exercises.

About 16.5mm between poles, so not much good for a P-bass, but good in most short scales.

[quote name='LawrenceH' timestamp='1319058627' post='1409558'] Ha, I saw this thread and clicked on it because I thought of your bass! It sounded very nice and growly I thought - guess it depends how much that's just the bass - what does it sound like with other pickups in, you ever tried? [/quote] Hi Lawrence, at the gig where you heard the bass, I'd have been using the toaster pickup at the neck on the majority of the songs, both pickups together on one tune, and the Darkstar soloed on only one song. From the sound of the toaster I reckon I'd be as happy with two of those, but I'd need to make some kind of surround to cover the huge rout. The bass started out with just one pickup, an old japanese Maxon single coil mudbucker lookalike in the mid position. This sounded good but was too microphonic. I replaced that later with a Dimarzio model one, which didn't have the upper mid "clank" I like. I changed that for the Darkstar as it was the only quality single coil I could find to fill the huge rout in my bass. Then later I added the toaster at the neck for a bit more versatility. The Darkstar does have a bit more presence in the very high treble than most passive pickups do - I can hear that when I record direct, but I tend not to like using cabs that go that high, so it's kind of lost on what I do. Since I'm now using my five string (there's a thread on it in Build Diaries) for gigs, I'm thinking I'd be as well to move the Darkstar on and stick another Kent Armstrong toaster in instead. Hope I haven't drifted too far off topic...

I've got one in my four string - it's a good pickup but I don't think there's anything magical about it. I wonder if I should eBay it for silly money while they're still scarce!

Although my Highway 1 Jazz didn't have it, and would have been fine without a pickguard. So there is at least one cheaper option for those who want to look like Jaco.