Beer of the Bass

I can't imagine he'd be too chuffed at having his picture bracketed by Union Jacks as it is there...

TC have their Helicon pedals designed to work with vocal mics (with XLR in and outs) that would require a bit less faffing than a guitar pedal. A vocalist in my old band used to use one for dubby echoes, but I'm sure there must be a pitch shift/harmoniser in the range.

Should be a nice little amp for recording purposes and lower volume stuff! Regarding the cab, as far as I gather the double baffle cabs function like a more conventional ported cab with the same tuning would (though I've never seen a clear answer on what the port tuning was). So there could well be a simpler route to the same result.

I'm presuming polite, considerate weirdos and perverts are perfectly welcome here!

I'm thinking it might be a non-starter with standard pickguard material - most are PVC which will release chlorine fumes when heated, and in the case of tortoiseshell pickguards there's a layer of very flammable celluloid too. It could work with acrylic or similar though.

I'm not sure how I managed this, but as far as I can recall I found my way onto Finnbass first, and only found out about the existence of Basschat from there. Seems odd when you consider the relative size and activity of the two!

Sometimes a little too superior, I find!

Come to think of it, standing waves can definitely occur within a cylindrical chamber. Otherwise wind instruments wouldn't do much...

This is much more how you'd expect it to look - a guy in a back room with a bandsaw and a dumpster. Which does sort of confirm that making such a big production of the Firebird X destruction must have been an intentional stunt.

He's readying himself to drive that tractor over a neat row of Firebird X's.

Is this your sheepdog? Nice hat!

I gather that large businesses will often destroy batches of unsaleable products, but the decision to make such an obvious spectacle of it is an odd one...

Regarding 6l6 vs 6l6GC, I think all current production "6l6" valves are the GC type whether they use the suffix or not. The original 6l6 was a metal bodied tube with a lower max plate voltage and dissipation, but those aren't something you'll run into much nowadays.

I did consider doing some sort of Meatball derivative, but since the main sounds I want to make are all present on this one, I thought I'd keep it simple!

I put together a Madbean Naughty Fish PCB, which is more or less a Mutron III envelope filter in a smaller box. I'd wanted something to do that reverse sweep “Bowwwp!" sound for a while, and this has it in spades.

There are definitely elements of Jemmott's playing that Jaco drew from, particularly on those funkier lines.

The DI outputs on mine don't have this noise, so I don't think it's normal for this model. One thing that did occur to me though - one of the preamp valves in mine became microphonic, which can cause a high pitched ringing. Does your noise vary if you gently tap each preamp valve? (you can do this through the cage with a wooden cocktail stick). If you hear loud ringing when doing this, that valve may need to be changed. If you're using both DI outputs simultaneously into the interface it could also be a ground loop issue, in which case the ground lift switch on the amp should help. It would also make the issue a little clearer if you let us know if the noise is heard through the speaker or just on the DI outputs and whether any of the amp controls affect it.

The AI speakers and combos that I've encountered seem to be designed around sounding natural in relatively low volume jazz or acoustic gig settings, where sensitivity and overall loudness aren't the main considerations. I'd say that the downfiring 1x10" combos they were making a few years ago run out of steam noticeably earlier than more conventional ported 1x10 cabs I've used. It's probably a nice cab for jazz double bassists, but I'd be surprised if it could replace a typical 2x10 for electric bass use.

Yep, the labelling on Standby switches can be counter-intuitive - usually 0 is "standby" and 1 is "run". On my DIY amps, whenever I've used a standby switch I've labelled the two positions as Standby/Play rather than 0/1.

It's almost like a Hohner Clavinet without the key mechanism, which would explain why Stevie Wonder is into it.

Certainly, where that's a component of a guitarists style, there's a good argument for some volume on stage. But it rarely needs multiple high powered amps running all-out.

Yep, I feel like he's taking a purist stance on something that his heroes actually did for pragmatic reasons at the time.

It occurs to me this conversation has been very all-or-nothing. It's not a straight choice between a silent stage and IEMs, or cranking multiple large guitar amps regardless of the stage and venue size. There are some excellent smaller valve amps available now (and good attenuators for the old favourite amps), and a lot of musicians can find a sweet spot in between those two poles.

I don't mean to knock Mr Bonamassa, he's a talented musician who's found his niche and worked hard at it, and he's very well in tune with his fan base. But I'd say he's a very different phenomenon to Knopfler or Queen. With them, the songs are the primary reason people love them - with Bonamassa it's his guitar antics. I can't name a single Bonamassa song without resorting to Google, and I say this as someone who has played bass in bands that covered at least a couple of them!

I can sort of understand where Bonamassa is coming from. I'm sure a majority of his audiences are guitarists themselves, and there's very much an element of vicariously living out their blooze rock fantasies through him. So even if he could get sounds so close no-one could tell the difference using a couple of quality modern guitars, in-ears and a Kemper, the audience want an array of noteworthy vintage guitars through a load of unobtainable boutique or vintage amps, cranked up in a way they could never get away with at the local blues jam night. It's part of the draw, I think.