SumOne

The Boss RC-3 is quite easy to use and has 10 simple drum tracks you can play along to and change the tempo of (I also ended up filling mine with about 50 different drum loops to play along to - can do this by importing .wav files or via aux in and as you can overdub you can still record your Bass over the top) it's small, tough, and they were about £120 new and quite common so you should be able to pick one up second hand for less than £80. A slight issue is I'm not sure how easy they are to get new now as they've been superseded by the RC-5 which looks better (including longer memory, 50 drum tracks) but is £160 new.

Me (and my neighbours) are currently listening to The Bug 'Pressure'

...actually I just tried it and it's a push to say it's fine on the low E, it will only play it without warbling about for about a second. The MXR and Aguilar Octavers are the best sounding ones I've used but playing style does need to be adapted to get the best out of them. I think sub-consciously I've kind of learned to play a bit differently when using them by not playing long sustaining notes below a certain point and to only play clean/solid notes, minimise fret noise and harmonics and anything other than the one note, no slap/pop, the same sort of techniques are needed with synth pedals. I find putting some distortion or envelope filter after the octaver (or synth) helps to disguise the wobbles/glitchyness. Digital ones will stop the wobbly/glitchyness but I don't think they sound as good, this video is good (7mins onward is about analogue tracking).

Pachyman is worth a listen

I'm not sure about that, yes- the song is made up of lots of simple parts working together but it is the Bass that is prominently repetitively driving it all along throughout as other parts come and go, I'd go as far to say say that song is a classic example of a Bass driven song.

I have an MXR M288 and find it can track right down to the low G well, and can even sound fine on the low E but isa bit of a muddy rumble. It's glitchy on the G string though but I think that's my Bass signal (slight fret buzz or harmonics) as it's not glitchy on the same notes on other strings. I think it's down to what others have said, basically it needs to be fed a clean signal, the glitching is it playing harmonics and fret rattle etc. It needs: loud signal, first in chain, clean playing, and I have quite a high action on strings.

As with most things in life, I think the Simpsons put best (albeit being about something slightly different!) We're the sauce on your steak We're the cheese in your cake We put the spring in Springfield We're the lace on your nightgown The point after touchdown Yes we put the spring in Springfield We're that little extra spice that makes exsistence extra nice A giddy little thrill at a reasonable price The gin in your martini The clams on your linguinie Yes we keep the BOING in Springfield

I'd pick your time if buying new - a couple of months ago the Stomp was £399, now they seem to be £529 in most places - add extra footswitches/expression pedal and the cost and size creeps up. I've owned a Helix Effects and Stomp and was impressed but in the end they weren't quite for me. I think most mid-range individual pedals do their specific jobs better, and I prefer their separate controls. Depends how much you also want the less-used effects and routing options all in one box to make up for that though (I concluded that I was better off spending on a few decent 'core' individual pedals).

Yeah, a few reasonably priced or multi-functional pedals have been mentioned but plenty of people's favourites are quite specific effects and >£250 which I would have never considered buying a few years ago as there are £20 Behringer type options that get the job done perfectly well......I'm starting to convince myself that >£250 is reasonable though if it's a pedal that is better (for me) than all others for that particular thing and I'd want to keep it forever and would be hearing it's noise for 100s of hours (and they don't lose their value too much if something more shiny came along and caught my eye!).

I'd perhaps consider if one 'do it all' pedal is the best option. If I had no pedals and a £300 budget I'd get separate second hand pedals that could each potentially do their individual jobs better: - Practice tool: Zoom b1 four for home use (headphone, Aux in, drum machine, looper, and all the other occasional fx) (£50) And if you don't want to use that for live stuff and want other core microbass 3 things covered: - Tuner: A separate tuner has a more obvious screen. (I just got a Korg Pitchblack micro for £30) - EQ pedal. Potentially can do more than a 'do it all' pedal EQ, I just got a source audio EQ v1 for £70 which has 8 bands +-18dB that can be saved in 4x presets you can select by footswitch. - Compressor, could get something like a spectracomp second hand for about £50 which you could fine tune to your setup and stomp on/off when needed. - Distortion: Something like the Source Audio Aftershock for about £100 would cover more distortion sounds. - DI. Is it needed? Amps have DI out and if playing ampless then how are you monitoring? If it is needed there are cheap utity XLR DI pedals.

I kind of wish you hadn't said that as I was checking that pedal out earlier today as am looking for something that does the double-tracking and pitch bend type effect of the Digitech Luxe (which seems difficult to get hold of in the UK) but then saw the price tag and moved along. If it's also good for the low-gain too then perhaps I should re-consider!

I've been searching for a Digitech Luxe for the exact same reasons: I like the chorus 'thickening' by doubling of the signal with a slight de-tuned version but I'm not so keen on the modulation that chorus pedals also add - I find that gives a slightly seasick/drunken feeling. There are a few pitch shifting pedals and double-tracking pedals but I don't think they are quite the same effect as the Luxe. I usually end up running chorus pedals with minimum speed settings which sort of gets around it but ideally I'd like to get a Luxe because it gets rid of the modulation completely and gives precise control over how much it is de-tuned.

Traded pedals with Marcin via post so that takes a bit more trust on both sides than the usual buying/selling and it all went well with the pedal arriving when expected, as described, well packaged etc. Thanks!

Bought a pedal from Dan and it all went well - good communication, quick postage with good packaging, and it's all working as expected. Thanks!

I'm only asking so I can add them to my shopping list!

Yeah, I've owned a lot of source audio one series pedals and can't fault their sounds or versatility. My issue has always been the interface with that annoying little toggle switch & that little hidden 'alt' switch (or long hold footswitch), I wish they had a small Preset counter to scroll through (something simple like the Boss rc3, or zoom ms60) or like their EQ pedals where you can hold down the footswitch to scroll through a few presets. I'm hoping the next generation of one control pedals include something like that.

I've had Tinnitus for most of my adult life due to to clubbing and DJing, I invested in some quite good earplugs a few years too late and the Tinnitus at least doesn't seem to have got worse. Luckily I've got quite used to it so it doesn't annoy me too much - it's been so constant for so long that I only really notice it when I think about it (in the same sort of way that you only notice you're breathing when you think about it).

What pedals have ended your pedal search for that particular effect/utility? These are my favourites that I don't have any desire to change: Korg Pitchblack Mini. Does what it's supposed to do accurately and reliably in a small size, any smaller and it'd start being difficult to read or would move about when stomping it on. Acts as a mute too. I got rid of my old one when I got a multi-FX with tuner but have another one on the way now and will be keeping it multi-FX or not. FEA Opti-FET Compressor. Sounds good and has foot-switchable sidechain which I think is a fairly unique feature that I use a lot so I can't see myself wanting a different compressor. MXR Brown Acid Fuzz. I went through about ten different Fuzzes before landing on this one, it's all subjective but this is my favourite. And honourable mentions to: EBS DPhaser. The best Phaser I've used, lots of control for a variety of phaser tones and internal adjustability too. Ideally I'd like the internal switches to be accessible on the outside and for it to have individual clean/phaser volume controls but it does fine without and not many phasers seem to have that level of control. MXR M82: Have owned and sold three as I always think the next envelope filter will do more but I think for it's specific thing ('quacky' bandpass sweep up- good for slap or responsive quick stuff) the M82 is hard to beat and next time I get one I'll keep hold of it. One Control Crimson Red: A decent EQ and preamp combination or Amp & Cab sim gets very close, and having tapewound strings helps get close too - those things never seem to get quite as good though for that one very specific heavy 70s dubby sound. Again, next time I get one I'll keep hold of it! Saying that though, I've gone a bit mental with pedal buying/selling/trading over the last year and part of that is that I enjoy finding out their differences and it's probably about the journey as much as the destination so I'll probably always be changing things around a bit.

Welcome! Nice Bass, I've got a Sandberg California and in hindsight it would have saved me a fair bit of ££ and faff if I'd have just got it as my first Bass rather than building up to it. Like others have said - it's probably worth getting a few face-to-face lessons booked in. I only booked in for four but found them useful after a few months of playing because the tutor picked up on some technique issues like the fact I was doing unintentional string bends so I got rid of that before it became too much of a habit. Watching online tutorials wouldn't have pointed that out to me - I guess I would have realised eventually but those few lessons probably saved me a lot of time. He also recommended that I always play to a metronome or beat, which I think was good advice.

Sounds good, I'm now going the route of separate pedals (mxr brown acid fuzz and xotic robotalk 2) and an EHX Switchblade Pro to do series order switching/parallel/clean blend.

Good communications and pedal arrived as described and was posted quickly - all good. Thanks!

Nice one, I'd be star struck... And yeah, id be shocked if someone said Jimmy Cliff wasn't nice.

There's something really cheesy about that but Jimmy Cliff can get away with it with that voice (he's always had some cheesy tenancies!), I like it. An interview with him in the guardian yesterday: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/music/2021/aug/06/the-return-of-jimmy-cliff-rebel-spirit-is-still-in-the-jamaican-people

Faith No Ministry Pistols