Boodang

As others say, practice is the key but… practice the wrong thing and all you’ll get good at is having bad technique. To that end maybe a few lessons to make sure that doesn’t happen. There’s many ways to skin this cat but Gary Willis has one of the best finger techniques, check out his ‘ consecutive string crossing’ on YouTube and some of his other videos on the subject. It doesn’t take long for it to become seamless once you’re on the right path.

Now that's a bass with stage presence!

Which famous bass player named his bass ‘the wife’?! Stop press: in answer to my question I do believe it was Billy Sheehan.

Use memory foam in case you have to do a retake when you're recording.

It’s a great idea! I've found a trumpet player so we’re putting a project together where we only go out and gig the Mark Isham ‘In a Silent Way’ album with possibly beaches Brew for an encore. Should make for a super fun, relaxed gig for both musicians and audience!

I think it's more about attitude than age. I'm in a covers and originals band, and I'm by far the oldest. In fact some of their dads are younger than me! But I don't care. I'm having tons of fun, the audience don't seem to mind. I might bring more wrinkles to the band but I also bring experience which seems to be appreciated, so I don't plan on stopping anytime soon. PS 40 is young!!

The problem I have with onboard preamps is that you've got limited space, limited power and limited controls as you're trying to squeeze it into limited real estate. Unless you have a 'thing' for the sound of a particular onboard preamp I wouldn't bother. I like to get it correct at the source, the pickups, keep it passive and then use a line driver to get the signal impedance down so little loss on the cable. These days I find I get my sound using a compressor rather than eq, but whatever works for you really. If you like the sound of the pups and you like the sound of your outboard gear, then all should be good. PS I had a Tobias a few years ago (I know, not quite an MTD!) which had a pine body. Apart from being uber light it sounded great. Can't quite remember why I sold it now!

Interestingly I do get some anxiety when I do a gig on bass (and I’ve been playing for 40 years) but when it’s drums, there’s zero anxiety. Don’t know why one has that affect and the other doesn’t. On the other point that was made, we had a violin player leave to go to another country but we’re continuing to put together an album of ‘Boston punk’ numbers which is actually the most fun thing I’ve done in ages.

Of course the closing of one door could lead to the opening of another…. a completely new hobby maybe. Or, how about a new instrument.. drums perhaps? I also see the bass as a drum kit with notes, so not a huge leap between the two.

No room to breathe sounds like a drummer issue rather than an e-kit issue. Having said that, even with modern ekits it’s easy to get the ‘machine gun’ effect and get carried away.

Got this just because I like phasers and…. It’s awesome! I’m in a blues band where I play drums and for the funkier numbers like ‘superstition’ I got our bass player to use this. He doesn’t use any effects but after using this he said if he had one pedal it would be this one. To prove it, I haven’t seen it since!

Another thought occurs.. for the numbers 'she' wants to play bass, you could play drums!

I'm in acovers band where I play drums and the bass player and I swap duties for the odd song. The difference being, we're not a couple! I've never been in a band where a couple is involved where there's no tension with the rest of the band. Not an ideal situation. Best advice, maybe the odd song where you use the opportunity to learn some keys.... in fact get a Moog Phatty and play the bass line yourself on that, Michael League style!

Got the Drumeo IEM’s recently and I’m blown away by the quality of reproduction. Now using them for everything audio. And two birds with one stone, monitors for practice/recording at home, and stage monitors for gigs.

That’s why all bolt on necks suck! Had a custom jazz made just so I could have a set neck and smooth unfettered access to the dusty end.

We’re using the xr18 as our main mixer for foh and cable the aux outputs to P2’s for iem’s. A bit messy but no hassles in setting up. I’ve freed up an aux by using the ultranet and personal monitor mixing unit which is an excellent bit of kit as it’s so easy to get the mix right.

Just lean it on the silver round thing that's behind you in the pic!

I've never been a fan of bass drums sounding like an explosion and taking up all the sonic space and the Ekit has really given me control over the kick sound. I'm currently using layered sampling to get the best of both worlds and use a combination of an 18 and 22. And if the PA is not up to it, the yamaha has a 'compressed' sounding vinyl kit and I use the BD from that as it's very mid eq'd. Also enjoying the variety of snare drums which is probably the thing i change most during a set to suit the song.

As well as playing bass, I also play an Ekit (Yamaha dtx6) in a band. It has it's pros and cons but overall, I and the band are loving it! I've been playing it for 18 months now and thoroughly enjoying the range of sounds you can get from it, especially as it's a covers band. It has, however, taken about 12 months to get a grip on it. We get a consistent sound foh but it's taken considerable editing (and trial and error) to get there. I particularly enjoy big gigs where you have what looks like a kids toy kit on stage but delivers a massive sound out front. And it's made low volume gigs and rehearsals a joy. In fact with iem's we're a monitor free zone. But you do have to get into editing (I have various eq'd presets for each kit depending on what type of PA it's going through) and as there's no acoustic volume (just like an electric guitar or bass!), monitoring is crucial (but with our xr18 desk that's an easy task). One side effect of playing an Ekit I hadn't considered before is that there's no hiding place for your kick pedal... for all the audience to criticise your technique!

My best mate in school was a great guitarist, even then he was a natural talent. So I couldn't pick up the guitar as I was always going to be comparing myself to him. He formed a band with his brother on bass, but when the brother couldn't commit to rehearsals he suggested I take up the bass. We loved going to see bands live and the idea of being on stage myself was always there. So I went to my local shop and they had a fretless Westone, and I thought well, if I'm going to play 4 strings rather than 6 then a fretless would look cool. I didn't actually pick up a fretted bass until 20 years later! It didn't take long for me to be hooked and not think of the bass as an something failed guitarists ended up playing. My biggest influence then was Chris Squire. Massively into Yes I was mesmerized by his driving bass lines. I never really nailed the tone on my fretless (!) but his playing style was what I aspired to. I spent the next few decades getting kicked out of bands for over playing! Then I came across Eberhard Weber and converted almost overnight to EUB. Much to the consternation of the rock band I was in at the time, I insisted on playing it exclusively. Only recently have I found my way back to fretless BG, but very much still learning and loving playing bass.

Always been an envelope filter fan but since coming across the Aguilar Grape Phaser it's been my effect of choice when getting funky in preference to my collection of EF pedals. So I was quite keen when Warm Audio announced they were releasing an accurate reproduction of the Mu-tron phasor II... and here it is. Shimmering, fast rate, phaser sounds are great for psychedelic guitar but for bass my preference is a slow rate with high feedback. And as the manual states, the feedback control is particularly effective with slow rates. For the audio clips I've tried to match the rate and feedback as a comparison between the Warm Audio and Aguilar but the Mutation also has a depth control (lacking on the Aguilar), which I've set to preference. To my ears, the WA is warmer (bassier) and smoother (less harsh), whereas the Aguilar has more mids and treble, and more of a swirly, squelchy, sound. The WA seems less extreme (for the slow rates at which I'd use it) than the Aguilar, although with the depth wide open it does approach the Aguilar but I think it's at its best at less extreme settings. But my fav sound is both used in series! Very squelchy and swirly but not much shimmer. Very funky. Interested to see what others think to the clips. Reverb is courtesy of a HoF, and an Aguilar TLC is first in chain. The bass used is a Squier Jazz fretless with Galli Synthesis flat strings. Settings for the WA as per picture, Aguilar is set 12 o'clock rate, 2 o'clock color (feedback). PS the Mutation is not a small pedal, about twice the size of the Aguilar, so will take up some board real estate. Seems very well made though. Clip 1; straight Clip 2; Warm Audio Clip 3; Aguilar Clip 4; Warm Audio plus Aguilar 00:01:66:00:5C:51_285_Straight.mp3 00:01:66:00:5C:51_287_Warm Audio.mp3 00:01:66:00:5C:51_289_Aguilar Grape Phaser.mp3 00:01:66:00:5C:51_291_Warm Audio + Aguilar.mp3

Just arrived! Had a quick play through, compared to the Aguilar Grape Phaser this is warmer and smoother. I will do a review in the next week with some clips to compare. Initial reaction, and it's early days, I prefer this to the Aguilar. PS have now posted a quick review with some clips.

I don't think this will help, but I found the biggest difference to my live playing occurred when I swapped over from bg to EUB. The reason, I believe, is because I was no longer having to give any thought to what I was doing on stage... routed to the spot, it's easier to concentrate on my playing.

I'm in a covers band with which I play drums and there are a couple of songs I absolutely detest but the audience love. To get through them, and the same strategy would apply if I were playing bass, I screw with the structure of my playing to the point where the bass player gives me a knowing look but the audience are less aware. And there's the fun, how much can you screw with the song without ruining it. So, for the microwave oven song i start out straight but by the end it's full on funk. It's been an interesting journey to see how much i can push it without losing the audience or for that matter the sympathy of my bandmates. I've made it perfectly clear to the rest of the band that I'm a consummate professional and will serve the song at all costs... with a few exceptions, which I don't tell them about and just have fun with. PS I HATE the microwave oven song!!!