Boodang

Lists like this are quite fun if only for introducing me to Dirty Loops and highlighting Lee Rocker's trip across America in an airstream. I'm biased here, but for me there's never enough mention of upright jazz players. My shout would go to Nick Blacka from Gogo Penguin for their approach to micro-compositional playing.

JPJ & JB have always been a huge influence on my playing and Zep played so infrequently in the UK it was an exciting weekend. I was too young to catch them in 75 at Earl's Court so wasn't going to miss them at knebworth. My friend didn't come as he didn't like outdoor gigs and was going to wait until they played a venue.. a big mistake. I remember the new album hadn't been released in time for the gig. Anybody here a fan of 'in through the out door'? There does seem to be a lot of dodgy guitar work on it, especially the intro to hot dog, which if I remember correctly was terrible played live. Seemed a bit of a scrappy album, were led zep on their way down by then? Certainly Robert Plant seems to have plenty more music in him but not so much Page, other than dodgy sound tracks to dodgy death wish movies, seems to be in an endless loop of remixes.

It's one reason I've always liked playing in a trio as it brings the bass to the fore. An analogy told to me by a sound engineer always stuck with me; if you only had one spotlight for the stage, at whom would you point it? Of course, the egotist singer!

Yeah, relative pitch something you can work on, perfect pitch not something I'd want to be lumbered with!

It's never occurred to me to keep a bass if it genuinely needs shims. At that point it's one step beyond.

Well, not quite the same but at least it's on dvd now

The knebworth gig is available on DVD now. Apparently the original recording was affected by an audio bleed which modulated the video. Digital technology has sorted this out so you can enjoy it in all it's glory.

Doesn't do 4th & 5ths, but a cog T65 does an octave down, octave up, plus some overdrive.

They were still good! I remember Led Zep played for about 3 hours.

PS. Chase & Dave support Led Zep! They were good though.

Anybody remember these gigs? Just found my old program.

Found some old bass player (us) clippings.... anybody remember this ad?! Getting perfect pitch wasn't as hard as achieving the facial expressions necessary I thought!

Yep, I run a TC Flashback2 into a HoF2 and that gives me plenty of options. They've both got slots for toneprint presets as well with some great ones to choose from.

Also, and this is not for every song, you could use the Gwizdala trick of using an echo, rather than a reverb. He has a preset on the Helix stomp which is also on the TC flashback2, where you get 3 short repeats. Use it subtly and it adds loads but isn't ott like some. I got a tc flashback2 s/h quite cheap and there's a Gwizdala toneprint for this... surprisingly useful.

As others have said here, don't scoop your sound and keep some healthy mids in there. Pedal wise, I've got an old sansamp which is great for adding a bit of that Ampeg style tone. Also I use an analogue octaver when I want to fill out in a trio. Not so much to fill in for the lack of a rhythm guitar but more to just thicken the sound. I just kick it in when needed in a song and keep the octave sound very low so it's subtle enough to not be a jump in tone. Also, too much and gets a bit artificial sounding. Also the reason for analogue rather than digital octaver is that it has a more organic and less synthy tone... imho.

If string budget it tight, a compelling argument for that Jameson tone... put a set of flats on and never, ever change them!

Fair point!

In fact, to simplify the issue, if you turn the comp control full ccw (so in theory it has no effect) and put the eq controls at 12 o'clock (again in theory the eq should have no affect) then switch between bypass and on, the tone of bass changes. In theory there should be no difference but the pedal seems to have an inherent in-built tonal quality which is not neutral.

With so much choice these days, and as strings are an essential ingredient in your tone and playability, why settle for less than amazing?!

I don't think the Spectracomp settings is the issue as I've loaded the same toneprint on to both; I've using the Captain East on both. When you take the bypass off the spectradrive pedal it kicks in both the comp and eq. The comp seems to be working as I would expect the captain east toneprint to respond but I can't get the eq to sound flat.

Got this recently so I could combine the Spectracomp with a 4 band eq and the fact it has an overdrive toneprint as well is a bonus. However.... When I'm just using the Spectracomp with the eq all set at 12 o'clock it doesn't sound neutral, not the same as just using a Spectracomp pedal on it's own. Is it because the eq controls don't have centre detents? Anyway, swapping between the two it's noticable. So, when my fretless goes through this I just want the comp, but when I switch to the fretted I roll off the treble and a bit of high mid. The eq is good, trouble is it doesn't seem to sound neutral when in theory it shouldn't be doing anything. Just wondered if anybody else felt the same / had the same issue as regards the neutrality, or lack of it. The only solution is to use both the Spectracomp and spectradrive with an a/b switch but it sort of defeats the object of why I bought the spectradrive in the first place!

Oh, and one thing I did notice when you look at the current line up, the specials have an 11" neck radius and the classic is 7.5". So another thing in the mix if neck radius is important to you.

... and have you seen the Darkray? A usa stingray with a darkglass preamp. That has to be interesting.

Interestingly the equivalent cost today that Fender were selling the P bass back in the day is around 2K, so not cheap. Makes you realise how far we've come in terms of quality/price, especially in the last few years. My Squier jazz is one of the best I've ever played in the 40 years of being a bassist and even with the hardware mods I've done still very cheap by comparison.

Worse thing I ever did was to get a custom made bass as a headless! Now I have a great bass but limited string choice... in theory you can clamp any string but in practice a lot of strings don't like this and destroy themselves under this abuse they weren't designed for. My fav strings have a synthetic core and even come with a warning on the packet about being delicate when installing (they're not delicate for playing purposes). If I want to be be 47 quid less well off all I have to do is try and put them on my headless!