Phil Starr

I'd certainly agree with certain strings and basses going well together. Anyway my love affair with flats continues, I used them through my little Hartke 10 last night at a gig (DI'd just in case, I needn't have worried) I was stuck in the corner as usual so lots of boundary reinforcement. It was lovely. I just sat below everyone in the mix, great sound in the soul/poppy stuff but just enough bite for the rockier songs. Unlike the Dean Markley's I didn't overpower everything else so i could actually turn up so the bass was prominent without taking over, which is what i really like to achieve when i am mixing someone else. The audience stayed on their feet all evening so we all enjoyed the warmth.

The 57 and the 58 have the same working parts mounted in a different case. The 57 works better at a bigger distance to the 58 which really needs you to be within a cm(ish) of the mic. Traditionally the 57 is used as an instrument mic but it makes a perfectly good vocal mic which suits some female voices. Cardiod mics have the flat spot directly behind the mic and super cardioids behind at about a 45degree angle. Feedback depends upon where the sound is coming from so you put monitors directly behind the cardioid and at an angle behind the super cardioid. Neither is strictly 'better' but you need to know what you've got. Shure have a great website [url="http://www.shure.co.uk/support_download/educational_content/microphones-basics/microphone_polar_patterns"]http://www.shure.co.uk/support_download/educational_content/microphones-basics/microphone_polar_patterns[/url] The matching transformer won't make a poor mic into a great one, all it does is match the mic to the input, They are getting hard to get hold of though, I've just checked maplin and they only do one designed to go the other way XLR->jack. you'd have to use adaptors to connect it up the way you want. You could also use a DI box designed for guitar though which would have the advantage of doubling as a .....DI for guitar! Actually you may be able to borrow one to try. To be honest I wouldn't spend too much on this as the money would be better spent on a new mic. Blue Aran are selling the XM8500 for £15 at the moment. It'll do till you can afford an AKG/Electrovoice/Senny

[quote name='Dub Saint' timestamp='1340496194' post='1705401'] Hi Everyone, I'm Dub Saint, the creator of the P, J, Ray sound test. Thanks so much for checking out my blog - I had no idea anyone was still interested in the sound test (I posted it on my blog over a week ago; the results were posted yesterday). It wasn't until I check my blog stats today that I realized almost 400 people clicked on my blog... TODAY!!! Unfortunately, I took the bass test recordings off of my soundcloud site yesterday, assuming the test had concluded and no one wanted to hear the samples now that the results had been posted.... apparently, was I wrong. SO... earlier today I reposted the recordings as they were when I originally made the post on my blog....everything should be working fine now. Thanks, and sorry for the inconvenience! Adam. My introduction to the different basses and the sound test is here: [url="http://dubsaint.wordpress.com/2012/06/13/p-j-or-ray-whats-the-difference-anyway-part-1-introduction/"]http://dubsaint.word...1-introduction/[/url] The sound test can be found here: [url="http://dubsaint.wordpress.com/2012/06/15/p-j-or-ray-whats-the-difference-anyway-part-2-take-the-sound-test/"]http://dubsaint.word...the-sound-test/[/url] The results/truth can be found here: [url="http://dubsaint.wordpress.com/2012/06/22/p-j-or-ray-part-3-the-results/"]http://dubsaint.word...-3-the-results/[/url] [/quote] Hey Adam, thanks for doing this. Well I got it right, the Ray stood out and the simplicity of the P sound just about enabled me to get it, the first clip on the Jazz gave it away. I really wouldn't have staked any money on it though. Sadly I liked the P-sound overall, I play a Jazz., oops. I thought it was a pretty fair test and certainly food for thought, surely no-one expects you to go out and buy three sets of five different strings! Part of this has to be dependent upon what style you play. Actually I liked the sound of the Ray slapped but I don't really like slap much and none of our songs need it. Oh, was the picked piece Matchbox 20 or just the universal chord sequence? It is almost note for note/beat for beat what I play for 'How Far We've Come'

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1340448961' post='1704546'] Most amusing - but just out of interest, what gave you this impression? [/quote] Well nobody I've spoken to has had a good word to say about flats and nobody playing live round here seems to use them. The impression is always given that it is only the sort of thing you would look at to be deliberately different ar as a way of getting close to the sound of an upright

Well I've not been on much, too much fun playing with my new toys, they sounded great at a full rehearsal last night, I could up the volume without spoiling the sound balance for the others. Mine are Elites, the only choice in Manson's was these or Roto's. First gig with them tonight. I'll let you know how i get on. The reason I posted was because I was previously under the impression that there was something special and obscure about using flats, a bit veggie/wholemeal/socks and sandals, that somehow they are 'difficult' 'dull','thuddy' or whatever. Actually they are just strings with their own tone and character which happens to sit well with other instruments and work well with some sorts of music. I'll eventually run my P bass with stainless roundwounds and swap in all probability. If you are reading this without having tried flats then I'd say don't leave it as long as i did, there's nothing obscure or difficult about them they are just strings which you'll like or not, but worth trying. You won't turn into a Morris Dancer, honest

OK there's lots of stuff here. First the factual bit. Mic's are either low impedance and balanced line needing a three pin connector, almost always an XLR (but I remember stereo jacks in the 70's) or they are single ended high impedance. The high impedance mics like yours actually have more output than the low impedance ones but we don't use them nowadays because they pick up electrical noise. The reason yours is so quiet is because it doesn't match your mixer inputs so the output is being lost. If you buy a matching transformer it will turn the output into a low impedance balanced output which will match your mixer and make all the mic's output available. Maplin sell them, the last one I bought was £6.99 but that was some time ago. Almost factual. The SM58 is as tough and reliable as people say but was designed in 1962 and things have moved on. I've run some tests including blind tests on the SM58, here's the results. Lot's of people make copies of SM58's including Behringer's XM8500 and the Samson Q7, we have these and three SM58's in the band so I did a blind testing. The bodies are all similarly robust but the wiring/soldering in the Behringer was poor and broke, resoldering has fixed it. There is very little difference in the sound, the Q7 has a slight edge and the SM58 was the weakest but most people couldn't tell in a blind testing. The Behringer had more handling noise and the Q7 least. The XM8500 had the best feedback rejection and the Q7 the worst. None of the differences were very large though and I would not be surprised if I had ten of these mics to find overlaps because of manufacturing spread. We've had the Q7 for 5 years and it is as good as new so reliability is good for at least this sample. Less scientifically I've swapped mics during gigs. Two gigs ago we did a headline spot at an open mic and I swapped our SM58 for a beta58, they are chalk and cheese, the beta is so much better. All the subtlety and phrasing in our male vocalists voice just came out, I confess I didn't know he could sing that well. (don't tell him) I also had to swap my AKG D5 for a dying SM58 whilst mixing for another band. This time there was a female singer. Again the improvement was out of this world, just so much cleaner and more detailed. To be fair it turned out not to be the mic but the lead, SM58's are tough. One of the reasons the SM58 is so tough is, I think, why they sound so ordinary. Materials technology has moved on and modern mics have thinner tougher diaphragms. The diaphragm in the SM58 just won't track subtle movements as accurately as a lighter modern equivalent, add in the restrictions of 1960's magnet design and materials and 40 years of development and it isn't surprising that modern mic's have moved on. An over engineered diaphragm in a well made mic will be reliable. If you are on a budget the two clones I have tried are both good matches for the Shure (they are super cardioids though and the Shure is a cardioid) or try the mic transformer for a really cheap 'fix'. If not I would highly recommend the AKG D5 but also look at the Sennheisers and the Electrovoice ND767a. If you want an equivalent Shure then look at the beta58 but give the SM58 a miss. Oh, there is some merit in using matching mic's as someone suggested, you can set the system up to get the best out of them all at the same time and the feedback characteristics will be the same for all of them making it easier to deal with.

Looks like it isn't just me then. I've just spent three hours practicing (my better half is out) and not a twinge. Hope it sounds as good at the gig. It is looking like D'addarios next.

Just bought my first set of flatwounds after 5 years of playing, why does no-one tell you about this? First of all they make playing so much easier, You lose all the squeaks and fretting noise and that smooth surface feels so effortless that my left hand just wants to move over the strings too quickly. I am having to conscientiously slow down whilst I adjust. On top of this I lost a lot of fret buzz and have lowered the action. I play with my fingers and the lack of rough windings is a dream for the right hand too. The tone isn't as flat as i had expected, it's obviously more mellow and i ain't dialing out any top on the guitar's tone (Its a Fender Jazz by the way) but I have had worse from two month old nickels. I gigged them last night with my Harke combo and it just sat in the mix beautifully. Not sure of the synergy with my Ashdown Mag 600/Deltalite stack though, I'll try them out at this Sat's gig. The flats are just so easy to play and flatter my probably minimal technique. The downside is they don't really reward hard playing the way my old Rotosound and Dean Markleys did. They don't really growl, just get louder, in fact they only seem to do one tone. I've obviously a lot to learn and I can see me needing to swap basses for different songs but so far I love them. So if you are a flats virgin I'd definitely say it is worth £30 to find out. Any tips from more experienced flat players very welcome.

For any speaker bass is radiated 360 degrees, in all directions. Higher frequencies are radiated in an increasingly tight 'beam'. In a normal room the deep bass will be reflected off rear walls, floors and ceilings depending upon the exact dimensions. This will give something like 6db's of bass boost, possibly more which is the equivalent of four times the power so if you use 250W normally you are going to need 1000w to make the same sound. Because you lose bass more than the top end you will have to use a lot of eq to retain your sound. Raising your cab will enable you to hear yourself better but will cut bass even further than if you place it on the floor. Your choices are: Use a bigger amp and speakers Go through the PA Accept that for one gig you won't be getting the same tone and volume. A couple of other things to worry about, get some windshields for all your mics worry about the earth, run everything from the same socket so they all have the same earth potential and earth any metal trailers of scaffolding. Use an RCD earth current breaker.

+1 for the vacuum cleaner, make sure it is turned down though. Yes, a dented tweeter will affect performance.

[quote name='bertbass' timestamp='1339687811' post='1692753'] I used to love the old pop 50s. The best 12" around at the time, that I could afford anyway. [/quote]Happy Days! [quote name='Count Bassie' timestamp='1339705483' post='1693198'] A remark made about the 300 from Phil: Can you elaborate just a bit here? [/quote] Yes, most speakers are pretty limited in the bass, lack of excursion means they run out of steam and compress the bass. In addition small magnets and high Vas mean that the speakers need to be built into a box which is too big to move. Most commercial low-mid price speakers are built into boxes which are too small as a result. This creates a peak in output at about an octave above the fundamental frequency of the first five frets of a 4 string (ish) often about 3dB. The bass then rolls off pretty quickly below this so bottom E (41Hz) can easily be 18dB down from the average output. The peak creates a nice warm fuzzy mush and the bass seems very loud to us as we can hear bass quite well at this point. This is the sound you kind of expect to hear from a bass cab and most of the old school 4x10's give this sound. Using any speaker with low Q in a correctly sized cab sounds different as without the peak all the fuzzy warmth disappears and real deep bass emerges. You hear more of the fundamental and less second harmonic. Our hearing isn't very good at these really low frequencies so the whole experience seems different. I've spent years designing hi fi speakers so to me (and Lawrence from his build thread) it sounds 'right' and 'clean' but you might well miss the warmth so I'm warning you just in case. It's the difference between the sound through a decent PA or good headphones and the sound through an average combo. Listen to your bass through headphones to see if it is the sound for you. [quote name='Count Bassie' timestamp='1339706648' post='1693238'] That cab is divided into two, down the center. So I'd be routing a hole in it, I imagine. One thought was to build an enclosure for an amplifier into the cab, making it a combo. It could become pretty Borg-ish if I let this run into the ether very far! So I'm just riffing now... I'll go throw it around and come back. Thanks again all, much appreciation for your help! [/quote] You need to run winisd, but if the partition is airtight I suspect two 300's would go into a single compartment or one 125 into each. Putting two 125's into one side would give you the bass peak/ early roll off of an undersized cab so you can mess around to see which sound you prefer. Oh when entering the data into Win ISD you'll find some of the specs are wrong on the data sheet and winisd's auto calculate will tick you off. Use the help and enter the parameters in the order WinISD instructs you and you will get the correct values calculated. It's just about different ways of measuring parameters. Oh, the program will let you run mutiple projects but puts all the results onto a single graph so you can compare different cabs on the same graph. Have fun.

[quote name='LawrenceH' timestamp='1339671856' post='1692326'] This is the thing with the Eminence neo speakers, they nearly all bump up the upper mids (as do quite a lot of the ceramics). Certain people on talkbass insist this is never a problem but my personal preference is for something a little smoother. If you look at 10" ceramics bear in mind they'd typically weigh as much as or more than a kappalite! If portability is an issue then the other manufacturers I suggested make very good neo speakers. [/quote] Lawrence is right and in fact most speakers have this peak. It occurs fairly naturally as the big cones we use would fall off in response at much lower frequencies if they were designed to be rigid. In fact they flex and the central portion is mainly responsible for radiating the higher frequencies. By fiddling with the way the cones are made the manufacturers can control this and create a peak or a gradual roll off. Celestions bass speakers all have this peak but their PA speakers much less so. Anyway, this peak sounds quite nice even though it is actually a distortion and gives the classic sound of many guitar and bass systems. You might miss it if it is what you are used to hearing. That's down to taste really rather than physics so you have to decide between a smooth sound and a punchy (but distorted) one. The Fanes give the smooth sound. You can always use EQ to add a peak,

Hi I've been using the Fane Sovereigns. they are a general purpose speaker with a flat response. They do two models the 10-125 and the 10-300. I've tried both. The 10-125 is the one they recommend for bass. they do others too. The 125 has a smaller voice coil so handles reduced power (125W geddit?) and a lighter cone. It has a very flat response and goes up to 4kHz, in a biggish box it will have a very 'polite' sound not unlike DI'ing through the PA. If you used these with amp modelling they'd work really well. Put them in a compact box (four in a compact 4x10 for instance) and they'd give you a bit of a bass hump which would warm up the sound a bit at the expense of a little less deep bass. The 300 has more power handling and a much bigger magnet, So heavy I rebuilt my 4x10.These have the heavier cone and so top end is reduced a little and they handle deep bass with more authority, They only need a tiny cabinet so you can go really small and still get the best out of them. I ended up with them in a 2x10 which is loud enough to completely murder the drummer with my 600W amp so you never need anything else for indoor work. The deep bass is really clean and effortless but almost unspectacular as a result. the overall sound of these two isn't as different as i expected, the 300 goes high enough that you don't really notice any top missing (though like James Jamerson I think there's no money above the 5th fret) and the 125 does a nice clean bass too. The really good thing about these two is that Xmax (excursion) is very good so they handle a lot of bass before farting out. If I were fitting these in the cab you picture I'd go for the 125's if you were only going to use two and the 300 if you use four. Check the prices though, these are cheaper than the equivalent Eminences in the UK but I expect the position is reversed in the USA.

We tried alternatives to a full kit including the cajon. It makes a nice sound but our drummer never took to it. We also tried a cafe drum but the sound is literally monotonous. Now we go out with a Hi-hat and snare in the smaller pubs with a stomp box for the kick sound. We use a logarhythm which is cheap but sounds it. One local band goes around with just a snare and the drummer gets terrific variety just in the rhythm. Trophy Wife use a home made drum synth [url="http://vimeo.com/22665566"]http://vimeo.com/22665566[/url] which sounds great and gives a lot of performance opportunity but isn't acoustic obviously To be honest after experimenting I think it is matching the instrument to the drummer rather than the choice you make. Asking a drummer to use a cajon on the basis that it is just hitting things is not unlike asking a guitarist to play bass.

This question comes up pretty often so I wrote a brief article on the topic [url="http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/columns/gear_maintenance/making_it_loud.html"]http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/columns/gear_maintenance/making_it_loud.html[/url] The advice you are getting is pretty sound all round and for your budget you should find something fairly useful I'd also recommend Peavey or Ashdown secondhand. Good Luck

[quote name='The Dark Lord' timestamp='1338932312' post='1681428'] I'm just about to pick up one of these [url="http://www.guitarandampshop.co.uk/acatalog/Laney_CXP-112_120_Watt_Active_Stage_Monitor_Speaker_Cabinet.html"]http://www.guitarand...er_Cabinet.html[/url] [/quote] yeah we had the 10" version which is let down by the horn, It never let us down but just didn't give the vocal clarity i am looking for, if you do get it let us know how you get on.

[quote name='skidder652003' timestamp='1338884445' post='1680355'] used some wharfdale actives on saturday, they were fantastic, not mine unfortunately! [/quote] I must admit these are probably high on my list as they seem to represent pretty good value, Any idea which model?

You don't give any indication of budget but if I won the lottery. (you have to buy a ticket? Damn!) I'd buy the AER Amp One. It does it by trickery but it is loud and has a lovely warm tone and is tiny. Over a grand though and I've never ever seen one second hand which says something. There is nothing else like it really and if you are thinking about spending that much you have to look, if only to rule it out. Sorry but I'd agree with the go listen and try advice. Yeah, it is nice to have people point you in the right direction but the biggest variable is your taste and it is worth the research effort to get the sound you love, which of course I didn't do last time.

there's no secret to making a cheap cab. Chipboard or MDF instead of ply spray or carpet rather than vinyl, cheap fittings and speakers with smaller magnets and pressed steel frames. Then save on quality control. the latter should be no problem with Thomann according to their reputation here as their aftre-sales is highly rated. Ply actually doesn't sound as good as the other two but the cabinet is tougher if you move it around a lot and are careless. The small magnet either means the bass will be restricted or the speaker will be a lot less efficient or the maximum excursion of the speaker will be limited. It may well sound OK at lowish volumes but will fart out at a lower sound level then a quality product. I've no experience of Harley Benton but a lot of cheap PA stuff I've examined is unbelievably well made for the price, I couldn't buy the parts for the cost of the completed cabs. I'd reckon that if you can live with the restrictions this stuff will do a job for you but you might do better looking for mid-range second hand. There were a pair of Peavey 2x10's went for £110 on ebay last week.

I'll attempt a simple explanation though it is probably better with some drawings to explain. We are surrounded by electro magnetic fields from just about every electrical gadget around us. Any conductor in a magnetic field will act as an aerial and pick up some of that energy as electricity. In an audio cable this comes out as noise, it is only a tiny voltage but so is the voltage a mic' produces. In a 'balanced' (three pin) cable there are two signal wires and an earth. The cables are wired up so the signal goes in opposite directions down the cables but the electromagnetic noise will be at the same volume and the same direction in both cables. In the amp they are combined so that the noise cancels out but the signal doesn't. A mono jack can't do this as it only has one connection and an earth. If the signal has been through an amp then it will be much bigger. The noise will be the same. It is still there but swamped by the signal so you can safely use a mono jack (or an unbalanced cable) for these connections like the ones to your IEM's The balanced XLR's will be quieter but you might not notice much difference, Always use XLR (balanced) connectors if you can, they are never really wrong but don't worry too much if you know there is a good strong signal in an unbalanced lead.

We are now a trio but started as a duo though with electric bass. You don't say what style of music you play or what sort of audiences you intend playing to so if I'm way off beam then that's why. You have to be more melodic on the bass I think rather than just bashing away at the root 8 to the bar. We do Chasing Cars but I do the repeated guitar pattern on bass whist the guitarist takes the rhythm. In How to Save a Life (Fray) I play part of the piano line as the bass line In Dakota I play the guitar hook and vary the rhythm quite a lot from the original. Stereophonics songs are great for a stripped back approach, There are a lot of nicely crafted songs which are simple enough to stand messing around with a lot. We do Mr Writer, Step on my old Size Nines and are looking at Local Boy. Tainted Love goes down well, have a listen to the Imelda May version where he uses double bass. Little Lion Man, Mumfords works well, I just copy the bass line for this. To Love Somebody Nina Simone/Bee Gees is great for a treatment again because it is a nice simple song. Of course you may not be as cheesy as we are and in the end you have to choose songs your singer can do well but by homing in on well structured but simple songs and being prepared to go more melodic on the bass as well as messing with rhythms there's not much you can't do a version of. It makes you think as a bassist though and really improves your playing.

The time has come to upgrade, We played a gig on Sunday where we headlined with an open mic first and this gave us a chance to completely sort our monitors. The singers sounded out of this world throughout the evening. We are using an old, cheap Maplin PA as monitors simply because it was lying around unused and it has done the job for years. Set up carefully it works a treat but playing alone makes it difficult to adjust during the set so we are looking for an active system we can easily adjust on-stage. What active monitors have people tried and what is their experience? Good and bad please.

+1 for the AKG D5. I'm with Stevie on this one Shure's are popular because we all know them and they don't break (nothing wrong with that of course) Would you buy a car because it was the best available in the 1960's or has technology moved on? EV ND767a worth a look too.

+1 for compression. She needs to learn mic technique though and there isn't a brand on earth that will deal with someone who doesn't address the mic properly. Can you improve her monitoring so she can pick herself out a bit better. She may then learn to self correct. Over half of poor singing is actually down to poor monitoring IMO. You might want to look at super or hyper cardioid pattern mics rather than cardioids like the SM58. A lot of female vocalists often get on better with SM57's. Actually the beta58 is supercardioid but avoid anything with too strong a proximity effect if the singer has poor mic technique. I use an AKG D5 which does handle female vocals well but it is more revealing than the Shures so if the harshness is due to pitch problems beware. The Electrovoice nd767a might be worth a look too.

+1 Copydex and it is an easy repair. I usually ease the whole dust cap off and stick it back down in one piece rather than just trying to stick the loose bit but you'll have to judge this yourself. If it comes off easily because all the glue has failed then this is the right approach. If it is firmly stuck down then more than gentle pulling will damage the cone surface so just stick the loose bit. Use a childs paintbrush to get the glue on both surfaces,