Phil Starr

His audition not mine, but yes any audition is always a two way process. It was one of those situations where everyone was terribly polite as he 'explained' that we were 'doing it all wrong' we needed to drop the songs from our set and all learn the set he had learned. We couldn't get away fast enough

It's the guitarists that get me on this one. "I play the solo just like the original" and then they never do, which wouldn't be an issue if it wasn't for coming out of the solo onto the E at the end. It wouldn't matter if they made eye contact, gave a little nod or stuck to the right number of bars. Or even if they knew that Free made at least four different versions out there. I had one guy at an audition (his not mine) shouting at me because I'd got it 'wrong'. 'Um, mate you came in three bars too late then missed the first beat of the bar. Fluffed the third to last bar in the solo and completely lost where you were was what I decided not to say. I've had others that tell me they improvise the solo but always end with 'this' and then fumble the demonstration of 'what they always play' or alternatively play 'this' three times in the solo so I have to guess which one of the three is the end. No point in asking them how many bars they want for the solo either. Then again was the band who told me 'we do the Christina Aguilera version' where the bassist plays over everything and which is in a different key . They played the Free version and had clearly told the female singer they were doing Christina just to get her to do the song. I rewarded myself by playing the Aguilera bassline over the verses which was actually good fun. Actually I love not playing the verses, it answers the question 'what does the bass actually do?' as the whole song lifts every time you come in.

Why does no-one show the bass player

It's the same sized cab as the BC110T (which if people aren't familiar is a home build design by Stevie which we published on Bass Chat during lockdown here) I have to confess that despite having better cabs it's my go to for rehearsals and small gigs. It's a really nice little cab and weighs nothing. The Celestion bass driver in it is a little gem which doesn't have the lumpy response peak that most bass speakers have, that lets you get away with a simple high pass filter for the horn driver which basically takes over where the bass unit starts to roll off. The crossover point is higher and the 10" Celestion has fairly modest power handling. It sounds great but won't go so loud. Fortunately our recent drummers are very controlled. The Monza is a very different beast, it goes lower than the 110T and the bass is much tighter and more controlled due to the much more powerful motor system in the bass driver. It is also a 600W speaker. You are going to get some of the slam you get from a much bigger speaker. The crossover point is nearly an octave lower (I think) so the midrange is sweeter and the dispersion of the Monza much better. We didn't spend much time comparing the BC110T with the Monza, it was just idle curiosity on my part to hear my own cab and we were surprised that it wasn't disgraced at that sort of volume. The sort of clarity from the Monza is at another level though.

@stevie

I had a chance today to see/hear the very first LFSys 10" cab, the 'Monza'. As far as I know there is nothing like it on the market yet, and it may be the next step in the evolution of bass cabs. A 10" cab that will be a genuine one cab solution. So I had a pleasant afternoon playing with speakers. @stevie brought across the Monza and one of the 12" Monacos to demonstrate and I have an LFSys Silverstone of my own. @bussonetthebass came along specifically to compare these speakers. We used a Bugera BV1001M with controls set to flat. We've measured the frequency response and know it to be just about neutral. We tested mainly with a Fender Highway One jazz fitted with Fender noiseless pups but also with a American Deluxe P bass and a Japanese thunderbird copy by Burny(Fernandes). Now it's hard to describe the sound of these three speakers because normally you'd describe a speaker by their 'voicing' and the voicing of all three is essentially flat. deliberately they add almost no sound of their own so the differences are minimal. Although each has it's own crossover design they all cross over at 2,000Hz and everything above that is essentially identical. What you hear is what comes out of the pickups, what you would hear in the recording studio direct from the pickups. The Silverstone has the flattest bass response and sounds the warmest of the three. The Monacos have a tailored bass response with a drop in bass at around 200Hz and then a shelved response after that. It's designed to avoid boominess at high volumes when used live, subjectively you can hear the bass goes all the way down but it doesn't become obtrusive at high volumes it movesfrom a lovely clean deep bass to a real slam as you crank the amp. The 10" Monza sits between these two, the bass is well controlled but retains a slight warmth. The outstanding thing about all these speakers though is their clarity across the rest of the range which is more than just a family resemblance. They do this with zero sibilance too, no nasty tizz from a cheap tweeter it all just sounds very natural. The other thing is that the sound is very even as you move round the room 60deg off axis either side and you hear pretty much what you hear 10deg off, I saw @bussonetthebass (Jules) walking round to test that claim so hopefully he will comment. Changing basses brough instant and very obvious changes in the sound. A lovely thud from the Japanese T-Bird a slightly polite but recognisable P sound from the P but our favourite was the Jazz with the upgraded PUPs. It all just sounded so clean. So how loud does the Monza go? Well it is a little quieter than its 12" siblings more than 1db and less than 3db so call it 2db (I didn't measure) Given that the Monza will handle double the power of the Silverstone (+3db) that means in my opinion it will match pretty much any drummer for volume with the right amp. I've been gigging my Silverstone with a Warwick Gnome round the local pubs so I know that is 'enough' for a pub band. With the Bugera or anything else that puts out 300W+ into it's 8ohms I think we now have a 10" bass cab which will do any pub gig or monitoring and fill a room with a 100 people in it without sweat. I think it might be the first truly one cab 10" solution for a gigging bassist. So what is special about it. On the surface it is a 10" speaker in a lightweight 30litre box with a horn tweeter, nothing revolutionary there. The differences are down to three main changes but significantly is the chosen 10" driver it has a huge 3" voice coil which allows it to dissipate more heat than a smaller coil so the driver is rated at 600W continuous. it's a long coil too so can handle a lot of low frequency excursion. The second part of this is the crossover because of the design of the bass driver it has to come in lower down and the horn has to cope with more of the mids. You can see the horn through the grille and for a small cab it is massive. The crossover itself is more complex than anything else you'll find in a bass cab and not only divides up the bass and treble but looks at the phase responses around the crossover frequency bringing the same level of design detail as you would get in a top end hi-fi speaker. It's more normal to see the 'crossover' in a bass cab to be no more than a high pass filter protecting the tweeter but allowing all sorts of problems across the crossover region even in cabs costing over £1,000. Finally this cab is built out of lightweight 12mm poplar ply and extensively braced. None of that is new of course but not many cabs can claim all three. There are cabs made of thinner ply extensively braced and others made of poplar ply unbraced or with limited bracing. You can buy PA speakers with similar care over the crossover but they won't have the same specs for the bass driver as this cab and will be in a plastic cab and as an active cab you won't be able to use it with your favourite bass amp. My conclusion was that if it had been available at the time I'd have gone for the Monza when I bought my cab. I think it is all the cab I'd ever need, I go through the PA nowadays at gigs so it would only ever be for monitoring or something I'd use if the PA was inadequate, or in emergencies where I'd need to fill a medium venue from back line. It has no sound advantage over the Silverstone but it will do the same things in a smaller cab. I've heard the Silverstone up against the BB2 and the Vanderkley and they aren't in the same league, they both have a more coloured sound. The BB2 is lighter but the smaller Monza is an even easier carry and fit in the boot. I'll leave you to decide if this little cab is a next step in evolution.

It is a guitar driver, that frame dates back to the mid 70's. The 80's version had a chunkier chassis I think. They still make a G-15 100 I'd be very careful about putting 100W through it or using it for bass. It may have a paper former for the coil and won't be using the sort of high temperature adhesives we use now. You might be able to sell it on to someone doing a restoration project if you do some research and find which cabs used that driver back in the 70's.

Welcome to Basschat No question is stupid and certainly not this one. All your bass needs is a set up, and the neck will need to be slightly concave or it will buzz at some points when you fret it. You really need to do a set up regularly, every time you change strings and on a regular basis throughout the life of the bass. The neck will buzz if you set the neck dead straight or sometimes if you set it with too much relief. You can stop it buzzing by raising the bridge of course but too much height at the bridge makes the strings too high to fret easily. The set up is a process of adjusting the neck where the relief moves the strings away from the fretboard and then balancing that sometimes by lowering the bridge if needed and balancing those two things so that the action is low enough to fret all along the neck but high enough to cut out any buzzing. Once you've done all this you may have changed the intonation so you'll need to check that too. It all sounds complex but once you've doine it a couple of times it's no harder than tuning up a new set of strings. I'd also advise you to get someone to help you the first time and preferably someone who will show you how they do it. It's a relatively cheap job to get done as it is a matter of just a few minutes work and a proper set up will make your bass a joy to play. In the long term learn to do it yourself Step one adjusting your truss rod

Welcome to Bass Chat @HarrisonHoand @UrijahGalloway I had forgotten all about this thread. Wood is a fantastic material but you have to accept an aging process. There are timber framed buildings whic are hundreds of years old with exposed oak beams, I built a treehouse out of pressure treated pine for my kids who are in their thirties now. I’ve recently taken it down and the timber has barely deteriorated, it is going through the planer to make new things. Teak on seaside piers lasts for decades in exposed conditions but nothing lasts forever. Look at almost any graveyard and the oldest stones can no longer be read. I kind of like the symbolism, that all things will fade and pass back into the soil. Only you can decide how long you want a memorial to last.

The only amp I’ve tried where that is a problem is the Warwick Gnome which really is tiny. I’m away from home so I can’t measure but I’m sure @stevie will be along

Guitarists, drummers, singers, bassists aren’t really the types of musicians you need to worry about IME. The big divide is between gigging musicians and the rest. Skilled and unskilled, pro or semi-pro, talented or just jobbing all fails into insignificance if you are in a band with these people. For a covers band you are going to need probably 30 songs to create an evening’s entertainment. That’s a lot of work. It’s disrespectful to expect to turn up knowing you’re going to mess up in front of an audience and to turn up to a rehearsal with four other people having learned the songs you are there to practice without having them good enough that you don’t hold them back. Hands up, I’m not the world’s greatest player, my playing is at best intermediate, we don’t all learn at the same rate but you know if someone is working hard. They make every rehearsal, turn up with everything prepared and let you know if there is a problem. Weve had a bit of illness and a couple of changes of personnel recently and I’ve worked with several dep’s. It’s been a privilege and an eye opener. Some have just been wonderful, a drummer who depped without rehearsal and others an inspiration. We had a bassist who depped on drums. He’d never gigged drums before but he learned the set,kept it simple and then sang harmonies as well. He was a gigging musician though so a deep understanding of what was needed carried him through. These people are real pro’s and a delight to work with, much more important than raw talent. We are a tolerant band, no big egos, we’ve all messed up but no one takes the mickey. We forgive mistakes from a new band member but you know if someone isn’t putting in a shift or they just aren’t capable. If every rehearsal shows some progress you know they are trying. If none of your set is working you know you’ll never get there. Get rid of these two or you will never leave the rehearsal room. With a decent keys player you can probably rehearse the rhythm section and vocals and be ready when you find the right guitarist. See how it goes with one before you add to your problems.

I see @Kiwi is reading this. Thanks to all of you who put all of the work in to keep this place going. I’ve met so many lovely people here and probably wouldn’t be playing without you all.

Don’t worry too much about the volume. Back in the day 200W was considered a loud amp and with decently efficient speakers even 100W would do the job. Electronics have improved bringing down the price per watt and we all pretty much carry more amp power than we strictly need. Unless your band operate at ‘stupid’ volumes (because this will damage your hearing) then 200W will be plenty. Using a compressor like the spectrocomp is great advice, you can bring up the average level without the peaks distorting. If you do think your sound is distorting roll off the bass a little it will clean up your sound in the mix anyway and protect both amp and speakers.

You should be able to do something really good within your budget depending upon your choices. A pair of RCF ART712’s new are around £950 so used would be well within your budget. These would cope with most gig situations and be better than the gear a lot of busy bands are using. Other brands are available. There are some decisions only you can make. Active speakers or passive with separate amps? Active is where we are all going but that means people are selling off their old ones and they can be real bargains out there. The cost to you is more complex set up and a bit of research to match amps to speakers. If this is really only going to be for rehearsal then it only needs setting up once so not really very inconvenient. Buying used means you get better gear for your money and if you make a mistake you can sell on and get your money back to try again. Your budget and the low price of modern gear would let you buy new and get something really quie competent but with a guarantee. What would you choose here. Finally you probably ought to put a bit aside for things like leads, stands microphones and so on. If you are updating the PA you won’t want to let other bits of the PA to let you down. Holding back a few euros could be a sensible choice. Finally I’ve forgotten where you are based, is gear including used widely available?

Good luck,enjoy it

Do you mean the monks or Carl Orff or just the language? Great tunes though

That's where you are going wrong, almost all the valvey goodness is coming from the output stages, the power amp, the combination of overloading the output valves and the transformer. That plus a dedicated guitar speaker. Yes you use the tone stack to tweak the tone but the basic timbre of a valve amp is shaped by the nature of hard driven output stages and the speakers chosen. It's a lovely amp but you are bypassing the loveliness (and carrying it unnecessarily) Guitar amps are miked up because you want the sound of the power amp and the speaker combined, which guitarists obsess about getting exactly right for 'their' tone' If you want to go speakerless then you also need to go ampless. You need to have something that simulates valve overdrive (basically increasing the second harmonic distortion and a bit of compression) and something that will simulate the response of the speakers, a modeller in other words. Something like the SansAmp already mentioned will do this or if funds are an issue the Behringer V-amp or a Zoom B1-Four. FWIW I go ampless nowadays using a SansAmp for bass and it just sprinkles pixie dust on my sound. Using a dummy load is rarely a good idea. For a guitarist it allows them to get their stage sound in the studio and 50 years ago it was the only way of doing that. A resistor capable of handling that sort of power is a really specialist thing and cost more than the simulators I've suggested. The dual rectifier coupled with a guitar speaker produces a glorious sound Some rate it the best guitar amp ever so it's a thing to treasure but not as a pre-amp. Given the price of replacing the valves and the fragility when moving them just switching them on and off at every gig is going to cost you more than a Zoom .

If you fancy a home build then one of these House Jam Micro Cab - Amps and Cabs - Basschat will do exactly the job you want. If not then from your FRFR needs I'd go a different route altogether. For Christmas this year I got a pair of 5" nearfield studio monitors. As they are designed for mixing uncompressed drums and bass at high volumes in small rooms they can absolutely handle your bass. they are also designed to be ruthlessly honest so FRFR is about as good as it gets. They are active so you don't need an amp and you can drive them off a Sansamp or a multi fx unit like the Zoom B1Four. They are so good I don't bother getting the PA out for rehearsals with my duo, two vox, bass, guitar and drum machine. loud enough to make your ears ring if you want. I've not bothered getting a bass amp out at home . There is absolutely no need. I went for the RCF Lyra but Yamaha and loads of others do equally good versions. Around £300 new for a pair and widely available used because people seem to upgrade studio stuff quite often.

I wouldn't dismiss @Silvia Bluejay quite so easily. The better your band is the easier it will be to get gigs. Having an identity is key. the first question the booker will ask is 'what do you play?' and if you can't answer in a couple of words you've probably lost your booking. Eclectic means you've shoved a set together at random and marks you out as unprofessional. You'll need something recorded so they can hear you and see what you do. The more professional it looks the better chance you'll have getting the gig. You've got to look at it from the pubs point of view. Times are hard for them so they have to be hard nosed. If a band charges £250 they are going to have to sell 250 extra drinks to pay for the band. They probably have to attract an extra 60-80 customers and keep them in the pub long enough to buy a few drinks. To do that they need to play songs people like at least competently, even if the band is brilliant they still need to play stuff people like. An unknown band is a risk. A bad Saturday is often the difference between making a profit over the week or a loss. Look up Lemonrock too, it isn't strong all over the country but where it is a lot of pubs will use it as their go-to for booking bands. In Cambridge itself it looks to be strong. It's tough if you are a start up band, you'll probably be asked where else you have played. There isn't a formula for promotional material any more than there is a chat up line that will get you a partner. Some decent recordings and video will help but to get people to even look at it you'll need someone to do a lot of leg work. They are the most important person in the band

Well done IAG who are a huge group selling reasonably priced gear like Music Tribe/Behringer but provide professional level after sales, showing it can be done. I too got my spares return of post. Based on the data I have you should be good for 500 gigs and twenty years Seriously I'd put the failure down to age, accidents happen over that sort of usage and paper cones can deteriorate over that sort of time period. I've seen coils become unsoldered where the flexible tails join them and all sorts. The probability would be that the other one will go before this one but you might get ten years before that happens. I'd keep an eye and ear open over the next couple of gigs and I'd have had a close look at the crossover board and internal wiring when I replaced the speaker but I wouldn't actually anticipate problems. Good luck

If these are Wharfedale Titans you can probably get spares from them. I had to replace a driver in my EVP subs and they provided a reasonably priced replacement within 48 hours. Over 15 years all sorts of events may have affected your speakers and failure after that time could be down to all sorts of things. That they lasted this long suggests you weren't doin much wrong. Having said that speakers at this price point won't be long throw so it is possible that over excursion may be a problem if you are mic'ing the kick especially if you are using any bass boost. Again after years of safe usage this is not that likely. Double check your speaker though, it's possibly working and the fault could be a cable, the internal wiring inside the cab or something wrong in the crossover, there may even be a fuse on the crossover board

I'll try and remember, I've just stocked up with cable ties from Lidl and posted that up. A few years back they actually stocked mic stands. Nice long boom arm they had too.

Well done, looks good and that Faital is a nice driver. You might be able to shed a few kilos by building a new cab the same dimensions out of lightweight ply if you get itching for more modification.

I think it's okay for me to say there are rumblings about an imminent release. @steviewill doubtless be along but I'm expecting to hear the first one within a couple of weeks. Not sure if that is a late prototype or the first production model but I'm really looking forward to hearing it

I'll drink to that, I've got a pair of ZS10's as well as the pros and recently re-tried them with memory buds. That improves the comfort and fit by so much and fit is all when it comes to improving the sound. They became my go to set for the gym until my bluetooth lead stopped working. For anyone reading this using universal fit IEM's keep trying buds until you get the best possible seal, it makes somuch difference to the sound.