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Thanks Phil. I didn't suggest any stick plus sub systems because the OP said he was old school and also because they can get pretty spendy, but you're right. FBT, HK, RCF and others offer excellent options. I'd add that one capable sub will always beat two less able ones. I find I need only one for probably 80% of the gigs I do (I sometimes wonder whether it was worth my buying two when one sits at home for much of the time). The RCF 8003 is very good, although it's a bit of a lump to carry around. The 905 is a little easier on the back. A pair on NXL24s plus a single 905 would be a pretty tasty rig and would come in under the OP's budget.

I think sometimes, it's just the time of the month and year. This Saturday just gone at a regular venue was rather quiet compared to usual. We put it down as the last weekend before payday, compounded by it being the first month after the summer holidays.

I spent years getting paid to "untrain" managers from using that technique. For what it's worth although too late in this case, The "sh1t sandwich" feedback method has several significant disadvantages. One major issue is that it often fails to achieve its intended purpose because of negativity bias; people are more likely to remember and focus on the negative feedback while disregarding the positive comments that frame it, rendering the praise ineffective. This can lead to recipients feeling that the positive feedback is insincere or merely a tactic to soften the blow, which undermines trust and makes the compliments seem fake. As a result, the positive feedback may be dismissed entirely, and the negative feedback may be perceived as more severe than intended. It'll be interesting to see what happens. If he's ex-military it might work.

Hi all, I’d like to step in and clarify things directly, as I can see some understandable confusion here. Bass Bags Ltd (the company) went into liquidation, but the Bass Bags brand, stock, and team were acquired by Strings Centre Ltd, which is now running the business. We are trading as Bass Bags (a Strings Centre brand) and continuing to serve musicians exactly as before. Like many UK retailers, we’ve faced tough trading conditions in recent years — Covid, Brexit, and wider global pressures (including the war in Ukraine) have all made it challenging. Closing Bass Bags Ltd was a restructuring step, but it has allowed us to protect the brand, keep the same team together, and continue looking after our customers. For me, Bass Bags has never just been a company name — it’s our team, a small family of people who share their expertise to make a living. We’re musicians and craftspeople ourselves, and we take things personally when it comes to our customers. That hasn’t changed, and it never will. To be absolutely clear: The same team is here looking after customers, just as we always have. No customer orders, hires, or repairs have been affected. We’re fully operational, continuing to support players across the UK and beyond. We’d always prefer people to pick up the phone and speak to us directly rather than speculate online — but I completely understand the concerns and wanted to set the record straight here. If anyone would like to talk to me directly, please feel free to get in touch: 📞 01332 840391 📧 [email protected] Thanks to everyone who has supported us over the years. We remain committed to delivering the same reliable service that Bass Bags has been known for since the beginning. David (Bass Bags / Strings Centre Ltd)

I once played a duo gig in a bar with just one drunk customer. He started howling like a dog over the music and couldn't take it any more. So I went over to him, picked him up (he was only little) and threw him into the street. He, did eventually, crawl back in to his seat at the bar. ...we weren't asked to come back 🤣

It's important to be aware of how the sound you create sits in the mix. If you're running through the PA, you can pretty well set your on stage sound however you like it, but not if you're depending on backline - wholly or partially - to feed the room. That sumptuous bass sound you hear close up to your rig can be woolly/boomy and indistinct at distance. I often find I have to cut lows and boost low mids to get a sound that works in context, even to the extent that the bass sounds a bit honky to me on stage. That's probably one of the many reasons P basses are so popular...

It's definitely a neck-off job. Depending on the design it's sometimes easier to convert to bolt-on and add a shim, or you can reset the angle and glue it back on. Check out twoodfrd on Youtube, he has a bunch of great videos about neck resets and the geometry involved (he's more fly-on-the-wall than how-to, so you have the just watch a bunch to figure stuff out, but he's brilliant).

IMO it doesn't matter if you are playing to just the bar staff and half of the other band on the bill or an adoring audience of several thousand. You have to give it everything. If you can't do that then maybe live performance isn't for you. I've played my share of poorly attended gigs, and you never know if one of the two people who aren't venue staff or in one of the other bands is going to be someone important who will open the doors to better gigs, as has also happened to me.

First proper rehearsal (after the initial meet and jam session) with the new covers band went really well, and we've very easily agreed on a couple of simple rules of engagement; [1] we want to make the singer sound as good as possible, so we'll play it where he needs to sing it and if it ultimately doesn't suit then we won't waste time on it, and [2] nobody has to play anything they hate. Plan is to get an initial set together and do some open mics to see what response we get, but the main drive behind it is that we play what we like and have fun doing it. With that in mind we went down the initial list, booted the couple I just wasn't going to have anything to do with, swapped some others with better suited songs by the same band, added some to look at which are my influence and they'd never heard of before, self-assigned some homework which are their influence and I'd never heard of before, and even chopped up and reordered a tune on the spot to get rid of a keyboard solo and make 'our' version. We have a better list for next time and it feels like everyone is pulling in the same direction. It's been ages since I've had to explain my odd (so I'm told) musical ways to new people, so that was fun, but they had to understand that keys / notes / dots / tabs / chord charts / number systems are all meaningless to me - I play by ear, have no idea which notes I'm playing, 'know' a song if I can literally hear it in my head, really don't care which key you move it to.. etc. It felt like one of those initial dating conversations where you start to question whether it'd be easier to just stay single than go over all this again, but at least they know now!

There are loads of wiring diagrams on Schaller's Megaswitch website. It's a bit awkward to navigait, but once you're figured out what set-up you're after it should make sense.

You'll have heard of Mayones though, Fame is their more budget friendly line and only sold through DV24/7 😎 My pal John has played a Fame Baphomet for a good few year now, swears by it 👍

Was it the Dragonflii in Pontypool by any chance? Great little pub but we had a similar issue with attendance :-)

This was my TE combo on cab tower.

This old TE head sounds amazing through my Bergantino ceramic magnet driver cabs.

I was in a band that literally played to a barman, one man and the man's dog. We did sell album to the man. We didn't ask if the album was for the dog.

Happens to the best of us, Blue. I remember one time we played to a completely empty room, save for the bar staff. They told us we could go home after playing the first set. We still got paid. Epic fail. It was a football club's social club - albeit a very small team in the Highland League, but is that what supporting your team looks like? I just couldn't believe it.

Very nice to see them back. Love the slick convertible combo thing. The heads say 4ohm minimum, but they sell a pre-done stack with the 115 and 210 (4ohm each, 2ohm total). How odd.

Well, it gives me no pleasure to say this, but I effing knew it. I've been saying on and off that they were in bother for the past couple of years. I hope that whoever buys what's left (Fender seem to be the front runner) isn't doing it just to hoard the name.

They probably enjoyed it more than Marc enjoyed our performance. He didn't clap once!

So I'm guessing the idea is to download songs in ChordPro format from SongSelect, and then add into your JustChords database? Are you able to increase the font size, scroll using a bluetooth footswitch, change keys on the fly (or at least relatively easily) and annotate?

Love the Marc Bolan cut-out story. I remember once we an outside event on a farm where we ended up playing to the livestock. Daryl