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Good luck with hearing back from Rickenbacker. Fingers crossed that it can be sorted out though. 🤞

Smash It Up - The Damned

It's a neverending debate. I prefer fretlines myself as we all have positions where we're less fluid and accurate and the lines are a useful reference to compliment muscle memory, and particularly in any venues where the absolute clarity of the note you're may be compromised! Funnily enough, most lined fretless players don't look at the lines at all once they're playing, I don't think, because even the line on the side of the board is offset from where your fingers will be due to the angle of the neck and fretboard relative to your body. FWIW I have two fretless basses, one lined and one unlined and I like them both. There is definitely a 'flex' to playing an unlined board but unless you're Alain Caron it may be good to keep your ego in check. I've seen and heard a couple of guys playing fretless bass on unlined boards over the years who were probably not quite as in-tune as they thought 😂

On MPE all channels would be one patch but the dynamics of that channel are sent per string. So if you do a string bend (again probably not with a hammond organ) why would you want all the strings to bend by the same amount - pitch bend is a per channel message, normally you would just want the bending to be done on the string that did it not all the strings. Not having mpe reduces that flexibility and takes you back to why are you putting up with the downside (over a keyboard) of poor response when you are not using the upside of expression. The GR pedals process the signal directly as well, but that is a cover on the tracking, not too surprising as the GR55 is 13 years old now, came out basically when the first iPad did, the speed of processing has changed a lot (although the speed of calculating a frequency from a wave not so much). So it seems like the technology is the same, but a bit more modern and with the midi built in.

The IEM thread is a bit overwhelming, lol, I decided not to add this to it - but I have read the first section and was hoping for some advice, I have been playing 4 years (but 58 yo), and just started rehearsing with a local band which is amazing / brilliant fun. They rehearse in a small room and play very loudly (to me), at times I can't hear what I am playing and I quite worried about hearing damage. I have bought some Fender Musician Series Ear Plugs for our next session. The band mostly play through their own speakers / cabs and I am standing right next to mine which makes it even more difficult to hear. Is there a standalone / self contained solution whereby I can have my bass, some ambient sound so I can hear what the band are playing into IEM's which allow me to control the volume and what I am hearing but still hear my bass in the mix. I read the 'bible' at the beginning here and see that potentially the Zoom H6 or similar might be the ticket with built in mikes - is that right? Can it be combined with wired or wireless IEM's - could anyone suggest something suitable? I don't mind spending some money but it looks like it will cost enough to not want to make a wrong purchase! I would be very grateful for some advice on what will work well. Thank you J

Always a Dusty fan but there are many versions of son of a preacher man and when I started the car up yesterday Jazz FM played the very excellent Mavis Staples version.

@Merton's TE1200 sounded amazing at last year's Bass Bash. I probably won't be able to get my hands on one again until next year's Bash - but I'd like to spend some time figuring out why it was so impressive.

I'd go with seller 'earlpilanz' on eBay: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/114490584526

In the covers band we generally get paid in cash, so the biggest problem is finding fivers sometimes. There is no band kitty, we're mercenaries, we divvy up the money on the night and it goes its separate ways. When the venue pays electronically, the guitarist handles it then reimburses us when the money finally deigns to show up. The originals band is different - there is a band kitty and all the money goes in there - no-one takes anything from it personally, it's all for the band. I look after it and maintain a spreadsheet of the ins and outs. Ins are gig fees and CD sales, outs are recording, publishing, getting CDs made if we can be arsed. It's not used for equipment - the band generally plays in venues with house backline and we maintain our own personal musical gear out of our own pockets.

I have a copperhead and I don't find it excessively bassy compared to other piezo pickups that I've tried. I think it can sound pretty good but I have to totally kill the mids on the amp that I'm using and then knock off the treble until the "microphonic" sounds from the strings, bridge etc are minimised.

There is definitely something special about the TE1200, maybe the EQ frequency points or the dual compressors but it sounds lovely. I was tempted last year but the new price put me off slightly but the purchase on here was a great deal

Yep I found my “mojo” again for playing in a band New people and better songs Great fun buying gear and discovering some great amps !