Leaderboard

I think my first audition made the band giggle. They're a covers band that will cover anything from gossip to audioslave to GnR. I had never been in a band before, and was terrified turning up to the audition. I'd played the bass for years, at home.... When I get there the bassist before me was just tearing down his 2 4x10 rig with Trace head and I immediately thought "shi what am I doing?" I place my 25 watt peavey practice combo next to it and tell the other bassist I was ready to bring the thunder - we have a laugh. I take my guitar out of its bag. Did I forget to mention I didn't actually own my own bass? It's my sister's that I stole years ago and it still has pink ribbons on the case. Anyway... I play my heart out and barely get heard over the thunderous drums. I place my tiny amp in a corner at head height to allow us to just about hear me and somehow I get the gig! We've just booked our 8th gig in July in front of 200 festival goers.

Limelight 00218 has finally arrived and what a beauty she is. I asked Mark to do as light a relic as possible on a '57' precision. She looks great, sounds great, and plays great. What more can I ask?

Ok, heres my real world experience of using x3 types of set up this year. First Set Up - markbass 500w evo head & barefaced super compact gen 3 (giving 8ohms - so approx 300w). gig types: - a couple of large functions - 200 people + and a few smaller gigs - all with pa support. opinion: firstly the portability is phenomenal. believe the hype. you can easily carry in one hand. foot print is small and cab can go anywhere. i was able to get some gorgeous tones out of it, as well as some really nice gigging tones and volumes. Only occasionally on some songs did the volume become an issue and i had to really dig in to hear. I was convinced this was my set up for ever. the amp was running fairly full on, with a little headroom, but i didnt really need much more volume. Second Set Up - markbass evo head and 6ohm markbass 610 - so approx 400w. gig type: my current set up - did beer festival in fairly large social club - around 300 guests. i picked his up on a whim at a bargain price as our band was starting to do much bigger gigs, and i always fancied a 610. So .... i was 100% happy with the super compact, this 610 was just going to give a bit more volume.... WRONG!! Once i hit the first note i just sounded SO SO warm, full, powerful and suddenly lifted all the band. Volume nowhere near half, and everyone could hear it crystal clear without it being loud. I think the thing is, the super compact is perfectly acceptable, brilliantly portable and loud for what it is. However, the 610 is just back to what bass is about - full, warm, powerful, punchy and never needing to be over loud. Suddenly the super compact had been brought back down to earth. Fair enough - its not meant as a competitor to a 610 but the difference is there. Think of a soloist compared to a choir - just so much more full and nice. Third Set Up - ashdown evo 900w head and ashdown 8x10 4ohm cab. gig type: one off large out door festival. large stage. large pa support. rig supplied by the festival. i used this at the weekend - and i swear its a wonder the whole band didnt get blown 200 yards into the crowd. Absolute ridiculous power. Ridiculous. i think it was on half volume and i had to turn my bass right down and still all you could hear was bass. Not a particularly nice sound, but thats more to do with we only had a 10 minute window to get set up. I cant even compare how the super compact would have been in comparison. Probably a whisper to a scream. In conclusion, it doesnt take a genius to see that thicker, better constructed wooden cabs, with more speakers have a phenomenal effect on everything - volume, tone and presence. However they also are x amount heavier, bulkier and more awkward. In my opinion, can a super compact compete with an decent 4x10? - only just, and thats if the band dont need you playing full out. If your a smallish pub band the super compact is the way to go, absolutely. /itll be great for you. Just as loud as a 4x0 in a small space, nice sound and SO easy to move around. However, in a medium sized gig you can cope with a super compact, but dont expect it to have great presence or much headroom, regardless of whether you are using pa support or not. It becomes more of a monitor. In a large venue its 4x10 upwards all the way.

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Rhythm sections don't play solos EVER!!!!!

The last time I saw a performance like that of the poor old gentleman to Jack's left was when we played a bank's office Christmas party. The CEO's secretary who booked us was there to explain that her boss fancied joining us on stage. For the whole set. And he'd already set up his stack. And his pedalboard. And he had some song suggestions. We'd just finished setting up on the periphery of the CEO's square footage when this perfectly pleasant, slightly porky chap wandered over with a PRS round his neck and asked us if we were ready to go? We were and we did. After a couple of numbers I looked round and this chap was pulling all these guitar faces and widdling away like a nutjob - in total silence, his amp being turned to zero. Our guitard looked at me, I looked at him, we both looked at the drummer and we smiled. After we finished he shook our hands, fulsomely complimented us on our playing and asked if we'd like to do it again some time. I said yes, certainly then wandered off to talk to his secretary away from the main party and ended up boffing her across his desk. Funny old world, eh?

Added this nice one to my arsenal Arpege six SeNr 026

I've said this before, but BC is one of the most polite, friendly and supportive forums I've ever come across. Mind you, what would you expect? - we're bass players aren't we ?

Honestly, didn't expect any of this, as i've said on the other thread i initially started, just to warn people of the fact there was a scammer out there. Great community here. Thank you so much

He only committed a bit of fraud - not murder, for Christ's sake!

If he does time, that won't be necessary.

The specs for the TKS 1126 are available online. http://www.tks.se/ The F112 specs will be similar enough to get a general idea (except the high frequency range will be around 20khz due to the tweeter). Specs won't tell you too much given, for instance, that the stated power handling is quoted at 450watts and Ed Friedland in the review is using a 2kw amp. I'm using 450/500w @8ohms into my TKS but a lot of Fearless users are using a lot more. The more important factors in tone will be the crossover points and the sound of the mid driver used. As with the Barefaced cabs there is a lot of user chat/reviews out there regarding the Fearless line. The Greenboy website states this about the DIY fEARFUL cab A 12/6 is almost as loud as most 210 cabs with one watt input, and more extended in response. When driven fully it can get nearly as loud as a good 410. The fEARFUL will sound fuller while maintaining clarity, and will disperse wider. It will not lose its punch when driven hard.

The bass version compromises by combining attack and release into one knob, but adds an ace up its sleeve in the form of the HPF. This lets you filter out the low end from the part of the circuit that detects the peaks, and with it dialled in you can negate the issue that many single band compressors have where if you hit a low note hard, it makes the compressor clamp down so hard that it audibly impacts your overall volume until it recovers and swells back up again (depending on how fast your attack/release is set).

Surely that should be … irregularly?

Musical masturbation. Please do this in private, not on stage.

There might be huge technical ‘evidence’ as to why one ‘thing’ (wood, pedal, make, mode, bass) is better than another but in the end I think the majority of people make their decisions according to something far more mysterious, the vibe or the feeling they get from whatever ‘thing’ it is. There are endless threads on here (extremely helpful threads I hasten to add) on the merits of all sorts of ‘things’ that go into huge technical detail but I remain convinced that the final decisions we make about what equipment we choose is based, usually, upon highly subjective and nebulous criteria that it’s difficult to name, let alone define.

So basically the other guy's made a £60 profit on a voided transaction, the 'justification' being a couple of vanilla set-ups. Nice work if you can get it. Really, everyone needs to learn how to fettle their own guitars. It's not difficult; the basic tools are dirt cheap; forums like BC are full of helpful people with bundles of experience; there's tons of information and vids out there; and even a little practical knowledge helps when trying out prospective purchases.

Manchester...erm, mid-80s... Our drummer (in an originals-with-the-odd-cover 80s Rock Band) was about to become a Dad, and had reluctantly decided he'd have to shelve the rehearsals and gigging for a good while, so he'd stepped down, and we were on the urgent look-out for a replacement. As a thoroughly nice chap, and knowing we had gigs booked we needed to fulfil, he had even left his kit at the rehearsal rooms for new drummers to use, in part or whole, for the auditions. We organised a Sunday afternoon, with an hour slot for each drummer we'd contacted, and it started unremarkably, but then, second to last, was the standout. And not in a good way. He turned up in a six-wheel Transit, immediately earning about a thousand bonus points, but it became terribly clear that all this thing held was his kit...and there was little room for anything else. After refusing to use of any of the already-set-up kit, he began ferrying kit in. And more kit. And more kit. After ten minutes of watching boxes piling up, and with his end of the rehearsal room beginning to look like the dockside of the Queen Mary before a round the world jaunt, we volunteered to help, and then we all spent the next 45 minutes setting up a furry tigerskin-covered double-kick kit, with six raised toms, three floor toms, eight rototoms and so many cymbals we couldn't see him any more. As he tightened up the third china cymbal, I said "No gong, then?", and he froze, looking concerned. "I didn't bring it...should I have done?" I assured him it wouldn't count against him, and eventually, with about five minutes left of his allotted hour, he was ready. The singist had been forced to nip outside to intercept the last auditionee, apologise and ask him to bear with and go for a pint in the local for twenty minutes, and then our hero launched into the first intro, to a then-bog-standard Bon Jovi tune we'd decided would make a good starter audition song. Now, in 35 years of bands, I've never played in a freeform jazz ensemble, and I certainly hadn't back then, so I was unfamiliar with the five-count intro, and the thirteen-bar drum fill*, but this chap was clearly a master. We couldn't possibly fault him for brio, enthusiasm, and certainly energy...it was his counting which left quite a lot to be desired**. In addition, having taken so long to set up his mahoooosive kit, he was determined to hit every single drum and cymbal as often as he could, with scant regard for the song, or indeed the befuddlement he was creating amongst his prospective fellow band-members. I shall leave to your imagination the meal he made of the drawn-out ending, suffice to say Richard Wagner, had he been hanging around the rehearsal rooms (unlikely) and not dead for about a century (for once, fortunate), would probably have shaken his head and said something unflattering about bombast. In German. He finished by standing, his arms aloft and his eyes shining. Had that thing Usain Bolt does (not the running, the archery-arms thing) been around, he would have been doing that. We shuffled our feet, unable to maintain eye contact with him or each other, for fear of collapsing into hysterics. Eventually the singer thanked him for his time, and we all heaved-to loading his van again, while the singer went to buy the other auditionee another pint. He didn't get the job. * I'm probably doing an enormous disservice to freeform jazz ensembles around the globe here, so apologies if so, but I'm at a loss as to where else to place it musically. Perhaps amongst those gangs of glassy-eyed, saffron-robed enthusiasts one encounters on the city streets, each banging a drum in a random manner with a blissful expression and no regard for hard-pressed shoppers... ** I note that 'dyscalcula' is the numerical equivalent of dyselxia, and apparently A Real Medical Thing. It may have been that he was a secret sufferer; that would explain an awful lot. Edit: I've just spotted that I've spelt 'dyslexia' wrong in the footnote above. Oh, the irony...

I remember you saying you were from Witney, but haven't heard about the explosion, I've only lived here five years, since I moved back from Finland. I grew up in Oxford, so I'm fairly local.

You, Madam, have class.

Just got an email offering 10% discount on orders before June 4th 2018. Code to use at the checkout is GDPBLAH Cheers.

I just finished listening to the first two Japan albums and to my suprise a couple more new Lutz tracks dropped, so now these are playing...

He should think himself lucky he didn't go on a killing spree or it'd have been the Beatles for all eternity.

Ok Ok. less serious then: Nickelback!

You're not *$£!%*X* joking!

I prefer the flexibilty (and easier carry) of two single 12 cabs. Also, assuming they are 8 ohms each you will get maximum output from your head. Although a 4 ohm two 12 cab will also do that you can't chop it in half for small gigs or practice. A two 12 might be harder to sell when the time comes as single 12s seem more common/popular.

‘Murmur’ by R.E.M. for probably the first time this century. I was a massive fan and from the mid eighties until the early nineties was obsessed with them. I think ‘Murmur’ is one of the strongest, most self assured debuts by any band. I think I’ll be revisiting the rest of their back catalogue now.

Clearly BC generally seen as a forum dedicated to the bass guitar but obviously there are also many instruments which use the bass clef. What about the bass singer in opera or doo-wap groups? The tuba in brass bands? The (contra) bassoon in orchestras? The bass synth in dance music? Anyone here play the euphonium or baritone horn? For me some of the best bass sounds come from the church organ, I mean those big muthas in cathedrals with pipes several metres tall. Is this kinda talk sacrilege?

just in case?

Is there a Guitar Guitar near you? They usually stock Roli stuff. If you're ever up my way, you're welcome to pop in for a play about on it.

This is the definition of jazz, I agree. I think the problem is that an aimless drum solo (or any aimless solo) doesn't push the music forward.

I'll just leave this here...

Done, and very glad to get behind this. Anyone who behaves like this scammer should be nailed (and as I understand the story SH provided the key evidence that nailed him). And anyone in our BC community, I hope, will get this kind of support. I'm only responding to the support I've had.

Pick up the one you want : https://www.thomann.de/gb/fretless_basses.html?oa=pra

Great bass playing and I like the singers voice

For me a cathedral organ played at full pelt beats everything else hands down, bass guitar included. I've been in York Minster and Glasgow Cathedral with the organ having it large (is that too down wiv da yoof?). Utter magic. Don't forget the trombone plays the bass clef too.

I play a bass drum; does that count..?

There was nothing happening to your left.

Organised chaos is exactly what happens after I've just done the one beat

Some photos from the factory this morning. First we have an unpainted test assembly of a 2018 CHB bass. Next we have some CHBs queued up ready for painting And finally some painted SWB-1 bass necks in tubes

Let's distinguish second hand bargains from list prices. My cheapest bass is an old Encore P (£79) that lives in my office and gets played through a c**p guitar amp at drunken after-work jams now and then. It feels pretty good to play, but I put it through a decent bass amp for the first time recently and was shocked at how dull and flat it sounded. Ok, it does what I bought it for, and I wouldn't leave anything better at work. My cheapest "real" bass is my GMR fretless, bought here, which has build and tone quality which should cost at least three times what I paid for it (£350). The only change I've made is to re-string it with chrome flats.

True. I once popped into PMT to get a cable and left with a Music Man Stingray. That took some explaining when I got home haha.

Nope, because even if you think you've no intention of buying anything, if you're like the rest of us, you will anyway. If not on that visit, then the next, or the one after that. They rely on it!

High praise indeed, from the forum's premier wordsmith. I am pink to the ears. It really was an excruciating afternoon though, and has left, as you'll have gathered, an indelible impression. I occasionally wonder where he is now, no doubt counting some hapless new recruits in with a 'one, two, seven, nine, er...four...'

[size=1][b][i][color="#FF0000"]Please note: This review has been written for the sheer enjoyment of writing. I am not connected with AC Guitars in any way, only as a customer The review has not been requested by AC Guitars nor was prior warning given to AC Guitars before posting.[/color][/i][/b][/size] [size=2]This is a review of the ACG 9 string bass which I took delivery of in January this year. This bass may have a larger than normal body and neck, but at the heart of it is a solid sounding, traditional electric bass guitar. AC Guitars have been making a name for themselves over the last few years. The vision of one man, Alan Cringean, ACG instruments are instantly recognisable with their original silhouettes, high build quality and stunning woods.[/size] [size=3][b][u]Construction and hardware[/u][/b][/size] [size=2]This ACG 9 string has the “Recurve Singlecut” shape and uses a set-neck, a glued joint, instead of the more usual thru-neck or bolt-on. This set-neck design is well executed and shaped with no ungainly mounds or troughs in the join between neck and body. The neck and body sandwich a “transition block” of wenge which, as well as being used when the neck and body are glued, gives a clean and handsome look to the finished joint. The neck itself is a 7 piece laminate of maple and wenge. The back of the headstock has a wenge backplate to mirror the wenge of the neck whilst the front of the headstock mirrors the wood used on the body of the bass, which is a smart touch. The headstock carries 9 Hipshot Ultralite tuners which have been angled slightly towards the body. This both makes tuning physically easier and reduces the size of the headstock to help with the balance of the whole instrument. The neck carries an acrylicised, book-matched, spalted maple fingerboard (!) which is completely flat (i.e. no radius). Supplied by Gallery Hardwoods in the USA, the “stabilized figured woods have been impregnated with monomers and acrylics to produce a dimensionally stable wood*” As well as allowing woods which were previously considered too fragile to be used as fingerboards the “stabilized woods minimize or totally eliminate: shrinking, cracking, expanding, warping*”. ACG have embraced this new innovation and are one of the only (if not the only) luthiers in the UK to offer acrylicised fingerboards to their customers. The ACG 9 has a 35” scale, has 17mm string spacing at the Hipshot bridge and a wide fingerboard which grows from 79.7mm (3.14”) at the nut to 126.4mm (4.98”) at the 24th fret. The neck is very shallow at 20.2mm (0.8”) and is very slighter narrower at the body joint. The frets themselves are fat and not too high measuring 2.58mm tall (0.1”) and 1.55mm high (0.06”). The entire bass is 118cm (46 ½”) long and 38cm (15”) at its widest point. Surprisingly, the big ACG 9 string weighs just 5.4kg (just under 12lbs) and fits in an off-the-shelf Hiscox case. The neck joint and body cutaway gives access to all of the 24 frets. The range of the ACG 9 is 5 octaves plus a major third (4 frets)!! The body is swamp ash and the piece has been specially selected for its light weight. A black veneer is sandwiched between this and the mahogany top. The top not only has stunning figuring but the colour varies from light, orangey hues to dark brown. The black hardware compliments the colouring of the whole bass. The whole instrument is finished in an acid catalysed lacquer with the “sheen level” adjusted to make a satin, smooth finish on the back of the neck and a high gloss everywhere else. On many basses, a thick gloss finish coats the whole instrument necessitating 0000 wire wool (or similar) to be used on the back of the neck to make it smoother and easier to get around on. This clever control of the “sheen level” makes the bass great to play straight away. The quality of the finish is really impressive with no bubbles, runs or other defects.[/size] [size=3][b][u]Electronics and controls[/u][/b][/size] [size=2]The ACG -01 preamp is only available on ACG basses (the 02 version, with reduced functionality can be purchased from ACG direct) and is a filter-based system. This does take some getting used to but, as with all things in life, the work you put in pays dividends. Sounds range from dark, thick and soupy to harsh, thin and trebly. Not only can separate sounds be set on each custom wound ACG pickup, they can then be blended together as well. If that wasn’t enough to shape your tone, each pickup has coil switching controlled by the relative toggle switch below the bridge. The controls are on 4 stacked knobs and the first of these takes care of volume and pickup blend. The next two stacks are low pass filter stacks, one for each pickup. The further the bottom of the stack is rotated clockwise, the more high frequencies are let through the filter. Importantly, the bottom end of the sound is not affected as it would be on a regular eq-based preamp. The top controls the “overshoot peak” essentially enhancing the frequencies passing through the filter. The fourth stack is a high-pass filter which affects the whole sound. This time, the lower ring controls the amount of low frequencies passing through and the top enhances those frequencies. It all sounds complicated, but in essence the stacks are volume/blend, tone shaping for neck pickup, tone shaping for bridge pickup and a stack to add treble to the whole thing. The 9 string also has a third toggle switch to select either the bridge pickup or the piezo pickup in the bridge. Instead of blending in a flat piezo signal to the magnetic pickups, either the bridge or piezo signal runs through one channel of the ACG EQ-01 preamp. This means that the piezo signal can be shaped as well, creating a totally new range of sounds. The pre goes down to 20Hz, so even affects the low F# string. This ACG bass also has a low-battery indicator, so the 9V battery can be changed before it’s completely exhausted. This avoids the huge embarrassment caused when your bass cuts out mid-gig.[/size] [size=3][b][u]Playability and sound[/u][/b][/size] [size=2]All of the previous would count for nought if the bass was a swine to play. As mentioned before, the fingerboard is very wide but because it’s flat, and so does not have a radius or a ‘curve’ to it, this makes getting around surprisingly easy. The fingerboard feels very smooth and hard, but even smoother than a traditional varnished maple fingerboard. This at first feels a little strange, but after a minute or so this is forgotten and you find that the fingerboard is ultra-fast. The 9 strings come from S.I.T. in the USA, are tuned in fourths from F# B E A D G C F and Bb and measure .165, .135, .105, .80, .60, .35, .30, .19 and .12. The lowest 5 strings are taper-core so exposing the core at the bridge and over the bridge saddle. It’s important to note that the 9 strings are based around a ‘conventional’ 4 string set of .35, 60, 80 and 105 with a .135 making the low B of a ‘conventional’ 5 string set. This essentially makes the instrument a 5 string bass with extra strings added and makes the adjustment to playing this “Extended Range Bass” as painless as possible. Straight from the workshop, the action was really low. This hasn’t been adjusted at all ever since and measures 1.6mm (4/64”) on the lowest string and 0.4mm (1/64”) on the highest string. At the 12th fret the action is 2mm (5/64”) and 0.6mm (1 ½ / 64”). There is a tiny bit of relief of 1.6mm (1/16”) in this neck. This low string height added to the glassy-smooth fingerboard combine to make the ACG 9 an incredibly easy instrument to play. The wide neck takes some getting used to but this is by no means an impossible mountain to climb. Frets end have been carefully bevelled and there are no protruding fret ends to catch flying fingers or thumbs. The crowns of the frets have been nicely shaped and polished to a high shine. Being really picky, the only criticism of the setup is that the strings are too low in the nut slots. There are some repairers and luthiers who would dictate that half of the string diameter should be exposed in the slot and that the sound could be muted because of this. Overall though, the setup is really low and buzz free which is all us bassists could ask for. The balance is also spot on. The neck strap button lives above the 10 fret giving a fulcrum which the headstock and tuners cannot outweigh. The bass is heavy, but not overly so. Wearing the bass with a thick, padded strap means this bass can be worn for extended periods during practice, rehearsal and gigs. Even with the preamp set totally flat, the sound of the ACG 9 is full and round and from there it is possible to dial in, literally, any sound you can think of. Even that low F# is audible and usable, even through a 40 watt 12” practice amp. The bass continues to sing all the way up the entire range with no dreaded ‘dead spots’. It has to be said though, that the preamp does need some getting used to as you start to understand how each control affects the sound. However, after a short time it gets easier to dial in sounds quickly and easily. As of now, I have one sound that seems to work for everything I need so I add bass or treble from that favoured setting. The pre even affects the low F# string so the entire range of the bass can be shaped. With this and the huge range of the bass, the ACG 9 becomes a very powerful tool indeed. The highest tribute I can pay to the ACG pre it is to say that, when finances allow, I will have one fitted into my Sei bass and sell the 3 band Schack circuitry that lives in there at the moment.[/size] [size=3][b][u]Conclusion[/u][/b][/size] [size=2]These “Extended Range” basses are definitely a niche market, so it is to ACG’s great credit that they even took the order for such an instrument. This is no publicity stunt though, but a serious instrument which shows ACG’s attributes of original design, high build quality and stunning woods. The acrylicised fingerboard is a revelation both in looks and playability and the ACG 01 preamp is a refreshing approach, addressing the limitations of the more conventional banded eq setup. All through both the consultation process on the specification and the build itself, communication between myself and ACG has truly been a two-way process. Ideas have been aired and used or left by the wayside according to what would serve the bass best. The instrument leads the way and Alan Cringean doesn’t impose his preconceptions or preferences during the build. I couldn’t be more pleased with this ACG 9 string. It sounds great, plays great, looks great and is wonderfully made. I have no qualms in recommending ACG for anyone looking for a new bass regardless of the number of strings required.[/size] [size=3]Further information on all ACG basses can be found at [url="http://www.acguitars.co.uk"]www.acguitars.co.uk[/url] A full explanation of the ACG filter-based preamp can be found directly at [url="http://www.acguitars.co.uk/docs/news/63.pdf"]www.acguitars.co.uk/docs/news/63.pdf[/url] [/size] [size=1][b][u]* Taken at 19/5/09 21:55 BST from [url="http://www.galleryhardwoods.com/stabilized.htm"]http://www.galleryhardwoods.com/stabilized.htm[/url] [/u][/b][/size]