Leaderboard

Started the first 2 gigs ( of 4 in Eastern England*) at Norwich Theatre Royal on Thursday. Due to a number of reasons we hadn’t played this wonderful venue for a number of years, so was great to return here. Lovely crew and facilities, and a great sell out crowd of 1,300. Gig went really well although I was feeling a tad under the weather - dropped a couple of silly mistakes but styled them out ( I think!). Friday saw us drive up to The Cresset Theatre in Peterborough. One of our regular gigs, about 3/4 full and a nice crowd again. Decent 2 hour drive home too, so in around 1am. * The other two gigs are this coming Friday 23rd in Newark, and Saturday 24th in Kings Lynn.

The Otis Jay Blues Band kicked off 2024 at Ringwood Meeting House, Hants. Four new numbers went pretty well, and with 60 paying punters we beat our previous record by 10! Was told to ‘turn up the bass’ in the interval… understandably so as I was only using an Elf and BF One10. But ‘going active’ on my Sandberg VM4 gave me the bass boost I needed and apparently the second half had more low end. Talks of three possible new gigs through this, so quite excited!

So today (yesterday) I played two gigs with two different bands. First gig was a local bar with in-house PA & engineer. You play on a small corner stage and the acoustics arn’t brilliant with the drums dominating the on stage sound. Result was we made a lot of mistakes and we were well off our best. Anyway, dashed off from that gig to my second gig 30 mins later. Threw our PA and lights into an already packed pub, quick sound check, and on we went. Great gig, great on stage sound, and the punters seemed happy with my FOH mix. Thank god for the Behringer XR18 as the ability to recall saved scenes make setting up on gigs like this a breeze. Oh and we must have done something right as the landlady gave us a little extra in the pay packet 😎

A sure fire contender for my favourite venue, Bath's Chapter 22 Roots and Records was host to my humble duo of darkness, Deadlight Dance, last night. Dean and Nic always looks after us. The setting is a record shop in the city centre that also trades in plants. Playing mainly mandocello and mandolin (with a second time on guitar for a song), my basses took a break. We were a little light on audience at first but it didn't take much to fill up the shop. The performance was one of our stronger ones. Honourable mention to co-headliner Steve Mercy. I think it's our 40th show. We walk the line between taking our music very seriously whilst not taking ourselves too seriously at all! People like our onstage chat. Gothic, but more Carry on Screaming meets Hammer Horror rather than anything too po-faced and serious. And if Boss are looking at this post, yes, you should endorse us!

Spacewasters gig at The Trinity Bar, Harrow last night, as part of a Shake Some Acton event with four bands on the bill. Very small stage that, now we’re a 5 piece was cramped to say the least. Being so small onstage sound was poor but having heard the other bands we knew sound out front was good - kudos to the sound man, he was attentive to all the bands all night and didn’t blast the volume to max or make bass drums sound like explosions. Went very well, lots of applause and cheering, which is always nice, and was home before midnight. Forgot to mention, the rig I used was a Hartke HA3500 into a Trace Elliot 4x10, was easy to get a very decent sound from it.

Hurtsfall played the O2 Academy in Leicester as part of the first night of HRH Goth 2. Both myself and our synth player were still less than 100% fit having had to cancel the gig we had on Tuesday. However this was potentially too important to miss and I suspect that only death (our own) would have stopped us playing this one. There was some weird hum/buzz problem that affected two of the bands before us and also our backing and no combination of leads and DI boxes would make it go away. In the end it was EQ'd out at the FoH desk, as there was limited time between bands to set up and to troubleshoot problems. Strangely it only appeared to affect FoH and not the monitors. Setting up the Bass VI and backing controls: And here we are playing our opening song "Lucid": Nice big stage, and by the time we were on stage there was a decent sized and vocal audience. I felt a bit sorry for the band that opened the evening who played to less than 50 people and a smattering of polite applause. I could see people dancing and singing along to our better known songs which is always gratifying. And lots of nice comments about our performance afterwards as well as plenty of people asking about when we'll have an album out - we're working on it right now! And it's always good to see your band's name on the Festival T-Shirt: There were several professional photographers in attendance so I hope to be able to post some better photos soon.

Played with The 77s at Market House in Maidstone last night. It was our last gig with our outgoing drummer, I thought it might be a bit awkward but it turned out fine. The place was packed, and we had a really good gig. It’s my favourite place to play locally, I have been playing at the weekly jam night that is held there, but it was nice to play a full gig there. There were a couple of the other “big” local covers bands playing at other pubs in town, but it didn’t seem to affect our attendance. we have a dep lined up for our next gig in March, and then nothing currently booked until June whilst we sort out a new drummer. The only downside was having to load out in torrential rain.

Short run of Everybody’s Talking About Jamie at Number 8 Theatre in Pershore for the towns local youth drama group. Fun show to play, some interesting bass lines and the kids were superb. I have worked on having a super small rig for shows but needed the pedalboard and two cabs for this one.

Another morning after the night before post for you My mob Yellowhouse played the Essex Riviera with a dep singer. She's done a couple of gigs with us over the last few months with us and it's getting better each time. I think this is the best bit of video I've ever seen of my lot. The sound is great and the vocals are immense. It's an old Skunk Anansie song which I've always wanted to play and Susie blows the doors off here.... (Cort A4, Orange 4 Stroke, Laney Digbeth pre on the tube setting and a couple of Barefaced Big Baby cabs for the geeks)

What key is that in?

Played at The Craufurd Arms with Stray last night supported by Bedford’s Thr3e. Really good home crowd and good sound thanks to our recently acquired sound engineer Stuart. I took my 77 Ric into a Bugera MOSFET and Eden 4x10. I always struggle to get a decent on stage bass tone at that venue but apparently it sounded great out front (thanks James!). Cart and Horses in London to come next Saturday!

The cock filter has been scaled back, thankfully. It means we can refer to Dick van Dyke and not Penis van Lesbian.

Haven't owned my Pro that long but it ain't going anywhere soon.

Here's my new Warwick RockBass Streamer fretless wiht black head.

I'm hating this topic - soon everyone will know how great Danos are, and I want to keep it to a select few! I've loved these things for years. Never had an original one (although nearly did once), but had a clutch of them and they've all been great. Although not as historically accurate, I ended up keeping the late 90's Korean Pro model in blueburst. Plays and sounds immense, and light as a feather. Just one vol / tone and a selector switch so a bit easier to use than the pointer contols, but I generally just leave the switch in the centre position and vol/tone full on. Am starting to trim down my stash of stuff due to impending semi-retirement but won't be letting the Longhorn go.

In case this is of interest to anyone - seems Cort have just released a new headless bass - looks pretty cool and for £700 seems fairly reasonable stacked against Ibanez etc. So new that there's nothing about it on the Cort website 😅 BassDirect have a Star Dust Black model after the green sold whilst it was typing!

I'm surprised we made it all the way to page two before the inevitable "the Beatles weren't all that" comments started...

Shaped a bit better this time ... (sanding the borders better soon); the bottom wood (I don't know what type it is) is quite hard to work with, and the top is very very soft ... I got a hiccup while sanding it, a a little piece got off, so I had to glue it ... now let's make the cavities as a nice human being would do! 🙂

I think there's a logical conclusion to that train of thought that involves not playing at all...

A multimeter does not load the battery, so you will get a slightly higher reading than when the battery is in use. Also, the voltage droops as the battery discharges, but it will recover a bit if left alone for a while. Put back into service, it will not last long, but it may allow the circuit to operate again for a while. David

I take it back... and tried to with a sneaky edit! From the Ibby Site, Support, Catalogues http://www.hoshinogakki.co.jp/pdf/ibanez/catalog/1995EU.pdf

Yeah, had one of them too, very nice basses of the usual Fujigen standard and scrub up well with a bit of TLC. They're active EMG pickups, so there is no bypass. They're not the stock pickups either. I did that same mod, swapping out the Ibanez pickups for EMG. @Grooverjr Depending on what they've installed, you've got the following controls 1 - Master volume, pickup blend, bass and treble cut and boost 2 - P Volume, J Volume, bass and treble cut and boost 3 - P Volume, J Volume, P tone, J tone With that in mind, play around and you should be able to figure it out. Yeahm h

Unfortunately you are correct. I like them for pit work and rehearsals where you don’t have to knock houses down. Same board and amp with my Aggie db112s has much more clout.

Out of curiosity I thought I'd measure the two whilst I had them out. The pale blue with the maple board is the (mezzo in case you don't know.) I did a couple of pics that the ibanez stats don't give you, which are probably more related to playability. Ie 1-4 fret distance and comparable width at 12th fret. Apologies if this is getting a bit off topic.

Well I’m off to see ,one love the Marley film, shall report back later

That's an interesting looking venue, Mick, but somehow I suspect the acoustics would have been a bit tricky ?

For me, absolutely not. Even if I had started early, not late, in life - the lifestyle of a professional musician is not for me and is nothing I would ever have aspired to. Much as I enjoy playing bass and being in a band it is purely as a hobby and on my terms. Being a bassist is a part of my life but it doesn't define me.

Finally got an actual board to put my pedals on.

There's quite a lot of detail about how it was found and the state of the bass here: https://www.debassist.nl/muzieknieuws/artikel/2-29077/paul-mccartneys-first-hfner-is-back?fbclid=IwAR2zFoM5u-eKYQaIErdIhaLsDu8ryKT4MPo9mJTogDQd0DGzsVVhj60494U

For once I’ve managed to post on the “How was your gig last night” thread, on the day after the night before. It was a lively night with the pub being pretty much full from when the host band kicked things off. It was the debut outing for my Rickenbacker. It got plenty of attention, in the main from the bass players, but a few of the guitarists and one of the drummers also oggled it. The singer will be back next month, so I’ll probably be back to the shortscale headless to avoid any whacks on the back of her head.

It's rather nice being in a 'power trio' with some licence to improvise and the space to jmp around while the 'main attraction' is largely tied to his mike 😁 We enjoy some coordinated instrument wagging too!

Hello there, As I some of you may know, I am an amateur bass builder. I have no formation and I am self-taught. Randall Wyn Fullmer (may he rest in peace, he past away 2023) gave me a lot of tips and shared his knowledge without limits. Before presenting my basses I'd like you to take a look of the documentary made by Mike Enns, : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNACNx5UlR8&t=2092s&ab_channel=Restrung Such a nice guy Randy, not like some others luthiers, if you check the Restrung channel you'll see he shared with Mike 16 videos "How to make a bass". It's really kind regarding the number of people who wants to "hide" their secrets. Anyway, I almost always was the tech guy since my youger ages, from electronics, amps to guitars and basses... If a friend had a need he came to me for a repair, a restrung, or something else. I think there's only a few of my basses I didn't touch and keep them stock. I learned by making a lot of mistakes, and now as I'm 40 I realize that mistakes are almost the thing that make you progress the most amongst everything, even if I have to admit some tools are almost mandatory if you want to achieve very nice job and you are a demanding to yourself person like me (and also impatient) :') (SECURITY RULES APART OF COURSE). I have to skip all the mods I've made, there's too many of them, if you want to check my Youtube channel you'll see some refins, probably one of the thing I like the most when it comes to get my hands on a bass. So after (a tiny bit of) thinking, I directly bought good woods to make my first bass. At the time I had one router (Elu MOF96) and some basic tools. For obvious reasons I made a fretless bass, 36" inches scale (why not?) with a flamed bubinga top, padauk back, and a hidden neck-thru construction (can't see neck from both sides) made of Wenge and bubinga. The fretboard was african ebony: I still own this bass today, it is far from perfect but still 100% functional and my first attempt too... As you can see I've putted Hipshot, Schaller, Seymour Duncan so only good stuff on it. I called it "Infinga" which is a mashup between Infinty (Warwick) and Bubinga. As a second bass one of my best friend just make me an order (to support the cause also) for a five strings. I choosed the woods carefully with a touch of "rare" wood ; a flamed ash top. Wings are made of ovengkol (or amazakoue) and the neck is 3 piece bubinga/mahogany with an amaranth fretboard. I fretted it by hand and hammer. I had a radiused wood bloc and a little bandsaw this time. Fortunately, I didn't screw up this one at all, and it is still used today. Originally pickups were SD SSB5 but my friend wanted more mojo so I've switched for Delano DCB5 quad coils with Glockenklang pre. Schaller tuners and ABM monorails. Then I wanted to realize a new shape a start to carve the wood and I created the Amani, which was a sort of simple cutaway bass made of maple with a bubinga top an ebony fretboard. I went with wood covers for the pickups (what a pain...) and wenge inserts in the neck. Still a neck through design. But as you may see, I pay some attention to carve the rear of the body by hand to make a lightweight and nicely curved bass. On the stand it might look akward but in hand it was very nice IMHO. The fretjob wasn't perfect at all so after a period I changed for an amaranth fretboard, fretless. I really love this design but it's not easy to make and doesn't please everybody. Pickups were, again, Delano (at the thime I had a company and I worked with Delano directly). Schaller tuners and ABM monorails. I finally sold this bass in its fretless version to a belgian mate. After this alien, comes the Infinga some of you tried, the one that made a passaround in UK. It was (yes it's dead) a birdseye maple body top with walnut babk, neck through contrsuction, and a neck made of walnut with maple inserts. It had this lovely Delano twincoil that remains, IMHO, one of the best pickups on the planet. It can cover a lot of sounds and has a nice warm and powerful tone. Despite the images below looking good, the fret job wasn't really good, I've made a mistake in measurements and the neck was thin too far inside the body. I broke a chip of wood and had to fill it with epoxy too. It went fretless for a long time before I recently burned it because I needed more room and I had too much unused basses and stuff. Routings weren't very clean neither. After this one I came back to the Amani model for one of the finest build I've ever made ; I sold it on this very website and if the owner is still here I'd love to have some feedback on it today. The recipe is once again a proven one ; flamed maple top with maple back, neck through maple/wenge neck with amaranth fretboard. The inlays were wood inserts of maple and wenge. I just used saddles from an ABM bridge and made a kind of string thru stop tail myself. Schaller tuners with custom amaranth keys, Delano DCB pickups, passive operation. I barely remind it so if it's somewhere it could be very nice to have some feedback on it. Speaking of one of my most beautiful build, I made another Amani 5 fretted, this one featured on Notreble.com (just google Elwray Basses notreble). It is a freaking great bass. Sold to a french guy who, I believe, still play with it. Despite the used woods it was very light because of a partially hollowed body (I routed two cavities on the back so it can handle any preamp with 4 batteries if needed, even if I decided to use a passive mode with "coils blenders" (just a pot that blends between the coils of each pickup). It's in french but the test is the first video on my Youtube channel. The body was made in afzelia (Warwick used it for some very firsts Streamer's), afzelia neck with maple inserts. Schaller tuners and ABM bridge. The fretboard is a very weird piece of padauk really hard and with differents colors in it. I took inspiration in the Warwick Thumb for the pickups placement; but even if I don't use Delano no more, the cost of these Delano Times Square pickups with tofferite magnets was outrageous ; 200/pc at the time an now I believe it'es close to 300. But they have a unique character I'll let you judge in the Youtube video. Then I decide to "innovate" with a bolt-on model. A simple Infinga 4 made of 50 yo dry belgian maple top and padauk with maple stripes back, thuya burl electronic cover, and a maple/padauk neck with same maple fretboard. I went for a Musicman style with a single EMG pickup. All the hardware was the Schaller vintage copper from the passarounf Infinga 4... A unique bass for me and it was bought by the same guy who bought me the Amani 5 above ! Following this one I've made an exact same setup (Infinga 4 bolt-on with Schaller hardware) but this time with an afzelia body and a P/J EMG X configuration. The neck was excatly the same, with same woods. I can say today I prefer bolt on, it's easier to made for me, and I like the idea to switch bodies and necks. On the pictures you can see the Amani 5 fretless (the first one) that became a fretless amaranth one. This bass made me love EMG pickups. I still think they are a very good option for recording setup and wide tone spectrum with a big choice of different pickups in a same enclosure (EMG35,40,45). Sold this one to a guitarist friend for not much. Then I used Leo Fender famous technique (joking, I don't know if it's true or legend) of "use chunks of woods laying around the workshop and make a bass with them", so I came with a bass with so many problems that it never has been finished and I burned it with the Infinga recently. The truss even crack through the back of the neck lol. Padauk body with afzelia and oak top, 9-ply neck (lol) with maple/padauk/afzelia. Nothing special about it, it stayed for many years like that. I retrieve the truss rod, although. Then I went in a period without real build, but I've made a lot of restorations in guitars and basses. Like a lot. An honorable mention although; in a trade I get a Rockbass Corvette $$ I completly transform into in a "better-than-custom-german-made" Warwick ; that's the only picture I have of it stock : Then I went a bit crazy and I completly made a new top in thuya burlwith a P/J configuration (Delano), all brand new hardware from Warwick, and a Crovette Proline '97 wenge neck : After all this like I said I quit bass making due to house works AND not enough money AND time consuming job. I continued restoration and reparations. But now after 4-5 years I finally get proper tools, new big bandsaw, fret tools of all sort, a Mafell router, a design I've been working on since 2 years. So if you read so far I'll tease a little bit before making a video (or maybe not in video, my english is just okay-ish) As I don't know yet when I'm goin' to make this video to introduce the "WN4" (stands for WalNut), I will try to explain briefly how I end up with the actual "classic" configuration of my very last one: I mentioned I had the chance to put my hands on a lot of basses, with the restorations and my GAS syndrom, so I worked on a design for about 1 year to have a classic but modern style (whatever it means something). Here's my points: - The body design is unique but still not too ostentatious, and small but ergonomic (small to avoir overweight, I didn't want to exceed 4Kg max, the proto is 3.5Kg) - Even if I'm a 5 string player, I designer a 4 string as it can interest more people in a first time - In my very personal experience with woods, I found that the type of wood is not the most important but the chunk itself is. I still wanted to go for walnut because it's rarely bad souding and it's a bit ecologic as it's coming from France. - For the neck, flamed maple and walnut inserts of 3mm seems to me a great solution to nail a quality tone - For the fretboard I went for an african ebony with stanless steel frets to have a "dry/clean?" tone - I choosed EMG35 size routing as EMG offers jazz, precision, dual coils, ceramics, and all brands are available in this size. - Despite the "classical" design, it is unique (I guess) because as a Warwick Infinity, (hard to explain here) the fretboard is starting where the body stops so the access is really, really easy to high notes and it's not a sort of commercial shitty argument. - I'm still torn because I like abalone but for ecological resaons I think for the future ones I'll go for fake white pearloid inlays, 8mm. - After trying a thousand bridges, I decide to use a Hipshot A style. But finally I went on the B style for two reasons: it's the same as MTD uses and it's simple and reliable (brass version) - Tuners HAVE TO be Gotoh for me (I know some ppl prefer Hipshot), so GB350 Res-O-lite. - I see no reason to not use a Graphtech nut. I had to replace a FODERA brass nut because it was poorly made (yes true) - I choose a passive operation even if I'm reasonably open to active. - Like I said bolt-on is easier to make and I like the idea of switching bodies/necks - truss rod is reversed (nut towards bridge) and in the future should be musicman style, way easier to setup. - 23 frets because not 24. 😅 Well, we will discuss all that on the appropriate post, but here's the prototype (in the video I'll introduce both proto and prod 1) for a bit of teasing : I do not intend to make a business but maybe if I can sell some to continue making basses that will be okay for me. Thanks for reading, Marco

Just a wee update on the Godin. Used it at our 6hr rehearsal today. Godin bass into my own Ampeg SVT7 and into the studios Ampeg 810 cab. Have to say it plays so well and it feels great to play even for longer periods. Bit heavier than my Sandberg VM4 but not by much. Deep sounding and suited the songs better than the VM4. Only failing was that it doesn't cut thru the mix like my VM4 in certain songs. That said the amp settings were the exact same as i use for my VM4. For the last hour i boosted the mids on the amp quite a bit and it cut thru far better. Overall i'm very pleased with this bass. Not sure if it will take over from my VM4 as my main bass in the Glam band but i'll give it a try at the next gig using my own Mesa Subway 210/115 cabs. Neck is so so nice on these Godin Shifter basses. Very like a slim jazz. Pick up selector meant i could get a traditional P bass tone and a nice PJ setting without any volume changes. I did set up the bass during the week when fitting new Elixir nickels. Elixirs didn't fit when strung thru with the E string as winding reduction started just before the nut so its strung like all of my other basses as standard on the bridge. String height is down at 2.25mm with absolutely no fret buzz. Very slight neck relief too, almost straight. Had to drop the P pick up a bit as strings were touching poles on occasion and raised the J pick up a touch to get a better balance across the pick up selector switch. It has a very slight neck dive compared to VM4 but its very slight and didn't really present any issues for me when playing it. All in all its been a great purchase and highly recommend them. Very few basses will match build quality for the money they were sold as new. Dave

Bees don't have hooves. Everyone knows that. 😋

I have a red one of these. It was my main gigging bass in my previous band I was in before I started acquiring JMJ Mustangs. It's a really comfy bass to play and currently has wilkinson tuners, Fender HiMass Bridge, and Fender Yosemite (American Performer) pickups. I should play it more really.

That's the very one! I think I'll get the strings off and give it a week of oiling and love then send it round to the luthier to get the action figured out. Thanks everyone - even Sunday is a school day!

I hope you enjoy. I did. A mate from work asked me to go with him so I obliged. I don't usually go in for musical biopics, especially about artists I love. Maybe it's because I went in just hoping it wouldn't be rubbish, but I think they did a good job for Bob. Also I was pleasantly surprised to see the cinema nearly full, with many young teenagers in attendance. If the movie is turning on the current new generation to Bob, reggae and a path to positivity in general then it's a worthy job well done imho. 🙂

The Guardian didn't like it much - which is probably a recommendation ................ 😎

I went for the no fuzz for Nazi scum one.

I kind of doubt it. I don't know which pins are dropped as to how the adapter is wired. Since I can't find any docs on the original 7 pin wiring diagram, I would be just guessing and there's no need to guess wrong here. All I can find is this information on the 4 button footswitch and 5 pin DIN wiring:

So your suggestion to a replacement hobby is knitting?

I still get disappointed at the self serving decisions people make in music. But I'm getting over it now. I need the work. It used to be a passion, but while nowadays I'm still passionate about playing, it's a job first and foremost. My favourite singer and very close friend recently pulled out of a project I'd set up. I didn't get stroppy, she had a heavy workload and said she couldn't commit to it. Then not long after she went and auditioned for a busy function band. Does it sting? Fk yes. What's my attitude towards it? Stay cool, after all I may pick up some dep work with her new band. And she puts regular work my way in another project. If I stuck out my bottom lip and spat out my dummy, how much better off would I be?

It was quite odd to be honest. My own bass sound was great from the cabs to about 2/3rds out onto the stage and then the bass seemed to disappear and i couldn't hear it at all. Can't say there was any other issues with the on stage sound. They had a great monitor system at front of stage too and i could hear the others very clearly however it did mean we weren't able to hear the FOH sound too well and it was mentioned by other musicians in the audience that guitarist was a bit too low in the mix. On hearing mobile vids it is noticeable that he was a bit lower than we would have with our own PA but not on stage. The PA subs (6off) were below the stage almost all the way round and when the SE initially turned them up you could feel the stage vibrate with the bass and he turned them back down a bit again. Overall it was a decent sound with a decent quality PA. I've had some SE that have no idea what they're doing and PA has been cheap rubbish. Dave