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A bit of an odd one, just three of us from our five person bluegrass band played a dinner gig (6-8) at a restaurant/pub in downtown North Bay. It is very long narrow room, not very good for live music and the owners are just wanting to see if music at that time would be a good idea. We played a couple of "bluegrassyish" sets with mostly standard bluegrass songs but some Gordon Lightfoot, Everly Brothers and a couple of other country or pop tunes and it went down well with the fairly small crowd. We kept the volume down so we could be heard but not disturb conversations and it worked out well, a number of compliments and even the staff seemed to enjoy it. We all know that being at the end of a long narrow room is about the worst way to set up but the people who wanted to hear better had tables closer to us and all the diners and drinkers seemed happy with the set up. This was our first gig as a trio and we were a bit worried about how it would go but now we are hoping to get a return gig and maybe gigs at other venues too. We don't take up much room and we aren't too loud and play an unusual mix of music and we are cheaper than bigger bands. Bluegrass is a summer festival type of music here so it's good to have a few gigs in the quiet time of the year. Edit: just got word we are invited back for next Tuesday.👍

So about a month ago - I decided to sell my Gibson Ripper to fund some house work for my little girl who needs a wet room… you have most likely seen the thread…no further comment…(love you guys). Ive been swapping between the Ripper and My Jack Casady… Both absolutely heroic in their own right. I’ve a potted history with Casady’s - I adore them and with a few minor tweaks, they’re ideal for me. So, resigned to the fact I’d be Gibson-less, I sold some bits and bobs I had in storage and a lovely little peavey bass to buy a gold Casady like my old one - to sit next to my blue one (one flats, one rounds…) But then I spotted an Anniversary model on a facebook marketplace listing which I’ve always loved (although I hated the white pickguard). The seller would not ship - and no matter how I wanted it…I agreed it was a stupid move in a gigbag. My loverboy @walshy stepped in and took the Casady under his wing. After a few weeks of trying to figure out when I could get to Hexham or he could get to Manchester. We managed it. By this point - the wonderful folk of BC had negated the sale of the Gibson by raising funds to help with the project for Iris. So I’ve now got 2 Casady’s and a ripper. Weirdly, the neck profiles are totally different - the blue one has a flatter profile, the Anniversary has a deeper shape. Needs a clean and a set up. The wonderful Earlpilanz on eBay has done me a black pickguard which is in the post. Actually really cheap (£20 all in, mental) At some point, I’ll have to sort some longer straps; the casady sits higher than I have the ripper even on the same straps because of the button position/body depth. but that’s me and gear done - for the next few years while we upgrade the house… Anyhow…fat bottomed girls…you make the rocking world go round…

Sooooo here's the bass now! It has a custom made split bobbin neodymium pickup that sounds really awesome. As for the paint I mixed and can painted it before doing a light relic on it. This Bronco now slaps. The string are Ernie Ball Cobalt flats SS tuned in D standard.

Major finger breakthrough today; suddenly a load of feeling seems to have come back (it's very itchy!). I'm playing my bass and can feel the pressure in the tip again for the first time when fretting. I think the itching is just the unused nerves firing up again. I can feel the winds of my strings with it, which I couldn't before.

RIght, last go for a while. Just finished some tidying up with a couple of @Chienmortbb patch cables. That's me done now (ha ha).

It's not strictly a new bass day but I recently received two basses in quite quick succession and I think they're both very worthy of a new bass day post. I've chatted with a few people on here about them (most because they were wondering what was enough to part me from Cog pedals) and I said I would put this post up when I'd spent time with both basses. I've been lucky enough to play some of the basses I've dreamed about over the last few years but one that's been firmly etched on the list of dream basses and one which I never thought I would actually own is a Ritter Roya 5-string. Owing to some fortunate timing and very optimistic book-keeping I was recently able to welcome this beautiful bass, named by Jens Ritter as The Red Line. It has an alder body, poplar burl top, black flamed maple fingerboard and Ritter's parametric preamp and triplebucker pick-ups. The neck is maple, it's built to a 35-inch scale and it's been given an arresting paint job that gives the bass its name (more photos below). The preamp and pick-up combination is extremely flexible so it's hard to say precisely what the signature tone is (it reminds me of a Pope preamp in terms of flexibility) but I've been having a lot of fun seeing what sounds I can dial in. I've tried to write the details in a matter-of-fact way but the result is absolutely mesmerising. The bass was exhibited at Guitar Summit in Mannheim a couple of months ago and it's one of the most beautiful basses I've seen in person (although I expect I'm horribly biased here). I should say too that Jens Ritter was very patient in answering all of my questions too, particularly as I was mithering him just before Guitar Summit. Here are a few more photos of it: Knowing the Ritter was coming was incredibly exciting but I was just as excited a few weeks later when my lovely wife went above and beyond (and beyond again) and surprised me with the most amazing gift for one my my milestone birthdays: a Dingwall AB II that I had been enamoured with since I first saw it (and which may look familiar to some on here). It's an incredibly generous gift and, frankly, I'm going to have to try much harder for birthdays and have my work cut out at Christmas. It has a chambered walnut body, wenge fretboard and, unusually for a Dingwall, an ovangkol neck. It has three FDV pick-ups and a Glockenklang preamp. It was originally built for NAMM but was instead tweaked and sent to George Baldwin (Hilltide). Here he is using it far better than I could ever hope to: I love the rustic colouring and styling of the bass on the modern-ish body and it sounds magical: it's got a deep growl but is very articulate. It's a wonderful bass all round and it's a nice thought that this will forever be the birthday bass. A few more photos:

Hi Folks, I was due to go and see the amazing Meshell Ndegeocello live at The KoKo in London's trendy Camden Town this Friday, 15th November, with my son and daughter, but I've come down with Covid, so now can't go. As gutted as I am to be missing out on seeing an amazing musician & singer/songwriter, I'm even more gutted not to be able share the experience with my kids - one of whom lives in Sweden - so these opportunities for family time don't come up too often for us.. Which led me to thinking about family, and the recent Basschat Fundraiser in aid of @AndyTravis and his family. So with that in mind, would anyone here like to buy my ticket for the gig on Friday for say, £25...? But instead of paying me, just make a donation to the Just Giving page here (link below) to help Andy and his family: https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/mark-clark-3 I reaise it's very short notice between now and Friday and, Mods, I'm not sure if this kind of post is even allowed.. But I figured it be a crying shame to waste my £45+ ticket to see one of the world's most innovative bass players, whilst there's a plethora of London-based bass players - with very generous hearts - right here in this Basschat family! Right? Right.... 😁 More info here about the gig: https://koko.co.uk/events/meshell-ndegeocello And Meshell: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meshell_Ndegeocello And here's half a screenshot of the QR code from my e-ticket, which I will forward onto whoever is interested and able to on Friday, and who'd like to make a donation to a very worthy cause. Ticket will be 'sold' on a first come, first served basis. Thanks for reading and for being the wonderful Basschat Community/family that you are... 😊 Cheers Nik

My two ACG’s, fretless unlined. Best ever 👍🏻

If, for any reason, you do decide to leave your bass in the car, make sure to leave the engine running and the radio on so that any would-be thief thinks that you are still in the car.

Five mins? In some parts of the UK, scroats will have all four wheels off your car, radio out, boot cleared in 30 secs and they'll be chatting your missus up at the same time. They're now gainfully employed teaching F1 teams how to be even faster in the pit stops.

An octave pedal is what you use if you really really want to blow drivers. 🤥

I'll report back. It's coming this week sometime.

Now that is how you demo a bass. Neck pickup fully open with a pick sounds glorious. That's just why I like it! That pickup placement works very well for me on a shortscale. But then, I'm a sucker for old school plonky tones 😄

Fan tas tic !!

Lovely offer @silverfoxnik. I'd like to go to this but can't, if there's anyone out there who can go but can't afford the ticket, give me a shout and I'll sort the fee 👍

After setting the relief and string height, the saddles are at the bottom of there travel. So increases thickness of shim or file the saddles? I think shim first.

But then you risk getting kidnapped rather than losing a guitar... these thieves stop at nothing! Probably the best is to sleep hanging from the window, with your guitar.

Did you read the thread? Much safer to sleep in the car and have the bass in the room.

Or a fencing mask.

How about a muzzle?

Cheers Clarky, At least they now don't have to have undergo that 'Uncool Dad' moment at the gig when I would have started yelling at Meshell to do a 20 minute slap bass solo! 🤣

Next gig is about a month away at Moor Brewery in Bristol. We've organised this one and it should be a corker if you like Doom! https://www.headfirstbristol.co.uk/whats-on/moor-beer-co/sat-14-dec-christmas-of-doom-114885#e114885

I know we're sort of shouting 'advise' and arguing together while the OP has walked off (I can picture it in a cartoon where someone asks a question, and everyone crowds around shouting over each other, not noticing the original person quietly walked away long ago).......but that's not gonna stop me joining in! Some music Theory is well worthwhile and goes a long way, but I'd say that reading music is generally a 'nice to have' for Bass, especially if you are doing what the majority of Bass players do - play rock/pop etc cover versions or originals. You won't see many of those Bass players standing there live reading sheet music. It's not the case for all instruments, there's good reason that Bass reading has developed Tabs, and Piano has not. I mean, for the bands I've been in it is the expectation that you learn the songs/basslines to play live without reading any notation, nowadays you can do that by listening to the recorded music, online tutorials, tabs, chord charts etc. to help you memorise, whereas in the past, written notation was the only way to get it communicated (or hearing others play live and memorising). So sure, it would be great to sight read music, but I wouldn't say it is a priority for most Bass players. Piano players (who probably play at least 10x the notes of Bass, and more variations, so need notation as it's too hard to memorise), or Bass players playing in Theatre shows just thrown into it with no time to memorise it's a different matter though and is pretty much essential. Anyway, my advice (shouting at cloud!) would be to nail the timing (and locking in with a drummer that might not keep perfect timing!). The temptation is to watch flashy Bass players on YouTube doing solo stuff with 1000 notes a minute, it looks good in that context, but in a band context it's over the top and you rarely see players doing it, Bass is a supporting instrument - part of the rhythm section at the back, so you've gotta have the rhythm! If 1000 notes per minute solo spotlight stuff was my thing then I'd play a guitar. Nowadays, I always practice to something to keep timing - metronome, drum track, band, recording etc. And yeah, wherever possible, play with others (fnarr fnarr).

I agree that the Boss WL-20 had the cleanest tone of the wireless I've used. Downsides for me were all practical live use ones: - 2.4 GHz and consequent noticeable drop outs (key deal breaker for me); - 'rigid' form factor was not so good eg with Ibanez SR basses; - my older ones had a not great battery life of around 3 to 4 hours, if I remember correctly. The NUX trumps it on all three counts, plus the handy charge case, so whilst I would have loved to have held onto the Boss, it was a no brainer for me to switch. I generally use a cable at home which is where nuances of tone are going to be most prominent - in a live mix I wouldn't be able to notice it, as you have alluded. Besides, I'm too preoccupied trying to get the notes right!

It’s possible to suffer all three, at the same time, and it’s horrible! I have nerve damage in my spine and one of the symptoms is having no feeling in most of the skin on my left buttock, down the back of my left leg and my left foot. When touching the dead areas I can’t feel anything. Sometimes I get itches in those areas but scratching has no effect because I can’t feel it, it’s maddening! If I touch the line between where I can feel and where I can’t, it feels like my whole leg has become a giant tongue and I’ve just licked a massive 9 volt battery!

I think it must be a mistake with the controls based on this YT video. Must be VBT or VVT.

I can explain honest…….. the electric ocean is probs a place holder, I’m looking into grabbing a Eqd life pedal, might also try out my bilge rat from hello sailor there aswell tho!!