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After two very late night finishes on Thursday and Friday at a couple of our pub residencies and back home in the small hours, which included having to deal with one of the venues that had hitherto supplied the drum kit not having one anymore, but not bothering to inform us(!), we had a real treat Sunday morning as the course band for the Hackney half-marathon for our fourth year. 8am arrive to set up and then 25,000 runners streaming passed over 2 hours which we played solidly without a break - so a bit of a marathon for us too! Made doubly special for me by having my daughter participating as a runner again this year. A complete blast and a great atmosphere! A little insta clip here to give you more of a feel for the event.

Two gig weekend this weekend. First was an evening gig at a local working mens club that we do a few times a year. Better than it sounds, it has a good stage, easy load in through the back door and a generally attentive crowd. I think numbers were a bit down on normal, but with quite a lot on that weekend around here, its not really that surprising, but the crowd were good, sound was good playing the spector for the first half and the #1 ibanez for the second half (to give my shoulder a break, the spector weighs a bit!). Went back to stereo IEM, and after taking my X18 in the house and going through it I found that the reason it didnt work well the last time I tried, Aux 5&6 that I was using for the IEM output was tied (for some reason) to the main output rather than bus 5&6, which is why adjusting them made no difference. Also I had fed the output from a multitrack I had recorded another time through the mixer again so I could offline concentrate on what I could do with the vocals of the singer - people have always complained he sounds muffled. I think I got it a lot better and he was really happy with how it sounded this weekend, in fact for the first time he said maybe it was too loud and clear! Noone complained they couldn't hear him. Sundays gig was an ourdoor pavillion, one of those venues that in the sun is fantastic, and in the rain is cramped and not so good. It was sunny so loads of space and everyone was in the mood for music. Setting up was easy, the cars are parked just on the left of the building on the grass, the bar part on the right and the crowd goes on a long way to the right in front of the bar. However setting up there was a panic as the original Evox PA on the left of this photo wouldn't switch on - we fiddled around, swapped leads etc, and nothing. In the end while I was looking elsewhere the guitarist and drummer noticed that when you rocked the pa forwards the power came on, and went off when it went back. so we moved it to be on one slab and put beer mats to make sure it was level and it stayed on for the whole gig. That si this weeks job. Didn't want to do the whole gig with just one evox 8 and there wasn't enough time to get home and get something else. Tried the soundcheck, my bass sounded terrible.Playing my Orange OLP, it was a summer day, that is a summer bass. Unfortunately there was no bass and it sounded weedy. I know it wasn't the battery as I had tested it during the week. Fiddle round, boosted the bass on the bass, and it sounded a little better, figuring that maybe a 10" speaker and Bam200 into the PA wasn't good enough for an open air (this is what I use all the time now), then I spotted it - the Bam200 as it is so small it lives in the gig bag, the bass and middle were fully anticlockwise, the treble fully clockwise, they just move in the bag. Put them all at 12 and suddenly I had a bass again (too much, turned the bass on the OLP down) The audience were in party mode and despite us doing exactly the same set list as saturday night and quite a few people from the previous night in attendance, they were really enjoying it, as did we. We have introduced 3 new songs in the last gigs, and they went well, I only messed up on some of the ones we have been playing for ever! So for info on the photo, that is my position on the right, microphone stand with iPad and sample pad (for pianos for 'In the End'), pedal board - mod dwarf, 12 step, critical mass vocals, going to the bam200 on the gnome 10" feeding through that line of wires to the PA (xlr from bam to mixer and jacks from the sampler and keyboard output of the dwarf to the mixer). The other leads are right speaker and ethernet from the mixer to the X-Control surface on the stand. This morning I woke up and feel like I lost a boxing match - too old for this shit!

A pfffft sort of gig Satdy night up in Blackburn (and a single vital road closure added 20 minutes to the nearly-an-hour trip there), mostly empty pub ("Oooo, you're up against Eurovision tonight") and apparently a complaint later that the drums were too loud. I'm not surprised; the pool team is apparently the big thing about the pub, so they can't move the table, it having been professionally levelled or something, so we were in front of it, with a big chunk of empty pub behind us that had more natural reverb than a church. Tricky to keep as quiet as they wanted, but ironically the half dozen drunks in there were deafening before we went on in their conversational volume, literally shouting at each other while all sitting round the same table. They buggered off at some point, as did most other folk, but hey. Didn't help that I'd been out on the bike for a 130-mile blatt in the sun, and that took it out of me (I seem to recall riding a big bike was a lot less physically demanding when I was 21), so I hit the Energy Wall about half ten. Anyhoo, earlish finish, and we got paid. Last minute dep call for hosting a jam night in Tyldesley last night, which was good fun, tho I was the soberest person in the place by eleven (with a 25 mile drive home to do), and we didn't finish till pushing midnight. Used the QSC 12.2, but it was wayyy too much, I need to look at the EQ settings for a less bassy, more focused preset for using a foot from you on a small stage. No inears, my ears are singing today. 😐 Light Sonic P, Stomp, inears/QSC. Green Sketchers for both gigs. Edit: Checked yesterday, and I was using the Bass Amp preset on the QSC, which isn't my favourite; had a faff about with it, and there are presets with less really low bottom ends which would have been more appropriate for a small pub gig with a raised floor (I'm not a fan of a ton of real lows; they're too much trouble to separate from boomy mud). On the other hand, for the gig the weekend before outside in a field, the bigger bottom end was very good. I guess I just don't use it enough to have got used to switching it about.

We were back at The Queens Arms in Brixham on Saturday night. I managed to bag a parking space right outside, which is unheard of. Another good night with an appreciative landlord and crowd. During the break a guy came up to ask me about my rig as he didn't recognise my Ashdown RM 500 evo ii and BF 210 cab, so we had a chat about them. He was actually a guitarist and did recognise my stingray, and was very complimentary on my sound and the balance with our guitarist. 11pm finish luckily, so no too late arriving home.

Rehearsed with my old soul band as a dep on Friday. Last time I depped was 18 months ago so a few new songs to learn. I've not had much time to learn or practice their set so I thought Friday was going to be a struggle and occasionally it was! On the whole though it was a very positive experience. Plenty of muscle memory kicking in and some of the new stuff like EW&F's Fantasy and Let's Groove sounded great (for a first time run through anyway 😄). It was great to see the guys again and meet the new guitarist, their positive and kind words during the rehearsal definitely gave my confidence a boost. The rehearsal room is in the singer's garden and he has a nice little spot by a river, the house was built in the 1600s I think so it has a lovely ambience. As it was a warm evening he had the bifold doors open and at one point there was cheering when a song finished. There was a slight pang of regret on my drive home but it was the right decision to leave when I did...just maybe wishing the dep jobs came around more often 😄

Man, I clicked on this post, thinking he had passed away. Good to know that he is still alive 😊

I was the other way round - started with J types and had no idea what to do with a P bass. Finally got there - I really love both, for different things.

It is. We're just being nice.

We should all take BC out for it's first legal pint 😄

I usually blame the drummer when its tuning issues. 😂 TBH i just blame the drummer for everything. Is that not why we have them ? 🤣 Dave

Won't get fired again!

Reminds me of my old band. We used to write and rehearse in the drummer's spare bedroom which was set up so we could plug in and use headphones. He used an electric drum kit so the only loud noise was the thud of the rubber (and he was a hard hitting drummer!) and the singer. The house was semi detached and he said an old lady lived nextdoor, gawd knows what she thought of it. Quite nice on our ears though.

I have got to keep my neb out of Facebook Marketplace. But it was too sparkly, and only 2 and a half hours away in the car. May I present this Burny (Fernandes) LSB-80 I just bought, simply because it was there, and I fancied it. I have plans for this bass. It's had a life, and it's been modded already (active stuff it would have originally come with is long gone, for example), so I'm going to be making some changes. It's not bad as is, but I think I can make it more to my liking. It plays really well (previous owner did a banging job of setting it up, recrowning frets etc) and it seems solidly made. Developments to come, stay tuned...

I had a 4-string set for a while that I bought to try, as they're just around £10-12, or £15 for a 5-string set. I finally put them on a bass and I'm really liking their sound. I almost never like a set of flats on day 1, but these are nice. That's all, public service announcement over.

As someone who plays both, I'll play devil's advocate and ask is failure to get results out of both types of tried, tested and proven instruments, a failure of the bass or the player?

Reassuringly heavy..

Wish i thought of that reply. Made me almost fall of my chair. 🤣🤣🤣 Dave

I remember The Bottom Line, but more because Steve Manes also ran a Triumph email list which I was on. I've learnt a lot about the existence of many makes of bass which I never knew existed, all of which are very expensive and several of which I now own. It appears that the level of one's knowledge is in inverse proportion to the contents of one's bank account.

Hi Nick, Thank you for posting Nick's foundation info. I can't imagine how proud he would be to know this exists... It was good to meet you at the studio, thought I'd join the BC forum now I'm learning to play bass. Kathryn (aka Blondy!) Ps purchased a little Squier Mustang in Olympic white 😍

But is it any less environmentally friendly that the amount of power required for 5+ competing streaming services (who all have mostly the same catalogue) and the devices they are being streamed to? And the objective is both, and if you are entertaining and good at promotion, IME it works.

Blame the guitarist, simples!

Aye, you were lucky!

The opportunity arose a couple of weeks ago, when we played on a cramped stage where there wasn't really enough room for a double bass. I used my Epiphone Century, HPF and a bit of always-on compression into the Walkabout Scout and the Monza. EQ'd out quite a lot of the bass, boosted the lower mids a bit and it sounded rich, warm and authoratative. 2 bass players in the audiece came up and raved about the sound.

i joined in 2010 but was lurking since 3100bc when I was looking for new strings for my Lute

Call me a convert. I bought a 4 string set to try out and was quite impressed. Well worth the price and compare favourably with some name-brand alternatives that cost 3-4 times as much.

There's room for both in the world

... Sgt Basschat on this day in May. I remember it like it was 18 years ago.

"I'm not dead"

"Refund Request Approved" Well that was quick and painless...

I`m so used to Precisions that I just can`t seem to get it right with a Jazz in a band setting, so I reckon this could well be a factor for others too. Especially as I`ve heard excellent Precision sounds from bands only to see it`s a Jazz being used so I know it can be done, just not, it seems by me.

Or in ear monitors. Lino’s P sounds so good!

Wait a bit until they settle in, and you'll like them even more. Amazing strings for that price tag.

Ooooh the okey-kokey...

One of my daughters was running the Hackney Half too. She got a PB. Your music must have lifted her to new levels! 😀👍

That's a great WAL story. I wasn't aware the passive ones could be retrofitted with electronics. Nice to know. Dave

I was chatting with someone and there's a really cool job for a professional musician to work as the manager of the Rock Project in and around Bristol (Clevedon and Portishead). Details here: https://www.facebook.com/TRPBristolNorthSomerset Payment seems really fair, too and the job looks amazing. Sadly not for me as I have kids and it's around school kicking out time. Thought I'd share as opportunities for stuff like this don't come up too often.

Been there Usually lasts half a song. It's possible that it's actually someone else being a bit off...

It was originally a single pickup, passive Pro1 that I picked up secondhand, but virtually new when someone p/x’d it at the music shop my then drummer ran (saw it on the wall in the shop, took it to our gig that night and it never went back 🤣) That was around 1982. A few years later I had a pickup built by Kent Armstrong into a Wal pickup housing and fitted in front of the bridge turning the Vol & Tone into two Vol with no tone, but still passive. In 1996 I took it up to Wal for a general service and Pete showed me another Pro1 that they had in that was being converted. He told me that the Pro’s were built with the intention that active electrics could be retrofitted if the owner desired in the future, and quoted a good price to do so for mine, so the die was cast and I went for that along with the service and a few weeks later I went back to collect my now active Wal with the Kent Armstrong pup swapped out. So it started life in 82 as a one pickup passive Pro and was converted by Wal to full active in 96.

My poorly taken photo does not do the bass justice. It looks much better in real life. The Japanese retailer's photos capture the finish much better.

We had a lovely gig last night, in what must be a unique venue, The Heron Theatre, Beetham, Cumbria. It's a grade 2 listed building in a small village, run as a charity entirely by volunteers. It serves a large rural catchment around south Cumbria where there aren't really many other venues of its kind. It was sold out well in advance at £15 a ticket. Great people to work with, nice dressing room, free tea, coffee & beer! We ran our own PA but spent the time to get the sound right and it really did sound great in the room as well as on stage. The audience loved it and many of them told us so. They are booked up June 2026, but we'll get another date after that. Rob

Just in from a gig. I dep for this rock band and the gig was at a pub I've never been to before. Parking was ace. Double gates into a spacious yard and a short load in through the back door. These small things make a gig so much nicer. I set up and did a line check. Despite everything being on its usual settings, the bass sound was monstrous. Maybe too loud I thought. It was a raised stage and hollow as far as I could tell. I use a cab isolator anyway, but the sound was HUGE. The opinion from those out front was that it wasn't too loud, so I left things as they were. Truth be told, I'm not a massive fan of most of the songs this band do. If I never play Long Train Running and Play That Funky Music again, it will be day too soon! The said, I did get to play Black Velvet for maybe the second time ever and that sounded great. I take repeated calls of 'one more song' after the encore as a good night. We left it at that. For the most part my signal line was: Shuker JJ Signature Precision > Darkglass Microtubes 900 v2 'Euryale' > Barefaced Big Twin Gen III Some effects were sporadically deployed.

Just back from another outing at the Reivers Sports Bar in Galashiels. A bit quieter than last time but we still had a few folk up and dancing. It was someone's birthday, so the Altered Images song made an unscheduled appearance. This was the first gig since I added the Thumpinator to the pedalboard and it made a hell of a difference. Tone was much more punchy and clear. Deffo money well spent. Rig: Sterling Stingray 5, Eden WTX264 into an Eden 210 cab. Pedals as shown: Footwear by Primani: