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Last night turned out to be a good one, despite having a particularly heavy cold that seems to be doing the rounds. I still have some in-date covid tests and it's apparently not, so on with the show. The gig was guest-headliner at a Metal 2 The Masses competition heat (playing while the votes are being counted and the judges are deliberating), so I swapped my usual 10-6 shift at work for the 7-3, got to the venue for 4 as instructed, sound-checked at about 6, nipped to Tesco for a picnic that I couldn't taste, and then just loitered in the dressing room until showtime at 9:45. I would have liked to see the competition bands but I was best off sat on a sofa with my menthol sweets and a bog-roll. Stage time came around fast enough, and although the drummer had been at the JD a little more than usual, he only made a couple of mistakes and I managed not to have any fits of coughing, sneezing or otherwise malfunctioning. There were plenty watching and all the inter-song noises were positive and enthusiastic, but the highlight for me was the looks on the faces of a pair of lasses down at the front. I may be wrong, but I got the feeling that they'd perhaps spent the night dutifully supporting their boy/friends in one of the more shouty-thrashy bands, so being faced with two corseted sopranos in an operatic-symphonic outfit at the same gig seemed to catch them off-guard; they looked somewhere between emotional and mesmerised ...in a good way. Packed up and tried to help as much as possible with loading out, but I was at the 'if I start coughing I'm not sure I'll be able to stop before I run out of air and keel over' stage, so I made my apologies and my exit. Had a gloriously rough night and now need to spend the next three days helping my lass to move house. Epic. Gear was my RB Streamer LX 5 -(G30)-> [XS-1 -> BC-1X -> VT Bass v2 -> BDDI v2] -> TC BAM200 -> Blackstar house cab, and it really sounded quite good from where I was stood so hopefully that translated to FoH. Noticed that I was getting some very brief drop-outs on the G30, which is very unusual for it in my experience, but I eventually spotted that it was happening every time one of the singers operated the switch on her radio mic. Will have to see whether it was a one-off or maybe a different channel will be less susceptible to issues. Took the Hardly Benton along as backup, and the one photo I was bothered to take all evening is of it...

Long horrible journey to Abertillery, a mining town where the average road gradient is about 45º. The local Blues club. They were a bit disappointed with an attendance of 80 people at £5 a head, which filled the place and we thought was excellent on such a grim nightn although the venue looked welcoming on a dark night. Bluesfire so LOTS of pa, lights etc. Played from 8:30 to 11+ with a raffle break. Nice little stage and great sound as good ceiling, carpet and plenty of bodies to control the sound. My rig has been sounding glorious since I just boosted a mids a bit. Could barely hear my voice in the monitor though. First time they've only used one sub and to my ears the low end sounded much better. We got a rapturous reception and were more free and improvisational than usual which was mostly fun and occasionally hairy. By the end I felt like I'd been beaten up, so the long slow load out and hour's drive in more rain were tedious. In bed at 1:45. Another gig tonight with Bendricks Rock nearly two hours away. Fortunately singer will drive. I see much ibuprofen in my future. I hope my body copes with this two month glut of gigs.

Errr..... interesting !

Short freebie gig playing an intermission set with the 7 piece jazz band last night that turned into an important learning experience for me. One of our members who is a teacher had organized a day long workshop for several school choral groups and due to a cancellation asked if we could fill a slot in the evening program and it went well and we sounded very good. I planned to use my Yamaha SLB 200 and go straight into the Traynor SB 112 combo that I have used many times either by itself or as a monitor with a line out to a PA. When I had it set in place and turned it on nothing happened, it usually takes 2-3 seconds to come on and has never failed before so I checked all the cords and used different wall outlets and still no action. Luckily the school had a bass amp I could use and it all went fine. Now for what I learned. If your amp has been sitting in a car in a parking lot for seven or eight hours with the temperature around -15C it will take while to warm up and come to life. I had taken it straight in and it was still cold but after I changed to the other amp I tried it one more time and stood like an idiot wondering why I bothered and then after about 10 seconds lights came on and all was well, it just needed extra time for the current to warm up the components, who would have guessed? Edit: Yes, I tried it this morning after it had been in my house overnight and all is well, lesson learned.

I blame the "keeping up with the drummer" mindset. Even I have fallen into that trap in my post. The drummer should be playing at the appropriate volume. Too many non-musical drummers playing at one volume. But that's another thread.

This is a tricky thing, and partly a result of muddled/lack of marketing/market research. The FI is derived from a pedal that was a bass-only product. However, the FI goes way beyond that. The patches show what the device is capable of in terms of programmability. The manual reflects the pedal’s ability to cover lots of territory. However, the marketing continues to focus almost solely on its being a “bass” pedal. This does mean that bass players have understandably felt perplexed by the seeming lack of bass-focused patches. Now it is a synth so there probably was an expectation for users to roll their own sounds to taste. However, earlier versions of the editor weren’t so user-friendly in terms of ease-of-connection, layout and patch management. These are things that I’ve pushed to improve in every iteration since 2019 and I feel the interface is much easier to work with than it was. Sure, it still has its own quirks and isn’t as slick as other companies’ editors, but it’s reasonably straightforward now and doesn’t suffer the software bloat/overload of other editors. The depth of on-panel parameter editing was also finally improved in v4 (I’d been pushing my implementation since 2019). Notwithstanding the aforementioned improvements, there are still many users who couldn’t or didn’t want to create their own patches via the editor. I hope that with a chunk of new classic sounds, the newly-added ability to copy and move patches directly on the pedal, and the deeper on-pedal parameter editing capability, these users will finally feel catered to; they’ll be able to modify the classic patches to their taste and copy the result to a new slot. As regards the DX patches, in addition to the obvious ones from the original DX7 internal patches which were all over records from the 80s, I’ve aimed to create and locate decent bass patches. If these don’t make the factory set, I’ll share them anyway via the cloud.

My last gig was NYE. We don't have a gig until February 19. It will be my first gig at age 72. This stretch of no gigs is driving me crazy. Daryl

There's small gigs, and there are bigger gigs. If the aim is to keep up with an unmiked acoustic drum kit for small pub gigs and rehearsals, just about any modern amp rated at 200W should be up to the job. A 500W isn't 2.5 times as loud as a 200W amp, it is twice as loud as a 50W amp. * please note: gross oversimplifications may have been applied

I've had mine since October. It's a KILLER! Loads of punch and headroom and heft, if I may say it, simple and brilliantly effective EQ. The hpf is something I'd never really thought of before, but it's a really useful shaping tool which fattens up the bottom end beautifully if counter- intuitively. Who knew that removing bass improved the low end? Everyone bar me, it would seem. I'm not a technical fella so this amp is perfect for me. Just switch it on and it sounds great. Fiddle around and it just sounds greaterer. Build quality looks to be as good as it gets, though time will tell, I guess. As for extras, I'm particularly taken with the USB out which I use to power my tuner. It sounds good through every cab I've put it through. I did some European shows back end of last year with a venue supplied cab at each. No issues with any of 'em, not even the beaten 90's Laney 410 at one nor the ancient Marshall 115 I ended up with at another. I'm the UK I use it with either a Barefaced 210 or 610 and it cooks, fellas, lemme tell ya. I'm doing a UK club tour with Atomic Rooster starting 19th of this month (Coming to town near you!)and I'm planning on using both cabs together. We'll see how that pans out. I'll finalise that set-up during rehearsals next week. I'll keep you informed... Shug

All pedals gone........ New pedal in............

Spent this morning flattening, cutting back and polishing the walnut and elm body that’s been in nitro for a while now. Always that slightly tense moment when you move from “looks alright” to “don’t mess this up now” 😅 It’s come up really nicely overall. There is a bit of grain sink in places, but nothing dramatic — and honestly on an open-pored wood like this, I think it just adds a bit of character rather than looking like a mistake. It still feels smooth to the touch and the gloss has settled well. This one’s very much in the nitro doing nitro things category: natural, slightly imperfect, and already starting to look like an instrument rather than a project. I’d rather that than bury the wood under half a gallon of plastic. It’ll be paired with a roasted maple neck with a rosewood fretboard, Guyker tuners, Fender Pure Vintage ’66 pickups, and a Hipshot bridge. The neck is already finished and set up, with the tuners installed, so it’s just waiting to be bolted on once the body’s had a bit more time to behave itself. Next job is letting it sit and behave itself before assembly. No rushing, Does this build make you feel “fizzy”?…..it doesn’t have a home yet…… This one is going to be a stunner and if it sounds and plays as well as previous builds, it will be immense. MGCS – made to play, built to last.

Tiny upgrade. Popped in a pair of P94s and changed the knobs to amber coloured ones (only because I shattered one of the originals getting one of the potentiometers out). From a visual aesthetic, I'm of the opinion the 90s look better than the humbuckers. I'm still staggered how good this is.

Easy and compact

Amplifiers don't deliver sound; speakers (drivers, cabs, whatever...) deliver sound. Watts is a unit of power, not volume; decibels is a unit of volume. The more efficient the speaker (driver, cab, whatever...), the more volume (decibels...) it can deliver for a given power (watts...). This would be referred to as its 'efficiency'. Soooooo... A low-powered amp into an efficient cab can produce more volume than a high-powered amp into an inefficient cab. Watts, in themselves, are a very poor unit for expressing volume. What's the solution..? If volume is required, look for an efficient cab, then match an amp to that cab. Turn the volume down at home. There is no contradiction; a good amp/cab combination can be used on stage and at home with no issues. If arena volumes are required, the PA will do the 'heavy lifting', anyway, and an IEM system will keep the stage volume at decent levels, whatever the amp/cab. Any quality amp and/or cab will be fine for both purposes (but a less imposing version may be preferred for home practice, to avoid carting stuff around...) There's a lot of advertising spiel surrounding the selling of music gear in general; don't be taken in by claims of 20/200/500/1000 watts or whatever, and ask your peers for their experience of 'real-life' usage. Hope this helps.

I think the start-off-with-something-familiar and then use it as a base from which to explore other sounds (and the way the settings interact) is how many players would prefer to approach discovery. Having sounds from familiar songs gives some reassurance that the pedal is fit for purpose out of the box without faff but...faff is an option for those down times when owners have a couple of hours to kill. It keeps things interesting. I think MXR and FI are both on the right track in that context and I hope they continue to expand the repetoire of familiar patches. Yeah but there is a question of relevance and perceptions of value. The value for a player is convenience in the beginning, then as their relationship with the unit grows...or not, they can explore when they get bored or have time - 'what else can I work out given it gets to close to X?' I think LukeFRC is absolutely right when he says "it feels like the FI1 was a reissue of the DI with more things a synth geek would want". This is not really a reason for gigging players to buy the pedal unless they're in an originals band. And there are fewer of those around now than even just five years ago. Most of us play covers. Speaking of which...there is still a gap in the market for a decent arpeggiator. So many companys have taken aim and missed.

I use the same amps at home as I do on the loudest gig. 800 watts sounds fine in my front room. They all have a thing called a master volume.

@mattpbass Insane right?

Sure. We used this one not so long ago...

Ever heard of showbusiness? 😉

Put an output block at the end of your current chain for whatever output you’re using to amp or foh. Add a return block after it and then I mapped the control to the volume or blend of the return so I could quickly adjust it. Feel free to then add some compression and light room reverb to taste.

I've taken up folks' suggestion to raise this with A&H, and they have been supportive so far and allowed me to make a warranty claim with Audio Technica, notwithstanding the fact that it is outside the 12 month warranty period. Very reassuring customer service by them so far!

First of all not all bands are rock bands, some may not even have a drummer, people who play quieter genres of music still need an amplifier if they play electric bass. Secondly we don't all use our amps to fill a room with sound. In my current band the bass amp is just a monitor for the band. The audience hear my bass through the PA. My bass amp only needs to fill the stage and if it is too loud it ends up going through the vocal mics and distorts the sound for the audience. If you are so loud that only a 500W amp will do then your band probably sounds quite poor however well you play because of the volume in the vocal mics. Finally you need to take account of the range of speakers we all use. A 100W amp through a 102db/W is going to be louder than a 300W amp through a 96db/W speaker. Like most people who are commenting I carry a 200/130W micro amp as a backup to my 500/300W amp but I tend to use the smaller amp almost all of the time as it is more than loud enough for the gigs I do.

Love this. ICAWW, Angine de poitrine is French for Angina.

I played in cover bands for hundreds of years. One of the favourite changes the drummers like to make is increasing the tempo dramatically to suit their excitement for the show. This provides a platform for the other musicians to simplify their parts, and get to the bar at break earlier, and for longer. Time at the bar slows down the second set and provides a more relaxed approach to tempo, timing, and pitch, complemented by an increase of guitar volume aprox. +12db.

A lot of the sellers that I used have disappeared from eBay but they do seem to come and go as I suspect some of them get pulled for copyright infringement etc. .There are plenty of bass necks on AliExpress though. China YueTong Store https://a.aliexpress.com/_EuhSpbm This is one that I haven‘t used before but am looking at to use next on AliExpress but I have a few necks stockpiled already for future builds. As with all things when you buy on online selling sites….do your research!……how long have they been on that platform, What are their reviews and do the reviews look genuine and most importantly, do they appear to specialise in guitar or instrument stock? The one above appears to supply instrument components which are also orchestral string necks so I would hope they would know what they are doing. If you are expecting an out of the box, set up, ready to go neck then you will be disappointed. If you are happy to do some levelling, dressing etc then they are very good for the money compared to a real Fender neck. You would likely have to do the same to one of those anyway. I have a customer MIM neck in the workshop at the moment to pair with one of my bodies. If I put it next to a Chinese one, apart from the headstock logo, there is very little difference in the quality if at all. It is very much a do your due diligence and a bit of fingers crossed when you first order from a company but I’ve never had a bad or unusable neck from China yet nor I have ever had one not arrive or damaged in transit. perhaps I’ve just been lucky.

I took me a while but I'd love to come along. Bringing G&L 2500 x 2 (One Tribute) P basses: P-Retro'd Warmoth, 32" scale Zoot, 54 and basic Warmoth. 2 amp heads, 1 x 12" Accugroove Line 6 Helix LT with Laptop. Peter

Me, @rumblefish and another BC'er did an a/b comparison with a TT-800 the other evening. Both superb amps and they weren't radically different in sound. The majority decision was in favour of the TT but that's not any sleight on the 800D. The TT just had some indefinable 'more' to it. Either way, incredible amps with that Mesa dna running through them.

Lucinda Williams. My God, what a trouper! Has to be helped on and off stage, can no longer play guitar - but sings better than ever. She burns with a righteous anti-Trump fury and well deserved her standing ovation in Basingstoke. I have rarely been so moved. Oh, and Doug Pettibone, guitar, was called back to the States so Marc Ford, ex Black Crowes, took on all six-string duties pretty damn well. To top all this, in ten days she’s touring the US as opener for Heart. All power to her…

Snoopy: 😁

Mad as a box of frogs, but brilliant nonetheless.

Personally, if the photos are obviously fake and a bit of fun, then that’s ok. I’ve done similar with my bands. No one is fooled, and it’s just a laugh. If things were done to look ‘real’ and trick people I’d be less comfortable.

GMC are a small UK luthier supplier (one man show I believe) that makes everything in-house and they sell a very decent bass notched/straight edge combo for just under £40. https://www.guitarbuilding.solutions

Frustrating, especially when most of the audience likely can't even play an instrument, so what do they know about it to judge?

If people are talking about it then the finish has been worth doing.

Just wondered what you make of it nearly a month on? Build quality? im super tempted by one, and in the pink!

Agreed. If they're your brand and gauge, you're good to go. On most of my basses I usually slap on a set of 40-95 Elixirs (I like the long lasting rich tone and bendability). I recently picked up a shortscale 5-string Maruszczyk 'Mr.Tee' as a P/X which had the thickest set of flats I've seen, so they had to go. I actually found a reasonably priced set of Ernie Ball 40-95 flatwounds and added a 35 gauge for the top C. A short setup later and it plays like butter. Due to the bargain price of my own Fazley Judge Plus (aka. Kermit the Bass), I threw on a set of cheap Warwick Red Label strings that I got in the Black Friday sales. Bass £63. Strings £8. Reminds me of the cafe menus on Discworld; Rat and beans 8p Rat and ketchup 7p Rat 4p” “Why does ketchup cost almost as much as the rat?” “Have you tried rat without ketchup?!"

It's a tricky thing to get right. I really like simple analogue synth programming and the real-time morphing possibilities, as long as I'm working on a classic-style synth like an Odyssey or Minimoog, where every function has a dedicated knob/slider. Also that approach relies on keyboard as an input method as I can play with one hand and tweak with the other. Much harder to make that work in a pedal format - keyboard naturally has all that space above the keys. Assignable expression pedal is about the limit imo. I've not spent enough time trying to make sense of FM with the benefit of a good instruction manual, but it's certainly not intuitive like analogue. I think most users treated the DX7 as a tweakable preset machine and I expect that's how 99% of the FI4.5 users are going to approach it. Really looking forward to the release of this update! Though it's going to require me to make a new pedalboard, to fit it in.

It does.

Non-standard by whose standards? The primitives of the USA? As this is an entirely rational prejudice I suppose it shouldn't be in here, but metric is a far superior measuring system to imperial (and which imperial are you using as the standard?), and the UK has been metric for 60 years, so why the f*ck do people still want o use imperial? I will make certain exemptions - tyres, loudspeakers, and televisions have become standardised as measured in inches. Nothing else should be. I'm just off to play my 865mm scale bass.

Had an audition with some local folks. The existing band members are guitar, keyboards, and female singist. Drummer and myself auditioning. They gave us 3 songs, and didn’t really know any of them. We had an honest conversation where us new guys will attend a couple more rehearsals and reevaluate. The drummer, however. Is a top chap and a joy to play with.

Had a wee rehearsal with the Glam band on Wed night after a month off. No real issues and decided to run thru the songs we haven't played in quite a few mths. That was fun. Gigging on 14th Feb at a 60th Birthday party. Not sure why we keep doing these but the money is good. Also the 21st Feb at a short notice one at The Ferry in Glasgow when a friends band had to cancel and we were put forward as a replacement band. Venue and myself eventually agreed on pricing etc and quite looking forward to playing it. Dave

Mantle vs the rest of the world... for anyone who may find it useful!

Collecting my freshly refurbished Wal Pro 2E from Paul at Electric Wood on Monday. *jumps up and down like an excited 5 year old*