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Well, shirley an envelope filter would be .....The Sorting Office? I'll get my coat.

- how did you work out / stumble on what sound you were after? Was it a particular bass player or a bass line on a music track (if so, who / what?) = Was told to go and get a Jazz bass for a gig I was doing at the time by a band member. Did so to solve an argument and found out THIS was the bass that made all the sounds that were in my head. Bass players on a lot of records I grew up listening to used a Jazz so I'm guessing that's how the sound got in there in the first place. - if you know your sound, how would you describe it? (May be a tricky one to put in words, I guess!) =Not "my" personal sound but borrowed. Back PU gives me a tight and defined Jaco type thing.(the yanks call it burp?) Both PUs gives me Marcus Miller slap thing or deep and round for grooving. Then there are other variables but mostly its these two simple settings that work over just about anything. (that I play on or bands I play with. Covers mostly.Pop.Funk.Soul.Rock.Indie) - what are the key ingredients in your signal chain that are essential to delivering 'that sound'. (Hopefully we'll get some great suggestions for combinations of strings, PUPs, EQs, amps, cabs and pedals, depending on which are the most important /really key bits of the chain for you). = Recording or low volume - Passive Jazz straight into desk or amp. Tone all the way off. PUPs back or both depending on tune. Gigs - Passive Jazz bass into sadowsky preamp pedal into EBS HD350 amp then EBS neo cab/s. In descending order of importance in the chain: Passive Jazz bass My fingers and where I pluck. Usually over near the bridge side near the back PU regardless of PU setting. Regardless of the bass I'd probably always do this anyway for finger style. That's how I get "my" borrowed sound. Strings by D'addario because they are nice to the touch and less effort due to low tension. From there its a preference but not essential. EG: I prefer the EBS stuff but its not the only amp that can achieve what I'm going for. I like the simplicity of it more than anything. There is a plug and play element to it that appeals to me. I know quickly if I'm going to get an ok tone or a great tone depending on the room so I can get on with accepting what its going to be on that gig and get on with it. The Sadowsky preamp pedal is more to give a signal boost than any major tone shaping. I use a touch of bass and treble boost. It works like that so I stick with it. I also use a Chorus pedal when I want a bit of sparkle for a riff or maybe in a solo if it fits with the tune.

The nastiest drum I've ever heard is a piccolo snare. As a non-drummer, if there is one contribution I can make to this thread, it's DON'T LET HIM HAVE A PICCOLO SNARE!!!

Hi All Lots going on at Chowny at the moment. So am sponsoring a thread to put you in the picture We've new offices in Bristol (in scenic Lawrence Hill) and would love to invite anybody who fancies it to pop by and have a play on our basses or pedals. Just give us a heads up when you want to come. So first stock updates: Stock in of all of the following: Retrovibe EVO Davie504 Basses Retrovibe EVO Retrovibe Volante Retrovibe Vantage Fuzzster Pedals Pitchcraft Pedals Stock incoming over the next month SWB Pro SWB-1 CHB-1 and CHB-2 (2018 editions) We've added a new video studio and are adding new videos to our Youtube channel twice a week. They will be a mix of things (jams, talks etc) Here is Scott Whitley and I talking about the SWB and how we came to make it. And here is Danny Sapko playing on the very first ever CHB that we made. Finally we are releasing our new Bassmosphere Pedal soon. It's boutique designed Chorus/Reverb pedal. Manufactured in China and sold for the price of £62 (plus the usual "basschat" discount). Anybody who wants to come and play some bass (and drums) or just bring your band into our studio to do a song - get in touch. Thanks! Will add to this thread as new stuff happens.

Whilst I`m not exactly keen on bands playing for nothing, sometimes, when starting out on the originals circuit it`s one of those things that has to be done. You either get 5 paid gigs a year, or you take a punt on a few more unpaid as well, knowing you`re expanding your audience/merch sales/fan-base. Additionally, and in regards to the op, they agreed to play for nothing. Now irrespective of whatever any other band is getting, if you make an agreement you should stick with it imo. Again, not wonderful but you can gain a reputation as trustworthy, which can work in your favour - it`s how we`ve done things. An example of this is we were playing Gateshead on a Friday night, Blackpool on the Sat night afterwards. A big gig in Glasgow was offered to us at very short notice. So we did all three, doing an early afternoon Glasgow set, we wouldn`t bin the small Blackpool gig for the better Glasgow one. It was knackering, but in honouring our commitments it further cemented our reputation as a band that can be trusted.And the band is now self-funding, we don`t take any money from it but it pays for all recording/merch/hotels/flights/ferries/van & driver hire etc. But if we`d binned all the early unpaid gigs I wonder if we`d be in that position now.

It's the way things are going certainly and round our way there are a LOT of acoustic om nights. A lot of the bedroom warriors need to learn how to project a song and entertain an audience, but I've seen some stand out performances from singer/guitarists or on one occasion a ukulele duo! If it keeps live music in places that would otherwise not bother, I think it's a good thing as long as the quality is there

It's the same material (3mm cast Acrylic). The flipside to having great optical clarity is that it does have some reflections but not that you'd notice in any of the playing environments my screen protecctor has been in over the past few months - indoors with lots of stage lights and outdoors. I'm just finishing off the design for the Helix Floor model as well ready for prototyping

I bought one of those new years ago for £365, couple of surprising quality issue with loose pots and wobbly input that wouldn't tighten... That tone though! I've never been as satisfied with a tone before or since that bass...

Sold

For sale MTD 535-21 fretless, WITH EXTRA OPTIONS VIDEO ADDED, FEATURED IN NOTREBLE.COM: https://www.notreble.com/buzz/2018/07/24/jesus-rico-perez-braighe-loch-iall/ One of the best fretless basses I`ve had, unfortunately I need to sell it. PRICE: 2500£ Specs: Myrtle top Tulipwood body Ebony fingerboard 21 lined fretless Ebony truss rod cover 35" scale, Hipshot USA ultralite tuners Bartolini USA custom pickups, specially made for Michael Tobias Bartolini custom preamp, Vol, Balance, Bass, Mids, Treble; 3 pos. frequency mid switch. Electronics, jack, truss rod, everything working in perfect conditions, with no issues, no surprises. EXTRA OPTIONS: ( see the pic ) Wenge neck $500 lined fretless $200 Ebony board $200 Matching peghead $200 The nut width is 45mm and string spacing is 19mm. on the original Hipshot B bridge; now it has installed a Hipshot "A" bridge ( fully adjustable ), which has not needed any new holes for its installation, it is installed perfectly in those that already exist. I will ship the ORIGINAL bridge too. The overall condition is very good, excepting a little mark that I SHOW IN THE PIC. Comes with non original case ( I never had it ) in perfect condition. The bass is located in Arroyo de la Miel, Spain, and can be shipped to E.U. (PROTECTED IN A CARDBOARD BOX with BUBBLE PROTECTIONS) at buyers costs. You can check my profile, I have previously sold and bought on this website, always with good results. Thanks for looking!

I have a super nice Bulgarian upright bass, a custom built - but not for me - instrument with some strange dimensions. The scale is 4/4, but the body is 3/4, built with massive tone wood. It is nothing short than huge. I had to get a new car to be able to transport it smoothly. Anyway, the bass is huge, the tone is huge. The instrument is built 2012, so I wonder how the tone will be in a hundred years when it is this big and full now... I've used a David Gage Realist on the bass, but it didn't work well. A lot of ugly "mid artifacts" that demanded heavy filtering to sound decent amplified. I sold the Realist and bought a Realist LifeLine and an adjustable bridge. The bass loved the LifeLine; it was the opposition to the Copperhead... I've used the bass with a Fishman Platinum Pro EQ/DI, and with my BasSwitch preamp, but when I got my little Quilter BassBlock 800 I could amplify the bass without preamp. Then I got a Vanderkley Spartan, and that one did NOT like the piezo pickup at all. The input impedance on the amp was a real mis-match to the LifeLine. Then my eye caught the little Redeemer Beltpack from Creation Audio Labs. It has an input impedance over 20 Mohms(!!!) making any pickup work well with any amp. I ordered one, and Lo and Behold! The tone is big and full. No gain problems. No need for eq-ing other than cutting some low bass. Best preamp I've ever used. So far the Beltpack isn't finally mounted on the tailpiece of the bass, I have to think a bit more before I get the proper design for the fastener. Anyway, the bass hasn't sounded petter amplified...

Squawk box, surely!!!

Hi all, I'm not a bassist myself, but my wonderful partner plays both electric and double bass so I guess I could be a bass widow? I'm taking a big risk posting here as I know he reads these forums regularly but hopefully he won't catch on. He is amazing, musically and as a partner. Before I met him I was shy and nervous but because of his love and support I have written and recorded an album, won a songwriting competition and performed at several festivals. The last year has been incredibly hard for me but he has been my rock, so loving and so supportive. I couldn't have made it through without him. His birthday is coming up and I want to get him something really special to show how thankful I am both to and for him. But I don't know where to start! My initial thought was whether there were any respected bassists that I could arrange a lesson with, or something like that. But I'm looking for any ideas or advice on something to get him that he would love but also not guess I would be capable of choosing. I have a decent amount of money to play with so let me have it! I should mention he plays the double bass more than the electric and tends to play country/bluegrass above anything else. I'm looking forward to your suggestions and thanks for letting me join! (And let's just hope he doesn't see this as it's pretty obvious it's him isn't it!) Thanks all! SD Xxxx

Decided to take the original screws out as the were only 6mm long and replace them with longer to give a bit more grip and include a flat washer and a spring washer rattling has ceased

A Roland SH101, I believe.

The decal arrived today, so I applied that this afternoon. Rothko & Frost have again supplied a high quality product at a fair price and with good service. I know others have had less successful experiences with them but I have no complaints, perhaps I’ve been lucky or they’ve been unlucky? Anyway, it looks great. I chose silver for the main part of the logo as I knew I’d be putting a mist coat of amber tint on it which would golden it up a bit. I signed and numbered the back of the headstock again too, as with the Bruno bass I recently completed. My little daughter Dulcie for whom the bass is named didn’t sign it, like her big brother did on his namesake instrument; she can’t hold a pen yet! I don’t think I’m going to bother clear coating or polishing, the nitro has buried the decal and hidden the edges well and looks nice and vintage, so I think I’ll just leave it as it is and see how it wears / ages naturally. In retrospect it’s just slightly darker than I’d have preferred; next time I’ll do fewer coats of tint before adding the decal, or use clear nitro for the final coats. I’ll let it rest overnight, give it a very light sanding tomorrow, reassemble the bass and hopefully give it a go at band rehearsals tomorrow.

Fender Rumble 500 all day. Great sound, light, 350 watts on it`s own and you can stick a cab under it to get the full 500 watts. The 200 Rumble would be good enough for monitoring but the price difference between it and the 500 isn`t that great and I always like to have enough power for any eventuality.

Thanks Rob. It is and more... Thanks for all your sound advice during the ordering stages

Me too. check his ABBA versions too. The harmonies work really well.

I have a few Hercules products but not the one mentioned above, all are superb quality and customer service was excellent when I had a minor issue (replacement was with me in a day FOC).

My instinct is to agree with this, but one thing gives me pause for thought: the promoters who do no promotion often have a lot of free time to get their version of the story out if they feel slighted by a band. This guy's clearly chock full of s**t, but there's a risk that he'll decide to spread a load of "fake nooze" about you guys cancelling and being unprofessional or whatever. If you wanted to hedge your bets...you said you've got some interest. Play this gig. Bring your crowd. Demonstrate just how good and professional you are - like Lozz said, watch the other bands, have a drink with them, make connections and flog some CDs if you can. Better still, asking the other bands seemingly innocent questions like, "oh, are you getting paid for this gig, then?" might help to sow the seeds of discord and quietly let them know that the promoter's trying to shaft you. If the promoter asks you whether you'd like to work with him again, you're in a really strong position to give him both barrels. If he doesn't, there are plenty of groups and message boards online where you can tell other musicians everything you've told us. E.g., if you're on Facetube, the "advice/blacklist for uk bands promoters and labels group" has about 17,000 users who could (should) be warned off working with the guy.

<super_nerdy_graphic_design_content> I have a buddy who does all my artwork for me. I pick the colours from Fiestaware https://goo.gl/TZ8Y2s which was dinnerware made in the 1940s/1950s. They all kind of follow a similar design, but with a different two colours on each pedal. I try give each pedal a quirky retro aesthetic. Up till now we've put the pedal naming duties out to the public (and if we pick a name from somebody they get a free pedal). The artwork is vinyl hardwearing outdoor stickers. They're super resilient. The pedals come blank from the factory and I have to spend 4 hours sticking all the stickers on. Here's what the stickers look like: </super_nerdy_graphic_design_content> The next pedal will be an envelope filter (with a HP/LP blend). Name suggestions welcome!

Is as far as I got before I'd decided. but it gets worse and alarm bells.. (I won't quote the rest) Cancel because of the catalogue of incompetency. Yes you wanna support a fanzine, so tell them why you are out of this debacle and thank them for their help. However, "Promoters" like this should be weeded out. Call this person out for having no clue and messing you around. You are better than this. Every musician is. Oh and you are worth way more than 'no money left' and certainly more than £100.

Bass needs more power from an amp to create a better sound. I'd start at 500 watts not because I need to be loud but because I want a clean powerful sound at whatever volume the band plays at. If you've been out of bass playing for the last 10 years, you might have noticed that the bass world has changed. You can still buy the old stuff, but it really is the old stuff. Modern bass gear is smaller, lighter, louder and sounds light years better than the average stuff of years gone by. I'd look in the BC classifieds (because you can find great gear at a good price) and look at separates because you can change your mind about your sound (and you will) an be able to upgrade each piece individually.

I welcome your new word and looking at the picture you posted, would also propose craftsmanshit be added to the list

True. All complete BS. And then there's the amps...

Awesome! Really practical for that situation where... Umm... You know.. Hang on... It'll come to me... ... Oh wait, no I've just remembered it's fecking useless

Nick's work is just mind-blowing. I'm actually saving up to buy every single product he's sent me prototype pictures of!

I think it was more that it was the first quality 2x15 I had. It was a bit underpowered and so I changed the speakers in it. Originally, I had a 1x18 cab and 2 4x12s (a smaller version of John Deacons rig) but it didn't sound right and was a mountain of stuff to cart around. After the Ampeg 2x15 I bought a Boogie diesel 2x15 (well, two in fact) and have been a rampant Boogie user ever since then (about 1988).

Tasty! Sean is a gent, buy with confidence.

Yes, the Sting/ Shaggy record.

Too many variables. I gave up. When it happens that's great. If not, I'm not going to sweat it. Blue

I've forced myself to take another look and you're right - he was hiding behind Kimball's not inconsiderable bulk! No idea why they gave the solo to the bass player then...

It's important to try and listen to your sound in the context of the rest of the band, which is hard to do effectively at high volume rehearsals. I like to play along to studio recordings with different combinations of basses and preamp pedals into headphones to figure out what works best. The last couple of bands I've been in have had a very thick distorted guitar tone (e.g. Les Paul into a cranked Orange tube head). Here I've found it best to use a scooped tone to provide a pillow of low end to underpin the sound, but with a bit of crispy gain up top to add clarity and fill out that upper midrange where the guitarist and vocalist don't often tread. I used a BB1025X with both pickups on which is naturally scooped and growly anyway, into a Darkglass B3K, although the Tech21 DP-3X is my weapon of choice for this tone now. If I'm playing at the jam night down my local, totally different ball game. Often more then one guitar, but usually thinner sounding, and often a higher pitched female vocalist. To slot in here I stay out of the upper mids, go easy on the deep low end and fill out the lower mids with a P-Bass or my Sandberg Basic (a bit like a Stingray), both of which are wearing TI flats. Either straight into the amp or via a low gain drive pedal of a totally different flavour to the other setup. Full range OD with no clean blend is the order of the day here, something that produces a guttural roar from below rather than grind from up top when you dig in, e.g. SFT, BB Preamp, Beta, Agro.

When we started our band I really had no idea of the type of sound I wanted - or more importantly that the band needed. My preferred sound is a traditional warm Precision/Ampeg type sound, maybe a touch of high end and compression to stop it being boomy. But that wasn`t what was needed, the guitarist has a very full on, and at the time quite bassy sound, so didn`t want a sludge fest, especially as we play fast. Additionally as we`re a 3-piece I didn`t want the backside of the songs to drop when there was a solo, so added a bit of gain, a fair bit of top end, and some high-mids. I ended up with somewhere between Duff McKagan, Mike Dirnt, JJ Burnell & Bruce Foxton. Which imo isn`t a bad place to be, sound-wise. I also developed a slight different style to suit the music I`m now playing, again to fill out more in lead solos. To get this sound I`ve tried a fair few preamp/DI pedals, Tech 21 Sansamp BDDI, Tech 21 VTDI, Aguilar Tonehammer, and combinations of these, but eventually settled on the Tech 21 Para Driver - it has sweepable mids, so I can get the regular Sansamp type sound, just with boosted upper mids. It`s a great pedal and that piece of kit that I find invaluable, pairs so nicely with the weighty sound of my Ashdown ABM600.

Nothing to say, except that any musician should be able to control his volume. There's absolutely no excuse for it

I’ve always been chasing the bass sound equivalent of a big lazy idling American V8 burbling away inside a Plymouth ‘Cuda. Randy HT’s work with Incognito reminds me of this.

I've tried a few preamps for DB and always seem to go back to the FDeck Clone. Has a great buffer and the useful HPF and phase switch. You can get them made in several forms and are pretty cheap.

Same here, pal of mine has a Ric he adores and thinks is a legendary classic bass. It sounds terrible and is an absolute chore to play though. If it didn't have the iconic look he wouldn't give it a second glance. Joint first position for worst bass however is a Hofner violin bass (one of the more pricey ones) I used the last time I was persuaded to go to a jam night. Just as clunky as the Ric with a similar amount of useless cosmetic adornments which hamper playing only this time it sounded like mud being played through more mud rather than a choice selection of honky farts like the Ric. I can only assume all the controls on the bass and amp were broken because it sounded the same no matter what. Again the owner was really proud of it and I have no idea why, I've seen his band a few times and the bass guitar and kick drum are indistinguishable from each other in the mix.

It's bad enough seeing the first Christmas ads on the box in September, now you've gone and started it in May I'm tempted to lock and hide this thread.

My mate has a Rickenbacker which he’s very proud of. I played it once - felt like a cheap 70’s starter bass. I just didn’t “get” it. So many do though. Strange. I don’t like marmite either.

I have played in bands where the singer will either have the lyrics on a stand, or a tablet. But they are professional musicians so can sing 100s of songs. They can't be expected to be word perfect on every song.

Aye. It's tuneless, derivative, poorly played and entirely lacking in emotion or creativity.

I completed the most important part of my build this week, which will help everything else: Yep, a shed, now I can do stuff that isn't outside! But having been busy all week and last weekend it has been slow progress. Never mind, I have next week off. But tonight I got a chance to do stuff, so I made a template for working out where the machineheads go on the neck, I placed and drilled the holes for the controls, in collaboration with my wife. I started work on the shaping of the arm rest bit, rounded off the corners (need to learn how not to burn the wood and chipped a few bits) I took out more wood in the electronics hole (need more out but I am taking that one slowly), and met with the long lost hole for the cables that I drilled when it was still two pieces of wood. Still rough in places, loads of things to correct but no major messups so far and nice to feel I am getting somewhere!

I've been using - and I've been very impressed with - a Bergantino B Amp. Very/increasingly flexible, around 800w, will go down to 2 and 2.7ohms. Fully parametric eq, studio quality DI, VR compression, cab profiles (if you use Bergs but good with others), very nicely designed and great build, presets/memory function, very punchy and very loud (if you need that). Light too at around 6.5lbs. Not the cheapest option but an extremely impressive amp in all respects (IMO)

It is a good set up with the 2x RM fifteens. Haven't yet done the 15+ 2*10 but the 2*10 on its own sounds good.

Have used 15s in the past and liked them. But there are still those who think that frequency response and transient response are linked to cone size, which is not necessarily the case. I've used 10s that can vibrate the building and hit you in the chest - admittedly they were in an 8X10 cab being powered by an SVT-CL, but you get the point...

OK, my journey seems to be going somewhere. I now seem to be the type of person who is genuinely excited be woken up early on a saturday morning by the postman delivering this: (you will never know how many times I rephrased 'wood', 'morning' and 'postman'!). So yay, now all I have to do is glue it together and start cutting (after first making sure to make a pickup cable hole. I bought some pickups yesterday too, turns out musicman style OLP 5 strings have a 15.2mm pickup spacing, which is ideal, so I got some of those. Still wondering about a narrow bridge but it is looking like individual monorail style. So glue - what glue do I use? I see people just glueing these things together and then carrying on. Is there really nothing else that holds the wood together than glue? I read a book on the net that said about having dowels as well, but I have never seen anyone do that.

My first build was also adding a body to a commercially bought neck - it's a great way of starting Welcome to the world of the highly driven but sightly crazy

[quote name='Count Bassy' timestamp='1509630355' post='3400430'] I don't pretend to know the figures, but with those 3 brands they've probably got over 50% of the market covered (though suprised no yamaha in there). [/quote] Very few of the London stores have any stocks of Yamaha - it's much easier to go to Yamaha Music London in Wardour St, they have virtually everything in stock there, even a BBNE2.