obbm

Alternatively they could not be removing something that cheap cables do, but I have yet to be convinced.

There can be quite a lot of unwelcome electrical interference in a stage environment especially if you have lighting dimmers around so it is wise to take whatever precautions you can to minimise this. One way is for all long cables to be balanced as this will help cancel out any interference and hum. Ideally you should keep unbalanced cables short and use balanced cables where running across the stage to, for example, an FOH mixer. This is why most amps and all DI boxes have a XLR output so you can use a balanced connection to the mixer.

This German concert was recorded during their Germany, Japan and Phillipines tour. They then went on to the USA for their final tour there and the famous Shea Stadium show in NYC. I think it's fair to say that they were internationally famous by June 1966. I first saw them in Guildford in June 1963 and then at their annual Xmas shows in London - 1963, 1964 and 1965. The memories of those shows has long faded apart from the incessant screaming.

Cliff Bennett and The Rebel Rousers were a great band but never really hit the big time. There is a compilation of their work "At Abbey Road - 1963-1969". The Rattles were a German group formed in the early 60s in Hamburg. Somewhere I have their single "Bye Bye Johnny" which was sung in Germinglish. Very entertaining. Another band you might like to check out from the mid-60s Merseybeat era are "The Rockin' Vickers" who featured amongst number a young Lemmy Kilminster on guitar who went on to much greater things.

What colour are the Speakon sockets on the amp and the cab? Do they have Neutrik embossed on them?

Lakland Jerry Scheff 4-string.

[quote name='Phil Adams' timestamp='1510041567' post='3403359'] Did anyone have a Linear 30? [/quote] Yes I had one of those. It served me well for several years. I currently have a Linear 50 as a rebuild project.

Have you considered a Buttkicker attached to his throne driven from a power amp or a small bass head? [url="https://www.thomann.de/gb/fischer_amps_buttkicker_mini_lfe_2_ohm.htm?glp=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIp8O4n_uq1wIV6rDtCh3-AAkjEAQYASABEgIn8_D_BwE"]https://www.thomann.de/gb/fischer_amps_buttkicker_mini_lfe_2_ohm.htm?glp=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIp8O4n_uq1wIV6rDtCh3-AAkjEAQYASABEgIn8_D_BwE[/url] All tactile and no increase in volume. I use one occasionally and mix my bass and drums through it.

Whilst experimenting with a stack-knob set-up a few years ago I successfully manage to dismantle and rebuild several stacked CTS pot with different resistive tracks. It would therefore be possible to make a 10K/100K version. I still have all the bits of the stacked pots in a box somewhere. I'd happily do this. All I would need are the right size CTS pots. Are the tracks linear or log?

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1509642332' post='3400560'] Well over here from the mid 60's on, we had Marshall, Sound City, Hiwatt and Orange amps and cabs. I'd say the sound of those amps and the bands that used them created and defined the sound of Rock. [/quote] ..... and Watkins, Vox T60, Vox Foundation Bass, Vox AC30B, Selmer Goliath, etc.

[quote name='SICbass' timestamp='1509537501' post='3399680'] That is absolutely briliant. For a moment there, I thought it was going to be one of skankdelvar's (a most excellent BCer) imaginative pieces of work á la Monty Python's "Luxury - t't kids uv tuday" etc. and then it turns out the whole thing is real. Or it least I hope it is and I'm not just a gullible prat, because it makes super reading. [/quote] Thanks. Absolutely true. The local music shop was Potters in Aldershot. It closed years ago but the edifice is still there.

The year was 1963. Jet Harris had left the Shadows and I'd just seen Little Richard and a few other artists at a show in Slough. I decided that I wanted to play a bass so I set about building myself one because real basses were just far too expensive, about 8 times the average weekly wage and I was still a poor schoolboy. My first bass was made out of one piece of plywood with no form of truss rod - I had no idea about such things as a 16 year old. The frets were inverted pieces of model railway track and the spacing was calculated using logarithmic tables. I needed a pick-up and remembered that during WW2 when my father was in the anti-aircraft artillery, one of his spoils was a German flying helmet. I'd used this as a headphone however needs must so I removed the ear-pieces and used them as the pick-ups. I saved up to to buy some tuners, a bridge and strings from a local music shop put it all together and amazingly it worked although the neck was like a banana and the action appalling. The second bass was made from a 1-inch thick piece of Pirana Pine and used most of the components from the original. I bought a cheap pick-up for this one. I had no amplifier so I got inside the family radiogram and soldered a screened cable to the volume pot. It worked but wasn't loud enough so I had to use my tape recorder to boost the signal. All very Heath Robinson but it worked and it meant that I could play along with records. Having played the trombone at school I had some understanding of music fundamentals however there were no tutors or internet back in 1963 so I bought just about the only tutorial book available and set out to learn some scales. Eventually I persuaded my mother to lend me £45 to buy a Framus Star bass, saved up and bought a Linear 30 amplifier and got a cabinet maker to build me a copy of a Marshall 4x12 which was fitted with Bakers Group 25 speakers from shop in Croydon. This rig served me well for several years.

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1509491739' post='3399467'] A friend used his parents radiogram instead of an amp. Today's rubbish gear is sheer luxury compared to the gear we started on back then. [/quote] Amen Chris. I modded my parents radiogram to use as a power amp and used a modded Philips Tape Recorder as a pre-amp.

[quote name='Woodinblack' timestamp='1509491615' post='3399465'] My speakons to my tc450 only work one way round, they are all marked which way is the head end! [/quote] Seeing as a cable is simply copper to copper with no active components I fear this is just another case of [i]Snake Oil.[/i]

[quote name='TomRandles97' timestamp='1509476590' post='3399303'] It's about 9 Years old. It isn't Neutrik, it's gear4music which is giving me some cause for concern. And no, it doesn't. I have a feeling that they sent me the wrong cable as the pole piece in the centre of the input (I'm sure that's probably not the correct terminology lol) is round, whereas I have another 2 pole neutrik brand speakon that has more of a semicircular pole piece. The one I just bought does fit the connection though so I'm unsure of how to differentiate between them. If it was a 4 pole, would this be the reason it's not working? [/quote] There have been a number of instances of problems with Markbass amps fitted with early Speakon combo sockets. I have an LM2 myself which is a bit picky about which Speakons it work with it. For the life of me I've not been able to get to the bottom of it yet. Best to stick with genuine Neutrik 2-pole connectors, because that's what the combo sockets are, and if one doesn't work then try another.

1. How old is the amp? i.e what is the year of manufacture? 2. Is the Speakon on your new cable a genuine Neutrik? 3. Does waggling the Speakon and cable up and down make any difference?

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1509474247' post='3399278'] IIRC the better right-angle XLRs allow the body to be rotated to each of the four 90° positions when you assemble it. [/quote] Not true for all makes of right-angle XLRs.

I have some brand new generic right-angle male and female XLRs which are £1 each plus postage if you are interested.

A couple of years ago I won some strings in the raffle at the SE Bass Bash. They have been fitted to my '73 precision for a while now and I really like them but I have no idea what make they are. The set is 50-70-90-110 The are flatwound. The winding is very tight so the string is incredibly smooth, unlike, for example, Rotosound. There are grey silks at the tuner end only, none at the bridge end. My first thought was Sadowsky Black Label as I have some of those and they have grey silks but they do not currently do 50-110 and anyway the mystery strings are slightly lower tension than the Black Labels. Can anyone throw any light on what make these might be?

[quote name='ambient' timestamp='1508591844' post='3393156'] It's an XLR to mono jack cable that I bought from Amazon. It's a good quality one, Van Damme cable and Neutrik plugs. I'm not very technically minded as you may have noticed . [/quote] Without knowing how the inside of the XLR is wired it's difficult to advise but balanced outputs were fitted to some basses to improve the signal when recording directly into a desk. For use with pedals you are much better off using the normal unbalanced jack output. I should return your Amazon cable and get a refund.

Firstly they are both outputs, not inputs because the bass is a signal generator. The XLR will be a balanced output designed go girectly into a mixer channel. You don't say what sort of XLR to jack cable you are using but it could be you are grounding one leg of the balanced signal.

Another successful deal with the Basschat legend that is Merton. Thanks Martin. I hope the young man appreciates it.

Great result.