Jakester

Well, some progress - I figured out what I was doing wrong with the effects. I hadn’t twigged that you didn’t need the effect as a channel insert as well as one of the fx ‘slots’ so I was in effect doubling up on each channel with awful results. Total rookie error but at least I got a useable starting sound at last!! 😂

I’m obviously in the minority as I know two or three really good keys players that I play with. However, one of the problems is that they’re so good, pinning them down can be really difficult as they’re really busy! And no, you’re not getting their numbers! 😜

Yup, tried these as they’re just not what we’re going for. I think it’s start from flat again - thanks for tips I’ll give that a go too.

🔨⚒🛠⛏👍🏻

Thanks! I fully appreciate its operator error - my issue want I couldn’t get to the bottom of why it had happened, whereas with an analog mixer you can see immediately.

Hmm, so took it out again to rehearsal with a view to getting a rough guide vocal EQ for our next gig. I struggled to get anything even half decent - in the end we just used the studio PA which was miles better. It’s really odd - last time it sounded great, used exactly the same settings (ie saved the file) but this time sounded bum. Even resetting to default didn’t help. Only thing (absent my incompetence) it could have been was it was different PA speakers on both occasions (I basically used the house PA as a power amp) but the difference seemed more than that to me. The reverb was uncontrollable and the vocals sounded really boxy irrespective of the EQ. Its quite knocked my confidence and I’m worrying about our gig next weekend. 😬 I’m going to start again. Does anyone have a good baseline starting EQ for a female vocal using an SM58?

I suppose you could try different ferrules? I’ve bought some off eBay in the past. Or the nuclear option is fill the holes with maple plugs and re-drill? Tape’s probably cheaper though😜

Do the ferrules of the tuners you’ve take off work with the Hipshots? I’ve done that in the past. Otherwise I’ve also wrapped a couple of turns of tape around them but that is a proper bodge...

Yep, that one looks like it’s only one. Our Mackie has two, so we run both tops via the sub. Can your budget stretch to one with two thru-passes?

Not as I understand it - on some you set the threshold frequency and anything over that goes to the tops, and anything under goes to the subs.

Another option - active subs sometimes have a built in crossover so it does the job for you from the existing full range mix.

Wow, lovely job!

👍🏻

Who’s on drums? I’m sure I recognise the face but can’t place the name..

Really big guy, or really small trumpet?

Only musically!

Well, the deed is done. I just explained that I had concerns that some of the stuff we were looking to play might be a bit challenging, and he was very gracious and we parted on (hopefully) good terms - at least I think we did (wait until I find the head of a Precision in my bed!) Now, anyone know any good bass players? 😉

Sorry, I think there's a conflation of two separate occurrences here! New band - jury's out. Other band's singing - deffo gone (just, no-one's actually told him yet....😳)

Yes, this was what happened with the singer in the other band - it was clear that even a little bit of prep could have resulted in a palpable improvement, but he could never be bothered, leading to using lyric sheets on stage. The lowlight was him introducing songs at our last gig as “sorry in advance, this is probably going to be stinky poo” when the rest of us had all worked hard to get the songs down.

Thanks for your views, very interesting. Just to put some meat on the bone: The chap in question is very nice but this is still essentially a startup, so I don’t know any of them very well. It wasn’t just the jamming he struggled with: we’d agreed a list of four tunes to run through at our first meeting; he warned us in advance that he’d only done three owing to work pressures (which is fine - real life takes precedence!) but even two of those were a bit ropy. It’s purely covers at the moment, so there’s no writing etc involved. Although this sounds very harsh as I type it, I don’t have the time to help develop someone - I play in two other bands (and there’s another one ‘on hiatus’) and work full time so I barely have enough time to sort myself out, let alone anyone else. Interestingly this has happened in another of my bands with our singer - we all felt he wasn’t cutting the mustard despite repeated chances, and so we auditioned someone else last night and she blew us away. It showed how we as a collective were being held back by the one individual.

May I prevail on the wisdom of the collective for a moment with this quandary? I’m in the process of putting together a new band. I thought we had the nucleus of something and we had a first jam this week. Everyone was very keen, and talked a good talk. Unfortunately one of the players simply wasn’t good enough - he was a lovely guy, but seemed to struggle to master even the basics of his instrument. He said he’d been playing for years, but ‘had had a little time away’. He managed to get through the first couple of tunes by playing his part rote with no alterations, but when we moved to jam a couple of tunes that we were all less sure on, he really struggled. Even suggesting the chords and then actual notes to him didn’t work. Having chatted it over with the others, we concluded he was lovely but just didn’t have the ability. It’s down to me to break it to him, and I’m in two minds. Do I: a) tell him thanks, but we’ve gone with someone else, (we haven’t yet) b) just tell him nicely but outright that he wasn’t good enough or c) have another jam with more difficult songs and tell him when he inevitably struggles?