fretmeister

Dusty Hill used to have a microPOG on all the time, with a Thumpinator after it to stop anything lower than an A getting through.

It was on the Rig Rundown when Elwood was still the tech.

It was set to just have a tiny bit of the octave happening and he never turned it off.

Ever since I watched that I've had an Octave and a Thumpinator on my board.

Could be handy! 

That looks like it would be amazing fun!

I wish I had the time to dedicate to something like that.

https://www.eich-amps.com/212s

Maybe?

I'd use plugins for guitar, bass and drums and only do the vocals the traditional way.

Workflow will be far quicker, the results will be far more consistent too.

On 21/04/2024 at 10:59, ASW said:

I also find it helps to make sure the drummer is doing their bit to fill out the sound during more intense sections of songs like the solo to the Darkness song. A few extra hits on cymbals or opening up the hi hats can make all the difference.

this can be brilliant - doesn't have to be more though. Can back off and then come back in harder. 

A lot of drummers think dynamics are all about going louder / more complex than the normal! They need to learn that going quieter and simplifying have just as much a dramatic effect.

The late Vinny Paul of Pantera was fantastic at this. Sometimes the guitar and bass would stay absolutely the same through 12 bars and yet every 2 or 4 bars the feel of the tune would be completely different, even to the point that it felt like the tempo had doubled. It hadn't, it was all in the drum arrangement. He really understood how to do that and he backed off just as much as he pushed forward.

1 hour ago, NikNik said:

Martin Turner of Wishbone Ash said he used tomato ketchup on Roto RS66 to deaden them. To this day, I'm not sure if was being cheeky or not.

There's a thread. Including some of my experiments.

The cream definitely works.

https://www.basschat.co.uk/topic/474941-aging-new-flat-wound-strings/page/2/#comment-5082124

All of Slipknot’s first album. How good is your drummer?

If he’s not god tier, then you could do all of St Anger instead…

Oh, and no other string sounds like the La Bella DTF. 

Strings direct will probably sell you a single one.

Then do the hand cream thing to age it down to sound like the old ones.

My shortie Sandberg is the best balanced instrument I’ve ever had.

My shortie Jim Deacon had bad neck drive as the P bass body was undersized and the tuners were massive old big plate things. Solved completely with Hipshot Ultralights. 
 

I think the traditional view of shorties = neck dive is just because older design shorties tended to be crap for all the reasons Andy pointed out. It had zero to do with the scale length and everything to do with all other factors. A 50 inch scale bass designed as poorly as an SG would suffer just as much. 

I can’t use the Pure Blues anymore due to a nickel allergy but in the past I have enjoyed them a lot. Excellent strings!

I bought my used one for £2450 but only got £1750 when I sold it on.

They are about £5800 + hard case + vat + shipping when new.

45 minutes ago, pete.young said:

Thanks for fixing my typo. 

 

Are there any drive pedals with a frequency cut-off, so you only get drive on the treble frequencies? Like the OC-3/OC-5 but the other way round sort of.

I think the X Series Darkglass do that:

https://www.darkglass.com/creation/microtubes-x7/

Not sure about any others - but you could use something like the Sine C24:

https://sineeffect.com/C24-High-Low-Pass-filter-pedal-p595346070

With a Boss LS-2. So you put your drive pedal in a loop with the C24 and then cut off all the bottom from the drive with the C24. Then the clean sound on the other LS-2 loop gets full range - but with a compressor as well to match the decay rates. Takes a while to dial in, but that makes all the difference in making it sound like 1 tone rather than 2.

Back in the days when I had a big rack I used 2 preamps that both had clean and dirty and ended up blending those 4 sounds together. It was awesome but weighed about as much as a small car so I'm not doing that again!  

Anywhere I damn well feel like.

I’ve played in a lot of 3 piece bands over the last 35 years.

Expanding on my Jack Bruce comment… there is loads that can be done in the spirit of the original arrangement. Still follow the chord charges as before but do different things with it. 
 

So if the original just has pounding root notes you could keep the root on Beats 1 and 3 but play octaves for 2 and 4. Or Back it off and only play on 1 and 3 to leave space and give more room to build. Then in bar 3 go back to playing all the notes.

Depending on the song, behind a solo that builds up as it goes I’m a big fan of simplifying the original bass line for the first 2 or 4 bars, then getting back to where it was, then adding octaves, and then going to a walking bass part with octave shifts, like Jack Bruce did with Cream.

It’s important to approach it still as a bass line where the rhythm is the vital element. So jumping up the neck is not a solo, it’s just a higher bass line. If the guitar solo is high don’t be scared of playing the normal bass part up an octave for some of it. The kick drums are still pounding the low end so let the bass move up as the guitar does.

Repeating a bar in a higher octave works really well too.

So if you are pounding the crotchets with AAGGF#F#EE in bar one, then in bar 2 play it identically but an octave up in bar 2, then down again in 3, and then up an octave BUT also change something in bar 4. If it fits playing it in reverse keeps the structure for the rhythm but also makes it more interesting to the listener.

JS Bach wrote the best bass parts in history. Like mini tunes under the melody that elevated the main tune to greatness.  I swear Jack Bruce must have listened to his stuff!

Tone.

Something I’ve discovered over the years is that a mid heavy tone, like a P bass instead of a J tends to work better. Theres a fatness that helps fill the tone out automatically. I’ve got a massive collection of 3 piece live albums and the P bass or PJ seems to rule above all. Theres a lot of flatwound use too, if the player is a pick user.

John Deacon’s tone is amazing for it. Have a quick listen to the live version of One Vision live at Wembley. Theres a YT version that only shows JD’s cameras. It’s so fat! P with flats and a pick is the basic bit, but pay attention when the rest of the band have backed off a lot… the tone is actually a bit unpleasant. It’s very mid heavy and has farty drive going on. None of that ice pick Darkglass tone, it’s a wide frequency fartiness that sounds horrible on its own and fantastic in the mix. It’s quite similar to the old Cream live album in that respect.

I use a Catalinbread SFT pedal to get that farty drive. I never use it in the house when playing alone as it sounds horrible! 😂 But even just with drums and nothing else, something magical happens and I can’t hear fart, I can only hear fatness and harmonic richness.
 

A different approach is the dUg / Entwhistle / Sheehan split tone, mixing clean and dirt. It can sound great, but it’s also really easy to make it sound like ar$e. The issue is getting the clean portion of the tone to decay at the same rate as the driven part, and that means dialling in compression on the clean to match the natural compression of the drive. 
 

Overall though, build the band tone from the bottom. Drums first, then bass, then guitar. Then it will still sound full when the guitar is soloing. If the entire tone is built on the guitar and everything else has fit round it, then the band tone loses all weight during solos.

But despite all this… enjoy the space of a 3 piece! 
 

A wall of noise gets tiring for an audience. So many bands these days seem to ignore dynamics. Have quiet bits, loud bits, thick bits, thin bits etc etc. The average punter will notice that sort of variation far quicker than anything else and it will keep them interested.

Otis Day and the Knights had it right….” A little bit softer now, a little bit softer now…… a little bit louder now….”

Anyway, I hope that helps a bit!

Little bit of drive to add thickness. Dont over do it.

Then redo the arrangement. Thats far more important. Channel your inner Jack Bruce.

bugger! 

1 hour ago, DaleASmith said:

that’s Peak not RMS. Seems a bit low 🤷‍♂️

I have long given up relying on any wattage = volume assumptions.

For a start it completely ignores speaker efficiency.

I'll almost certainly try one at some point - as long as the fan noise is very very low - and then get a mad drummer to play next to me.

Is there a PA system there?

If so - bass and a preamp unit to go straight into the PA. No amp.

Some places appear to have stock.

I'm tempted but at the moment I have spent a bit on other things and I don't fancy sleeping in the shed.

Irrespective of method - if the band don't look like they are enjoying it then the punters won't either. I don't think that comes down to the PA.

Mind you - for some genres, like rock, a live gig can sound too perfect. I want to hear the pick scratches on the strings and that sort of thing that makes it different to just staying at home and listening to the CD at a louder volume.

IME bands live or die on 2 factors (ignoring basic musical capability)

1: Band enjoyment / entertainment level. Bored band = bored audience.

2: The FOH engineer. Always either a genius or a cretin. Unfortunately most seem to be the latter. Excessive kick drums and muddy bass, very little anywhere in the mids, and eye gouging top end where only the cymbals live.

Manual

Found the manual online. 

As per usual Boss haven't explained what the frequency centres of any of the controls are. Bit annoying that.

I'd really like to try this. 

Decent onboard compressor, adjustable HPF - all good.

They have missed a trick by not using those LEDS on the front to also act as a tuner though. That would have been excellent.

22 minutes ago, bassace said:

No low cut/hi pass, or do I get it another way?

The "Bottom" knob is an HPF