Mornats

Another + for a Zoom. I use the H1 and consider that to be bloody good. I'm always impressed with the quality from such a cheap device. I don't know it compares with the H2N and others in the range but Zooms do have a good rep on here.

I have a Spotify premium account - I've had it for about a year now. I love it from a consumer point of view. I've paid £120 in total for a year's service and I've listened to more than a grand's worth of CDs (assuming around £8-9 a CD) on it. Loads of stuff I'd never listen to again and stuff i'd have bought on the stop, and then gone and grabbed that band's entire back catalogue. And I've been exposed to music I'd never have heard otherwise. But yes, the artists aren't getting a lot of money from it and this does sadden me. Personally, I blame the record labels. They completely failed to tackle the new online market years ago and instead went about suing their fans who wanted to listen to the music and downloaded it illegally. They never gave those fans a viable alternative. It was up to Apple and iTunes and the likes of Spotify to make something of it all. Apple must be laughing so hard at the music industry right now, they've made millions because the music industry stood there not knowing what to do and Apple swept in and well, richest company in the world blah-blah-blah. Also, these record labels allowed their artists to appear on Spotify. Well, they did a piss-poor job of negotiating decent royalties didn't they? And who do the artists blame? The labels? No! Spotify! So sad.

Love it I've always thought that the bass should take a bit more of a melodic role and take over the lead at times. Glad that John E can prove my point right!

I've not tried the site you mentioned but Scott Devine's [url="http://scottsbasslessons.com/"]http://scottsbasslessons.com/[/url] site is free to subscribe to and his lessons are always first rate. Plus he's probably easier to listen to

I have two from the Aspiration series and yes, they're good. I don't have that one in particular but they knock up some very good low cost basses.

[quote name='KevB' timestamp='1381053616' post='2233698'] Aesthetically I like the look of rosewood on a jazz but maple on a P which is why I'm currently gigging these [url="http://s30.photobucket.com/user/KevB64/media/IMG_1418_zps4d527748.jpg.html"][/url] [/quote] For me they're the wrong way round. For some reason I'd expect maple on a jazz and rosewood on a precision. I have no idea why though!

[quote name='Dingus' timestamp='1380822086' post='2231147'] it always seems to me that spending around £500 on a budget instrument that is often a compromise and ultimately second rate in performance and construction is a bit of a waste of £500 that could be put to better use saving for something better. [/quote] Totally get what you're saying, it's a false economy buying a string of budget basses and ending up spending the same as if you'd bought a top end one. But check out what I was saying above about my latest shopping experience. I pitted a Sandberg against that Yamaha and the Yammy won. There was no compromise involved.

[quote name='lazybones' timestamp='1380671213' post='2228893'] no i want the best i can afford,yeh the are alll playable but why would you want budget anything..nope wrong ,get a really good guitar and keep it for years when you get bore sell it for same has you bought it [/quote] Hmm, my new Yamaha TRBX retails for £480 (street price between £380 and £430) if you would consider that a budget bass. When I was trying out basses in the shop I tried a £1500 Sandberg, an £1100 MIA Fender Jazz and also an MIA Fender P and the Yamaha beat them all in terms of playability, feel and sound for me. So I'd argue that "get a really good guitar" can include a "budget anything". Fender, in my opinion, have quality control issues with a lot of £1000+ basses and I've found it rare to pick up one in a shop that was worth over a grand to me. That Sandberg was indeed a lovely bass in every respect but it just didn't suit me. I do have a budget (£290 new) Dean bass that isn't anywhere near as nice as my other basses and could not be compared to the likes of the Sandberg at all. But in all honesty, I held that Sandberg up against the Yamaha and compared them in every respect and the Yammy won out. They could have had the same price tag on and the Yammy would still have won.

This is brilliant! Looks ace. How does it play and sound?

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1380740696' post='2229928'] I've caught myself in the nuts a bunch of times picking up my mockingbird to play sat down. [/quote] They're rather pointy aren't they? (The basses, not your nuts.)

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1380724168' post='2229571'] A source of samples that I often use for the Basschat monthly challenges is Freesound: [url="http://www.freesound.org/"]http://www.freesound.org/[/url] [/quote] Great resource, cheers! And bonus votes for anyone who successfully manages to incorporate this sound into their track: [url="http://www.freesound.org/people/felix.blume/sounds/202111/"]http://www.freesound.org/people/felix.blume/sounds/202111/[/url] (well, there aren't any bonus votes to give out but I found that on their homepage and well, kudos if you can fit it into a track!)

So everyone can see the look on your face when you smack yourself with it. (Hope you're ok by the way!)

[quote name='Mornats' timestamp='1380737435' post='2229838'] I'd love to come and have a play too but I wouldn't know which buttons to press. [/quote] Story of my life come to think of it.

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1380665225' post='2228826'] Bagsie a play date at your house! [/quote] I'd love to come and have a play too but I wouldn't know which buttons to press.

Ah I didn't notice that Earbrass. And yeah, on the pro account you get to see the number of times each soundcloud user had listened to your track (and which user it was). [quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1380665114' post='2228822'] Interesting thread! And I agree… the "pro" SoundCloud account is well worth the money. Not so much for the stats in my case, but for the extra upload capacity. [/quote] I upgraded the same week I started my account when I found out that a pro plan (well, it was a different plan back then but it's the pro one now) allowed you to replace a track with a new version and keep the comments and plays. Totally worth it. The extra upload time is great too as I'm 17 minutes from my 4 hour limit now time to delete some old crap I guess!

Yeah, only on pro. Which is totally worth the £23 or so a year in my opinion.

Wow, I have more listens that I thought: (4319!) Country breakdown only shows the top 50 I think. 1.United Kingdom 2141 2.United States 258 3.Spain 76 4.Germany 68 5.France 56 6.Netherlands 43 7.Australia 42 8.Canada 30 9.Peru 24 10.Norway 21 11.Italy 19 12.Turkey 16 13.Denmark 15 14.Brazil 13 15.Belgium 13 16.Argentina 12 17.Finland 11 18.Ireland 11 19.Portugal 10 20.Poland 8 21.Mexico 8 22.Sweden 8 23.Russian Federation 7 24.Korea, Republic of 7 25.Croatia 7 26.Hungary 7 27.Japan 6 28.China 5 29.Austria 5 30.Iran, Islamic Republic of 5 31.Hong Kong 4 32.Thailand 4 33.Singapore 4 34.Israel 4 35.Philippines 4 36.Liechtenstein 4 37.Chile 4 38.Czech Republic 3 39.Switzerland 3 40.Ukraine 3 41.Latvia 3 42.Taiwan (ROC) 3 43.Slovakia 3 44.Romania 3 45.Bulgaria 2 46.South Africa 2 47.Kuwait 2 48.Estonia 2 49.Greece 2 50.Bahrain 2

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1380630644' post='2228073'] Time to go headless perhaps? And carbon fibre should be capable of handling the rough treatment. [url="http://s1128.photobucket.com/user/h4ppyjack/media/Basses%20CURRENT/Status%20Graphite%20Streamline%205%202011%20CURRENT/CIMG0836.jpg.html"][/url] [/quote] Is that strung with flats?

[quote name='Bilbo' timestamp='1380565096' post='2227199'] The language people are using make me think folk think the cello in my piece was 'played'. I repeat that it is a VST and was 'typed' in. [/quote] Still impressive though. I use the Miroslav VST and it's not easy getting such a natural sounding piece down. Kudos for making us think it was played on a real cello!

Mine is an only child and is due to be sent to a foster home in the very near future. [url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulnattress/9873394375/][/url] [url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulnattress/9873394375/]SGC Nanyo Bass Collection SB320 Fretless[/url] by [url=http://www.flickr.com/people/paulnattress/]Paul Nattress[/url], on Flickr

Another close one (aren't they all?). Bilbo and lowdown's were top of my list, with a very similar feel. In fact, there were a lot of tracks here that captured the same mood. I'll give a shout out to The Boy for capturing a different "glad to be alive still" feel (that's how interpreted). Dad's (not my real dad) entry deserves an honourable mention too as I loved how he used the guns to form the beat. In the end, lowdown's pipped it for me. That low drone at the beginning summed up the sounds of war going on around you. But I'll be listening to Bilbo's for quite some time.

Once again I've been too busy recording band stuff to enter this month's so I'll pop on over and have a listen. Maybe someone will beat Skol this month

Thanks for your comments and suggestions everyone! We're thinking either indie rock or alt rock describe us best. I favour indie rock as alt rock to me means Faith No More etc.

Help! I'm designing some business cards for my band and I want to put on there which genre of music we play. We're an originals band and have usually used "blues rock" to describe ourselves but I'm not sure now as some of our stuff is not bluesy and not quite rock. Have a listen to some of our tracks and let me know what you think we should describe ourselves as: [url="https://soundcloud.com/beautiful-skin"]https://soundcloud.com/beautiful-skin[/url] There are some varied tracks on there, for example The Flow is very different from Industrial Machine.

[quote name='Conan' timestamp='1380375407' post='2224446'] Er..... Out of interest, what exactly do you think of when you talk about the "active sound" that you said you didn't like? [/quote] Well for me the active sound is quite clean and lacks that single coil passive growl thing that goes on. There's a quality about it that sounds manufactured. Having said that, my new Yamaha TRBX has a lovely active sound that sounds like a passive bass with three tone controls, rather than an active noise-free clinical active bass. Make any sense?