gafbass02

Same here, I used to lug a mahoosive trace stack around, sometimes two of them!…and a 2x10 combo as a bass monitor!! (Such a fool!) At least they were taken in a truck and handled entirely by roadies on some tours, which helped. Then I went through a pile of class d lightweight rigs, markbass, genz, bergantino etc, before switching to a pair of headrush frfr 112s when the gigs started to get a lot more frequent and I got older!! That quickly switched to one 112, and now my rig has vanished and my pedalboard has shrunk and I’m on IEMs, which is amazing!.. Same sound every gig, at whatever volume I choose, load in is quick and easy, as is a quick line check, and packing up is just putting my bass in it’s bag and zipping up my pedalboard. it’s ace. I don’t miss an amp other than for looks factor. I truly regret not doing it years earlier.

It now has a bartolini preamp and sounds fantastic debating some nordstrands and improved tuners next.

Can’t wait to see it.

Many times in the mid 00s when I was having a lucky spell with a band I was in. We got to do the whole all standing behind the merch stand at some big venues with a long queue of folks each wanting to say hello and to get each of us to sign their albums. It was all very surreal. Some would still be waiting around the loading bay gates when it was time to leave, or would follow us from gig to gig in their T-shirts. I was stopped in public a few times too. Cool, and a life experience that I’m grateful for. But still, very surreal.

Everyone else’s bass I’ve ever played ever, I swear! I just don’t get it. Everyone else’s action feels terrible to me!

My set up has a few routing options depending on whether I’m DIing from the zoom or the boom avenue, or running out to a pair of headrush 112s from the sonicake switcher. Mostly it’s run using a (bloomin expensive!) custom made multicore signal/headphone cable so the signal goes into the Sparrow DI (only switched on if I’m running a passive bass) and the out to the zoom for all the signal processing. From there it’s on to the horse EQ (again only used to subtract v low and hi frequencies if running to the 112s, otherwise it’s also off.) Then to the boom avenue preamp for punch, and DI out to the desk. But the signal splits at this point from the boom ave’s 1/4” out to the caline EQ which is for keeping my IEM signal as close to foh as possible so I don’t don’t make per song eq changes on the bass that might sound strange out front, here I can tweak what I’m hearing without affecting the FOH. From there the signal goes into the Rolls PM50 where I receive my monitor feed. The headphone section of my multicore cable goes in there and allows me to mix my own level against the rest of the band as I wish. I can also use a wireless and single headphone cable if I prefer, or Di straight from the zoom and use the boom ave and EQs for iems. Or should I wish, I can stereo out the zoom into the 2xfrfr speakers and run stereo, or take a mono out and use the other monitor for fold back, or a single speaker using both channels, one for bass, one for fold back. But mostly It’s run ampless as seen. It’s a very flexible, yet simple set up. At present, the board is all housed on a squashed up Harley Benton spaceship 60xl for portability. When festival season comes around and it’s all getting chucked in a van day in, day out, for protection, I move the whole lot over onto a much larger Pedaltrain in a flight case. I forget which model, but it’s big!

We do it pretty straight with a nice big synth bass sound. It’s fun IMG_0584.MOV

Someone had previously screwed a ramp into this bass and then seemingly cut/snapped the screws off and filed them flat to the body. It actually looks pretty good with the whole ‘rustic’ vibe, but I added this felt malarkey as an experiment to cover them, and actually really like it. Easily removed too should I prefer the look without.

Had a random gig between Christmas and new year that was packed and would’ve been fun had I not been so rotten ill, I even sat down for a few songs. This Saturday I was feeling much better and was back to business as usual. Standard pub rock covers, great fun was had, great crowd up dancing from song one, the sound in my IEMs was fab. All good as far as I’m concerned IMG_0635.MOV

My most recent set recently gave up the ghost after about ten years, they were on my blue jazz and used as the backdrop for one of the fretfx website pages. I’ve used them since they first appeared, but don’t have any at present. They’re cool though.

I’m loving the new SR500 colour

For the last decade or so, I normally do a solo acoustic gig on NYE, but this year I’ve elected to take a break. It’s my daughters 11th birthday and this year she literally begged me to stay at home with her. Apart from the covid years, when I was desperately ill anyway, she’s never had me home. So this is the year Tbh, Im enjoying it too

I just want an Ibanez EHB. Nothing fancy, but since covid, I can’t manage much at all in the way of weight, and I’m stuck on the side of the stage which always has a wall in headstock range, so the EHB looms in my future, should the day ever come when I can find the money. A simple wish but it’s mine.

Funnily enough, my keys player had a heart attack on stage once too. He survived thank goodness.

I just got home. Survived. Slept most of the day and arrived just before start. Sat down for a few songs and didn’t sing. So glad that’s over!!

I did one once when I was feeling very ‘off’. Turned out I was coming down with meningitis. Worse was the next one when I was ‘recovering’ from said meningitis after my spinal tap. I also played with measles once and a bout of sciatica mid gig once stopped me from being able to operate my pedals unless I lent backwards! My worse was just a flu type thing as a vocalist. I should’ve cancelled that one. The whole reason I searched out this thread, is cause I’ve just spent all of Christmas laid up with a fever and violent cough etc and tonight I have a three hour gig I can’t get out of. My wife has agreed to drop off and pick up and I’ve told the band I’ll arrive just before we start and leave as soon as we finish and I’ll probs sit down. Thank goodness for IEMs, but the fact that we’re using a dep engineer has me nervy! Spending today in bed in readiness.

Thanks. It’s not as ‘contrasty’ in real life, the pics make it stand out more.

I’m all about the active these days, after years on passive. I did break out my jazz once, and my band’s engineer told me never to bring a passive again 😅 I’ve decided just to leave the SR300 as it is now. It’s fine, just not as good as the others, but then it’s also much cheaper than the others

My laser stomp was pretty amazing for the solo gigs, that and my SR300 purely for the colour!

I decided to cover the screws between the pickups and prevent finger damage above the pickups. Reversible, I’ll see how I feel about it after a few days.

Sky veil matte