akabane

15 hours ago, TheLowDown said:

Major 3rds was an example to make the point. You should be at least aware of where all the major/minor 3rds, natural/flat 5ths, and minor/major 7ths are depending on what chord type you're playing. Playing scales across the entire neck teaches you more than just note positions so you don't have to rely on beginner shapes. 

A 4 string means that there is less to consider which makes playing much nippier when you need it.  If you know the fretboard well enough, going up or down the neck where necessary shouldn't be a problem, and even encourages a certain creativity. 

If you think a 6er doesn't add complication to navigation then maybe there is still a lot of work to be done on fretboard awareness. But if you just play in the box all night every night, a 5 or 6 string will definitely suit you much better. 

It's incredible how much ignorance can be spewed in a post and touted as facts

The only issue I personally see with it (and talking about 'normal' pitch correction, not heavy autotune), is that it means that between the singer and the band, nobody even HEARD the singer not being in tune; if that were the case, surely they'd just make the singer practice that parts more.

9 hours ago, itu said:

I partly agree. Development costs and testing, too. Most of the effects we use nowadays are from the 1970's or '80's, as we can see from this thread. A serious processor and a case and some hardware around the box. Yes, why not. But again this gets back to development and testing. It is far more easy to test just few effects and check their reliability, than some PlethoraX5 type of thing. The price tag tells it, too.

An ultra capable unit would still lack adjustments, or would be big, or the usability could be really complex (although it is true most of us do some adjustments very seldom). I could see a monitor connector (or at least a USB) in an FX unit, just like there is one in a modern digital mixer. That way the adjustments would be reasonably easy, and those few pots could be addressed to the parameters needed. Serious set up takes time and the computer/tablet/phone UI is usually better than a pedal. After all basic adjustments the big screen is needed rarely. I think this path is seen with modern units, like tce and its Toneprint, Eventide, Source Audio, and alike.

I agree, but you're talking like the pedal makers can't take the development cost of an actual modern product, which is why I really hate the pedal market. They don't care because everyone keeps buying the same pedals from 15 years ago in a new (sometimes) shell!

Companies don't develop in series, but in parallel. Along with the yearly pedal rehash, they could spend some of the budget to advance the industry a bit and if they started the process 5 years ago, trust  you me, we would now have an actually good digital, usable, non-crippled pedal, that can do things expected in 2020. I guess I'm just waiting for the line of old gits "only twists me one nob" to stop fueling the market, so perhaps some incentives will come through lol

1 minute ago, bagsieblue said:

Yeah I agree - I (still).... I dont think the poor old Ibanez bass is the problem.

For this genre - £250 ish quid on a second hand Tech 21 Dug Pedal or a second hand HX stomp - 10 minutes downloading some presets and picking the one that worked best and you'd be golden on this.

To be fair to the argument, I do understand the need for specific looks  or qualilties, especially in the normified metal/djent genre where if you don't turn up with a dingwall with a darkglass fx you'll likely be laughed at, regardless of the sound your current instrument can produce.

I do agree that depending on commitment to the band(or genre), OP should try to compromise; surely not 2.5k worth of compromise though, that's the point. One spends 2.5k on an electric instrument if they REALLY want it and they REALLY  can afford it.

That doesn't change that my quoted point in the previous post is a sad and false statement.

8 hours ago, peteb said:

Of course if the rest of the band are using top quality gear then there is a risk that any deficiencies in yours may be more apparent. 

Well, this is grim to hear there's people reasoning like this AND factually false, especially when you are talking about electric instruments; which is what makes this statement sad, considering it's been spoken as truth lol.

I just find it really jarring and disappointing (but hey, music hardware has to keep churning money)  that in an age where  we can fit incredibly powerful chips into a wristwatch,  our big-donkey digital fx are still stuck in the '90s in terms of audio technology, and every year new FX HARDWARE BOXES come out, which is ridicolous. It's time to get rid of shitty DSP processors and advance a bit there. But then half of the guitar and bass players wouldn't know what to blame for sounding like crap nor where to throw money at, hmm...choices, choices

Sounds good! Bit of feedback: your singer is flat against the instrumental, I'd add a few cents to bring the voice in line

Btw: is your singer italian by any chance?

By Jove...that fretboard and top *slowly takes off sunglasses*

1 hour ago, binky_bass said:

@ambient - If/When you sell it, let me know!

Hey you! I was first!

Congrats! the most beautiful W&T body shape (not that embarrassing ‘let’s try to make a Dingwall like look they seem to sell’ bullcrop they have on their website now) coupled with the right amount of strings!

What’s the string spacing? If you ever want to pass it on, remember me!

9 minutes ago, prowla said:

In case anybody is wondering about his bullying and manipulative tendencies, here's couple of excerpts from my messenger conversations with him where he said he was coming to my house "to refund me":

[snipped out screenshots]

Note it includes threats to have my FB profile removed, insults, told me to "give it up", and the assertion that I should "man up".

I wasn't going to accept meeting at my house, because one of the members here suggested that he could then not turn up, but post a message along the lines of "Great to meet you earlier and glad we could sort it all out.", which would then turn into a case of his word against mine (even though he is a convicted fraudster, liar, and counterfeiter).

I enjoyed suggesting we should meet at the local police station, but the funniest bit was where he said to me "Why lie" - that was a case of the pot calling the kettle black!

This is the measure of the man.

Then later, further attempts to manipulate events via his proxy "Jason Lear" account:

The cover was slipping throughout that Jason Lear conversation, though I played it straight

The "I've a relative who's a lawyer" ruse was fairly transparent, but the telling bit was the "I've (over) £100 too", where he slipped to 1st person.

 

Thank you for posting these in a more legible way.

It is of uttermost importance than nobody should actually feel threatened by this character and they save eventual threats for future reference.

I want to thank everyone in here who insisted that this thread would stay open and public. Just caught up with it.

Mr. Mason is lucky indeed so few people that fell for his antics took action with Police, legal ways or just plain accepted his invites to have a ‘chat’, as attempting to write on a keyboard or even play bass with a few broken fingers I’m told can be challenging.

Just as another word of warning from someone who used to study conmen and scams for a few years (of which by the way he is only the latter, as conman is too much of a compliment for such a...silly Willy), obviously do not give any credence to anything he says - starting from ‘I’ve shipped your pedal’ to ‘I’ll sue you’ to ‘I’m coming over for a wee chat’. Just do not engage in angry countertalk as it fuels the scammer with the knowledge you are all still pending from his lips to get your own money back. Do not cede to conditions to get your money back. Stay calm and collected, pat him on the head and let it flow underneath your feet while you compile fraud and police reports. 
Do not give belief in any of his friends or associates contacting you on their behalf.

Do not give belief if he tells you he’s talking to the police and *he* needs info from you to forward the police. 
Do not give belief if you get contacted by an ‘attorney’ or a ‘legal representative’ shortly after you’ve asked your money back or threatening to take legal action. If anyone falls for this specifically, they will go into the ‘sinker’ part of ‘hook, line and sinker’ and the scammer will manage to get even more money out of you.

Do not fall for the thought process of ‘why would he do that for 50 or 100 quid? He gigs around/has a job/whatever’. This is literally the same argument thieves (and we are talking about people stealing millions) make when caught on fingerprints ‘why would I do it that way? I’d have worn gloves’ - the reason is because they’re lazy and incompetent, for if they weren’t, they wouldn’t be stealing or get caught  in the first place. 

And although I do sympathise with anyone who has an addiction of any kind, do not give belief when the scammer hides behind those things as they are just another layer of lies.

He finds himself in quite the unlucky situation of someone who not only has been exposed and now reported a few times, but also has a recorded criminal history and keeps forging identities and protected material, thus creating even more criminal liability on top of what would have been a ‘simple’ product fraud/attempt issue.

I can’t help much more if not by saying that I am willing to chip in with SERIOUS amounts for help with legal costs against this person, as it will be sunk money for everyone even when the cases will be won.

Let’s be clear, very few people will get their money back from it regardless. Even Her Majesty can’t squeeze blood out of a rock. Most of the times, those people live by flipping profits from a scam to the next, and they stay overexposed for way too long and will NEED to scam MORE people in order to give YOU your money back. And guess what, once they do, a good portion of the cases they will think ‘well...I’d rather keep this money now’.

I am glad to see a good portion of the basschatters who were victims going out of their way to keep this thread healthy and alive. Scammers make it a matter of principle and so should you all. 
Just like the magnificent guy who knocked on every door until he found his house, then magically the money appeared on his bank account. THAT, by the way, Mr. Mason, is how you successfully threaten people, and how you are a class act about it (I can say for sure if I had been in their shoes, I definitely wouldn’t have been happy with just being refunded, I’d have definitely insisted on sitting down with him and have a nice...group videochat with the rest of the BC fellas myself)

I’m sorry for the lengthy and frankly quite useless post, but after eating through 30-odd pages, my blood has been boiling non stop and this helped calm me down a bit. Mods, let me know if I have used unnecessarily unkind words towards him, so I can edit them out.

Peace and happy festivities to you all low end geezers,

Em

3 minutes ago, Hellzero said:

Unless you go up to seven or...

...then go back to 6! 

Welcome to the 6ers club!

once you’re in...

Delivery drivers DON'T WANT you to know this LITTLE KNOWN SECRET to have your bass delivered during xmas!!!1!one

Just how many times has this poor thing been walked over? 😮

I'm sorry - I hope the bass is in a hard case indeed.

12 minutes ago, Nicko said:

Most bands I've played with have less formal music knowledge than I do and wouldn't know a phrygian mode if it cropped when they started jamming something. The chances of me "needing" to play phrygian are pretty remote although no doubt I end up doing it sometimes. 

I agree it depends on the type of player that you are but as a guitarist turned bass player I tend to visualise the chord on my fretboard and pick out the chord tones to form a bass line or a lead line.  This doesn't require me to "know" my modes although I'll sometimes backtrack and try to figure out what the hell it was that I played over the progression but actually I'm not sure it matters much if it sounds good.

Exactly. Which is why nobody really *needs* to know that theory side of those things, as long as one learned how and when to slot them into the music!

The way I see practice structuring advice is that it's something that heavily, heavily depends on the person, what they play/like to play and how their character is.

At the end of the day, it just depends on what someone wants out of their music playing.

If you're someone who's happy with not knowing why things sound the way they do, and are happy knowing the songs in your set to do your 30-50 gigs per year to enjoy having fun with your mates, there is no reason for you to spend any time on theory/modes/scales/read charts/etc... You will never need that knowledge applied in any way (you're never going to jam to an improvised tune which is not part of your set or follows the same standard), nobody is ever going to put a chart in front of you, you will have the time of your life and enjoy playing you covers/music. To do this, commitment to theory and structured practice is a big old zero.

For EVERYONE ELSE who does NOT fit into the above category, I would suggest to add some degree of structured practice. Coming from a classical studies background (and having let that slip for the past...10 years, and my technical playing is now completely shite because of that) I know the benefits of such a thing, trusting the process and so forth. However, structure has to change based on you. In any structured routine, something that is vital and necessary is to play some actual music you like/are learning during the session. You just keep going at your scales for a month straight without anything else in between, you will get burned out. (This excludes people that tend to have a more obsessive behaviour, for which structured practice is a blessing instead). 

However the point I want to make is that neither approach makes you an inherently better musician. Plenty of cats never learned how to play a phrygian when called for, and they're among the best players in the business. They still play the fricking phrygian, they just don't know how it's called. They know how it sounds. 

On the other hand, plenty of people deep in technicalities and with plenty of theoretic knowledge, never played with a live band before and would fall down to their knees at the first drum fill. 

Obviously I'm talking extremes here for the sake of example, and the best is in most cases somewhere in between. I've just in the past few months started adding structured practice again, and I tend to do 20/30ish minutes of modes/arpeggios to warm up, then a bit of note hunting on the fretboard (learning some spots I never did learn), then pratice whatever music/songs I'm wanting to study or play for an hour or two (or whatever it takes, longer when I'm learning something complex by ear), and follow up with some slow chords practice at the end. The idea is that the songs/music/learn new material takes still the majority of practice time - with an unchangeable head to the session (modes/arpeggios/scales) - a variable middle (songs to learn/pratice/etc) - and a variable ending (currently on chords but can be any other technique you want to be working on). This should keep my fingers and mind limber and allow me to have plenty of fun both in the music I'm playing and the techniques I'm studying. As always, progress is bite size, but visible and very rewarding. 

So in closure, I'm very pro structured practice sessions, however I do not deem them necessary for someone to be a good musician. As long as we understand each other when we're playing together and it works and sounds great.

As the good ol' Vic would say: "The objective is getting you to learn the language of music. How you get there is almost irrelevant, as long as you do"

Peace!

Beautiful, beautiful instrument, congratulations! Those tiger stripes

7 minutes ago, Bassman68 said:

When I’m feeling in a ‘Pino’ mood...

‘87 Ray, Just add an octaver & chorus

I can hear the Stravinsky line already  *mwaaah mwah mwaaaaaaaaah*

I just love the sound and character of a Smith.

This is a test recording I made over a bass-less version of Pat Metheny's "Have you heard" (pardon the dud notes here and there, still learning it):

• Straight to Logic DI, no eq/fx etc.
• Using 'new' eq settings (in the back cavity of the Smith)
• Bass/Mids/High flat, pick up slightly biased towards neck

EDIT: Welp tried uploading on soundcloud but no dice, copyright strikes fast and hard. Just attaching it here for now; let me know if there's some other streaming based alternative I can use in the future so it's an embeddable 'just play' thing?  

Have You Heard_KSTestmp3.mp3

Oh, you. 🤤

Ok, I'll tell you - this is fortunately the Smith I envy less of you (being a 5er )

Those three I've seen are all breathtaking though! And the price on this is killer!

This is one of the prettiest FBasses I've ever seen. 

I don't really mind

It allows to find some good ideas/versions/arrangements!

Edit: Given that the 'issue' seems to be the fact that those covers are being made in response to the death of someone, I'll put it in these terms as an idea: if I published a cover of a Van Halen song three years ago on Youtube, it's always only had 54 views. Today, it blows up to 500k views. In an alternate universe, I never published that video, and I hear that Van Halen passed away: I now make or publish that cover, that reaches 500k views just the same. From a 'final user' point of view, who is the one that is actively going to look for those things given what happened (aided by the good old YT algo), nothing changes - I get served the content I looked for. So it's just a moral question, at the end; Youtube is an on-demand platform first. If you see content being watched a lot, it's because...people want to watch it