pete.young

Many moons ago, my guitarist mate and I had a gig backing a local C&W singer / guitarist. It was fun while it lasted, but we both were awarded the DCM (Don't Come Monday!) after switching to the reggae version half-way through a particularly maudlin performance of "Help me make it through the night" .

I guess you have to decide which is more important: having a 33.5" bass with the markers in the right place, or a 34" with them slightly out of line. I suspect the difference between 33.5 and 34 isn't going to be much tonally or in terms of string tension, and there are no intonation issues with a fretless (other than those introduced by the player!)

I've answered this in 'Obscure Musical Backwaters in more detail, but mine's 34" dead. This is looking really good. I'm just beginning to wonder whether my SB310 would benefit from similar treatment, except with a Stingray pickup in the sweet spot. Just put a Nordy pre-amp in my SB465 and I'm very happy with the results.

OK, fair enough. Apologies for being flippant, I should have just got the tape measure out rather than trying to be clever. Blame it on the shiraz! The distance from the nut to the string saddle break point on the 'G' of my factory fretless SB320 is exactly 34 inches, and the intonation is spot on. The saddle is almost as far 'forward' (ie towards the pickups) as it will go. The distance from the nut to the centre-line of the two dot position markers at the 12th fret is 17". Could it be that the fret markers on your bass are in the correct position for a fretted fingerboard? On my fretted SB310, it's 16.5 inches from nut to the centre-line of the dot markers, 16 3/4 inch to the furthest one from the nut.

Um, the saddle is adjustable.

[quote name='bjelkeman' timestamp='1372284503' post='2123953'] Yeah, a lot of us in Sweden are going with the local speaker mfg TKS and his best selling boxes are based around 12s. [/quote] Hi Bjelkeman, Would be interesting to get your thoughts on EBS. I've been using an EBS Neo 2x12 for several years and haven't heard anything that I would change it for.

Markbass LMII, EBS Neo 2x12, Gramma pad. Mind ewe we've been running everything through the PA for quite a while now and I've been using a small combo as a monitor.

Rays are fine, but remember Bernard also used a Precision and gawd help us a BC Rich Eagle, and still sounded like Bernard. To me that was an absolutely top-class performance by great musicians at the very top of their game. I agree with nottswarwick.

You could do a lot worse than read this blog from 51m0n: http://blog.basschat.co.uk/setting-up-a-compressor/

What about a 5-string US Sterling? There's a nice one up for sale on the forum at the moment. I was thinking about it, but didn't like the string spacing, and I decided it wasn't ever going to be a match for my BBNE2 .

Ste, well done to you for getting involved and promoting this excellent initiative. Do you just need bass strings, or is there a need for other instruments too?

We are almost at the point of not having any backline. The only exception is my Puma 110, which goes on a stand so the drummer and I can hear it, but it's not loud enough to affect the FOH mix. We got this way as a result of a gig in a long thin building, where I couldn't hear my bass amp standing next to it, but it was massively loud 30 feet into the room. We're now at the point where the vocals go through one pair of monitors, keyboard player has a second mix through a floor monitor and the guitarist has in-ear monitors. Everything goes through the PA for FOH and we have a sound engineer/photographer who sorts the mix out. I love it. It's totally controllable and has drastically reduced the noise on stage. We have a very quiet drummer anyway, and now that we no longer have a massive valve guitar amp to compete with we go home from gigs without any tinnitis or deafness.

I bought an amp from a dodgy bassworld seller called CrazyKiwi and he suggested I might like to check out the forum.

... bassist of Mumford and Sons. Blood clot on the brain. Could have been nasty. [url="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/22862854"]http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/22862854[/url]

Probably cheaper to buy a Squier VMJ Jaguar than have the routing work done, get a custom scratch plate made and buy another pickup.

Yamaha's are not all narrow necked - the TRB5P that oopsdabassist has is 19mm at the bridge and my NE2 is about 18. TRBX 505 and 305 are 18mm which is not particularly narrow. Vigier would be a good choice, at the other end of the cost scale the OLP MM3 is around 16.5mm . But it's not all about pure narrowness of neck, the thickness is important too. I found the TRB5P to be much more playable than a G&L L2500 tribute, which has a spacing of around 17.5mm but a deep neck front-to-back. Ibanez SR505 is very comfortable too, not sure what the width is but it's very playable.

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1370859458' post='2106300'] As others have pointed out, acoustic basses are pretty much a complete waste of time. [/quote] Yup, the double bass is the size it is for a reason.

[quote name='mildmanofrock' timestamp='1370864230' post='2106425'] Hi folks, apologies if this has been asked/discussed before. I'm going to Italy on Wednesday and would like to practice tracks in the hotel room. I have Mp3 files of the tracks - for iPod/CD. Can anyone recommend a really titchy amp/practicing/play along solution? [/quote] Tascam MP-BT1

Damn! I tried to get a ticket for that and failed, it was sold out long before I found out about the tour :-( I've been an admirer of Bonnie's work since 1977, there is no-one else quite like her.

I just pick up my spare bass.

I just put a Nordstrand 2-band 4-knob into my SB465, it is active/passive (though why you'd want the passive I don't know) and fits easily into the cavity. You may need to open out the holes in the top with a round file though, because the pot threads are slightly bigger than the original SGC Nanyo. It's not unusual for the original preamps to go wrong: I replaced mine with an Artec 3-band, but the Nordy sounds a lot better.