MichaelDean

I've wanted a single cut guitar for a little while. Just fancied something with two humbuckers, a Gibson scale length and lots of knobs to twiddle. I decided to sell some pedals I wasn't using to fund it. I thought I'd try just trading them in at PMT first for one of their Antiquity guitars, but they gave me truly awful prices. So I went to eBay and made a lot more money than I expected! I've had my eye on the SC-550 II since it launched, but didn't think I'd have enough dosh to get one. I was wrong! I took delivery of one in Faded Tobacco Flame this afternoon. It s a lovely thing. Fretwork is great with stainless steel frets. Pickups are pretty decent. I've got it set up in drop C with the stock set of 10s, with very low action and no buzzing. The top is lovely - it doesn't have much 3d movement, but the figuring is really nice and even and it's pretty well bookmatched. Oh, and it weighs just over 3kg! I've been noodling around this evening in Reaper with a song idea and my GX-100, and I'm very happy overall. There are a few weird bits though. Since day one, people have been saying that the machine head keys are greenish, and the nut is white, which doesn't go with the cream binding. I wasn't sure if I entirely believed them. I should have. It's very odd overall. I've got some new tuners on order, and I think I can live with the white nut for now at least. The only properly bad bit that I've noticed is on the back, by the pickup selector cavity. A bit of paint has chipped off. I've messaged Thomann, so I'll see what they say. I'll probably end up sticking some nail varnish on it though.

@PaulWarning, yes, I agree, that OP also probably doesn't play the biggest stages. I was just trying to get across how in ear monitors are totally suitable for hearing a monitor mix over the sound of an acoustic kit or even louder sound sources. His drummer's wish to use IEMs shouldn't be entirely dismissed because he doesn't feel the need.

In my current band, bass into GX-100 with an always on overdrive, then into my ABM-600 with the valve drive on at about 2 o'clock. I don't like clean blend distortions either, which I think is probably an unpopular opinion. But if you can get a fat and full sounding distortion on it's own, why ruin it with clean signal!?! 😂

Lots of gigging musicians (including drummers) playing the biggest stadiums and festival stages rely on in ear monitors. They can then also hear themselves over massive PA systems that are louder than a drum kit.

Not if he wants a kick, snare and overhead mics. I guess you could feed that from another mixer, but who wants to carry two mixers?

That doesn't get around not having enough inputs on the desk if the drummer wants to go with IEMs.

@solo4652 some well fitted in ear monitors will also provide passive noise isolation, which means that the audio volume in your monitors doesn't need to be that loud in order to hear what you and the rest of the band are playing. I was in a band in uni and we went to in ears as the guitarist was playing to a click all of the time to loop stuff live. I wasn't using ear protection at the time. I went from some probable hearing damage in a normal band practice to feeling like I've been listening to some music. No ringing at all after a 4 hour practice. The volume difference was astounding and the clarity was totally worth it. I could even hear myself so well, some engineers told me to turn my amp up on stage for more stage volume.

Just to follow up, we ended up using CD Baby, which was easy and quick. $9.99 to release the EP everywhere. It was all processed quickly as well. It was released last Friday on all of your favourite streaming platforms.

Ah, sorry. Didn't notice the JJ/JH difference 🥲

I'm just about young enough that Spongebob Square Pants was a thing for my immediate peers. And every now and again, I have a listen to the movie soundtrack. It's got a good selection of different artists on it! Motorhead even did a song. I'm feeling good today, so I stuck it on, on my walk into work.

No worries dude! I just googled it to see what I could find!

A local and new-ish luthier might do it for you for less than £300, but it is a significant piece of work to make a neck to fit a potentially oddly shaped neck pocket in a less common scale length. The price of a refret alone tends to start at around £180. Add in materials and time - I don't know that anyone is going to make much money from it at £300. I'd be buying this in your shoes, then list the loaded body on eBay and see what you get! https://www.jimmyegypt.com/cort-gb35-jj-5-string-bass-black

It'd be really interesting to hear something like a regular class AB Ashdown ABM vs a class D ABM. Same preamp, different poweramp. I'm guessing there wouldn't be much/any difference.

I'd have liked to have done it in an originals band, but before I'd settled down, bought a house, got a cat and started my family. For everyone in my current band, it'd be very hard to cover equivalent wages with doing it full time. I'd need to win the lottery to make it work now. It'd also need to be the right group of people. In the band where we did a couple of (self organised) tours, I couldn't have coped long term. On our short UK tour: We ended up getting a parking ticket on one of the vechicles because I didn't have enough cash, and no-one else thought it was urgent/would help me get the change together The drummer put petrol in my diesel car The drummer didn't bring his counterpart licence, so I had to drive the van all of the time After drving from London (and getting a bit lost in London - hate driving there!) to Brighton following a gig, I couldn't convince one person to have a pint with me at the youth hostel we were staying at Plus I don't think we were prolific enough to maintain a decent song output. The guitarist was a total perfectionist and nothing else would do, so it'd take MONTHS to finish a song. I think maybe the one I'm in now would be better at those sorts of things. Not sure I'm tempted to find out right now, especially after writing that down!

To be fair, I wasn't much of a fan of the bass stuff on the P1. I guess they may have had stats on who was using the bass bits from the app and decided not to bother if the number of users was low? I've just offloaded my P1 on eBay. On the bass side, you had to do a blend of dry signal and effected signal with a crossover. So not even proper parallel signals. The guitar bits didn't sound good to my ears with guitar or bass. It was all very harsh sounding, the tracking of the octaver was terrible. I regret ever keeping it in the first place. I just thought I'd get it dialled in eventually, but that never happened. I'm glad it's gone!

@Cheeto726 I've got a HB TE-52 telecaster and it's a really comfortable instrument to play. I can get the action really low. A couple of the nut slots are a bit tall, but I don't spend a lot of time in that area so I've not remedied it yet. I have done some mods (humbucker rail bridge pickup, 6 saddle bridge, some tuners I've had for years), but they were also all budget upgrades. I've not got more than £200 in it all together and it's just really fun. I've also just ordered the SC-550 II Les Paul type guitar to have knocking around. I'm hoping that's going to be pretty great too. The consistency of low end guitars has come on a long way and with the HB business model, you (generally) get something a bit beyond the initial outlay and gig worthy.

I guess after the initial excitement, I'd also be wondering how my wife came across $4k that I can fritter away! The list of things to do in the house never ends!

I'd take a trip to Bass Direct and see what fanned fret I liked the best. I really liked the playability of a Spector NS Dimension, but it didn't sustain like my Dingwall. I'd like to try out the Dimension HP vs D-Roc vs Combustion vs NG and take my pick.

I love my Dingwall with the 34"-37" scale. I feel like I can play some parts in my current band better on that than I can my 34" scale bass. I still love my Mustang too though. Everything has a time and place.

You can get it on Amazon.

We're also playing at the first Bristol heat of Metal 2 the Masses on the 28th of February at Exchange in Bristol.

Were playing at the Bristol heats for Metal 2 the Masses, a competition where we might get to play at Bloodstock. We're Hora. https://horadoom.bandcamp.com/album/witch-trial-sessions-vol-1

The EP is now live on all of your favourite streaming platforms! https://horadoom.bandcamp.com/album/witch-trial-sessions-vol-1

Yup. I had a really nice comment about my playing on my first ever gig at 15 and it's really stuck with me.

I'm playing in drop C in my band and was using CGCFA#. I found the highest string wasn't getting used, so I've tuned that up to a C as well. Now I'm using CGCFC and I really like having easy access to the three octave spread super easily. Drop G was discussed on the band chat earlier... For my usual string brand, they recommend a .160 for that. That's just getting on for a suspension bridge support, not a bass string!