BigRedX

Personally I'm not a massive fan of pull-up banners (in the world of displays a pop-up banner is something entirely different) as I don't think they have the right vibe for bands. However I see them more and more behind or at the side of bands at gigs so I'm probably in the minority here. However if you are going to go down this route, be aware that the budget versions are not particularly robust. IME they fail under in less than a year of trade fair use being put up by reps, so I doubt the sort of abuse they will suffer in the typical gigging environment will be any more friendly. Again one of the advantages of having PA and lighting provided by the venues I play is that if there is enough room for a "backdrop" it will be back-projected as part of the lighting rig and all we have to do is supply the venue or promotor with the band logo/graphics in JPEG or PNG format.

This doesn't answer you question, but IME the two most important features of a backdrop are: 1. Having some means of displaying it so that it is level and uncrumpled that doesn't involve gaffa-taping to the wall. 2. That it is visible (or at least the band name is visible) over the top of the drummer, keyboard player, backline and anything else at the back of the stage.

TBH if I had a string winder the amount of time I'd spend looking for it first I would have probably been able to wind all the strings on my Bass VI by hand.

Back in the 80s when I was first looking at this I found it quicker to develop enough rudimentary keyboard technique than it was to modify my guitar and bass playing style in order to get usable and repeatable synth sounds out of them.

I've already done two festivals so far this year - HRH Goth and BlaqkhOlesun (3 if you include Goth At The Brewery which is part of the WGW) - and will also be playing Leodis Requiem this weekend in Leeds and have another three already lined up later in the year. All are properly paid. As you can probably tell from the festival names they are all "genre" events, and are all indoor which is my preferred festival location in the UK. One year The Terrortones did a "summer" of festivals and it rained quite heavily at every single one, except the one where we played inside when the weather was sweltering and most of the audience stayed outside. For a couple, our stage set up was mostly about avoiding the leaks in the stage roof. I don't generally don't get involved with organising gigs, but I do know that for most of them we were approached by the festival organisers and asked if we were available. It helps that both bands I play with are known on the "scene" which already gives us an "in". Also most of the festivals I've done in the last 3 years the line-up was organised about 6 months before the festival date, however IME there are always last-minute cancellation slots available. My advice would be target your festivals so that you are approaching events that would be interested in the kind of music your band plays. You're probably already too late for this summer unless you are hoping to fill a last-minute cancellation, in which case make sure that all of your band are available for any potential offers before putting your band forward. Otherwise start contacting organisers for 2025 about a month after this year's event is over.

On reflection I don't really think that Idles are my kind of band. I like my performers to look a bit more fabulous and I want my angry aggression to be accompanied by a memorable tune.

Another weird one. Am I missing something really obvious or is it not possible to assign a "switch" control to a Snapshot in HX Edit? For any continuous controller I right click to the right of the value and the list of assignments pops up to allow me to select "Snapshot". When I do the same to a switch nothing happens. However pressing and holding the appropriate parameter control on the Helix itself allows access to this function. Then when I load up HX Edit the parameter has the Snapshot camera icon to the left of it. Any idea why I can't make this assignment in the HX Edit app? The parameters I'm trying to change are in the Obsidian 7000 model and want to be able to control the positions of the Grunt and Attack switches using snapshots.

Which is why when you hear isolated bass guitar tracks, they always have much more drive/distortion on them then is noticeable in the final mix.

The lyrics are great but now Idles need some better tunes to back them up and an image that isn't homeless heroin addicts from the 70s.

One of the problems with "tone woods" is that sometimes there is no choice. Not all of us play P or J basses or their copies. One of the basses I play is only available with an alder body and maple neck and fretboard, so in many ways the choice of woods used to make the bass is irrelevant because there is no choice.

Hurtsfall from our recent gig at the BlaqkhOlesun Festival at Morecambe. 90 seconds of "Revelator" Hurtsfall-Revelator.mp4

In a way I regret selling every single musical instrument I have ever owned. However there is also no point in owning an instrument that doesn't get played because technology has made it redundant (most of my synths), it has become uneconomical to repair (the rest of my synths) or because I have other instruments that are more suitable for my needs (all my fretless basses and those with less than 5 strings).

You'll need to take your laptop to rehearsals then, so you can quickly make the final changes required for the sound to be correct in a band setting. I know I keep banging on about how great the Helix is, but the user interface makes quick changes without the computer a doddle.

The easiest way is to get as close as you can at home and then fine-tune your patches during a technical rehearsal with your band. That means you need to know the user interfaces of your multi-effects back to front so you can make the right changes quickly and effectively (pun intended) in the practice room.

More details of the Leodis Requiem Festival at Wharf Chambers in Leeds Saturday line-up have been released: Doors at 14.00 Bands from first on to last: General Ambi3nc3 (14.30) Astrofaun (15.30) Debdepan (16.30) The Scarlet Hour (17.30) Helle (18.30) Hurtsfall (19.30) Arch Femmesis (20.45) Witch of the Vale (22.00) Sacrilege DJs until late Edit for updated playing times

Are you still going to veneer the whole board?

7 years ago I took a long hard look at my collection of almost 50 guitars and basses and ruthlessly sold all the ones that I wasn't using. I'm now down to 9: Two guitars (Gus G1 and Fretking Esprit) that were custom made for me and which get occasional use when I am writing songs. Two Gus G3 5-strings - a main and a backup for one band I play in An Eastwood Hooky 6-string bass which I use in the other band I play in and a Burns Barracuda which is its backup. A Squier Bass VI, Ibanez Firebird copy and an ancient Kimbara acoustic which will all get sold when I get my act together and list them. There were some real gems amongst the instruments I sold: Two 5-string Overwater Originals, one of which may have been the first 5-string Overwater ever made from 1983. A Pedulla Buzz A Sei Flamboyant 5-string Fretless A Born To Rock F4B A Warwick MiK 5-string StarBass II And a load of other weird and/or rare instruments However I wasn't using them, and wasn't likely to be using them in the near future for anything other than noodling at home, so I sold them all.

Maybe it didn't come across very well, but I was trying to question the assumption that you had to have a device with amp and cab models in it to get the best out of an FRFR cab. I think a lot of my particular bias comes from the fact that most of the time (almost 45 years now) I haven't had anything remotely resembling a traditional bass rig, and even for the relatively brief period when I did, any colouration the amp and cabs added was completely overshadowed by the Bass Pod that was also in the signal chain, something that was brought home by the fact that when I was had a large and small rig the difference in sound between the two could be eliminated by slight EQ tweaks on the Bass Pod.

Why do you need amp and cab models? In real life their primary function is to make your line or instrument level signal loud enough to hear over the drummer. All a modelled amp does is give you a pre-set EQ curve with some adjustments, and is out-performed by any number of dedicated EQ modules. A bass cab is essentially just a low pass filter. IME adding amp and cab models to my Helix signal chain makes the overall sound much worse. I do use a couple of guitar amp models mostly because I either like the EQ frequencies or the drive sound. The rest of my patches don't have any amp or cab models and sound all the better for it. Remember that a lot of classic recorded bass sounds are the bass guitar straight into the desk or studio EQ unit, and haven't been anywhere near a traditional bass rig.

What pile-driver banging? The kick drum on that mix was pretty restrained compared with a lot of dance music.

There's a really irritating squelchy click on the attack of all the "synth" bits that sounds like something in the signal chain overloading.

I still found side dots in the wrong place too distracting, even when I knew they were in the wrong place.

IME there is little point doing merch for a one-off gig unless you are a very well known band. Merch is a long term-investment. Even if you are only playing once a month 4 T-shirts sold at each gig should cover your costs in less than a year. Anything after that is profit.

At the two O2 Arena gigs I have done they had a single PoS location for festival and band merchandise with someone employed by the festival to sell all the merch, so IMO it was worth the 10 or 15% that they took.

I've only come across this twice in the last 15 years (both times at O2 Arenas).