P-T-P

Thanks for the feedback. Aside from the weight of current sub, as the bass player, I find it also ads a massive amount of dub-style bottom end that means the bass gets lost in the mix.

Very helpful thanks.

Bringing an old thread back to life with a question on this topic. If the monitoring aspect was taken out of the equation - i.e. just using the system for FOH to run the whole band - do you think it would cope in most scenarios? We stopped using backline a couple of years ago and are all using in ear monitors. Bass, guitars, backing track, kick drum and and overhead plus a couple of vocals. Happy with our sound, increasingly unhappy with hefting a massive sub around. I imagine we play similar sized venues as yourself. Any experience of the ERGO system in comparison?

Bit late to this thread but may help someone. Been gigging with the m18 for the past 2 or 3 years. We replaced our Mackie DL1608 with it. We all love it. The apps work a treat and with a little patience it does a heck of a lot for a really great price in a small package. The ability to have 6 aux mixes makes running individual iems super easy. The amp and fx modelling mean me (bass) and singer (second guitar) haven’t brought an amp to a gig in years and the lead guitarist just brings his helix. Depending on the line-up, we run two or three vocal mics. Most gigs we just mic the kick and use an overhead for the drums but we could add additional mics to the kit if needed. If you need more mic inputs, you’d possibly need a small sub mixer. As we bring no back line , for back-up purposes we bring a second m18 and I know that we could use that as a slave to increase the inputs. Honestly, I think it’s an astonishingly good bit of kit for any small giggling band.

I'm pretty sure most guitars are at least two piece bodies. Certainly that's the original construction used by Fender. Having a one piece body might produce a little more warmth but then having a multi-piece body might add more punch due to the increased strength and rigidity that comes from gluing the pieces together. One piece bodies tend to be the preserve of boutique type instruments and custom builds. In respect of the price tag for Lakland Skylines, they're definitely more pricey than they were but the fact is their build quality and tone was vastly superior to the US Fenders that were around in the 2000s and they were/are all set-up in the US, with the same spec pick-ups as the US Laklands, and by the same build team. That's where the reputation and price-tag comes from. It's basses like the Lakland Skylines, Sadowsky Metro and so on which I think forced Fender's hand into putting more care into their US made instruments which also then contributed to the massive price rises of Fenders across the board over the past 10 years. It would be interesting to hear Lakland's take on the subject of the natural finishes.

Yes, I did. Epic sounding bass which had the original stock Aero pick-ups and a Bartolini NTBT pre-amp fitted. The pre-amp died and though it was replaced like for like, it lost it's mojo for me. I now have white with rosewood, Aeros and passive and I'm a very happy bunny again. To the original poster, I can understand where you're coming from as that would annoy me too. I bought a natural DJ5 a few years ago from guitarguitar and didn't ask for pics, just went on weight. The bass came and was beautifully made but the figuring/grain was very light, which was a bit disappointing. I don't think you're wrong sending it back if you're unhappy, but I would dispute it being a QC issue, it's more something that's always a possibility with a mass-produced natural or transparent finish instrument which doesn't come with a book-matched top. These ones are a bit jarring... I had a sunburst Fender jazz which had three obvious joins in it and, on closer inspection it was made of seven strips of wood. Hope you enjoy your Fender, I'm sure it's a beaut, but you may have missed out on not simply changing for a more aesthetically pleasing DJ5 as they are monster basses.

Having gone to full modelling, we initially tried just our FBT x-lite 12s tops but sound was a bit compressed. Changed to ALTO 312 tops which cope a lot better and okay for smaller gigs. Added two cheap active subs - Evolution sub 15 - much improvement but tops still getting full range signal as no crossover on the sub outs. Finally added a single ALTO TS312s and sound is amazing, if I say so myself. More than adequate for most gigs we do and a super quick set-up and take down.

We have a shallow 4u rack, bottom to top... rcf m18 mixer 2u 2 x Audio tecnica radio mics Receiver 1u CH38 2 x Sennheiser g2 item transmitters 1u CH70 At the rear, top we have a 1u bnc punched plate with bnc couplers through it with bnc cables linking to the receivers/transmitters and the antenna on the other side. Works a treat.

I'm happy to consider shipping to Italy. Have sent a couple of basses overseas down the years.