peteb

The thing is, they kinda have a point! Fashions change and twenty years ago, I only played active basses, but I find myself being pulled back to using passive Fenders (just like when I first started gigging). Sound engineers love them and I just saw a Tom Bukovac video, where he suggested that a Fender Precision is still the bass, the only one that will work on every session he does. You might not personally agree, but you can't disregard his opinion - it carries a lot of weight. Don't get me wrong - I have an active 'super jazz' and a stingray and they both sound great. But I still find myself taking a passive Fender out to most of the gigs that I do.

I must admit, I'm a bit envious! I've got a great blues band of a similar ilk, which has just about wound down as two of the key members because they are just too busy, not to mention that the main dep guitarist is unavailable due to a serious back issue. The Zep tribute hasn't got a lot of gigs booked for this year and I would love to fill up the diary gigging with a blues rock band like that, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of opportunities at the moment.

That is pretty cheap for a 95! Having said that, the 95 that I had, sported a 'transition' bridge (or that's what I was told), i.e. the bigger, original style bridge, but without the damper felts. Also, the battery cover for my 95 had a metal battery cover, rather than the plastic battery box.

I've got the sfx micro-Thumpinator on my board at the front of the chain, which takes out everything below 25Hz. So that is just frequencies that you can't actually hear, but you are ensuring that your amp doesn't have to deal with them (so more headroom) and that they are not causing any issues in the FOH PA system. I still have the mpulse, but don't get the chance to take it out often these days, instead using a Handbox R-400. The Mesa may be a slightly better amp, but the R-400 sounds very similar and is a much easier carry. However, it doesn't have the para EQ, but as compromises go - it's a pretty good one! I'm sure that the WB-100 sounds really nice, but it will inevitably be a bit less bullet proof than the R-400, might not be as responsive and won't be as easy to pack into a single car along with someone else's gear. Also, the R-400 will be easier to unload into the house at 2am, which at our age is definitely a factor! Personally, I prefer to boost the lo-mids and have a bit of a hi-mid cut. I've also got the Caveman pre / DI on my board, which has a baked in lo-mid bump and gives the option to the sound engineer to DI from there, with me knowing that it will sound great out front. It is all about managing what goes to FOH and making it as easy as possible for the sound engineer, while ensuring that they can't screw it up and I get the sound that I want. There are inevitably certain compromises to be made about weight / transporting gear, but that's all part of gigging, especially these days!

I have tried to put together a rig that helps a good sound engineer get the bass done in the soundcheck as quickly as possible. I also try to make it as idiot proof as possible, to make it difficult for a not very good engineer to f*** things up! Bear in mind that most venues aren't so bad that you have to do more than minor tweaks, assuming that you have realistic EQ settings to start with. I also use a gramma pad when feasible (i.e. 95% of gigs) and I have a HPF at the front of my signal chain. I rarely get any problems these day and any tweaks needed for the room tend to be pretty minor ones.

To be honest, that really isn't my experience! Modern Class D amps do not seem to have the response or attack of hybrid amps or, from what I understand given my limited experience of them, valve amps. That's the reason I got rid of my Class D Mesa amp - sounded great in a room on it's own, but didn't have the response I needed live. This was particularly noticeable when I was playing onstage with a band with a lot of keys and stuff going on, less so in a blues / boogie band with two relatively clean guitars! The advantage with a para EQ is that if you are in a room with sound issues, you can find what frequencies are causing the problems and sweep the EQ centre for that band until the issue goes away. I used to find that with my Mesa mpulse that in certain rooms, it was often the low-mids that caused a problem. If you changed the frequency then you could usually get around the problem with the sound of the room pretty easily. The problem with para EQs is that you can get a truly awful sound if you don't understand how the various frequencies work together! I used to follow the manual's suggested settings (for 'Driving Rock', if I remember correctly) and then tweaked until I got the sound that I wanted. As ever, you don't necessarily need a perfectly flat EQ, remember a little goes a long way and you probably don't want any massive boosts or cuts so that you can hear a coherent representation of every note that you are going to play.

First gig of the year, with the Zep tribute in Cottingham on the east coast. A bit rusty with a dep guitar player as our BL / guitarist is still out with serious back issues, but all-in-all a pretty solid performance. A decent crowd with 160 tickets sold and a great reaction. I didn't bother taking any pictures as it is pretty much the same rig as the last 60 / 70 gigs. I did note that the (very good) sound engineer (actually a husband and wife team) DI'd from the Caveman preamp / DI on my board rather than from the amp. Some do, some don't, but seemed to sound good out front either way. Next gig in Scotland with the same dep guitarist in a few weeks...

I have an issue with Stingrays, in that I like them but rarely gig them. I've moved several of them on, as I'm not really using them, only to go out and buy another! I've had (in total) three 4 strings, two 5 strings, as well as a US Sterling 4 string and sold them all, apart from the current red 91 with a rosewood board! It's got to the point that when I mentioned that I've been offered quite a decent amount for the red 91, my wife told me not to sell it because I would only end up buying another one!

Very much this. I've got a 91 Stingray (no case) that I don't use much and I've been advised by a couple of guys in the trade that I could easily get £1,500-1,600 for it (although I am in no rush to cash in on it). Ten years or so ago, I was buying and selling US Stingrays for £700-800, which then creeped up to about £1k. The price has definitely gone up since then.

That's more than I'm doing and when I've got anywhere near that level, I've aggravated old (mainly football) injuries and had to stop training for a while. However, I wouldn't want to put people off. You can do a lot less than Dave and still get tangible benefits. The main point is to build a bit of core strength and to halt muscle decay and maintain bone density. All of this is very important once you hit your fifties. To achieve this, all you need to do is lift medium weights on a regular basis. As far as improving your core goes, I have a displaced vertebrae in my back as a result of doing too many sit-ups once in my thirties and then playing football the day after. This could have quite a serious affect on me, especially at this time of year when the weather gets cold. However, when I started going to a gym in my late thirties, I started doing moderate weight exercises to strengthen the muscles around my spine and I have never had a problem with my back since. How many people here complain about back issues stopping them from lifting cabs, playing certain basses, etc. A few months of doing simple exercises and I went from being in agony whenever the weather got cold, to having no problem with my back at all. You can do similar things to alleviate shoulder problems as well.

The obvious thing to note (for me) is that when you search '1964 fender jazz bass' on Reverb, you get a page with this one @ £3.8k, one for just under £9k in America and all the others in the £15k to £18k range. The only ones that come up at a broadly similar price are Custom Shop models.

That is a very good point. There are a lot of people on here who are struggling with basic fitness that impacts on them gigging and being able to lift amps / cabs or wear a 9lb bass on a strap, etc. This as well as, I'm sure, many other things in their life. As you get a bit older, it is a very good idea to have some sort of programme of weightlifting to minimise muscle decay and maintain bone density. I say this as someone isn't the most enthusiastic gym goer. I haven't been for nearly three months for a variety of issues (all good reasons, but still) and I really need to get back to it. However, once you start doing even modest lifting, you will find that it makes a big difference after just a couple of months or so. It will also make a massive improvement to what your life will be like when you get a bit older. You do have do be sensible about it and not go for the weights you could have done when you were a bit younger (I speak from experience) and it is certainly a good idea to speak to someone who can give you sensible advice. But hitting the gym in middle age will have a very beneficial impact on your life and allow you to do things like carry on gigging for significantly longer.

If we're going to do memes - wise words from Bleeding Gums Murphy!

I've never really thought of it as 'hifi' and it seems to have a nice warm articulate sound, which you might think of as being 'tubey'. I am always using it in front of a hybrid amp on gigs, so it is difficult to say really. I have been told that it does sound great out front, when the DI is taken from the Caveman. The DI does work very well when used on gigs, but beyond that I'm afraid that this is all a bit above my paygrade!

Nope, never had any issue at all. Every sound engineer who has used the DI has always loved it. I know that it is transformer balanced, which the spec claims will 'avoid any hum/noise issues and eliminates the need for an external D.I./Line Driver' and that there is an amp ground lift (that to be fair, I thought was the same thing).

I've got a Caveman BP1 Compact, which sounds great to me. It has it's own baked in sound (basically enhanced low-mids) that I like, so you would have to be happy with that. I think that it sounds great, it's got a top quality DI and sound engineers seem to like it. https://www.caveman-audio.com/products/bp1c/

It may do, but it is more likely that you need to practice with a metronome and work on how to improve the way that you listen to your own playing! You are not alone - timing and consistency are what sorts the men from the boys and the thing that really makes you a top player. I've been playing for fifty years and they are the two things that I'm still working on!

That's the whole point of jam sessions like that! Some of the most memorable nights of my musical 'career' have been blues jam sessions (admittedly with semi-known experienced players, rather than with novice players getting up)!

That's a hell of a P bass collection!

That goes against the whole point of inviting relative novice players to get up at a jam. The idea is that inexperienced players can get the opportunity to learn how to play with other musicians and develop their playing, especially how to busk / improvise. I would hazard a guess that the guys who slagged you off were not that great themselves! I'm glad that you had better experiences with later blues jams.

That's fine, in that case the simple solution is don't go along to a blues jam. However, you said that you don't think 'there are many people who couldn't play at a blues jam'. That is certainly not true! Plenty of people think that because they know what a pentatonic scale is, therefore they can play blues because it's easy. Then they get upset when it becomes obvious that they suck. If you have the technique to play a relatively complex heavy metal riff and can play in time, then you're good to go (to a certain level). Same with most other genres. Just about anyone can play a blues scale and know a couple of blues licks, but that doesn't mean that you can play the blues convincingly and when you are playing blues, there is no way to hide behind basic technique. You really have to know how to interact with the other players on the bandstand and have a bit of melodic nous not to sound completely cr*p. Nothing will find out a poor player quicker than a blues jam! I would suggest that one of the best things you can do to become a better musician is to learn how to navigate a blues jam, even if playing the blues is never going to be your main thing.