lownote

I deconstruct it like this: Route A I need to show people what I can do and demonstrate what degree of an derrière I am. I also need to see this in other people. Both needs are met in a decent jam session or equivalent. I was introduced to my local blues society ( not my perfect choice of genre) and started going along. I've now had two cracking bass chairs in two of the best blues / rock bands in my region. Route B I have been in JoinMyBand and BandMix for several years. I had two contacts, from a very odd pot head, and a decent enough own-stuff band. Route A is to my mind the only one: play with people and build contacts, build skills, be willing and be as likeable as you can.

@franzbassist I just bought some at your recommendation and the tone is nice so thanks for that. But the one massive downside is mine won't stay in tune. They're going out by whole tones in less than an hour – and I keep winding and winding - I can’t believe they don’t go twang… I’ve changed dozens of string sets in my life. My MO includes making sure there’s at least two turns round the winding post, I gently stretch the string after fitting by pulling in the middle, and press down in front of the bridge. And I do know that new strings take a while to stabilise. But I’ve had these on for hours now and they’re still going way out of tune in just a few minutes. My old Dunlops barely needed adjusting once a month… Edit: Just heard back from Mark at Bass Direct who flogged them to me. He thinks they're slipping on the tuning post. With two to three turns and the end stuck down the 'ole in the middle of the post I can't see how that's happening. Never happened to me before.

String Direct recommended me the D'Adarrio equivalent of Fast fret. I now have the Dad stuff, Fast Fret, Dr Duck and Finger Ease - enough to last me into the next century. 😂

Try https://www.hannahsmusic.co.uk/gm.html , just ordered some

I play flatwound strings, a well worn set of Dunlops. But having returned to gigging for the first time in a long time I'm having trouble with sticky strings. To be clear, this isn't the stickiness of new flats, these are well worn and smooth. Also I don't have this issue when practising, only when gigging. My fingers start to stick to the strings and it makes playing fast really difficult. Any thoughts?

Having had both, BF are so light weight isn't an issue. Obv one 210 is bulkier. Ohmage could be an issue but the BF 210s is switchable. IMHO the 2x110 set up in black grille would be best for me and looks the dogs. But YMMV.

I asked Alex straight up a while back and he said the original issues were with a dodgy glue supplier, since resolved. FWIW.

my Voices tell me not to listen

They re-placed the side markings on my unlined fretless without fuss and reasonably cost wise. Can't speak otherwise. As they make the Sei line of basses I suspect there's not much they don't know

Dea Matrona

Really interesting and useful (for muppets like me) exposition on various options for fooling around on a single chord

Gosh I've always set up my own, can't help. I've never found a decent tech in 10 years so learned to do everything myself. This was confirmed by one pro tech I went to in the early days who one day said ' what the [bleep] are you doing still coming to me, do it yourself'. If this seems a trifle eccentric it's quite common where I live. Happy D'ad owner.

Good chap. Helpful, efficient and able to cheerfully sort out idiocies on my part. Hope to deal with him again.

I'd do well playing any instrument properly. Not got there yet lol.

Yeah, it's a passing note thing, like blue notes or a bend

As a fretless player I don't have to just play the notes. Recently, bored during a 12 bar at a gig I experimented with playing between the notes. So fingering a B- and a bit rather than a C. Now I know this an excuse for playing badly, but actually in places it sounded OK and more interesting than when I played the proper note. I 'spose it's no different to bending notes. Any input from music theorists?

Not sure what sense it made me calling the 210 'dark'. More a sax term I think. What I meant was the PJ are I think uncoloured and reflect your bass and how you play it, the BF 10s (110 and 210) are advertsied as coloured - kind of warmer, and 'smokier'. I would and did choose the BF 210 for my blues band, where the bass is more a melodic drum. I also used the PJ for that with suitable EQ adjustment, but the PJ's more inclined towards using the bass as a melodic instrument. Christ I type some pompous b*llocks at times, lol.

Top choices both. My PJ cabs (cab 27 and 47) were the mutts, as was my BF210. Wish I hadn't sold the 210... Not sure if they're not fairly different though.The PJs are very clean, whereas the BF is quite 'dark'. YMMV, just MHO.

I talked to the top bod at Ashdown a while back and he said their volume controls are designed to be fairly linear all the way to the top. So you get top volume at top settings. He said some other makers cram all the acceleration in the first half of the volume control, giving the illusion of serious pokiness to come but in fact there's not much improvement after that. FWIW.

I seem to have a chocolate thing. Precision: smooth dark; jazz: CDM with hazelnuts.

Precision: Sunburst / tort Jazz: black / red tort

Liked my PJB 7" 300w drivers for performance and happy to accept others' insistence that the 5" drivers are even more useful at 400w. Don't quite understand how they do it but thenthere's a lot I don't understand.