Dood

Eventually my logo (and avatar) will become T-Shirts. Ok, so I've only had a few dozen orders, but I like it! My Signature pic hopefully explains it!

Thank you I really appreciate that. it's been a week from hell, so this was a nice lift.

I will certainly drop some video links in later, but off the top of my head the latest squeeze is a band called VOLA. I also love everything that a chap called David Maxim Micic produces, especially the BILO EPs. Not a new album, but I still smile every time I listen to Audioplastik’s “In The Head Of A Maniac”. I know the band very well which makes the album even better I will also have to add the 2018 release from Ostura called “The Room”. Yeah that’s a blatant plug, I know.. but honestly I’m still amazed that it was possible to pull off this album. I’ll do a post about it later in this thread, but even if you don’t like the genre it’s still an incredible feat of production no denying!

I think it is worth adding that although I have clearly said “you can” it doesn’t mean we should ALL the time! It’s not gonna wash at The Dog And Duck! I am sort of specifically talking about much, much larger stages with a higher audience capacity venue. Thought I should add that for clarity before I’m shot down he he

I too have experimented. Not at a gig mind, a rehearsal. I added our band’s 800W active sub to my 300watt 2x10 set up, but the gain setting actually couldn’t for some reason be dialled back far enough. Every note had the most beautiful low end punch (in the gut) with no distortion at all.. but that was all anyone could hear in the room 😂😂😂😂😂😂

Any PA we haven't worked with before will get our tech spec so they know what gear we use. It's my job to liaise with them from a technical standpoint. I prefer to speak directly on the phone if I can't meet in person. At the gig, for me on my own, firstly I give the engineer a line check. I'll tell them what my loudest sounds are and I will demonstrate them. I will give short sharp transients and longer sustained notes to begin with to set up channel gain. Then I will play a bunch of different lines in loops of say 4 bars or so with my core tone. They hopefully will already know that I have a few effects that I use too and thus when the engineer is happy I'll give those a zoom through. Basically though, a good engineer will clearly communicate what they need from you. A bad one will grunt in to his foldback mic, or worse gesture at you from his darkened cell at the other end of the venue. So far, I'm pleased to say that only minimal EQ tweaking and a small amount of compression gets added on the desk for my bass sound. Everything else is already on my effects board.

Likewise! I've no idea why I am even in this conversation as my pairs of subs are in my IEMs! No amps or physical monitors anywhere near me on stage ha ha! No backline, just my little pedal board and my IEM mixer in front of me. I love letting FOH do it's job properly.

Oh and the gig, I forgot to mention. My hunch was bang on. Having a really nice full sound, our gig delivered the energy in the lows to keep the dance floor busy. - Even if a couple of times in the evening the audience were singing SO loudly, they set the limiter off themselves!

Or any sub set up by anyone who doesn't know how to set up a sub for it's destined purpose.

I think this is a very interesting point and something I clearly pointed out and proved to one of my fellow musicians only recently. Here's my story: We played a venue recently that we knew had a very sensitive sound limiter. A 3 second threshold and all power off. Yes, one of those We knew it was going to be a tough gig so our usually sensitive drummer even brought an electric kit instead of his usual acoustic kit. I mean sensitive in that he's every bit a professional drummer who knows what kit to bring to what gig and knows it doesn't need leathering for a great sound. Anyway, I digress. The discussion was that as the limiter is set really low we should only take the 12" tops for the PA because the subs would be way too much. (The venue was actually very large). My response was actually no, we'll take both subs. We will go with the fuller sound even if we DID have to play relatively quietly. As it happens, the limiter was so badly configured that I managed to take a selfie video with me talking, right up against the PA speaker which was playing music at a volume just under the limiter's threshold. (yeah, I know, geeky, but we did test both the threshold and the resonant frequency band of the limiter.) Now, you may be asking, what the actually flibbertyjibbit has this got to do with backline? - It's a common misconception that a sub is always all about booming low end, like some teenager's vauxhall nova with a huge bass speaker slapped in the boot. If your system is set up properly, then you should be able to experience support in the low end that a well selected sub brings. Looking for a description, I'd say 'flat response' all the way down, rather than the hyped pumping lows of say dance music. Let's say 'girth' to your notes rather than attempting to blow your audience towards the back wall. A good option when you have no PA support as an example.

That’d be a great test!

I love the idea of the 12 and a sub after seeing the QSC stack I linked earlier, but I am a total sucker for playing with stereo effects when appropriate (or noodling around) this I’d want two tops. Looks like I’ll need all three units ha ha!!!

I've been using EZD2 in my home studio for a long while, but my 'new' band have just been tracking drums using GGD and the mixes are sounding really good. I've only got a demo on my home machine to play with so I can't really comment on use I'm afraid.

Well, the DTuner when set up properly will be super fast, no doubt. Though in any gig situation, if any of my band members need to say, change guitar or what have you, then it’s usually factored in to our performance to ensure there are no long pauses. That’s possibly something you could look in to if you end up not going for the DTuner?

It’s an amazing gadget and I used one for years, but I have to admit, once you learn how to drop tune by ear, it takes a short amount of time (or with a tuner of course). This is probably the reason why I would like a drop tuner, but in over 20 years since not having one, I’ve never needed it ha ha!

Honestly a thing of beauty! The DBS heads had over engineered power supplies and a power amp with a huge amount of headroom even for it’s seemingly tiny 400W output vs today’s standards. Looking at the schematics, the preamplifier is really nice. The only downside was that this whole rig was a hernia inducer !!

I love my in-ears and all the RnR killing, but there’s a rig I would have loved to have owned! My first decent bass rig was the (rather unfortunately named) Intergrated Bass System from Marshall. Many I am sure didn’t think much of it, but I always had compliments This was to be the natural progression but I ended up playing lead guitar for many years instead.

Drop NewTone Strings a line. I'd bet they'd even do the gauges you wanted too

We're all MU members, so fortunately we've not had anything pulled that we really care about, (i.e. important gigs, functions etc) mainly because we have a signed contract in place. I feel for those that have been plopped on; I appreciate that the MU subs might seem expensive at first look, but it only needs to save one gig to pay for itself I suppose. Oh and I see no problem with calling out venues/managers/promoters for acting badly. In fact, the MU like to hear about them and their misdemeanours!

On a Mac you can combine two hardware devices as an 'Aggregate Device', so both are seen as one unit with multiple ins and outs. I can't comment on Windows I'm afraid.

Ah! Great, I've found the manufacturer! @petetexas http://www.current-logic.com/dcdc_converter_cpt_fulree.php

You certainly can! Are you ok with soldering? The problem is, I can't find the exact item I bought to do the same! Here's the closest: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/14-50V-To-12V-5-5-2-5DC-Male-Converter-CPT-Car-power-Step-Down-Regulator-OL/183401643613?epid=9004621668&hash=item2ab396fe5d:g:wVIAAOSwZOBbhAFr:rk:2:pf:0 which is a little convertor that in the case of the above will allow you to but anything up to 50V in and get 12V DC out. The one I bought was a 9V output version but I can't find them on eBay at the moment! Here's the title from my purchase history: 5.5*2.5DC Male 11-50V to 9V Converter Step Down Regulator CPT Car power UK It was £4 and I bought these: 5.5mm x 2.1mm Female DC Power Socket CCTV male Connector solder 1-15 inline plug to give me options as to what I solder on. I also bought a 5V USB version that allows me to power USB devices from pedal board PSUs! Of curse you will want the 9V version and I am sure they are out there, maybe on AliExpress or similar. If I had the time I'd make up loads of these as they have been really useful when you have one really good 'pedal power' power supply.