thebasswhisperer

Thanks for the honorable mention. The democracy of the internet (perhaps a thing of the past soon) allows everyone to be a star, and so... they are. They say it takes a village... but hopefully not Expert Village! Have you seen any of their videos? They have how-to videos on every subject from "Machine Gun Slap Triplets" to knitting sweaters, and amazingly they seemed to have found the least qualified person in the world to demonstrate each topic! It's a brilliant concept. The fellow they had demonstrating the slap triplets was actually playing two 16ths and an 8th note and called it a triplet. Well, at least he could tell there were three notes being played. I wouldn't discourage anyone from trying, but it seems people no longer understand the concept of "not ready for public consumption". It used to be people practiced, and developed a skill before they let everyone see what they're doing.... now we get to see everyone's first attempt at everything. And of course, there are enough boneheads out there that will say "Awesome vid!" - and so they keep doing it. I never envisioned doing this, I fell into it by accident, and just kept having to produce things every month for a few years... I'm still relatively unskilled in terms of video.... but I've learned to do what I do, and keep it fairly tight. I try to address the main points of the piece, show what it does, but I never "sweeten" the audio with eq, just compression (very important when mixing to -6dB for video). But it's not my goal to make it sound "bad" either, just accurate. At this point in time, I'm only demoing things that I'm personally interested in, so if I'm spending all that time to shoot and edit it, I've already decided that I like it, so it's not really an objective thing... These days, if I'm demoing something, it can be taken as a "stamp of approval" for whatever it's worth.

Thanks for the positive comments. Yeah, the slapping thing seems to bug a lot of players... but the reality is, I came up in the 70s and everyone was slapping back then... I love the style, it's fun, and sure - it's attention grabbing. But more importantly, it's an extreme use of the instrument that gives me a really good sense of its capabilities. When I hear how a bass responds to slap, I get all sorts of info about its general performance - but that's because I've been slapping for so long. I'm not super attached to slapping all the time, in fact, in my gig life, I almost never slap these days, but hey.... if I didn't slap, people would complain about me NOT slapping. However, I will NOT slap in a demo that features a hollow body bass, or flatwounds, a man has to draw the line [i]somewhere![/i]

[quote name='steve-bbb' timestamp='1385907660' post='2293405'] hmmm green space cat nice unusual do you know my friend Cody he lives in Austin? [/quote] Oh yeah! Cody! Of course I know him! Hey, do you know my friend Nigel? He lives in England!

Sandberg is a brand I have no experience with, they're not common in the US, but I am getting one sent to me for a review in Bass Player, look forward to trying it. I'm a big MM fan, and really... I haven't found anything else that tries to sound like one that succeeds. But if you're still trying to decide.... don't forget about Leo's other progeny... G&L!

Love my L2.5K! I bought a used '97 on Talkbass about a year ago, and it's become the most used instrument in my collection. It sounds great for everything I do - rock, country, blues, jazz, funk, salsa... I have to force myself to play my other basses now. But has anyone spent any time with the newer M 2500? I just got one in to demo recently (it's coming up soon), and I really love this one too! It's similar enough to the L series that you can clearly identify the sound as G&L, but it's a more polite, more refined version of the tone. It's a little more "normal" with its 3-band boost/cut system, and mine weighs only 8.5lbs... which for a G&L 5-string is almost unheard of. Pretty too...

Thanks all! I'll take a look around and see what's going on here...

Howdy from Texas y'all. Actually, I'm not really all that proud to be living in Texas... I'm surrounded by 26 million morons, but within the Austin City Limits... all is groovy. I thought I'd join up here as I'm hoping to expand the UK audience for my [url="http://www.youtube.com/bassguitarmag"]Bass Whisperer video channel on Youtube[/url]. I figured since I'm almost fluent in the language, it would be a good idea to reach out... Things are getting pretty busy for me in the demo department these days, I've got a thing going with G&L to shoot several of their basses, and I just put up demos for AER, Seymour Duncan, and Eastwood Guitars recently. I'll have a bunch of cool items coming up soon. My goal is to capture the gear the way you'll hear it, explain all the ins and outs, features, and design elements, and hopefully inspire you to buy it! I'm also there to answer questions - if I can. Please take a look at the channel, subscribe, comment, ask questions, etc. Originally, I did this work for Guitar World mag, and while it was a valuable training experience, I did not always have a say in the items I would shoot. These days, I only accept instruments, and gear that I personally want to play. Considering the time involved in making a decent quality video, and the relatively low hourly wage I can eek out of what I get paid (yes, this is a job, not a hobby), I decided I might as well LOVE what I'm shooting and get to keep it. So, don't think of my work as a "review," it's a demo. My opinions are not un-biased, if I'm shooting a demo, you can assume that I like the featured piece. I will no longer bother with junk, only top gear that I am personally into playing. I'm also a relatively smart guy regarding music and such... I'm alway open to questions about theory, jazz, improv, whatever... I'm super busy online, but I will try to maintain a presence here... but if I don't respond to your questions quickly, don't give up, I'll get to them. Thanks!