Mod_Machine

Last bar last song on sunday the volume seemed to dip substantially...twisted the volume down and back up and it returned but nees to sort before my gig on sat....i had also noticed a really distant distortion in the notes earlier that day which would be erradicated by flicking the volune knob so should have guesses it was going. Any recommendations on what to get or is any old pot from from maplins ok? Also does the fault sound like its the volune pot or capacitor and tone pot replacement too? Finally ddnt someone on here do a full straight replacement set...no soldering required? if so does anyone know who and how much?

I 'found' the cure as an early teen when you think you are deeper than you really are and spend your time relating to songs like 'from the edge of the deep green sea'!!! obviously i learnt quickly to just enjoy music for being music but i have always held a special place in my heart for the cure and watched them live throughout the 90s..i stopped at growing my own ragdoll edward scissor hand barnet though. Just recently id revisited all my cure albums as wanted to replicate simon gallups faith period bass sound. Ended up uploading my fav 167 tracks onto my iphone and that includes the amazing lives albums concert and show....i also sat down and watched cure in orange and show a couple of weeks ago....and that emphasised what only a few are whispering, this wasnt a great cure performance. They really do lack energy/character and dont sound any grander than when they toured as a four piece. The current line up is really lacklustre and though professional, reeve is just replicating perry bamontes guitar parts and perrys playing style and riff approaches were key to a cure sound that also imcluded the fender vi robert smith used to play. Reeve just doesnt sit right as a cure member.....plus seems to emphasise the cures age. Simon gallup on bass was good as always but his current look and stance made him look like he had been 'created' by tim burton. And some else said it was all just a bit dull....probably saved by such a strong back catalogue

Ok...tried those which has indicated the resonance swelling on that note isnt the issue, but that the note im playing with it has no resonance...almost like a dead note...its perfectly intune but has no depth.... D string 16th fret...as i say perfectly in tune but no sub depth...is this just a sign of the string starting to die?

Hi - posted on the effects page but have a sound check at 6pm and want to try and sort prior to this. I have a lovely consistent new wave sound running a fender mustang pickups into tuner, marshall comp, EHX bass big muff and marshall delay. This goes into an ashdown with the bright emphasis on and the eq set with bass at around 5, mid down to mid and trebles up to 6 or 7. With the compression it all sounds very Simon Gallup of early 'faith period' cure- compressed and new wave just the way i like it. I decided to add a little chorus which i only really waated in the background but opted for an EHX small clone fitted just before the delay. Its fine but appears to flange - mostly on its most minimal rate setting which is how i want the chrous.... its giving me a headache now though cause i cant even out all the notes 'volume' or depth to the compressed feel of before. I cant get it very close using the chrous BEFORE the compressor and running my hartke bass attack vxl at the end of the chain. Perfect sound, and really extremely even across the fret board if im using my home built jedson based rebuild - with an old 80s cort and gibson SG neck, bridge etc...however its a git to play live as neck dives. The same set up is fine with the mustang except for the 14th fret on the a string where the low sub bass swells....why is this and what can i do to remove and even it out with everything else....it just seems to be that one note! Sound check is at 6 so im pretty eager to sort! Please help...you are my only hope!

Yep defo happening across the board, less noticable as it progressed up the rate setting and as you say almost flange like on its lowest depth and rate setting....pretty much where i want it! anything i can do to sort as i shift all over the fretboard and lots of octive shifting....even with lots of compression at the start of my chain...and quarter comp at the amp its still audible and i loose my new wave compressed tone any more than there! kinda quite gutted as so close to that other voices sound for live performances....of which i have one tom night.

Hi, im running my bass into a berhinger tuner, marshall compressor, electro harmonix big muff, electro harmonix small clone and marshall echo/delay pedal into an ashdown blue 180 amp. Im after a lush compressed sound similar to simon gallup on the cure song 'other voices'. All was well and close enough for me with a good constant tone across the fret board that consistently cut through the guitar and drums live perfectly.... but i wanted that very light smidge of chorus so added the electro harmonix small clone as per above layout. Now the sound is good with the rate set at the lowest but i find the volume across the fret board no longer even...no matter how hard i compress its the same..it improves slightly if i also add some additional compression at the amp but thats not always possible when using someone elses amp...however even then iys still not right...for example its ago up to around the 7th fret across all strings but if i shoot up to the 17th fret on the g string the note seems to literally disappear and seems low in volume...less compression at the amp emphasises these wierd issues. Can any one lend a bit of advice how to ...erm...'cure' this issue before i purchase i different pedal?

Helpful and honest (as always) taking my gear to another level...and ultimately making me sound better than i actually am! Cheers Doc

Hi ...i know its been a while.... I want to replace the tuning keys on my short scale mustang bass...preferably with elephant ear style ones. I remember being really impressed with the ones that came fitted to an epiphone eb0(!!??) but they were really quite heavy and left my jedson based home build a little out of balance (shame as i love it and used it for recording most of the album but uncomfortable for a set any longer than about 20 mins!) So any recommendations on what would be a good quality replacement? cheers in advance M_M

Cheers for the response. The band is a nightmare place to be at the moment! - but only coz we start recording the album on sat and havent actually written one of the songs we declared as finished! yep, tried the other artists on label and the only manager we like the look of is doing it part time AND (more importantly) doesnt want to take another artist on! The others who have shown interest in us we have been largely unimpressed with - mainly as we expect them to at least put a little background work into who we are, what weve done etc. plus the majority of the bands we know locally who are managed use very 'local' managers who have ok 'local' contacts but not alot else - and coming from Bedfordshire thats a BAD bad thing! We have started the usual trawl and the label manager himself has come from a larger label so has some contacts, but we like to do things ourselves up to a point and the idea of the label (no matter how good they have been to us financially) sourcing us management represents potential for future conflict of interest. Just thought id start narrowing our search and contact list through a few trusted recommendations here, though ultimately i guess there is no major rush (after all the album may sound tosh and the need for a manager will be the least of our worries when the label drops us!)

Anyone? Someone somewhere must have had some positive management experiences - the right one is like an honoury memeber of the band after all!??

Hi, Does anyone have any positive experiences of managers they would like to recommend to us? Not asking for any of you to do any work for us, or recommend us just would feel more comfortable if i new which managers people have had good experience with before i contact them! We are a three piece indie/alternative band in Beds/Herts area signed to an independant label with a small artist roster. Following discussion with a major, the release of our EP, more discussions (and finally a few visits by said major at our gigs) they are all aiming for a dual release of a full album later this year. We have national PR coverage through Sonic PR who also 'service' depeche mode, moby, kraftwork, Django Django etc and are getting us all the right things (Music Week cover CD, music mag spreads, EP/gig/single reviews in the Sun, Sunday Mail plus many a blog site etc We did have a manager a couple of years back but i cant talk about it without having vietnam style flashbacks and we have been self managing for the last 18 months (ironically since things started to happen for us!.) Unfortunately we have pretty much got as far as we can off our own backs and need a manager to help take over those decisions and negotiations that are far too personal to be left entirely up to us etc etc. Any advice greatly appreciated and again if ive posted in the wrong area please do not take insult! Thanks Mod

Hi, He was playing at the Rhythm Festival in Bedfordshire (Old Warden mansion House) this last weekend and as we wereplaying on the sunday we had access all areas. I agree the guy looks in stunning shape for his age. Was nice and close and agree his playing was inspirational and a very kind warm fella to boot. Made me proud to be bass player again. Shame I had to keep explaining to my girlfreind who he was, i dont think it was til he closed the set with White Room that any bells started ringing for her!! Thought he would be the highlight of the weekend but following our set the stage manager actually allocated somebody from his team to help pack the bands equipment away just so i could be 'released' by the rest of the band to run over to another stage to watch a personal hero, Bruce Foxton (ended up in the wings for the From The Jam set so a massive thumbs up to all the accomodating festival staff for a change.) The guy blew me away with his energy and nimble footedness and was very accepting of my embarrasingly childish inabilty to speak properly when he spoke to me post gig. I cant believe so many of these internationally renowned artists are so gracious to fans, when so many of the pointless 5 minute nobodies and one hit indie wonders we play with are the most embarrisgly arrogant gimps you could ever meet!

But in real terms this is the absolute opposite of what happens. Im assuming becasue of the weight distribution - eg the cavities for all the electrics on an aready light body mean that if the pin is moved up the centre of gravity is moved and due to the lack of the weight pulling it down at the base of the body the head stock takes over as the heaviest point and gravity then really starts to pull the thing down. I really need to find that thread on the scince behind it all. Ultimately though i have three holes in the end of my bass at the moment - and guess which one causes greatest neck dive.... the one that is highest up. Guess which one causes lowest. the one furthest down! Logically if you think about it, if the neck is the heaviest part of the bass which is what is causing the neck dive and you move the retaining pin higher up the bass (meaning less load on the strap itself and therefore less load to pull the neck back up) moving the pin up is very unlikely to erradicate the problem - but actually make it worse. Sorry for the lady bird book of science approach but its the only way i can put it into words - the strap placement on the picture in the one above is already at around the 12th fret - not the 15th (as mine is) which should already be balancing the bass out quite well. The photo by ou7shined just shows the bass being played and could therefore just be being held up but as it has the longer 'horn' section shouldnt be suffering from neck dive in the first place. Where the lack of a longer horn section is causing the problem surely its actual load on the rear of the strap that will pull the neck up, therefore moving the strap to lowest point means that all of the load of the bass is on the strap! this is as apposed to thinking that the weight of the bass below the strap pin will 'pull' the neck up through the strap, when in fact that would be one of the lighter parts of the bass all of the weightless cavities with electrics in are actually there!

I have a similar playing angle in my avatar photo but havent moved the strap pin?!!?

The bass is a short scale (well same scale as the EB0 which is 30.5! I stole the bridge from that donor also as its quite heavy weight and the only good thing about the eb0 is that the intonation can be set pretty tight and stay there!) I have recetified the dive quite a bit (certainly doesnt fall as 'low' as the BEFORE shot above!) and this has eased the weight on my neck hand trying to keep it up a little and thus reducing chance of cramp. Ive done this by moving the strap pin at the bridge end down about 1/4 inch. This on its own didnt make much difference so i looked at what gibson were doing with their SGs as they suffer similar neck dive issues. This led me to forget about using the horn strap pin and fit a strap retaining pin at the rear of the neck plate using a longer reatianing screw. Has helped massively. Dont know the science as its moving it further away from the 12th fret location but is alos placing the strap pin within the basses central line, or something!?? Although now actually playable a small weight like shown above very well may eradicate all neck dive now. Only draw back is the slightly lowered bridge end strap pin means the top of the bass has an inclination to roll forward, away from my stomach, when im not playing...but at least it doesnt flip.

Some pretty cool ideas. I'll try and locate the thread over the next couple of days and hotline it. I read it a while ago and remember thinking at the time thank god I don't have a bass that suffers from neck dive so did save a linkstraight to it even though now SO relevant!

For example what about creating a cavity at the rear of the bass loaded with weights to weigh down that side?

Hi all, just got back in but hasn't everyone been busy! Read with interest many if the comments but need to clarify a couple of things. Firstly the bass is my back up bass to my 'proper' bass (all be it still short scale coz I just don't like long scale basses!) It was originally a 70s jedson bass that are unplayable in standard form due to a number of reasons (half scale with bridge fitted in wrong place at factory, neck a standard guitar neck with bass strings on, bad electrics, poor pickups, floating style roller bridge copy fitted directly to body!). The work I'm doing to it is so I have a better idea of what goes into a bass other than just setting intonation or tightening a truss rod. This is a cost effective and enjoyable approach rather than starting from scratch and also allows me try things without the risk of screwing up an expensive bass. Saying That I'm still keen to make this more playable! Also with regards to strap pin placement at the rear I can confirm that the further up the bass towards the shoulder it is moved the WORSE the neck dive becomes. There is a very good post somewhere on bass chat discussing the mathematics and science behind this, but ultimately the fact I've moved the strap pin down toward the jack socket and not returned it to it's original position is also an indication that in 'practice' the science behind that post is accurate. So, with that in mind, and the fact I'm not changing the way it looks in a noticable way or spending large sums of money for minimal weight savings by replacing the pegs (If I was going to do that I already have some ibanez jet king pegs sitting around) what else is there? Would creating a cavity

Mmmm - im thinking ill be giving the 'hole in the neck' approach a miss! Im really also not the kinda guy to have things hanging from the ens of the bass. I move alot when i play so a bag of weights attached to the end of the strap are likely to cause non insurable damage to a venue, or almost as bad, some pretty serious injuries. Already moved the strap pin down to being in the centre at the rear (rather than as previous where it was further up) and surely the bass will 'flip' when not being played if i move it down towards jack plug area? Bass is a telecaster guitar shape - in fact here it is.... [attachment=85300:short_scale_jedson.jpg]