NancyJohnson

If you know me, you'll know that I've tended to convert my passive basses to active via the addition of John East circuits; I reckon I'll installed maybe ten Uni-Pres in total (not all mine).

About three years ago I put a Uni-Pre 3 in one of my Lulls (the JAX/NRT); the installation wasn't that straightforward to be honest, just problematic.  John and I had a loooong conversation over the phone; he gave me a diagnosis that proved 100% correct (it was unrelated to the Uni-Pre and was actually a ground-wire issue on one of the pickups) and I fired up the soldering iron and repaired it while we were speaking.  

Oddly, the bass itself was generally fine, there was an intermittent issue where if I fiddled with the stacked mid controls too much the bass would make a noise not dissimilar to a theremin until I tapped the mid-pot a few times.  Given the reliability issues, I tended to lean on other basses and left the Lull at home, thinking that at some point I'd just get another Uni-Pre and just swap it out.  I decided to give John a shout.  We exchanged emails, he advised me to take the mid-pot out of the circuit (there's a little jumper that allows this), remove it and send it off to him.  I did this and a couple of days later I got the pot back (with a clean bill of health) and a new wiring loom.  All fitted.  Fantastic.  I'd wager the bass actually sounds a little different too.

I'd just like to convey that John's customer service here is off the chart.  Legendary.  I really have no doubt that had the issue been with one of the bigger manufacturers (ie EMG/Aguilar), I wouldn't even have got a reply from their service teams given the age of the part, but John seems to thrive on this stuff.  He's all over Talkbass threads.

100% legend.  What a bloke.

Went to a barbecue yesterday, guy hosting has a ton of guitars, ranging from his early purchase copies through to the current crop of Gibsons and Fenders.  He's not a brilliant player and plays - by his own admission - in a terrible cover band, but has disposable income and loves guitars.

Interestingly, he needed/wanted an acoustic bass for something and picked up a used G4M acoustic bass locally for £90.00.  He asked me for an opinion.

I think I must have played it for over an hour.  Genuinely surprised at how wonderful it was.  Only criticisms were that there were some sharp fret ends up the dusty end and the action could have been a mm or two lower, but it was just brilliant.  Played acoustically, tonally it was full and rich, amazingly so.  Zero fret buzz, neck straight, no high frets.  Neck profile was quite shallow.  Very playable.

Do I need an acoustic bass?  Well do I?

Dual truss-rods aren't particularly unusual - certainly I'd expect a wider necked instrument (ie a 6-string+ bass) to have two as a necessity.  Rickenbacker basses have them (which I've always thought was overkill).  The honourable member for Tamworth has answered how they're used quite succinctly.

Tweaking the truss rod(s) is easy enough and if done with a bit of patience and care, it shouldn't be an issue.  Just do little 1/8 or 1/4 turns tops and remember the rule or righty-tighy and lefty-loosey.  Results are generally instantaneous and in all honesty there's no real need to leave the neck overnight; detune the bass, adjust, tune up, repeat.  The woods/glues/construction of modern basses will allow for tweakage.

Remember also that the truss rods are only one element in the chain to achieve buzz free playing - doesn't matter how straight your neck is if you have a high fret.

17 minutes ago, Danny P said:

Weird, in all my years doing functions I've never had a Burn's Night gig. Is your friend based in Scotland? 

 

We get a few Christmas office party gigs each year which helps for December, but November, January, and February are always dead. We're a well-paid and very in-demand and regularly-booked function band for March-October, so if we don't get any gigs in the winter then it leads me to believe that functions in the winter just don't really exist in the numbers necessary to fund a normal life. 

No, not in Scotland.

My parents used to go to Burn's Night dinner dances.  It was a kind of let loose the shackles of the New Year doldrums.  Can't say that this kind of thing (or dinner dances in general) appeals to me in the slightest, but each to their own.

I have a mate who says his NFI for December and New Year gigs (10+) swells his coffers significantly until the next big hit which is Burns Night weekenders.  

What about registering interest with local studios (session rates) or just joining another working band?

Dependent on how you may be from a numeracy basis, you could contact doing office work outside of music three days a week.   

1 hour ago, Combed20 said:

Hi, is the DP-3X still available?

Thanks 

Yep!

I saw a video on this earlier...Peach Guitars.

Either the guy playing it is a giant or it's a tiny instrument.  It looks absolutely diddly.

Last count I'm at is seven.  Two Lulls, two Hamers, a Spector, a '70s Aria Precision and an Ibanez Roadster project thing.

Reckon I've owned pretty much everything I've desired over the last four decades, wouldn't have minded a Stingray 4HH, but probably wouldn't have hung onto it.  No idea why I bought several Fenders as I disliked them all immensely.  Wish I'd hung on to the white Gibson Thunderbird that I sold to @police squad, but I needed the swag for one of the Lulls.  I'd like to get a Lull T4 at some point.

9 minutes ago, Misdee said:

I remember when those Roadster's came out. They sounded superb, with a very gutsy sound. I seem to  remember the neck profile being a shallow D profile similar to a vintage Stingray, very different to the Musician Bass neck shape.

 

As others have mentioned, those Ibanez pickups that were essentially DiMarzio copies were absolutely brutal! 

There was an active circuit too.  Ridiculous value for money at the time, I think I paid about £190 new.

Nothing but happy memories...I ran it through a Carlsboro Stingray combo at the time; I have some desk-audio from a biggish gig I did a few days after that top photo, just a microphone in front of the cab, and it sounds really nice.  Quite full and modern.  (Of course it's the polar opposite to how I tend to sound now.)

I know there's a ton of information out there about wood stains, but my go to for a flat colour would always be Fiebings Leather Dye.

Used it to stain/colour fingerboards and my old Ibanez body.  Apply/rub in with lint-free kitchen towels (Bounty or similar).  Goes on great, very forgiving, gets everywhere.

Back when all this was fields, my first non-copy bass was an Ibanez Roadster.  Here's a photo of me mid-flight from 1981/82:

About two years ago, I bought another one, it was just a sunburst body, neck, bridge and machines.  Stripped it back, refinished it, dropped in a Warman P/J set and just wired these through two volumes and a pickup selector switch.  Who needs tone controls, eh?

It plays nicely.  I might get a proper respray at some point (perhaps with a bit of glitter in it), no rush.

I'll wager this is something that you will probably not have seen or heard before.

I'm a big powerpop fan and for some time have loved a Californian band called Tsar (who have spawned a few other bands, despite them still being more or less together).  First album came out in 2000 and contained the song 'Kathy Fong Is The Bomb'.  A couple of days ago I had Spotify going at it threw up a track called Baby Talk by a band from Massachusetts called Loose Lips.  Pretty much identical musically [EDIT here] and while the lyrics are different, the delivery of the lines thereon is also pretty much identical. 

The Loose Lips album was released in October 1999, the Tsar album mid-2000, but Jeff Whalen (Tsar front man) said the song was about 'a cool Japanese woman [I] worked with before Tsar got signed'.

Have a listen!

I'm old enough to remember when members here were going nutso about Sue Ryder basses.

13 hours ago, Rollin Thunder said:

When he was in (founded) Sigue sigue sputnik he played “space guitar”  my maybe its that 😉 

 

he always used to play a Thunderbird in the Original generation X and when he played with Sisters of Mercy. 

In SSS, he used a Roland G-707:

In Generation X, he was pretty synonymous with a Rickenbacker 4001/4003 (which he still uses):

There's a couple of photos of him using a Thunderbird (this is with Sham69):

It is interesting reading the comments here.  

The audio character varies from amp to amp; for years I just used a rack set up (Tech21 RBI into a Matrix power amp), while it was a two stage system Tech21 used to make the Landmark amp that would deliver the same result.  The Darkglass AO900 head I'm using now will do more or less the same in one unit.

I used a Hartke combo in a studio last week and found it extremely ponky; same goes those that I'm forced to use in gig places where the backline is already there.  I just need a tone with a bit of grit in it.

Me! Me! Me!  I just plug into a Darkglass AO900. 

I was forced into using a studio combo last week.  God it was awful.

*Edit.  If we're only talking about a one box amp solution, does a separate pre-amp and power amp count?  If so, then realistically me! me! me! for years.  I've never liked chorus/flange/octaver etc.

Following an almost catastrophic hard drive failure, I felt it might be a decent opportunity to rip all my XTC stuff to FLAC, CDs and the BluRay content.

Spent a very enjoyable hour listening to Andy Partridge's work tapes for Skylarking.

2 hours ago, theyellowcar said:

I had a 70’s Columbus Jazz Bass in my younger years - my uncle picked it up for next to nothing, needed all new electronics but it turned into a bit of a machine! Coincidentally my cousin recently bought one and fixed it up - he cleaned it up nicely

I had a sunburst one.  £65.00 Adam Music, Staines.  1978.  Nothing but happy memories. 

As detailed elsewhere here, I was lucky enough to pick up an Aria Pro II Primary Bass via Gumtree about ten years ago.  It was part of a job lot of three guitars and a practice amp.  £50.

The bass was non-functioning and bits were broken/missing, so I'll admit I threw a little bit of swag at it to get it up and running.  New bridge, used Delano pickup, I had pots and an old black scratch plate.  The finish on the back of the neck was was very unpleasant and sticky, so I sanded that back.  Every time I take her out, I put a new ding in her.

Here she is in all her beauty.  

58 minutes ago, Paulhauser said:

Great! 

I have my reservations about the ergonomics but I understand that this is such a personal thing.

Turns out there is one white Euro X for sale in this side of the channel.... 

There's just too much focus on Thunderbird shaped instruments suffering from neck dive.  I've been playing 'birds for about 15 years (Gibson, Hamer, Lull and now the Spector) and while yes it's inevitable, I use both hands while I'm playing so it isn't really a problem per se.

14 hours ago, Paulhauser said:

@hiram.k.hackenbacker's for sale post bought me back here. (Unfortunately I'm no game for it me being outside of GB)

I loved seeing this project being realized by @cetera and eventhough the NS shape is what does it for me in the Spector world I know the X shape is one of the Holy Grails for some of the hard core Spector players.

How's everybody likes their Euro X now after a few months?

 

 

 

I'm loving mine.  The Spector/Darkglass AO900 set up just seems to work very well with each other, so much so that I haven't used any of my Tech21 (DI-2112 and a dUg DP-3X) outboard kit for a while now.

Desired tone is an odd thing; when I got the dUg pedal I described it as a DI-2112 on steroids and it pretty much is - it'll do pretty much what the DI-2112 and then expand on that.  The AO900 is kind of like the DP-3X on steroids; never really bonded with it until the Euro-X arrived and I took a bit of time to actually dial in what I wanted tonally.  (With minimal tweakage my Lull has also come alive.)

2 hours ago, Woodinblack said:

 

Indeed - and this is what always gets me. If your preamp 'works better' at 18v than 9V, it means it isn't working properly at 9v.

I suppose you could also look at it by saying the circuit was designed to tolerate 18v and should be 18v, but operates okay at 9v and is sold as such.  

Oddly - and swerving the thread a little - I have a Geddy Lee Tech21 thing - the DI-2112.  It works fine off a 9v PSU, but it sounds better/fuller with an 18v supply (to quote Tech21 'for increased headroom and clarity').  

18 minutes ago, ahpook said:

 

You're missing the whole joy of soldering angle

 

Oh, did I mention that before ?

Sometimes I wonder whether the original posts on the occasional thread here are simply put up to disgruntle the masses.

Let's see.  First off, my Rush experience.  Saw them several times from the first UK tour (Hammersmith) through to one of the Wembley shows.  Genuinely like them as individuals, adore the rapport and chemistry.  My first Rush album purchase was All The World's A Stage on Canadian/Anthem import (double vinyl/triple gatefold), after which I went backwards to the first album; 2112, Caress Of Steel, Fly By Night, Rush.  Of the first four albums I only really connected with the tracks that featured in the live album and a lot of Caress Of Steel was frankly unlistenable (it still is).  Moving forward, I went up to Grace Under Pressure but probably only listened to it once (looking at the track listing a couple of moments ago I could recall how any of the songs went) and that was pretty much it.  I do have some live BluRays and enjoy these, although I'm not familiar with a lot of the material.  I don't have any issue with Geddy's voice.  Shrill at times, but it is what it is.  It's Rush.

Moving forward to Geddy's chops.  The bloke is off the scale.  I know it's all horses for courses, but within the prog/hard rock genre he's easily in the top five bassists ever.  I mean the guy is never going to fit into Living Colour or Nine Inch Nails, but he's easily up there with all the greats.  Just did a quick search for 'top rock bassists' on google and look at the list that comes back; there's a lot of big names there.  He's a country mile ahead of most of them.

9 hours ago, hill76 said:

Genzler re/Q pedal quotes higher input headroom depending on supply voltage (9-18v).

Headroom is an odd thing. 

If you have a 900w amp (yes) and you only play at 30% of it's perceived output because it's goes so loud (yes), the headroom element is quantified as the unused 70%.  While that 70% demonstrably represents the ability of the amp to go louder, it also leads that at comfortable levels (the 30%) the amplifier isn't being driven so hard that it goes all mushy.

Now headroom in pickups/circuit?  If the the pickups work perfectly well at 9v, sticking an additional 9v into the circuit isn't going to realistically provide 'headroom' per se.  Assuming the 18v power is within the capacity of the circuit and doesn't fry anything, the additional voltage isn't going to do anything radical; the circuit cannot perform outside it's designated parameters, it won't go louder or add addition tone as it's limited by design (I didn't really notice any difference when I did it). 

I've read up enough on this over the years, people saying when they hit hard the EMGs would distort/clip, whereas with an 18v they wouldn't (resolution, lower the pickups or turn the output pot on the bass and/or learn how to adapt your right hand technique).  Possibly less output noise from the bass (never suffered this with any bass, there's a thing called grounding, or you can drop the earth on a DI box).

Thing is we do these tweaks because we're bass players and because we feel we need to.  These things make little or no difference once you're in a full-band context.