Greg Edwards69

On the subject of synths, has anyone had much luck with the 3 Osc Synth effect found in the Stereo Pitch/synth section? It seems to be the closest thing to a proper synth “engine”. TBH I’m not great at dialling in synths, so I’m tweaking knobs more randomly than with real intent. I wish line 6 would introduce effect level presets for this type of effect

Chad’s synth presets are the only presets I’ve ever paid for. They sound great but I’ve yet to find a use for them! The only other synth sounds I use are simple ones I made myself for Time is Running Out and Cars.. I was really hoping 3.0 would beef up the synth department but is wasn’t to be. But now they’ve built the polyphonic engine, we can hope they apply this technology into building a better synth engine in the future. I’d love a deep impact / future impact model. FWIW Dr Tone aka Jon Willis knows his stuff when it comes to bass tone, particularly driven rock tones, up synth really isn’t his thing. I have to admit though, most of his presets seem to work great for him, but they just sound awful in my hands.

It's for this reason my band sometimes has the odd 'Technical rehearsal" when we need to try new gear or new sounds and ideas. It does help trying these things at gig level, with our gig rigs in a band context. If everyone is in the same mindset of being listening to the actual sound and being aware of what everyone else is going you can be more critical on the actual tones everyone is producing rather than concentrating on the the song and playing the right notes. I don't play loud at home either, but I've gotten better at dealing in usable sounds at home lately since going fully frfr. I initially bought a Headrush 112 for gigging with rather than plugging my helix into my old bass amp and cab, and I used headphones or my little Blackstar Core ID Beam set to 'flat' mode for home use. I was getting closer than with my old rig, but it still wasn't quite there. What made the difference was getting the smaller Headrush 108 for home use and rehearsals (seriously, this little things kicks serious derrière at full band rehearsals). Tonally, the two frfr speakers are very, very similar and my results are far more consistent. I also engage the contour switch on them at home which boosts the bass and treble and helps factor in fletcher munson loudness effect. And, playing along to tracks in via the spare speaker input also help gauge my tonal mix. Reminds me of my fuzz quest too. I was so disappointed in the big muff PI and it's quirks that I replaced it with an MXR Bass Fuzz Deluxe which had proper dry and wet controls. What a waste of money. It simply didn't have enough volume in the fuzz part - you turn up the dry to maintain unity volume and the fuzz disappeared in a band mix. Ended up getting a cheap Mooer Fog fuzz which worked really well. This is what I love about the Helix thought. If any effect doesn't sit quite right in the mix, you can add eq etc to it and mangle it into shape without having to buy extra pedals and rewire a pedalboard every gig. Even better is the ability to tweak effect settings on the fly, with your feet, whilst you're playing! The future is now.

I hate 9v battery clips with a passion. Why do so many bass builders and stomp box manufacturers insist on using cheap, flimsy battery clips? I'm not heavy handed at all, but I've broken a number of clips over the years, where one of the studs comes away with the dead battery. It scares me everytime I need to change a battery and I have to carefully ease it off with a thin tool.

Or when people mis-spell Squier. Only joking, I've done it more times than I care to mention.

I just reply and ask them to make an offer. What annoys me more is when they ask for a discount because they have to travel to pick the item up. Sorry, I’m happy to negotiate, but I’m not compensating for your travel fares.

Great answer which pretty much aligns with my thinking. Although I hadn’t thought of the retrospective angle. Regardless of the ergonomic, comfort and playability benefits which I’m intrigued by, it definitely seems to be en vogue or “fashionable” hence the likes of sire, Warwick, and musicman offering shortscale models. I just wonder if it’s a trend that’s here to stay or a passing fad.

I'd likely take you up on that offer too. It would be good to meet a fellow bass nerd in the local area. I am quite intrigued to try one. As much as I love my current clutch of basses, there are times it get challenging, more so physically than technically. I had to part ways with my old Warwick Thumb for ergonomic reasons. A 2-3 hour gig would leave me in pain for days - as great a bass as it was, it wasn't worth the agony it left my back and shoulder in. Now that I like the sound of. Could be best of both worlds. Short to medium scale in one instrument. Ibanez make both short scale and fanfret designs - maybe they need a nudge to combine the two. I think you might be onto something. Fender designs are the most ubiquitous to the point of becoming standard. A bit like MS Word - I'm a graphic designer by trade and you wouldn't believe the number of times customers have asked for the finished design in word format! It's probably this ubiquitousness (is that a word?) that made long scale the industry standard.

As the title really. I’m neither for or against short scale - indeed, my first bass was a no name beaten up short scale jazz-ish copy I bought of a mate for £35 so I’m not adverse to them. I know they've been around since the 60s, but I’m seeing more and more of them lately and even big brands not associated with short scale are getting in the act, such as Sire, musicman, Ibanez and even Jackson. Is it the royal blood or Justin mendelson effect, is it just a passing fad, should I join in?

"Look But You Can't Touch" - Poison "Keep Your Hands To Yourself" - The Georgia Satellites "Don't Come around here no more" - Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers "Reach" - S Club 7 "Sweet Caroline" - Neil Diamond (Hands, not touching hands, not reaching out, not touching me, not touching you). "Everybody Hurts" or "It's the end of the world as we know it" - REM

I think Davie504 might win this.

I looked at the pdf manual earlier, but it's rather simplified and doesn't give the information I was after Good to know about the battery life. Yamaha's session cake webpage says that if you use the 4 pole cable supplied (TRRS) you can use an ios device to record and use effects apps to process the input signal. Have you tried this at all?

These devices have just been brought to my attention, and I'm very intrigued! Could be very useful for a silent rehearsal. I have a couple of questions though. Does the SC-02 let you use XLR for vocals and the guitar input at the same time? I'd assume yes, and you simply balance the volume with the guitar volume? Battery life. How long does a good set of AA's last? How does the "iOS device an an effector" work via the aux in jack? Can you use amplitube or Bias to get an amp sound?

I went to my local for a cheap dinner last night and got quite annoyed. Two of the main reasons in the guidelines for not having live music in pubs are social distancing and mitigating the risk of droplet spread caused by raised voices of people singing along. It appears however, that it's perfectly find for pubs to show big screen football matches and for viewers to huddle up, shout, cheer and jeer without intervention.

I'm not sure about that. I highly doubt people are purposely not going to gigs so that can stay at home watch a live stream from someone's iphone instead.

The only issue I have with his videos is the pointless ‘behind the scene’ waffle, often from his car or on the stairs up to his studio, that takes up the first couple of minutes of every video. Just get on with it Scott!

We had our first gig since March last weekend. An outdoor event for a biker club in Pitsea (yeah, glamorous!). My playing was fine, but physically - well, let's just say I was out of practice of playing for extended periods of time, even with a couple of rehearsals - my back is still aching! Looks like the rest of the gigs we've had in the diary have now been cancelled. Only had three more this year two have cancelled and we're working on the assumption the third one will be. The inside scoop from a soundman at a prolific local music venue is that they don't expect live music to start up again until at least March 2021. If not later!

I find that easier with older songs - pre 'protools' era. Song structures tended to be simpler. These days there's song much chopping up and rearranging of song structures done after the recording process, song rarely adhere to a simple structure. Similar to my post above - the bass lines of modern songs are usually technically easy to play, but remembering the structures is the most challenging part.

For me it's "Get what you give" by the New Radicals. It's not a technically challenging bass line by any stretch, pretty simple to be honest. I just have a job remembering it all! There's a lot of beautiful chord voicing shaped by the bass note choice that seem to change every verse and chorus which make it dynamically interesting. Not to mention the tasteful fills here and there at the right place which I seem to forget when to play them.

I must admit, it irks me somewhat when people bash companies like Behringer for ripping off other companies designs, then it transpires that they play a Fender shaped bass that isn't made by Fender.

In the hole on the front bass skin. Acts like a bass port on a speaker cabinet. Their youtube channel has a load of information and demos of it. https://www.youtube.com/user/KickportTV

Our drummer has a roland bass drum trigger alongside his acoustic bass drum pedal which he plugs into the spare channel of my headrush frfr speaker. Usually reserves it few a few songs though, but it sounds great on the odd few 80s pop tunes or modern dance tracks that need 'that' sound. His acoustic bass drum however has been fitted with a 'kick port' device. Wow. I can honestly say it's probably the best upgrade any drummer can make to their bass drum. Tight, focused, deep and not flabby. Hardly needs any damping either. Although louder, it's more balanced with the rest of the kit, and often doesn't require mic'ing up in venues that usually require it. https://kickport.com/kickport