Al Krow

Kinda glad our guitarist hasn't discovered you guys, his two favourite genres are...ska and reggae and we currently have none in our sets! 😅

Oooh that does sound like a LOT of fun! How long has the band been going?

Happy to get the ball rolling... My current band is LA Mixtrax. We formed as a four piece (female vox, guitar, bass and drums), at the start of 2022 to play pop / rock covers from 1960s to current and initially were doing mainly pub gigs, but seem to get a healthy dose of function gigs in the diary these days, which are both better paying but involve a significantly bigger time commitment. We're based in London and will be averaging around 60 gigs a year for this year and last. Our pub gigs are generally London but we will travel further afield for function gigs. The current line-up has 3 different lead singers, each of whom we think are great and each bring something different to the party, with the 'backing band' being more permanent. I'm band leader for my sins. Probably the best place to hear us in on Insta- LA Mixtrax, which seems to be a main focus for our social media effort these days. In terms of getting more gigs - the starting point was having some half decent gig footage from our early pub gigs to share with new pub venues, and then investing in getting a showreel done a couple of years back to help us get function gig work. I'd personally say this is a 'must have' for function work - there's a huge amount of very slick competition out there and a showreel is pretty much all a potential client booking you for their wedding or milestone birthday party has to go on. I'd love to get us tighter and better sounding over the next couple of years and increase the proportion of function gigs from around a quarter of the total that we're currently doing.

BC cover bands 1. @Al Krow LA Mixtrax Four piece female fronted, formed in 2022. London based. Mixture of pub and function work doing approx. c. 60 gigs pa. 2. @SumOne Skavana 8 piece: Drum, Bass, Lead Guitar, Rhythm Guitar, Singer, Trombone, Sax x2 (alto and baritone) Also formed in 2022. Ska and reggae cover versions of Nirvana & other well known bands. Sussex based c. 25+ gigs per year mostly pubs and small festivals BC tribute bands

BC original bands 1. @Lozz196 The Spacewasters garage punk/rock. Formed c. 2005 years. 10 gigs a year London and south plus a few overseas. 2. @Russ Earthbound AD female-fronted original metal. Based in NY/NJ, USA. Currently not gigging much - but new EP release just out. 3. @woodyratm The Julian Year difficult to classify “cyber nu-metal??” Formed 2010. Gigging maybe every few months. 4. @Cat Burrito Deadlight Dance 2 piece boy-band 80s goth, formed 2020. Wiltshire based. Mixture of covers and original (signed). > 20 gigs pa. 5. @Wilson_51_ Erronaut four piece stoner/doom/grunge c 30 gigs pa - debut album released end 2024 6. @BigRedX Hurtsfall post-punk/goth/synth-pop formed 2019 Nottingham based c. 20 gigs pa - have released 10 singles 7. @Stofferson Syncolima stoner / grunge formed c. 2021 Notts / Derby based c. 30 gigs pa - 3rd album out this year & tour in Nov 8. @Twigman Sad lovers and giants formed 1980 Watford based, gig a few times a year, mostly overseas, Currently working on their 10th album

Thought it would be both really interesting and a great way to get to know each other a bit better, if we had a thread dedicated to the current main band we each play in? So, if you're in a band, please share a bit about: - your band, its history, whereabouts you're based and play, music genres? - whether it's covers and mainly play at pubs and clubs or if you regularly do functions? - or if it's a tribute or originals band? Please feel free to share how many gigs you guys are typically doing each year, and how you go about getting bookings. A video clip / picture is often worth a thousand words 😊

I agree Phil, I thought that was an excellent cover (how did they get the vocal echos done so well?) and why has that got less tham 150 views?!

First dibs on yours please when you sell it on then! 😅

Fwiw I don't think the Boss SY-1 or SY-200 come close to the FI in terms of the quality of its synth tones, but it delivers something decent enough for live use on a few songs that need it in our sets. (I also really like its arpeggiator!) I'd therefore be pleasantly surprised if the SY-300 was able to come anywhere near close to what the MXR / FI are producing tonally. What the SY-200 does provide, however, is excellent "tracking" (in the commonly used sense of that term) and a lack of glitchiness, neither of which seem possible without changing playing technique with the FI. So, despite its limitations, the Boss is the one that I've kept on my board. If the MXR provides a combination of great synth tones, accessibility, and tight tracking, as they seem to indicate they've done, then they've pretty much hit the jackpot for many bass players looking to use a synth pedal for live use.

That would be great, Peter. And an honest comparison of latency, tracking and glitching would be very welcome too! I've not kept up to date on the latest FI manuals, but was thinking that if instead of "1 to 99" you renamed the pre-set patches as being in the style of "[Artist initials]/[Song]" it would immediately make the FI more accessible and, dare I say, even more desirable? You could then have the 10 most popular bass synth sounds as the first bank? Just a thought!

Did you manage to get any clips to share with us? No worries if not. As you mentioned, there doesn't seem to be an input gain with the sub mix doubling up as the output gain.

Are you still on the 2.4 GHz setting for the CQ wifi?

+tracking/latency/glitching = usability live. Really interested to see if the MXR lives up to the hype on this!

Switched the desk wifi on our CQ18T from 2.4Ghz to 5.0 Ghz at our gig tonight.. The personal mix apps on the band members' phones worked flawlessly with no drop outs for the first time.

I've used it as standard on pretty much all my patches for live use, to tighten up the low end. Cut bass at about 50Hz.

Thanks for that - hope the gig goes well tonight and look forward to your clips! PS that's a seriously impressive pedal board!

Great to hear such a favourable report from a function gig! Did you get any clips of you guys playing live? What's the latency/tracking like vs the C4?

The preamp EQ frequencies for quite a few bass brands seems to be something they keep close to their chest!

Shipping and import duties will account for another sizeable chunk of the rest.

Yeah it's mad! This is a potentially stunning new piece of kit that's been 18 months in development; appears to have fab tracking for 5 string basses, has some totally usable bass synth sounds straight out of the box and a very compact form factor. Not surprising that it's making so many go weak at the wallet! Sure usb, midi etc. would be really nice to have - but I guess we've got something to look forward to in a Mk2 in 3-4 years time. In the meantime, is it going to give a bunch of us bass-players, who aren't also part-time keys players (and very likely have no wish to be!) a better synth sound? Just maybe 😅

That's 'cos everything IS pricey these days!

Comprehensive run through of the features from MXR:

+1^^ to both of those which, as you say, are great selling points. I've always struggled with the tracking / glitchiness of one or two of the leading synth pedals, which meant they didn't work for me live. I ended up with a Boss SY200 which has fabulously tight tracking, but doesn't have the quality of synth tones of e.g. a FI. This pedal seems to deliver the best of both worlds. That really is quite a feat, well done MXR/IMA!

Sorry I won't be able to help you out on that dear chap this time around...but I'll happily join you on the 2nd hand waiting list! (And I've got first dibs on any kit coming onto the market from @SumOne under our long term 'gear' supply arrangements 😅). Wow! This thing is already shaking up the market - just checked what's been recently listed in the FS section and quite a few synth pedals! Clearly a lot of folk (understandably IMO given how good this thing appears to be!) seem to be wanting to make the switch.

Haha fair enough! For those needing to scroll through several patches mid set and not during a break between songs, then there is the option of using an external foot switch - I guess similar to what many folk use with their multi-fx? Midi capability would have been a very nice touch.