Al Krow

Apparently Jaco didn't use a pedal board compressor live. Left it to the WR sound engineer. I guess he must have sounded shite.

Some folk seem to manage without any pedals other than a tuner and go straight into their amps. I'm a little staggered that anyone goes to listen to them 😁

Hi Rb - that's pretty much exactly it! My post below from a couple of weeks back, ties in exactly with what you're hearing. The 425/424 are a slightly updated version of 415/414 model that you had, with laminated rather than single piece necks. The 1025/1024 then adds more refined pups and bridge and I think the body construction on the 1025/4 is 3 piece construction vs 1 piece (I believe) on the 425/424 and predecessor 415/4. As I mentioned in my post below, I think the bulk of the tonal difference is down to the more refined pups. I didn't find that the 1025 had higher output than my 425 - the pups were pretty hot on that. Dunno if that could be down the relative pup heights of the two basses you've had? But all in all, sounds like you've hit the jackpot with your 1024. What was the issue with the 414 neck you had?

How are you finding the 1024 compared to your previous 414? Is this one more "you"? You and @gobasserk have definitely started a trend for BB's on wood! Does look great!

You're actually contractually obliged to get a B1-4 as a compact version of your B3N, (btw that's exactly what I did and there's one on for a good price in FS right now), as you started up the B1-4 thread! It's the law, right? 😁 Besides it resulted in me getting two of the darned things and the same for @JohnDaBass also. Oh yes and another one due to your Boss SY-1 thread, and worst of all a thread on Ibby SRs meaning I'm now lumbered with three of those! As for that neat Lekato Looper we've both got, was that me or you spotting that? Clearly your threads can be very expensive! More seriously, if you're thinking about trading in your B3N, then worth noting that the B1-4 does have some neat little upgrades over the B3N, as well as being more compact, e.g. global vol and 3 band EQ (can't recall if the B3N has a global vol?); drums being accessible parallel to rather than just within a patch and being able to access the patches in banks of 10. The B3N wins on number of stomp switches and 150 patch storage rather than 50. Speaking of John and his bass, we're trying to work out whether we can easily ToneLib file share by email. If we can, I'd be very happy to make my 35 or so patch efforts available to other BCers on this thread.

I think many Emperors would claim to feel utterly naked without their compressors always on. Oh wait...

I'll let you have a pic of my PB at some point with all the others that have survived many and various pogroms. Tbf on you many, many were not so lucky and are now being used and abused by other BCers, eBayers, fBook and Gumtree afficiandos. But that was pre Covid. The world has changed...

Haha! I'm happy to take a sweepstake on that following your recent "success" with the SY-1 prediction. Oh wait...

A decent dedicated octaver will likely have better tracking in terms of going low, although pretty much all octavers will warble if you sustain the note too long (@Woodinblack helpfully pointed out that this was not "unusual as the primary octave dies faster than the harmonics"). I recently got a Boss OC-5 which I can readily recommend and is reasonably priced (obviously nothing is going to compete with the B1-4 on price though!). They seem to be flying off the shelves though and a lot of places are out of stock.

Now if that were only true for my pedalboards! 😁

But at least I've FINALLY got around to getting one! Must have bought and sold literally 100 pedals in the time it's taken me to decide which DAW to get!! I mean what was going on here? I guess (more seriously) a DAW is not just for Christmas in the way a pedal can be: once you've invested the time getting to grips with it you're kinda committed; it's more of a serious relationship than a holiday romance. Well that's my excuse anyway! 😁

Congrats - that's a stunner!

So, perhaps the biggest dither in DAW-land over. I've decided the answer has gotta be whatever is going to make it easiest to collaborate with yer BC mates... In my case that's going to be Cubase Elements £77 from Juno or £78 via Amazon. And apparently it's great. Can't wait!

@krispn - cheers for taking the to time write that lengthy post for us. Certainly no need to personalise this as I'm actually not looking for any particular guidance or input - I've had plenty! But thanks for your very kind offer - it's appreciated. FWIW my focus these days is much more addressing all the other stuff you rightly mentioned in your excellent earlier post; with gear being an enjoyable & fun distraction rather than the main event - although I do still end up getting suckered into thread re-treads such as this, lol! My challenge (and apologies for continuing to repeat it), in the context of this thread, is for folk who are finding compression works well to share what that actually sounds like, as a couple have already kindly done. I get that it will be tailored to their own set up. Others can then make up their own mind whether what they are hearing is going to be useful for them or not in one of the eight areas you outlined earlier, plus the more limiter focus that ped shared. And if we get a few more clips to add to the ones we already have, this thread could very possibly end up being one of the most useful compression threads ever! 😊

@acroxixo sounds great! Feel free to share any YT clips of you playing the bass / rig in action with either (or both!) of your bands. Of course, I'm pretty much the last person on BC who is going to contradict you about just how good a BB1025 is!

+1^^ And a top notch Berg amp (yes it's D class and I know we were debating those a few pages back - but it gets my vote!) head to top it off. (I think there's one in the FS right now). @acroxixo is there a full rock band you're in, that your rig gets played with?

@krispn cheers mate - TJS's stuff is always thoughtfully put together. What would be fantastic, when you're next at rehearsal, is if you (or anyone else!) could get a recording done "in the mix" with comp engaged and switched off - I'm sure this thread will still be "open" when your laptop has been cleaned up 😊 The nuance point you mention is, however, an important one - as we are constantly told the real benefit of the PB compression is "in the mix". And maybe you could encourage your southern buddy to share the clip he's already done, as I'm sure everyone is bored with me and him going round in circles (again) - lol! Particularly given that it would take 30 seconds to upload and he's made a point of referencing it earlier in the thread. If I recall correctly, his band was sounding pretty good in case he's feeling shy!

Soz - gonna be nothing further from me in terms of compression related clips - I'm not the one saying that "normal" (i.e. not being purely used as a limiter) pedal board compression makes a noticeable difference in a band mix. Besides, I've posted a shed load of clips on this forum over the past few years (this week's are on the OC-5 thread); so I'm sure a few BC comp fanboys , if they really believe in the value of pedal board compression, will oblige. If there's silence on the subject, well I think that tells its own story. As yours is already done, shouldn't take any effort to share that one for us all to have a listen to? And maybe the OP could oblige with a couple to illustrate what the misconceptions are he believes we are all suffering from? Obliged to Kev for getting the ball rolling with that A/B comparison of compressor both bypassed and engaged from 2013. Good man. Be useful to hear a few transparent clean compressors, without the overlay of heavy dirt, in action in similar vein particularly in a band mix. But I'm not holding my breath! 😉

Actually there was a very useful sound clip on that video you posted at 05.47 to 06.27 where he A/B's with and without the compressor on, so thanks for sharing. That's exactly the thing it would be great to hear more of. Folk can now have a listen to the clip and make their own minds up. I'm afraid I'm not going to stray from my simple point (and it's not directed at you specifically Kev - it's more a general one for this discussion): if we BC'ers or our audience can't hear and notice a difference then frankly there's plenty else to be focussing on (e.g. all the stuff in krispn's post). If we can and it's making a positive difference, then excellent. I look forward to folk posting their A/B sound clips with comps on and off, particularly useful in a live mix. In the meantime, no point me commenting further - I've said my piece 😁

Ok cool - back to my point: if it can't be heard even by us BC'ers, well what's the point? Let's get some clips posted, gents.

Mate, if there is a cheese sandwich on offer this time, I'll be around in a flash! 😁 Shared clips on this thread would be awesome! If it can't be heard even by us BC'ers, well what's the point? That's really all I'm trying to get across.

"It's subtle, unintuitive, and rarely a night-and-day change when A/B'd. This makes the compression-proving sound clip a bit of a wild goose chase, and to worry whether an audience member could pick it out?" "There is no chance in hell a punter is going to notice that!" So in conclusion - you're not going to hear it on a clip (although apparently we can on Cuzzie's?) because that's akin to chasing geese, and no audience member will ever notice whether you have a compressor or not. As @Kev rightly said: "...It just means more to some bassists than others, and that’s absolutely fine" or as krispn put it very eloquently earlier: I'm totally good with that! I'd best now vacate the field for the return of the Jedi 😁

Bingo, no disagreement from me there 😉

@Jus Lukin - lol! Compression isn't rocket science: threshold, compression ratio, make up gain to compensate for compression, attack and release. Get to grips with those and you're good to go. But if PB compressors make a difference in a live mix, it should be a simple thing to make a recording to demonstrate. Come on gents let's hear ya!

Yup, dear fella, you did and all credit to you for that one! The "but" was it didn't sound too different to a slight volume boost! But be great if you are happy to share the clip here as it's exactly the sort of evidence that is actually useful in this discussion and I suspect would be of interest to more than just yours truly (aka Sith Lord, apparently 😁). Yeah fair enough Kev and I think that's well understood. I think the point is a LOT of folk have done exactly this over the years and not found any difference. Bear in mind from a live player's perspective they should be wearing a decent set of ear plugs if they value their hearing and the same for your band mates. So perhaps the better test would be whether someone in the audience specifically listening out for the bass line could notice it. And that's where a few half decent recordings would be really useful.