xilddx

[quote name='KK Jale' post='1042327' date='Nov 30 2010, 01:28 PM']+1 on OldG's excellent advice above. If you can't make a Shubb work for you, the problem is a) the guitar's set up or the way you're using it. Guaranteed. Sorry! Kysers are the worst - the unadjustable grip of death. The G7 is okay but pricey, and every time you pick it up you're starting from scratch tension-wise and you'll have to check no strings are buzzing by playing the open strings - a nightmare on stage. The only decent affordable Shubb contender IMO is the Planet Waves Dual Action. A bit gawky but very clever - instant clamping but adjustable, like a Kyster/Shubb cross. [url="http://www.soundslive.co.uk/product~name~Planet-Waves-Dual-Action-Guitar-Capo-PW-CP-05c~ID~14522.asp"]Linky here[/url][/quote] Another thumbs up for the Shubb, never had a problem in twenty years with mine. Your guitar is at fault or you are not applying the capo properly.

[quote name='funkymonkey25uk' post='1041468' date='Nov 29 2010, 06:31 PM']hey guys n gals yeah just to add my 2p's worth i've just got into the Neon strings after being a Rotosound user for the last 18yrs and I must say that I was shocked on how good the Neon strings are. Great tone, highs/mids/lows etc..... I found a great ebay supplier works out around £20 and I received them in less than 7 days which rocks! ta much! Nathan p.s i'll try and add some pics.... [attachment=65337:neon_strings_002.JPG] [attachment=65338:neon_strings_001.JPG][/quote] Fab! I gigged mine last Friday. They have great tone and feel, especially with my silk gloves Great strings, I love DRs.

[quote name='Kraken' post='1042337' date='Nov 30 2010, 01:35 PM']that is a conversation you and I are going to have to have over a brew or two... [/quote] I just want to be clear, I was pretty much told I shouldn't criticise anything unless I can do better myself. Which, to me at least, is bollocks and a rather wimpy, meek attitude. Hence my comment about criticising the gov, even though I could not possibly be an MP

Wow! Very, very impressive, Jake! I've recorded at BBC Maida Vale's main studio, but although it's big and got lots of history and whathaveyer, it's a bit old now. Air Studio 1 looks bloody fabulous!!

[quote name='jonunders' post='1042351' date='Nov 30 2010, 01:41 PM']is this a good show, worth going to. can you pick up some good bargins at these show's[/quote] No-one knows, mate. It's the first one.

[quote name='Andy' post='1042271' date='Nov 30 2010, 12:54 PM']My feelings exactly mate. I feel musically illiterate, but you guys have all helped motivate me to arrange my first lesson with Jakesbass - it's happening next week and I'm genuinely excited about it - definitely the start of a journey [/quote] Hey, mate, be prepared for the most exciting and stimulating music lesson of your life. Jake's a bloody hero. Glad you went for it

I had a Mighty Mite maple and ebanol fretless J neck and it was brilliant. Fit my Jap P Special like a glove, played beautifully, was cheap to buy, very well made.

[quote name='BassBunny' post='1041591' date='Nov 29 2010, 08:23 PM']Cheers for the comments. I wasn't after a freebie, just a nudge in the right direction and sorted now thanks.[/quote] May we know how you sorted it? It would be useful on this forum. Thanks.

[quote name='SMV' post='1040372' date='Nov 28 2010, 08:06 PM']Wow interesting responses - I'd like to reiterate the 'in jest' part of the topic title... It's nice to get a bit of debate and opinions going though! Paul - I too find it handy when I forget my pick... or need a quick change from fingerstyle mid song (though I can't remember the last time I needed to do that!) Mike - I was indeed going hell for leather with it and I paid the price! I usually use the technique in a more restrained manner - I've found the O'jays 'money' bass line sounds sweet when I play it double thumbed as opposed to pick or fingers. Garry +1 on the palm muting. Wil +1 Larry's got the funk... I wish he'd share it more! I'm going to stick to my guns on the 'mostly' pointless though because I don't think it expands the bass vocabulary beyond music you couldn't play using more 'traditional' techniques. Discuss?[/quote] It can not possibly be a pointless technique. It allows you to play very fast, and will therefore make you feel like a MAN. And as we know, to be a MAN you have to play without a pick, and play very, very fast.

[quote name='Doddy' post='1041813' date='Nov 29 2010, 11:30 PM']I thought the original letter writer was just as bad. The interesting thing in the mag for me was the interview with the new girl from the Smashing Pumpkins (very tidy,by the way). She mentions how Billy Corgan got in touch after her band supported his,and he offered her the gig. So,the whole 'open auditions' via YouTube were bullshit then?[/quote] I thought both sounded like a pair of twats, but I think Jeff Berlin had a better point. Just started reading the Wooten interview, HE speaks a LOT of sense. BUT, I cannot wait for the Scott Thunes interview next month! Great picture of him in the back, I doubt he's lost a shred of attitude.

[quote name='ead' post='1040111' date='Nov 28 2010, 05:04 PM']I look forward with much anticipation to your own highly informative, blemish free, gilt edged, advertising free and presumably also foc publicaion I'm at a loss to think of one specialist (or even generalist) publication that is not imperfect; sorry about the double negative there folks. If it draws a few more people into the fold then good luck to it. I enjoy reading it but have yet to buy any gear just because it was recommended there, I go and try it myself along with some other similar products. Although in my defence I know nothing about anything so I find bits of it quite informative. I normally enjoy your post silddx but I think you're somewhat off target here.[/quote] I had better not hear you criticise the government on here, my friend, or even a bass guitar, unless you can build either to a higher standard. EDIT: I think this thread helped them actually, they have made quite a few improvements, although stupid mistakes still creep in. How's your motor car by the way? Is it perfect? Any criticisms?

I printed out major-minor's Bass Bootcamp Session 1 today. f***ing BRILLIANT!! There's an pinned link index of them all (20 odd sessions) in the Theory section. Be working on my triads reading and playing tonight. Love the Simplified Sight Reading for Bass book too, it really is ace. Feeling GOOD!

[quote name='Faithless' post='1041059' date='Nov 29 2010, 12:42 PM'] You still don't need to read to be in a band, right... Seriously though, I'm glad you've 'found' reading, Sild. It definetly makes one a better musician.[/quote] Thanks mate. I have never "needed" to read in any band I've ever been in, but I suppose I have a good ear and can pick things up quickly and compose, sing harmonies, etc. But reading gives you access to so much information that was previously hidden. I want to study harmony, and counterpoint, in much more depth once I have learned this language. Cheers.

White all the way for me. I have a black one too which looks ok and is the only other colour option for me. I used to say white for fretless and black for fretted. These days I only like white. I need to look sharp on stage, and white basses are, without exception, very stylish and look great in any musical situation. The ugliest finishes I have ever seen are the Pedulla two tone bursts, HIDEOUS to behold, and you can see the wood grain through them too which makes them even more HIDEOUS.

[quote name='51m0n' post='1040868' date='Nov 29 2010, 10:04 AM']Errr no.... I said (and you may have noticed a reference to it once or twice already in this very thread) a compressor with only one knob, (and anything with no metering at all, is complete and utter b*ll*x I stand by that too, anything where you dont have the metering to see what it does, and the controls to tailor it to the envelope of the sound your bass, with your strings, you playing it, your fx, etc etc etc is only useful if you are lucky, and even then will only ever be a one trick pony. That trick having been designed more to make an easy sale of the amp for non-technical staff in guiatr shops than to actually enable you to get the best from the amp, whilst also beiung so completely generic as to be flawed nearly always. I may have reiterated this more than once in fact.... Without decent metering (ie input, output AND gain reduction) you cannot really tell when compresison is happening - its inherently hard to hear, unless it is set up to be so incredibly in your face that it is in fact crushing the life out of your dynamics (as much a result of stupidly fast attack times, and or stupidly long release times as the ratio and threshold). With decent metering you can quite easily set a 'best guess' ratio (say 3:1 for starters), longish attack, medium release, then bring the threshold down until you get significant (but not overpowering) levels of gain reduction (lets say an average of 3-6dB, with the occasional real peak at 9dB). Then take the gain up to unity with the makeup gain. The play with the attack to make it effect the attack of your bass sound in the way you wish (either loping it off of accentuating it) then you can tweak the release to fit the music you are playing. Then fine tune the ratio, threshold and makeup gain. Yes it takes about 5 minutes, yes it is iterative, yes it is a bit of a dark art (but no where near as bad as you might think after a couple of goes). You need to keep in mind that there are different ways to achieve the same amount of compression, either a low threshold (ie compression starts sooner) and a very low ratio, or a much higher ration and a higher threshold. Although these two strategies produce the same amount of gain reduction they can be very different in how they actually sound. You need to have the controls available and take the time to try both ways to see what workd best for you. Ask Silverfoxnik how having his DBX set up 'just so' worked out for him on the gig he had that evening, and it only took a few minutes to get it right. Thing is it really does have decent metering and all the controls you need. Sounded pretty fab to me when we were getting the settings together on it. I would highly recommend one to anyone looking for a compressor for bass. I also doubt that the gain in your POD is useless, I'm pretty sure it would be a makeup gain, and if you dont find you need it then the chances are that you arent really doing any compression at all. Having said that I haven't played with that particular device before so I may be wrong as to exactly what the relationship is between the two in that case. (Plus you cant underestimate the importance of more lights and meters on your rig, it helps you see where the one is, and we all know how important that is!) Sorry for the long explanation Nigel, just consider yourself lucky you didnt sit through the full works on Saturday, I think some people clearly wished they had made your choice too [/quote] I was only winding you up, mate Thanks for the explanation though. I have to use my ears for compression, and if it sounds right to me, then it's right. It's in the studio where I tend to leave it alone. Mind you, the Krupa album is mostly my POD compressor, the engineer thought it sounded really good. And he had some really nice old studio compressors.

[quote name='Clarky' post='1040645' date='Nov 28 2010, 11:57 PM']When we have all traded on our amps with one compressor knob [/quote] I wish I'd have been at the compressor thing with 51m0n The POD X3 has compressor, two controls - Threshold and Gain. The gain is pretty pointless as far as I've found, but the Threshold is very useful. With Kit's band it's very low and with Krupa it's quite high. It depends on the music I'm playing, Kit requires a LOT of dynamics so I use very little compression. Threshhold is all I need. In the studio, it gets more complicated. Live you need only one knob, IMHO. I'm assuming 51m0n said something similar?

[quote name='Johngh' post='1040607' date='Nov 28 2010, 11:33 PM']Finally had chance to post. Stayed at Weybridge the night and travelled back up to snowy Derbyshire this evening. It was great to put faces to so many names and it's a great result with all the money going to charity. Highlight for me was Urb's clinic, great sounding Sei he has as well. Many thanks to all who contrbuted to getting this bash set up and all who provided clinics. Well worth the trip from Derbyshire.[/quote] sh*t man, I didn't even know you were there! It would have been so nice to say hello. I was in urb's clinic too.

[quote name='Doddy' post='1040598' date='Nov 28 2010, 11:23 PM']I like this thread. Nice one guys.[/quote] It's good innit! Thanks for all your good words too, mate

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='1040402' date='Nov 28 2010, 08:32 PM']Fortunately I don't have to choose between X Factor wannabees and Elton John cover versions, there is a ton of actually-good music I can listen to instead.[/quote] That's such an unfair and ignorant statement my friend. And suggests to the suggestible reader, that maybe you are unable to distinguish between those with real musicality and those who simply have a singing voice exploited by TV moguls. I'm pretty sad about that because I like you, respect you, and know you are better than making deliberately provocative statements without sensible foundation.

[quote name='Hamster' post='1040353' date='Nov 28 2010, 07:49 PM']I had an enjoyable day too - although I was pretty tired by 6pm! Here's the final score on the doors: Entry money - £370 Raffle - £135.35 Tea, coffee & cakes - £29.50 Profit = £534.85 Cost of venue hire - £230 Clear profit to charity = £305 This will be split between The Kambia Appeal (kambia.org.uk) - supporting a hospital in Sierra Leone (Si did his thing on their last web site), and, The Samaritans (samaritans.org) The school principle - Gareth Balch, is very kindly donating the venue hire fee to the school's adopted charity, - The African Childrens Choir - [url="http://africanchildrenschoir.com/"]http://africanchildrenschoir.com/[/url] So, every penny raised - [u][b]£535[/b][/u] - goes to charity! - I'm very pleased!, and well done to all who chipped in and contributed to an enjoyable day in numerous ways! Colin[/quote] That's fantastic! Great stuff, Colin

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' post='1039988' date='Nov 28 2010, 03:12 PM']I have had a busy weekend again, Good gig though! Im going to write in my book the proper names as its confusing with all the whole notes and half notes etc. I suppose its a bit of a negative mark against the book I have? How are the rest of the provisional readers getting on? Its all gone a bit quiet....[/quote] Yes, sorry, I've been incredibly busy, but I've been doing a bit where I can. I started to feel the need for a good book. Out of the blue at the SE Bass Bash yesterday Thunderbird13 gave me the Bass Builders Simplified Sight Reading for Bass. I had a look last night and it's superb! A really excellent book for learning this stuff at any level. It's just masses of exercises in a very logical structured format with very useful explanations and techniques for learning. I found I could do most of the timing exercises quite easily, even the dotted notes and rests, tied notes, etc. It's the actual notes and how they relate to the bass I need to really focus on. Comes with a CD although T13's was missing as per his earlier post. I have just ordered the book with CD from Amazon along with Fingerboard Harmony for Bass by Gary Willis, from the same series of books (both just over £11 each). I'm really excited by all this I'm already becoming a lot more creative as a result of dipping my toes in the water. Wish I'd have done this 20 years ago but then I have a lot of experience and fragments of theory and attitude to draw upon so all this will be applied much more effectively to my playing and composition. I already have a musical philosophy and I'm starting to realise I [b]do [/b]have an attitude and some personality on my chosen instrument. All that is going to help me apply the theory and develop a lot more, more quickly. My attitude to this has changed completely. Not knowing theory and not being able to read now makes me feel like a right sucker. I could have been so much better as a musician had I bothered to get my head out my arse years ago, and even recently. I also feel like a baby, incomplete and naive to music. Here starts a new and exciting journey!

[quote name='Mcgiver69' post='886247' date='Jul 5 2010, 12:06 PM']I don't know her personally but to be honest I prefer her music to Lady Gaga's. She looks like a young lass working her butt off to make it. I like "Guns & Horses" it sounds like good honest pop.[/quote] She's great! May I ask why you mention Gaga? Have you put them both in the same basket perhaps? They are like chalk and cheese, incomparable. You may as well say you prefer free range eggs to oak floorboards. Gaga works extremely hard too you know, there is a human being under there, working just as hard as Ellie, and oak floorboards. Just thought I would point that out

[quote name='Jigster' post='1038385' date='Nov 26 2010, 10:48 PM']...had a chance to gig at Babalou and we couldn't make it work - how's the set up there?[/quote] It's in a crypt so low ceilings and pillars obstructing the view of the stage from most angles. The stage is quite small but there is a rear bit to it for drums and side areas for your string section or whatever. PA is ok I suppose, crap for vocals for some reason. You have to have the right voice for it to work. Only two of the five bands tonight did, us and a superb power blues band. The sound guy is a wizened Scottish geezer who only knows the basics, moans a lot, and is disorganised and not particularly helpful. He really f***ed us up by putting one of our monitors on full volume and it blew my f***ing head off. The bass and keys were absolutely deafening and my ears rang for our set and afterwards. Efforts to get him to turn it down were rewarded with the bass being reduced and the keys left as they were. The guy is not bright. And he doesn't care about sound enough to want to do his job properly. Nice crowd though and we went down a storm. We were second headline of five bands (it's normally six! all different styles and ability level too, stupid) and were supporting a great quirky electro-pop band called Empress, check them out, they are really interesting and the singer is gorgeous! Because of so much f***ing around, we went on much later than planned, so we got most of Empress's crowd. It was 11.30 when they finally got on and a fair proportion of the audience had left by this point. I had to too, but I caught a couple of songs, really great band live. The place looks lovely in pictures but for some reason it has no spirit, just seems so corporate, reminded me of the Rock Garden in Covent Garden. Make sure you bring water or juice with you. After requesting a pint of lime soda (and being told in a really off way they don't have pint glasses and lime cordial) I got charged £2 for a small glass of soda and ice with a piece of lime in, f***ing ridiculous. I questioned this affront and the tall, handsome "bar man" was surly, unhelpful, unsmiling and unrepentant. As soon as I stupidly gave him the money, he went went back to laughing and joking with him mate at the end of the bar. That really wound me up. I seriously wanted to kick him down a flight of stairs but I'm not like that. I had to go out and calm down for half an hour. Anyway, each song I played in our set was my imaginary soundtrack to the c*** being waterboarded. I played well £3.50 for a 330ml bottle of beer, £2.50 for a bottle water. I'll never go there as a punter. EVER. I don't want to play there again either if possible. Also, they insist you bring 25 paying people with you to get a slot, but that's bullshit, there were about 50 max at the venue and about 20 of them were in the bands. They say that sh*t to scare you a bit.

Ahh, what a lovely day! A great way of honouring Old Git, who was a very witty, extremely knowlegeable, helpful and friendly guy - all of which characteristics were greatly in evidence at the BASH yesterday. Very heartwarming As usual there is so little time to do everything one wishes, which for me is mostly talking I tried the basses and rig of Cetera though, and boi, does he have a wonderful red Spector Euro! Thanks Gary! The two workshops I was at were really useful and interesting, thanks Johnny Lager and urb. The jam room was great fun, we made some interesting music in there, I really enjoyed it! Thanks so much to Paul S for the lend of the Fender guitar amp, and thanks to Thunderbird 13 for the lend of the Sightreading for Bass book and the Rush bass transcriptions, you're both verk kind. I didn't talk to as many people as I would have liked and as always, come away feeling guilty, not having done what I said I would do due to lack of time and a very inefficient memory (I forgot my bloody camera aswell Sorry to Bottle for forgetting to lend you those clippers for your strings (think you got it sorted though), Robocorpse for not trying your Ricks, Born2BMild (I really wanted to try the Zons and Foderas), and Nik, Mac, Clarky and many others who I didn't talk to as much as I would have liked. Really nice talking to some new faces aswell though. Thanks to Nik, Sarah, Colin, Jack and Paul and the workshop dudes for a great day Nigel

[quote name='flyfisher' post='1035021' date='Nov 24 2010, 12:59 PM']Thanks. We didn't fancy driving across London on a friday evening so we took the train, hence instruments only. Rock 'n' Roll eh? [/quote] Trace GP7 mate. Really funny here. The first band just had a hissy fit at the SO and stormed off home during their SC.