Dan Dare

Nick's right. If you're not sure whether they will stick with it, get them something used and not too dear (but not rubbish, obviously). You can always sell it on if you upgrade.

Neutrik makes a jack plug with a fat body for speaker lead use, if you have a head that doesn't have a Speakon socket. I bought a 3 metre speaker lead with them fitted recently so I could use my heads in the event that I encounter a cab that doesn't have Speakons. I cut it in half and attached a Speakon to one end of each of the resultant leads.

The 4B and C4 both use the Piranha 5" drivers, although you can get the C4 with Neo drivers, too. Despite claims that there is no difference between Neo and ceramic magnets, I found, when auditioning them, that the Neos were slightly sweeter sounding, with a little less punch. The 4B is larger and has a more old school (but still clean/crisp) sound. The C4 is smaller and has a tighter, more mid-focused sound. One of each makes a pretty potent small rig. They are both very revealing, so will highlight differences in amplification. I use either an AG700 or a Carvin C1000 with mine. I'm at Archway. PM me if you want to drop by.

Yep. Very tiny germs. The instrument's riddled with them. It would be more appropriate were the additional line on the back of the headstock to announce "Butchered in East Sussex...

BTW, if you're ever due to be in North London, you'd be welcome to drop by and try them. Let me know.

I have two C4s and two 4Bs. I use them in varying quantities depending on how much noise I need to make. You do need several of the 5" driver cabs to shift air and produce real volume. The ones with 7" drivers, such as the CAB 47, have quite a bit more weight to the sound. I prefer the 5s slightly, but as I don't like tweeters for bass (the 47 has one), that's not really a surprise. The 7s are pretty fine, too. PJB cabs with 7s are cheaper, too, so you get more bang for your buck. Really, you need to find a dealer and try them side by side.

My standard reply to the "Can I play your instrument?" question is "Can I have the keys to your car?" They both probably cost about the same when you factor in my rig.

If you want the lightest weight, Epifani are worth a look, too. Any of the brands mentioned above will do a sterling job. A lot of cab manufacturers use the same or very similar drivers, anyway.

Class D amps use power amp modules that are bought in from manufacturers such as B&O/Icepower or Hypex. The technology is well established and it is just not worth amp designers attempting to design/build their own. Generally, they are not repairable. However, that doesn't mean that if they fail, the amp is scrap. Provided the preamp is fine, the power amp module can often be replaced.

Pretty amazing, aren't they? The place where I work has an all D&B system (which was installed for the Olympics). I reckon it must have cost around £500k. There are a dozen or so subs under the seating and 50+ top boxes hung from the ceiling, all driven by D&B and Powersoft amps. Sounds fabulous when we play music through it. I run a Fohhn PA (also German made and approaching D&B stuff in price). I once combined my two Fohhn powered subs with my Phil Jones cabs and AG700. Made a stonking bass rig.

There's a considerable difference of degree and scale.

Teachers are as prone to prejudice as anyone. The problem is that they are in a position to influence/affect others with those prejudices. Re comments above about using the stronger hand on the fretboard, I've always understood that the stronger hand should be the one that creates the rhythm/timing. If you're right handed, try holding a solid rhythm with your left. Not easy (unless you play drums/percussion and have already trained both your hands).

Paddle faster. I hear banjos 😁

Plenty of sound advice above. I'd also suggest having a look at and perhaps changing the setup of your instrument and even the way you play it. If you are getting on a little and may have a tendency towards developing arthritis, playing an instrument with heavy strings and/or a high action (if you do) will aggravate the situation. Posture and the way you hold the instrument is important, too. If you tend to use a 'claw' type of technique that puts your hands under tension, that will not help matters.

Why must it be either/or? One of the bands I play in mixes up covers and originals, popular and obscure.

Of course it's an equaliser, i.e. a device for adjusting eq. It doesn't matter what label they stick on it. That's what it does.

Exactly. Try running a frequency sweep at high enough volume to be useful in a bar and you're going to p1ss everyone off before you've even played a note. It will be of little, if any, use because the results will be affected by background noise, bodies absorbing certain frequencies and so on. As EBS Freak says, domestic/hi-fi equipment is not appropriate for our purposes.

Ah, Black Friday. The chance for retailers to clear their shelves of old stock whilst convincing us we're getting a bargain. Super.

Try "taking the room out of the equation" in a noisy bar, where you don't have the luxury of setting up, doing a frequency sweep and setting eq when the place is empty, where there is background music playing, people chatting, shouting and so on, glasses clinking, TVs blaring, etc. How many bar bands take a "real sound engineer" with them to gigs? My pleasure, by the way.

Perhaps they've cloned him

Wow. Exceedingly rare. I'm a mandolin player, too. Used to have the mandolin equivalent of it (1920s A model). Horror story from some years back. Andy's in Denmark Street had a Gibson mandocello from the 1920s in the window. It looked gorgeous from the front, but the back had been stove in (heaven knows how) and badly. They were selling it on commission. Don't know what happened to it.

Also, the instrument is stated to be "located in Long Island, NY" in the description. So why is it listed as being in London?

Used Rumble should come in under £300. I really don't think 100w will cut it unless your bandmates play very gently.

Peavey power amps are pretty bomb-proof and can be picked up cheap, too.

From my perspective as a very old git (66 today), this is and has always been cyclical. Live music comes and goes in popularity. Its demise (much like that of the guitar) has been touted for decades, but it always comes back as people tire of processed pap. There are certainly fewer live music venues round my way in Norf Lunnon, than there were a few years back, although there is still a reasonable scene. Plenty of awful open mic nites, of course. People perform for free, their mates come to cheer them along and buy plenty of drink, so it's a no-brainer for the venue. Went to one with a pal recently and it was truly dreadful, with one notable exception - a woman who had written some decent songs, which she actually played on guitar (on which she was quite accomplished) and sang well. She also seemed to appreciate, unlike the other performers, that one should learn the words of the songs one sings and engage with an audience, rather than stare at a smartphone screen and read the lyrics (at the end of the night, I asked a couple of those who had done this why it was, given that they had apparently written the songs they sang, that they needed to read them). Guess I'm just a grumpy old git.