bob_atherton

Thanks Guys. Just ordered a small pot of Birchwood Casey Tru Oil. Bob

Just bought a 'new' Fender Custom Shop 63 P bass. Very nice but never really liked that stripped back of neck thing.

My guitarist swears by Tung oil on these necks, but my tech says to use high quality Danish oil as it has a small content of polyurethane, which he says is better than Tung oil. He also said use Tung oil if you want but in his opinion Danish is the way to go.

Any thoughts and advice? Thanks. I want to put something on the neck so is there another option. Cheers. Bob  

7 hours ago, Steve Browning said:

Thank you. Feelin' Sad on the If You Can't Beat Your Brain album is simply one of the most tasteful blues solos ever recorded.

 

Love the idea of the original version of WDYDI.

Well, we will be playing that track and many others at a 1 off gig at The Sheppey, Glastonbury on Oct 23rd

5 hours ago, Steve Browning said:

Very envious. His playing with Stretch is sublime. Stewart Copeland is a huge bonus too.

I will let him know you think that. Thanks..! FWIW we now play "why did you do it" as a slow blues, it was the original version that never made it on the album.

8 hours ago, fretmeister said:

An LPF?

Low Pas Filter and High Pass Filter as well. I cut anything below about 30 hz and anything above about 4K. Tightens up the sound. 

On 24/09/2021 at 15:35, bassman7755 said:

 

This is exactly what the Barefaced Machinist pedal does isn't it ? (not the cab part obviously)

It's not quite how it works in my rig.

The signal is split at the end of all EQ, compression, LPF, etc. The top amp is set to a more mid punch tone, not much low end. The bottom amp feeds the lower cab which give a fat low end sound without much mid punch.

I wouldn't feel comfortable being at a gig with only one amp and only one cab, so I might as well use two of each in a very versatile rig.

25 minutes ago, Steve Browning said:

 

That isn't Kirby of Stretch fame is it?

One and the same. I also played on a Curved Air album with him just before lock-down. 

Stewart Copeland was also playing on the album.... that made my day/month/year/life...!!!

My rig

Hi Guys. After much testing, gigs, and playing in three different bands I have a happy result.

On the advice of Kirby, our guitarist, I bought a Tonebone ABY unit. I have this connected to the amps. The Mesa going to the bottom cab and the LMIII going to the top cab. The LMIII needed polarity change on the pedal. Both cabs set to 4ohm.

The result is an incredibly versatile rig that gives me exactly the tone and power that I'm after regardless of the venue. I could not be more pleased. I don't have the rig playing that loud but the versatility of tone and the fact that if any amp or cab craps out at a gig I can keep on playing is priceless. 

I have now ordered a single 1x10 cab from Barefaced to use as the top cab at smaller gigs.

I am seriously pleased with the set-up.

Thanks again for all your kind advice.

Cheers, Bob

5 hours ago, fretmeister said:

I've just had a look at the cab specs. Switchable 4 or 12 ohms.

 

The Mesa WD800 will run at 2 ohms - there's a little switch on the back.

 

So just use the cabs in 4ohm mode giving a total of 2ohms and make sure the amp switch is set correctly. Full power and headroom available.

 

Job done.

 

 

If the amp fails then use the Mark Bass and flick the cabs to 12 ohms each giving 6 ohms total. Impedance is not a static thing anyway so you really won't notice that much difference between 4ohms and 6 ohms. Just turn it up a little if you need to and get to the end of the gig.

5 hours ago, fretmeister said:

 

I've spent most of the day testing and tweaking and I'm very pleased, and surprised , with the results.

If I run my Mesa at 2 ohm into the cabs set to 4 ohm then it sounds a lot more wooly and thick compared to the cabs set to 12 ohm and the amp to 4 ohm, at the same perceived volume. The later sounds more articulate and open.

At this point I had the cabs daisy-chained with speakon to top cab from amp and then connected to bottom cab from top cab with speakon.

I then connected both cabs direct from the amp, no daisy-chain.  This improved things again. I have absolutely no idea why but it sounded clearer and tighter. The two cabs set like this give me loads of volume and headroom. I have band practices tomorrow and Friday and first gig, outdoors, with the new cabs on Sunday.

I'm hoping that this configuration will work out well, we will see.

The two things that have baffled me are why does the amp sound so different and worse set to 2 ohms? and why, after decades of daisy-chaining my speaker cabs does it sound better with both cabs connected directly to the amp? 

Thanks again guys for all the great help. I now think that just the Mesa WD800 will be my only amp with the MB LMIII as my back up/spare. Happy days...! 

9 hours ago, DiMarco said:

Hi Bob,

 

I use a couple of different rigs.

 

If the venue is large enough I bring the SVT-4 pro with Barefaced Big Twin II.

When I need tiny footprint I stack up two Trace Elliot 2x8" cabs and use a TC RH750 instead. I love its flexibility and built in tuner but class D amps are not for me.

That amp sounding pretty sterile by itself made me begin shaping my tone on the pedalboard instead, adding some valve heft at will.

For this I use either a Two Notes Le Bass preamp (which can also blend in valve overdrive) or/and an EHX Black Finger compressor.

This makes the TC amp sounds just as hefty as my SVT-4 pro and I can switch the hefty valve bit off whenever I want a modern ultra clean and articulate sound.

 

Just saying... Maybe you can fix it using just one amp.

 

Cheers, Marco

 

Hi Marco

Thanks for your reply. What I'm trying to achieve is a one size rig fits all gigs situation. I always take a spare amp and two cabs to any gig, along with spare bass and cable. 

It occurred to me that rather than have the MB LMIII sitting backstage, just in case, I should use it in the rig. I have found that the Bareface 2x10's require very little EQ to get me in the zone sound wise. The cabs let you know what the amp's tonal signature is much better than my old Markbass cabs did. With this in mind I have now ordered a 1x10 from Bareface and will use that on top of the 2x10 for small gigs and two 2x10's for larger gigs. I can set the 2x10's to 4 ohm and get the full power from each amp. It should, in theory, give me huge amounts of power and flexibility. I too use a pedal-board with a MB compressor, a HP/LP filter and a Tone Hammer pre. I do fantasize over getting another Hiwatt DR103 but my back is the voice of reason. It would also look a bit odd balancing on top of a vertical 2x10 cab!  

Cheers, Bob

Thanks for all the advice guys. I do have a HPF and a LPF. The point of running two identical cabs is to get the best integration between them. Back in the day I used to use my Rickenbacker 4001 with 'Ricosound' and put the bridge pickup through an H&H 100 watt into two 2x12 cabs and my neck pickup into a Hiwatt 100 and a Hiwatt 2x15 cab.  It sounded great and gave me quite a Chris Squire sort of sound. We also had a couple of roadies..!

What I want now is the capability to tweak the sound from both cabs to suit the venue. Both amps sound quite good but neither is perfect. I suspect that by using my suggested setup it will give me the best of both in a very portable setup. By using the cabs at 4ohm each it will give me a 1300 watt rig. Way too much power but with great headroom. I'll sort it out one way or another and let you know how it works out. Thanks again. Bob

Hi. I want to run two Barefaced 2x10 cabs with a Markbass LMIII for the top cab, and a Mesa WD800 for the bottom cab. The Markbass on its own gives me lovely articulation and sounds just right, but, looses the heft of using the Mesa on its own.

I want to also run both cabs at 4ohm to give me loads of headroom from the two amps. I thought this would be pretty straightforward but it would appear to be a bit of a minefield with reference to phase, ground loops etc. I never want to run just one cab at once so I guess I dont really need an ABY box, or do I..? Any help is very seriously appreciated. Thanks, Bob 

Thanks Guys. I have a soft spot for flats. I had them on my very first bass, a Shaftesbury Tele copy back in 1970. Short scale so easy on my fingers and good to learn on. 

I don't often have the opportunity to go for flats, but a blues band seems like an opportunity I can't pass up. 

I may yet feel I need to go back to rounds and , to be honest, I didn't know DR did lo-riders in 50-110. Do them come in nickle at that gauge? I hate stainless rounds. 

Anyway will report back once landed and worn in. I think that takes about a year or so...(-: 

Just ordered a set. Pretty sure they will nail what I'm after. Thanks again. Bob

23 minutes ago, jrixn1 said:

For flats: I had a P bass with La Bella 0760M "Original 1954", 052-110, all strings tuned down one step, which I thought worked well and sounded good.  Pino had this setup on the D'Angelo album Voodoo.

If its good enough for you and Pino, that should work for me. Am I right in thinking these were the strings Jamerson used? If so, what's not to like?!!

Hi. I am joining a blues band that tunes in  D, not standard tuning.

For many years my strings have been nickle DR Lo Riders 45-105. These are perfect for my style of playing.

For our new band rehearsals I've been tuning down to D and setting up the bass accordingly. This is sort of OK but far from ideal as the strings are a lot more floppy, easy for my left hand but lacking the tone and punch that I'm used to.

I need strings that will give me a pretty similar feel to the DR's when tuned down to D. Any suggestions will be very welcome, Thanks.

I'm also open to thinking about getting some heavy weight flats as I think these might fit the bill as well. Again any ideas..?

Thanks, Bob

18 hours ago, krispn said:

A valve pre won't match what valve a power section adds. That's where the magic happens. DId the routing options do what you wanted or will you likely look elsewhere?

I just tried it between bass and amp, as I thought this would tell me what the unit was all about.  

Well.... in a nutshell it didn't float my boat. 

It sounded a bit ill defined to me. I used to use Hiwatt DR103's back in the day and really liked what valves could do. I guess I was looking for a touch of valve magic and a more open sound.

I'm sure many others will really like what it does but it wasn't for me. 

On 09/06/2021 at 07:46, krispn said:

Let us know how you get on with it. 

Will do. Unit arrives in about a week from now.

7 hours ago, krispn said:

I can see the logic of that. I had the Broughton HPF/LPF its a great unit but you could still try in the fx loop of the marknbass pre if it has one (I think it does?)

Good idea. I'll try anything that can stay on the board. Thanks. 

6 hours ago, krispn said:

As has been said neither is right or wrong but you may prefer to have the comp after the HPF so the lows aren't triggering the comp,

-you could have it in the amp effects loop and see what it does for you there especially if you have a series or parallel option

-you could have it in the MARKBASS preamp effects loop and see what it does for you there

or just try it at either end of the signal chain.

Just wondering is the HPF/LPF built into the amp or a standalone pedal? I know the spec on the WD800 is pretty fully featured as is. Cracking looking feature set on those!

 

The reason I'm changing from the Tone Hammer pedal to the Markbass has a lot to do with the warmth of the MB and the bass frequency on the MB is 70hz, not 40hz on the Tone Hammer. The HP/LP filter is a Broughton (great bit of kit). I want to get everything sorted on the pedal board and not use any of the fx loops etc. The reason for this is that, covid allowing, I will be touring and I will only be allowed to take two basses and pedal board. The amps/cabs will be provided at the gigs. It also needs to be able to work in the US and Japan so I have a power supply that switches to the voltage of the country. 

I have just bought a MB Vintage pre pedal to replace my Tone Hammer on on my board. At the moment most of my tone shaping is done with my amp, a Mesa Boogie WD 800, and the board is just for a bit of tweaking at the gig. I now want nearly all of "my sound" to be created on the board with the amp set to pretty much flat but use the amp's mid band parametric to tweak at the gig. The board order on the board at the moment is tuner, HP/LP filter, compressor, Tone Hammer and into amp. Would this chain still be the best order? Thanks.  

Thanks again for the helpful replies guys. I have yet to try it with a band, so the proof of the pudding etc.... Bob

Thanks for the replies guys. I'll probably just roll off the treble and up the bass a bit. Till I try it with the band it's going to be a bit of guesswork. Not sure what the shape is but it's the latest version which, imho, looks pretty cool. Has there been a negative response to it, shape wise? 

Just one more question. If I was looking for a change of pickup , does it have to be an active one or is all the active bit done by the preamp? This may be a dumb question.....