bnt

White China - Ultravox

Wonderland - Big Country

The Thomann prices have come down since launch, too: £149 / €175 incl. VAT. I had to add some strings and cables to my order to get my order over the €200 threshold for free shipping. 😉

Robbery, Assault & Battery - Genesis

I just ordered a TONEX ONE, so I'll find out by next week. In addition to the amp and cab sims, it has some features that will come in handy, such as the compressor and the audio interface. I think it will go great on my small board with octaver and phaser in front.

Bye Bye Bye - NSYNC

Cat Food - King Crimson

Clockwork Angels - Rush

Thursday's Child - David Bowie

La Grange - ZZ Top

Raincloud - Bankstatement (Tony Banks & friends)

I suggest you check this setting from the article: paste about:config in the address bar and accept the warning search for network.cookie.cookieBehavior : if you see a value of 5 next to it, that's a possible cause. You can hit Edit (the "pen") and change it to 4 as a test.

The Scan QR Code method worked fine with my iPhone's built-in Passwords management system too (under Settings). This combines a password manager and code generator in one place i.e. you can save the password there too. For anyone interested in the geeky stuff: all these Authenticator apps use an industry standard called TOTP, or time-based one-time passwords. Microsoft's version has added some extra functionality that simplifies the authentication through notifications, but it can fall back to use TOTP standard.

And now for something a little different: I just put together a second board to go with a computer of some sort, starting with my 2018 Apple iPad: Harley Benton PowerPlant Tuner / PSU (new) tc SpectraDrive preamp (old) Lead Foot volume pedal (new), which is bigger than I thought I wanted, but it all fits in the case and I like it. Boss MD-200 Modulation (a year old) Thomann t.mix. MicroMix 2 USB (new) The mixer acts as a USB Audio interface, in to the iPad via an old Camera Connection Kit (CCK). It can also play back Bluetooth audio from e.g. a mobile phone, for practice. It has to be powered - the iPad can't power the mixer off battery alone. I was concerned I might need a powered USB hub, but I think I avoided that, barely. On the iPad I'm trying various things. You can do complex audio routing with plugins through an app called AUM. The screen currently shows the AudioKit L7 Live Looper, which is pretty powerful, has pre- and post-loop effects, and runs great on this iPad as a standalone app. It can be controlled entirely by MIDI if you have that option, but I'm thinking of mounting the iPad on a mic stand for easy access. I might run vocals through it too, since the mixer has a mic input spare. The board needs to be tidied up and some cables need to be improved e.g. the RCA cable with 1/4" adapters is way too long at this point. But it's working and sounds very good so far. With the Bass VI, I'm not exactly up to Frippertronics standard yet, but we shall see!

Nothing too drastic since the last time I posted the board. The new pedal is the Mooer Soul Shiver, which is an odd bird. Its effects don't quite follow the conventional expectations. The Vibrato setting has some Tremolo going on, while the Rotary does a better Chorus than the Chorus setting. For the little it cost, I'm impressed, though I don't use it heavily. I got it since I thought my Bass VI could use a bit of that. After the Peterson tuner and the Orange KongPressor, the main change is the way I'm using the Complicator (the Simplifier clone) at the heart of the setup. I don't really need the parallel loops since I mostly have effects with blend controls anyway, avoiding the dreaded tone suck. So I've reconfigured it to give me two switchable channels: Green (main) channel: Parallel Send to the MXR bass octave deluxe, Mosky Silver Horse (Klone, low gain) and JHS 3 Series Phaser to the Donner A/B switch. (Yep, I still think Phaser is a must-have, and this is a good one.) Red (alt) Channel: Complicator Internal Preamp section (mild gain) to Preamp Send, T-Rex Diva Drive, Tone City Matcha Cream Fuzz, Mooer Soul Shiver and Sonicake Sonic Ambience, to the Donner A/B switch. (The Matcha Cream fuzz, which is not subtle, doesn't kill the bass if I keep the tone setting low.) Then from the switch Y output back to the Parallel return and cab sim. I use the headphone output to the USB-powered wireless transmitter for my wireless "TV" headphones; they do colour the sound a little, but it's good for practice. I can feed music from my old iPad to the Aux in too. Plans? I'm thinking about a different fuzz, maybe the Pigtronix Octava Micro. I'm still searching for a good pseudo-8-string tone, so I want a solid octave up, analogue if possible. I've read good things about the Pigtronix here and elsewhere.

I checked CME again, and their ETA for the Purple FSR CV is now November. Which means that Anderton's aren't going to get them till then at least. With the heavier La Bella strings on mine, I had to tighten the truss rod several times to try and improve the action, and in my latest attempt today, one of the strings broke at the tuner. I may be able to fix it, but I'm back on the original D'Addario strings for now. The 0.084" low E is definitely too floppy and wooly-sounding, a common complaint, but that's all D'Addario sells. You have to look to other companies for better e.g. La Bella, and StringJoy says they've designed a set specifically to address this. I didn't loosen the truss rod again, and with the original strings, the action is getting close to what I would call good action. I did the relief check (Fender method) with a capo on 1st, fretting at 18th, and measured 0.35mm at the 8th = acceptable but could be a little better. Still happy with the bridge, intonation was fine with the heavier strings. If anyone says they can't intonate it, my first question would be whether they have physically moved the bridge to the centre of its travel after tuning it up. I move it until it's upright and centred, give the vibrato bar some exercise, retune, and then the intonation is very close. Tuning is stable as long as I give the bar a little yank up after using it. (This happens to Strats too.) Electrics: I've gotten to the bottom of the problems I had. The earth wires from the pickups are soldered to one of the switch screws. That screw contacts with the switch plate. That plate contacts with the screws on the choke switch. The ground wire to the output is soldered to the body of said choke switch. So you have multiple unsoldered metal-metal screw connections that have to make good contact for the pickups to work. After some rescrewing (?) of all the switch screws, it all seems to be making decent contact now. It's still a questionable system, though. I wanted to know whether we have humbucking in effect in the 1+2 and 2+3 pickup combinations, and after some high-gain tests through headphones, it appears that we do. After fixing the grounding problem above, it took some major gain to hear much noise at all, which says good things about the shielding. The noise dropped off with 1+2 and 2+3, and increased with 1+3 selected. So far I prefer the tone I get from 1+2.

I’ve been almost militantly fingers-only for decades, despite being a fan of some great pick players such as Tony Butler and Chris Squire. A change is being forced upon me for medical reasons, though. I was never the strongest fingerstyle player as it was, no ‘Arry, but I did OK with some Rush songs, for example. MS has affected my plucking fingers and I can’t rely on them to play quickly and consistently any more. So I’ve decided to try more pick playing, and getting a Bass VI is part of that. I’ve lowered the action to borderline “too low”, and am starting to develop more speed. I kind-of shocked myself today by playing Hysteria (Muse) on it with a pick, through the Crunch Cab preset in Apple MainStage, and it sounded decent. On my main bass it’s a struggle. Re. Picks, so far I’m liking the Harley Benton light ones (0.6-0.9 mm), which have a kind of parchment finish that helps me with grip. I’m dropping them much less than standard picks. I read that players such as Carol Kaye used felt picks, the stuff hats are made of - sounds interesting:

What about a "Klon" circuit for a mild boost/overdrive? I'm a cheapskate, so I got the Mosky Silver Horse, which has "Gold" and "Silver" "Klon" circuits. I could have saved myself a tenner by getting the Golden Horse, which has only the "Gold" circuit, which is lower gain. Last night I put the Bass VI through it and on one setting I could hear a little clipping when I played hard. I find the "Gold" circuit to be bass-friendly too.

Correction - July! Damn Yankees and their weird MDY date formats.

I just installed the La Bella flats on it - at work - and so far that looks OK. Intonation is very close on all strings. This is after pushing the floating bridge to roughly the middle of its travel after the string change. With the bridge floating like that, I suspect that perfectly accurate intonation is an unrealistic expectation. I'll keep the advice in mind and may reconsider later, but so far the bridge is good enough for my purposes. Vibrato still works, slightly less travel. I have more dialing-in to do still. However, I'm already having trouble with the pickup switches, cutting out after hardly any use, and so they will be the first thing to get scrutinized & maybe replaced. PS just remembered to check that the strings aren't contacting the back of the bridge: all clear there.

I wanted one of those purple ones, but didn't get in quickly enough. From what I know, they are exclusive to Andertons and Chicago Music Exchange, and CME says they're getting more in May. Which leads me to think Anderton's will get them too.

I’ll find out soon enough. I’m encouraged by what I’ve seen so far, particularly with the bridge. There are videos of guys having to cut intonation screws in half because they were catching on the strings.

You've basically described the kinds of issues I'd read about and hope to avoid. I'll hang on to the stock strings, then. Odd thing is that I'm seeing videos about heavier strings improving things, not making them worse.

Yup, I've jumped on the Bass VI bandwagon: I've been thinking about a short-scale bass for a while, but also something that will lend itself more to plectrum playing. I already "play" guitar tuned in all fourths (EADGCF), and this will get the same treatment. Not quite yet, though, since I had it delivered to the office and a couple of people are interested in seeing it, so it's there for the weekend. So I don't have a photo,but it's identical to the one on the Fender site, in black. I've seen a few YT videos of people documenting the problems with these out of the box, and spending a lot of money to remedy their shortcomings. Sometimes more than the cost of the instrument itself. I won't be doing that. Some known issues and my conclusions so far: Strings: yeah, the stock roundwounds are crap, with a 0.084 low E. I wanted flatwounds anyway, so I got a set of LaBellas with the 0.095 low E at the same time. Haven't installed them yet. Pickups / Electronics. Working, but I haven't done any critical listening tests yet. I want hum-cancelling with the 1+2 and 2+3 pickup selections, and if I don't already have that, I'll try and make it so. I'm getting conflicting information about this. If I have to swap the #2 pickup wiring phase, I hope I can also invert the magnets to bring it back in phase. (Or maybe I want some out-of-phase quack.) Neck: action seems pretty good, it has been set up for those stock strings. I will need to tighten the truss rod a little for the new strings, and a quick test shows it's very tight under string tension. I'll try again with the strings off. Frets: very happy so far. They seem level with no sharp ends at all. Indian Laurel fingerboard is extremely dry, as expected, so it will get lots of lovely lemon oil. Bridge: others have reported severe intonation problems. on the low E in particular. I didn't find a problem there with the stock strings, and I can see room for adjustment in both directions. There's more room for adjustment forward, and they say that's what the heavier strings will need, but I won't know until I try it. The adjustment screw won't contact the string at all. In a quick test I was able to lower the bridge to "too low", which hopefully means that no shimming will ever be required. (I do not like shimming at all.) Vibrato: it's not going to get a lot of use, and I'm not expecting much, but in a quick test it didn't seem worse than a typical cheap vibrato. After pushing down, a quick tug up to get it back in position, and tuning seemed OK. One thing I only learned recently about this type of vibrato is that the bridge is designed to move when you use it. The strings do not slide, the bridge moves with them. It's on the Jaguar and Jazzmaster guitars too. Some YT-ers have replaced the stock bridge, but I think I won't need to. So on first inspection it looks like Fender / Squier has addressed many of the problems that have been reported. It's a new area for me, and I'll need some time to get used to the scale and string spacing, and I expect to do a lot more with the plectrum. I wish it was smaller and lighter, though; with the long body and big headstock, it's definitely a full-size instrument.

I've gone a bit mad: home board, I doubt I'll need all this stuff live: Peterson StroboStomp Mini out in to the Ly-Rock "Complicator", using both its effects loops: Parallel Loop for lows: KongPressor (almost always on), MXR bass octave deluxe, T-Rex Diva Drive, JHS 3 Series Phaser, Lekato Loop Auto (looper). I've settled on no LPF, so I can have just the KongPressor for an un-effected tone. Only just got the looper & stiil thinking about how I might use it. These pedals are all bass-friendly, even if they aren't "bass pedals". Preamp Loop for highs: first the internal preamp set to a little dirt with a mild bass cut. Out to a Donner A/B switch so I can turn this whole loop off. The A input is where I would insert a guitar (at home), or the bridge pickup if I start playing with "stereo" bass wiring again. Then to the Mosky Silver Horse (Klone) - still playing with tones there, but quite low gain. Tone City Matcha Cream fuzz set to fairly aggressive. Both pedals can reduce the bass if turned up, but that's not a problem now. The SoniCake Sonic Ambience: basic delay and reverb in a pretty cheap pedal. Then both channels back in to the "Complicator", blended about 50% each, and in to the cab sim. Headphone out for practice, amp or DI if I need them.