Beer of the Bass

Looks useful and less cumbersome than the bass mute. Would it be bad of me to point out the resemblance to one of these? [url="http://www.ecomenstrual.co.uk/shop/The_Washable_Crochet_Tampon.html"]http://www.ecomenstrual.co.uk/shop/The_Washable_Crochet_Tampon.html[/url]

A little more progress; I got hold of a 12" radius block and applied the radius for the fingerboard. Here it is at the start of the sanding - I made pencil marks all over the board so that I could see where material was being removed. Then on to drilling for the marker dots. I'm using 8mm black pearl dots, for a touch of bling. I then glued in the dots using CA glue and sanded them level. They are not quite levelled in this picture. I've also tidied up the headstock outline, but didn't take a picture of that. I still need to round the corners of the neck at the heel to match the pocket. Next I'm going to do the side dots and drill the tuner holes. Fretting will come after than, then I'll start profiling the back of the neck. It's slowly looking more and more like a neck...

My brother went to college with Rory, and I know his work is good. I'm not sure if guitar focussed luthiers always welcome double basses though, I'd have to find that out.

I need a couple of small things doing on my bass, and while previously I would have gone to Ken MacDonald, I hear he's retired nowadays. His work was always excellent and I wish him well! The work consists of re-gluing a seam between the back and sides, which is complicated slightly as it's at the treble side of the waist, where the back brace meets the side, so there's some downward pressure from the soundpost. I've attempted to glue this myself with hide glue and it hasn't held, so it's time to get it done properly. The other thing that needs doing is to re-dress the fingerboard slightly, in a small area under the G string where I'm getting some buzzing. I had a new ebony fingerboard fitted in 2008, and I presume the wood has moved a little causing the buzz. So this means I need someone with a good understanding of setup for Jazz pizz technique. Other folk I'm aware of who work on basses in Scotland are Bill Kelday in Fintry and Chantal Van Lierop in Glasgow. While I've heard good things about his work, Kelday is about a 50 mile drive from me. I use the City Car Club rather than owning a car, so 2x100 mile round trips at 23p/mile would add a fair chunk to the cost of the repair. So has anyone on here been to Van Lierop for work? And is there anyone else around that I'm unaware of?

I think living in a city centre and playing in originals bands makes a difference. When we do shorter sets at multi-band gigs, gear sharing or using the house rig make much more sense. Most of the sound in these venues comes through the FOH anyway, so the amp is primarily a monitor. Edinburgh is not very car-friendly, so if I can avoid driving to a gig I will. This is one of the reasons I sold my valve amp, as it wasn't getting gigged that often and when it was, the audience were hearing only hearing the DI in many venues. My larger 2x12" cab only gets gigged a few times per year at the moment (though it got more use when my band was hosting a monthly night), but I take out my small rig (EA Wizzy 10 and GK MB200) whenever we do the the smaller pubs.

I would say yes to "as good as" but no to "the same as", if that makes any sense!

I bought some double bass strings from Andy when he replied to my wanted ad. He was pleasant to deal with, got things done quickly and the strings are fine. Cheers!

A luthier visit might be in order, as at the very least I wouldn't trust the soundpost to be perfectly positioned after being shipped with the bridge down. A really good setup will do wonders for any bass, so it would be a good idea anyway.

I've decided to try out Spiro Weichs as my first port of call, and already have a used set on the way (Hurrah for the basschat classifieds!).

I've got an ad in the Wanted section for these, and it was suggested I link it here as not everyone checks down there. [url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/232113-velvet-blue-double-bass-strings/"]http://basschat.co.uk/topic/232113-velvet-blue-double-bass-strings/[/url] (Mods, if cross-posting this is not OK, feel free to remove it)

Maple tends to be on the heavy side too. With the slim body depth Ric use, they can get away with it. I'm not sure about the white inlays on maple though, otherwise it looks great.

You've got to admire his attention to detail with the relic'ed strings though!

I've had a bit of a search around here and on Talkbass, and the Blues sound like they may be worth a try. I think I'll look for a used set, as it's hard to be sure whether I'll get on with them. It's a shame I missed the last couple of sets in the classifieds. I may have to put a wanted ad up...

If it is a wolf tone, you'll really notice it acoustically when playing with the bow, and it is likely to happen equally badly (possibly worse) on the same note on the D string. Trying to bow the note, it will be difficult to start and tends towards an ugly sounding warbly beat frequency. If that's the case then a wolf eliminator weight on the afterlengths could help. My bass has a wolf tone around the B natural, and I found that a weight on the A-string afterlength helped a great deal. I found it worked best when the weight was adjusted so that the bowing the afterlength produced the same note the wolf was centred around.

That string matrix is a useful thing. Interesting that the arco sample for Spirocores is missing! What's the surface texture like on the Blues? Are they a fine roundwound like the other Velvets?

I'm playing Spirocore Mittels at the moment, which I love the pizz sound of, and I can just about live with the arco sound, though it's always a little on the bright side. The acoustic volume and projection of the Mittels is something I like too. I'm suffering some left hand/wrist issues which I'm going to see my GP about tomorrow, and I'm considering going to some lower tension strings for a while. I suspect that my problems are triggered by my guitar playing rather than double bass (as the pain starting has coincided with an increase in the time I spend playing guitar), but while my wrist is a little tender I'd like to make things easier on myself. So, I'm looking for recommendations of strings which are lower in tension and somewhat bow-able which still have reasonable projection and can get me to that growly pizz place I enjoy with Spiro Mittels. I don't mind strings which bow like Spirocores, but my arco requirement probably rules out some of the non-metal wrapped strings. Spiro Weichs might be an obvious contender, but I'm sure there are others out there. The new Innovation Jazz/Arco hybrids sound promising, but aren't on the market yet. I've had Innovation Honeys before, but those are perhaps a little on the dark side and don't feel a lot softer than the Mittels.

Certainly, when I was gigging with a 100 watt valve amp (using a 2x12" with decent efficiency), I never got it to the point where the power stage was audibly breaking up. My band is fairly moderate in volume though, with a laid back drummer and guitarists using 1x12" valve combos of 15 watts and 40 watts. I sometimes wonder whether I could get away with a smaller head of 30 or 50 watts with this band (partly because I fancy building one when funds allow). With that in mind, a good 200 watt valve amp should totally drive a loud rock band with the right cabs, and 400 watts is major stadium and festival stage stuff.

Cutting out the nut slot with a small Japanese hobby saw and a little 1/8" chisel I rummaged out of a car boot sale for the job: Then on to gluing the fingerboard. I used three small tacks to stop it from slipping while clamping, two through the 21st fret slot and one through the nut slot, so that the holes will not be visible when they are removed. The clamping itself could have gone better - I skimped a bit and didn't make a proper caul, thinking I had enough clamps to spread the load well enough. Of course, I should have used some heftier clamps and a caul, but I didn't fully realise that until I had the glue on! I ended up clamping one side in my little work bench and the other side with my cheap plastic clamps. I think I've got it done well enough, but this is definitely on my list of things to plan better and do differently next time...

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1394626277' post='2393403'] While I was looking for a suitable Fat Goth track to post I noticed some others where the bassist is playing a Fender, but he still sounds exactly the same. Maybe the Ric isn't quite so distinctive after all? [/quote] Likewise, I was thinking of posting some of the old Sensational Alex Harvey Band stuff, as Chris Glen used a Ric a lot and often sounded great on record, but watching some live footage I realised I wouldn't be able to tell which was the Ric and which was his single-coil Precision. I'm sure that if I sat and listened to a player swapping from one to the other I would notice the difference in sound, but there is a definite overlap in the way a given bass player can sound on both instruments.

If it's a commission sale it might not be theirs to change the strings on. They do get some interesting stuff in - I recall really fancying the MM Sabre they had in but not being able to afford it!

[quote name='Big_Stu' timestamp='1394369646' post='2390701'] You want Rick "clank"? [/quote] Wow, that one takes the clank pretty far! Did he always sound like that, or is he using the Ric-o-Sound outputs and they forgot to mic the bass side of the rig?

I think that a lot of cheaper amps are capable of sounding very good now (thinking of things like the GK MB series or the Hartke LH500 for instance), so there are diminishing returns as you go upmarket from there. Speakers are a very different story, of course.

It's an unusual design, in that most buyers of massive valve amps probably aren't looking for that style of preamp. I suspect they'd sell more of them if they had just a handful of knobs.

My camera seems to be behaving right now and I've made a bit of progress with the neck. The CF rods are epoxied in, one was a just a hair proud of the surface so I had to scrape it level. I've cut out the rough outline and planed the sides of the neck, while the headstock outline still needs a little tidying. I did this with an ordinary rip saw for the straight lines and a coping saw for the headstock. This was a bit of a workout, and I remembered why they call it rock maple!