Spoombung

There are more rotten bands around than useless bass players. Most rock bands are unbelievably, stunningly dull and boring...but are completely oblivious to it.

[quote name='Monckyman' timestamp='1356387714' post='1909942'] Focus estate. [/quote] My choice too.

Anything on the low B string = inaudible.

Give him an audition. You might grow to love him.

You can make[quote name='51m0n' timestamp='1355139992' post='1894457'] Cant believe we are already back to this. CD, at 16bit 44.1KHz is a technically superior medium than vinyl in every single way measurable (those being useful frequency response, and dynamic range). The noise floor on vinyl is far far higher than that on CD, the frequency rnage on vinyl is limited by a myriad factors to do with the very physical nature of vinyl cutting. CD is not 'lossy' sampling is not losing information, and converting back from digital to analogue does not leave 'steps' wher the samples were in the wave form. If you prefer the sound of vinyl on your system, great lucky youi. If you are comparing CD to vinyl, then for goodness sake compare apples to apples, it must be the same version (right down to mastering) of both albums. If you dont like the CD then fine, its your CD player, or your ears just prefer the sound as a result of the inherent flaws in vinyl vs those in CD. Almost any complaint against CD should be aimed at mastering for volume if its aCd released in post '95. For any CD pre '90 then you have to understand a bit more about the recording process pre-digital: digital multitrack was around in major studios from the early 80's by the way (infamous Sony machines), so a lot of those favourite albums on vinyl were in fact tracked digitally even back then. A lot of tracking around this time was doen with a pure analogue tape mindset, and the gernal belief was that you needed to get as hot as you could without an 'over' - exceeding 0dBfs - which sounded like arse. In fact this often meant that recordists were pushing the analogue input side on their digital kit to hard, and it sounded harsh as a result - not the analogue to digital conversion, the analogue input, important difference. Its now understood that the whole point of the increased headroom (particularly at 24bit, where everyone who means business is recording anyway) means you should be allowing yourself at least 6dB and more like 12dB opf headroom [i]over the higherst peak level[/i] when tracking, which means you AD input is competely unstressed, and the soudn of the result is fantastic quality. But back in the day everyone (and I mean absolutely everyone) was pushing analogue tape hard and bright to get tape compression (level compression is a GOOD THING not a bad thing, analogue or digital, lossy data compression is a BAD THING, lossless data compression is a GOOD THING - lets just get that clarified) and to combat tape his (if you track to bright you turn down top end on mix time and hiss with it). If you take that same ethos and apply it to pure digital recording though you just end up with harsh sounding CDs, and less harsh sounding vinyl (due to the final mastering process being a little different to vinyl). ANyone noticed how music as late as 80's pop has no sub in it? Production/mastering for cassette tape, little radios and vinyl all caused that. 70's funk has pants all low end either. Nothing much below 80Hz (check out PFunk records on vinyl if you dont believe me) - now listen to a Daptones CD. And they are lauded over as a pure analogue production house revelling in the sound of vintage, yet on CD and vinyl they tend to have more low end than the real stuff they emulate. CD is the better medium technically, but as we all know there are a myriad ways of screwing the pooch on these things. If you have vinyl you prefer the sound of enjoy it, if you have CDs you prefer the sound of, enjoy them. Once you get to 96Khz 24bit lossless recordings (tracked that way , not upsampled later) with decent and thoughtful mastering, in a great room acoustically (all you people claiming a is better than b are listening in an acoustically treated space to make these judgements aren't you?) - it sounds pretty incredible, and the vinyl purists woudl do well to attempt a truly objective listen to it compared to anything else at all. They have a huge list of digital kit, will track to any of the main DAWS, mix from any of them blah blah blah. If you want to you can go there and limit the effectiveness of your recording by tracking direct to stereo vinyl, they will be happy to lighten your wallet for the privelege [/quote][quote name='51m0n' timestamp='1355139992' post='1894457'] Cant believe we are already back to this. CD, at 16bit 44.1KHz is a technically superior medium than vinyl in every single way measurable (those being useful frequency response, and dynamic range). The noise floor on vinyl is far far higher than that on CD, the frequency rnage on vinyl is limited by a myriad factors to do with the very physical nature of vinyl cutting. CD is not 'lossy' sampling is not losing information, and converting back from digital to analogue does not leave 'steps' wher the samples were in the wave form. If you prefer the sound of vinyl on your system, great lucky youi. If you are comparing CD to vinyl, then for goodness sake compare apples to apples, it must be the same version (right down to mastering) of both albums. If you dont like the CD then fine, its your CD player, or your ears just prefer the sound as a result of the inherent flaws in vinyl vs those in CD. Almost any complaint against CD should be aimed at mastering for volume if its aCd released in post '95. For any CD pre '90 then you have to understand a bit more about the recording process pre-digital: digital multitrack was around in major studios from the early 80's by the way (infamous Sony machines), so a lot of those favourite albums on vinyl were in fact tracked digitally even back then. A lot of tracking around this time was doen with a pure analogue tape mindset, and the gernal belief was that you needed to get as hot as you could without an 'over' - exceeding 0dBfs - which sounded like arse. In fact this often meant that recordists were pushing the analogue input side on their digital kit to hard, and it sounded harsh as a result - not the analogue to digital conversion, the analogue input, important difference. Its now understood that the whole point of the increased headroom (particularly at 24bit, where everyone who means business is recording anyway) means you should be allowing yourself at least 6dB and more like 12dB opf headroom [i]over the higherst peak level[/i] when tracking, which means you AD input is competely unstressed, and the soudn of the result is fantastic quality. But back in the day everyone (and I mean absolutely everyone) was pushing analogue tape hard and bright to get tape compression (level compression is a GOOD THING not a bad thing, analogue or digital, lossy data compression is a BAD THING, lossless data compression is a GOOD THING - lets just get that clarified) and to combat tape his (if you track to bright you turn down top end on mix time and hiss with it). If you take that same ethos and apply it to pure digital recording though you just end up with harsh sounding CDs, and less harsh sounding vinyl (due to the final mastering process being a little different to vinyl). ANyone noticed how music as late as 80's pop has no sub in it? Production/mastering for cassette tape, little radios and vinyl all caused that. 70's funk has pants all low end either. Nothing much below 80Hz (check out PFunk records on vinyl if you dont believe me) - now listen to a Daptones CD. And they are lauded over as a pure analogue production house revelling in the sound of vintage, yet on CD and vinyl they tend to have more low end than the real stuff they emulate. CD is the better medium technically, but as we all know there are a myriad ways of screwing the pooch on these things. If you have vinyl you prefer the sound of enjoy it, if you have CDs you prefer the sound of, enjoy them. Once you get to 96Khz 24bit lossless recordings (tracked that way , not upsampled later) with decent and thoughtful mastering, in a great room acoustically (all you people claiming a is better than b are listening in an acoustically treated space to make these judgements aren't you?) - it sounds pretty incredible, and the vinyl purists woudl do well to attempt a truly objective listen to it compared to anything else at all. They have a huge list of digital kit, will track to any of the main DAWS, mix from any of them blah blah blah. If you want to you can go there and limit the effectiveness of your recording by tracking direct to stereo vinyl, they will be happy to lighten your wallet for the privelege [/quote] Very good accurate, historical points about the difference between recording for an analogue release compared to a digital one - and how you can mess up the sound of a CD.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1355053500' post='1893316'] I hate vinyl. Personally I think that well-recorded digital formats are the best thing that has happened to music since the first recording was made. I can't understand how a format that actually wears out every time it is used (no matter how good the playback equipment is) can be held in such high esteem. I'm certainly not going to shed any tears for the missing hiss, pops, clicks, scratches, wow and flutter, and jumping styluses in my digital music collection. I do get the impression that the vinyl apologists are either displaying very selective memory, or they were lucky enough to never encounter any of the appalling excuses for pressings that littered vinyl releases from the mid 70s to the late 80s. Records that were full of unwanted aural artefacts from the first playing, pressed on vinyl so thin it nearly qualified as a flexi-disc. Discs pressed so badly off-centre they made you sea-sick when you listened to them. That feeling of dread when you invariably had to return a faulty pressing to the record shop, knowing that you's have to endure the 3rd degree regarding your vinyl handling and the equipment you were using to play it on before they'd even consider an exchange. And then the disappointment at discovering that either your damaged copy was the only one the shop had, or that all the other copies in the box were equally bad - so you had to either take it with all its faults or go without that particular record. Vinyl also puts a lot of restrictions on what can actually be reproduced. Anything interesting with phase and stereo imagery is likely to result in a recording that can't even be cut to vinyl let alone played. A digital file has no such issues. And that's before we get into the comparison of bandwidth, dynamic range and signal to noise ratios. Hopefully 5im0n will be along shortly to contribute to this thread with more detail, but a well recorded and masters CD outperforms vinyl all round, and while it's not indestructible it is a good deal more robust. As for over-compression and the loudness wars blame the record companies (and the artists who seemingly allow it without protest) not the format. Volume on vinyl (within limits) was a trade-off with running time. Louder signal meant wider grooves and consequently less of them inch diameter of the record and therefore less running time. You could get a significant increase in volume by cutting the running time of each side of the album from just under 20 minutes to just over 16. With CD once you reach 0dB (that's all 16 bits set to 1 - all of them set to 0 is silence) there's nowhere else to go. The only way you can make the recording sound louder in digital is to limit the peaks and make the average signal level higher. This of course leads to the over-compressed sound that lots of CDs display. There's no reason for it other than it's what record companies think their consumers want (and a lack of complaints by most consumers). In fact if anything the dynamic range of the CD is too big for home listening. This is certainly a complaint I've heard from some classical music listeners who have difficulty balancing the quiet passages against the loud ones on CD in a typical home environment. In the end though, I can't help thinking that the people who complain about modern music formats, have lost sight of the most important thing - the actual music itself. So long as the delivery medium isn't intruding on the listening experience then the format being used doesn't matter. [/quote] Great points.

I think they're out of business. The disco people are probably keeping that website going for the sake of it... and some old stock is still there. :-(

I was actually trying to buy a TC amp I thought they had in stock... but couldn't find it on their website- so wanted to speak to the guy running it.

Hmmm The guy on the phone said they've ceased trading as it wasn't making a profit. He didn't put me through to anybody so I'm a bit surprised the shop was open last week...?

Just found out they have officially ceased trading. It never looked good at that silly warehouse full of disco equipment next to IKEA. It was a far cry from the Essex place. What a shame; I liked the guy who ran it.

[quote name='silddx' timestamp='1354018961' post='1880819'] Started in September mate, this is the third. But it's in the Recording Forum, the NeverNeverLand of Basschat We've had nearly double the votes in two days than we had the entire October voting week already though, so it's definitely becoming more popular [/quote] I think the 'recording' section should be abandoned - as no one goes there. People should post their music up in the main section

Don't touch it

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1354030983' post='1881118'] And a fat lot of f***ing good it did them............. [/quote] hahahahahaha! Obvious but still incredibly funny

Typical Prescott rehearsal: http://youtu.be/vxpZIAmPOMI

Our stuff is a challenge to memorise; uneven lengths, variations, complexity, etc. the first thing I do is memorise the first 10 seconds or so- that helps trigger the memory for the rest. So run through the whole baseline at home several times then put emphasis on memorising the start of the song. Play just that bit over and over again.

Actually I want withdraw my previous comments. I never make any mistakes and I'm a practically perfect bassist in nearly every way.

The common cause of errors for me is relaxing into a groove and enjoying the other guys playing. Then I forget about the tricky bit coming up and it's suddenly on top of me, like I said, no one seems to notice or care ...

I had no idea there was a composition competition here on Basschat. How long has it been going?

I usually f*** up on every track but nobody notices or gives a sh*t

[quote name='yoseph900' timestamp='1353160989' post='1872238'] Hi everyone, In the new year [b][color=#ff0000]GAK[/color][/b] are expanding their bass department. We're looking to get on board with a handful more high-end brands. I would be very grateful for your opinions on what high-end brands you would like to see hanging on our walls. Thanks very much team. Joe. [/quote] How about the Ibanez Groovelines - I mean in the actual shop - so people can try them? You can't get 'em anywhere in the UK

Easily the best shop in Denmark street