Eight

Cheers for all the advice so far guys. [quote name='XB26354' post='443678' date='Mar 24 2009, 12:38 PM']I wouldn't try to limit yourself be believing you need to play or not play any style. It just so happens that jazz is the main style of music that specifically demands all instruments improvise at some point.[/quote] Its not that I'm restricting myself to styles as such. I just don't like jazz (I know we've discussed using such sweeping statements before though) so don't really want to sit through hours of the stuff unless it really is going to be the best way to develop. Improvisation is something I'm doing because I greatly respect musicians (even jazz ones ) who have this skill and its an ability I want for myself. I think I'll have to schedule practice time on doing as you (and the other fine folk here) suggest, looking at treble clef instruments, building out the rhythms and trying to incorporate the melody. Cheers mate.

[quote name='AM1' post='443655' date='Mar 24 2009, 12:29 PM']I intend to take every opportunity to post pictures of fit male bass players, drool over them[/quote] You'll be needing that picture of me then.

Stop being a g-.... Just kidding AM. Edit: incidently, I am closely following this thread 'cause one of my fingers is knacking.

[quote name='XB26354' post='443628' date='Mar 24 2009, 12:15 PM']I'd respectfully ask why you feel the need to work on bass soloing if you're not playing jazz? Although it is talked about a lot it is very rarely heard/asked for outside of modern jazz circles.[/quote] Well... For a sense of completeness maybe. Because I'm not currently learning bass just from a functional point of view. Because its challenging. Or just because there's nothing more or less wrong with a bass solo than there is a lead guitar solo. And I don't believe you need to play jazz to pull it off. I don't gig, I'm not even in a band. So I have no whinging guitard telling me what I can and can't play. I just have limited ability.

There's only so much stuff I can cover in lessons (I ask a LOT of questions) so this is something we've not really looked at yet but it keeps getting mentioned. I need to work on bass solos (hell I need to work on improvising bass riffs as well ) but whilst I know the main scales etc. I'm just not feeling the solo vibe yet. Can you recommend any tracks or artists that might be good inspiration? Er... no jazz please (no offense intended). Cheers guys.

[quote name='lowdown' post='443459' date='Mar 24 2009, 09:36 AM']The clue is in the title... [/quote] Bopland? I thought it was a Ramones site. Cool anecdote though - I liked that.

*** WARNING - MAY CONTAIN JAZZ ***

If I had to guess, which I do, I'd say these are pretty small [url="http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/behringer-mx-400/70729"]http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/behringer-mx-400/70729[/url] [url="http://www.absolute.ms/shop/view_product.php?product=artpowermixii&searchlink=yes&search=MIXER&page=2"]http://www.absolute.ms/shop/view_product.p...IXER&page=2[/url] [url="http://www.absolute.ms/shop/view_product.php?product=artpowermixi&searchlink=yes&search=MIXER&page=2"]http://www.absolute.ms/shop/view_product.p...IXER&page=2[/url]

Cheers Wulf, That's great info. Will probably still have a go next time I'm passing, but won't make a special trip as it doesn't sound like they're quite what I'm after.

Can anyone say how the tone compares to other basses? I'm in the market for a new bass (for metal) and want something with a fairly thick, scary low end (as opposed to too punchy a sound). I've literally just discovered a place near me stocks Trabens and so this could be an option.

[quote name='bremen' post='442221' date='Mar 23 2009, 09:31 AM']Back in the day we were advised to post a cassette of the songs to ourselves in a Recorded Delivery package, and not break the seal till we needed to prove the date we recorded them.[/quote] Better than nothing. From recent things I've read, unless its identical, then the accused is going to say that similarities must be just coincidence. (Aren't they still arguing about that in the Coldplay dispute?) Even worse if you're unsigned etc. as they could say they couldn't have heard your music before. It would be very hard to prove they did something like break into / intercepting an email account. Edit: just to clarify that one: you wouldn't get help from the police on something like this; you won't have access to the offenders computers and your ISP is unlikely to take a mail server offline for you to analyse. So even if you knew someone qualified (this bit is important if they're going to testify in court) in forensic computing, you wouldn't be able to prove anything. I'm sure they talked about this in Guitar World once. They pointed out stuff like its incredibly rare for famous artists and record companies to want to steal anything as the potential costs are so great. And anyone not that big who steals your music isn't going to be worth suing. Your legal costs would be horrible and all you might get is an apology and stop them playing it. I can understand people want to protect their hard work, but sometimes the paranoia gets the better of people.

Legally, his songs are already protected as a work of intellectual property. Its enforcing it that's tricky i.e. having enough evidence that the song is yours to be able to take someone to court and win. There's probably loads of threads on that already. But the easiest way to put off this problem, would be to email the mp3s in password protected .rar/.zip files and give you all the password over the phone or at rehearsal. You realise that the chances of someone actually nicking a song in the way you imagine are incredibly slim. Someone with the ability is unlikely to even know who you are. Unless you're secretly very famous. (Can you be secretly famous - bit of an oxymoron there)

If you've lost interest then quit and do something else. Music will still be here when you get back. Life is too short, do something that does interest you. But if you've only lost motivation then that's a different kettle... You've got to figure out what's going on in your head. Is this something you want to do but can't be arsed (lack of inspiration, energy, commitment etc.) or something you actually don't want to be doing at all anymore.

[quote name='RAY AGAINST THE MACHINE' post='441702' date='Mar 22 2009, 01:48 PM']If I was buying another one ,I think that I would sill leave it as is tho' [/quote] There's a part of me that doesn't like modifying things. But then that other part of me is saying that maybe I'd have an ideal bass if I did. Ah hell I dunno. Thinking out loud really.

[quote name='RAY AGAINST THE MACHINE' post='441691' date='Mar 22 2009, 01:36 PM']Sounds like you should leave alone. I believe in not altering stuff unless it's absolutely necessary. You could sell it ,then look for something more suitable for your requirements etc. [/quote] I haven't bought it yet. I have one Curbow which I love and there's no way I'd change it or sell it. My thinking was whether to get another and try to shape its sound into something that fits better with what I want Bass No. 3 to do.

[quote name='Crazykiwi' post='441060' date='Mar 21 2009, 01:28 PM']Are you trying to fix a problem that isn't there? If you don't need the slap switch, can you ignore it?[/quote] Well, yes I am probably am considering fixing a problem that isn't there. But it was a thought that came out of wanting (not really needing) a bass for a specific job and not quite feeling that a stock Curbow is right. Its not just the slap switch really, the Curbows seem very punchy to me, which is great, but not exactly what I'm after next. Changing the pups and perhaps putting in a more generic 3-band eq might work for me (this would probably leave the switch unused) but I don't know how much any of this would cost so have no real idea whether this is something even worth thinking about.

[quote name='Al Heeley' post='441206' date='Mar 21 2009, 06:23 PM']Eight: you are right about Ableton, very user-friendly, after 1/2 an hour I'd imported some drum loops from EZdrummer, synched 4 different keyboard midi tracks and played a bass groove along at the same time thru an audio track. It has a GUI feel that I find a lot easier and more logical to move around in so i guess the Cubase LE will gather some more dust while I learn the ropes.[/quote] Cool - glad you're enjoying it. I was pretty stunned when I first tried it, couldn't believe a package that was so straightforward to use would actually have the features and abilities to rival the main sequencers. I'm glad they don't make me choose between Sonar and Live. I'd be very sorry to see one of them go.

Like an animal. I've got enough to worry about hitting the right strings without varying how hard I hit them.

[quote name='Al Heeley' post='440187' date='Mar 20 2009, 12:10 PM']I'm presuming all of these will have similar access to the VST instruments, to run EZdrummer and guitar rig/amplitude, etc...?[/quote] More than likely they'll find the "Vstplugins" directory that Cubase created. If they don't, you can set the location of the vst plugins in each program to point to it. They can all use VST and VSTi plugins so EzDrummer, Guitar Rig and Amplitude all work lovely in them. I have Guitar Rig and Amplitude and know first hand that both are sweeet in Sonar and Live. Don't have EzDrummer but I do have Toontrack's DrumKitFromHell Superior and that works well too. So you've no worries on your plugin fronts.

[quote name='leprechaun' post='440121' date='Mar 20 2009, 11:18 AM']Good advice, unfortunately the ability to do this is becoming less common as the manufacturers are battling against software piracy and are reluctant to allow trial versions to be available for download.[/quote] Yeah I can never understand that logic. Al already has Cubase LE (guessing it came with the soundcard?) so if he downloads the trials for Cakewalk Sonar (or perhaps Project5 even?) and Ableton Live then he's covered three of the most popular sequencers for Windows guys. For the others, well, to be perfectly honest, if they're not going to give you trial version so you can sensibly decide where to spend the money you work all day for, then I'm in support of downloading it illegally and trying it that way. I am not in support of keeping it beyond a reasonable period of testing it though.

Probably should. Not totally sold on side-chaining; though thank god they did bring it in to stop people asking for it all the time. The sort of heavy duty mixing and mastering end of things isn't something I have much ability with. In the past, I've tended to focus more on arranging tracks and letting someone else worry about the white man's magic side. Midi editing was always pretty good (better than most if you ask me) but yeah, there were improvements to be made and from what I know, they made them. I just decided to spend the upgrade money elsewhere at the time... but should probably review that decision again now.

[quote name='lowdown' post='440108' date='Mar 20 2009, 11:02 AM']Its like the argument - MAC sounds better than PC. About time that appeared again.[/quote] Oh yes please, that's my favourite DAW related argument ever. Brainless fun all the way.

[quote name='lowdown' post='440091' date='Mar 20 2009, 10:42 AM']I upgraded to SPE 8 a few months ago......... And the Midi editing thing has really come along. The Sonar Score editor is a lot easier on the eyes than Cubase [ but i think Cubase 5 has improved that ][/quote] I'm still on 6. Had 5PE before that and when 6 came in with all the extra time stretching stuff it pretty much ticked the last remaining boxes I could have asked for. I hear the later versions have done a great job improving an already great user interface though.

[quote name='leprechaun' post='440086' date='Mar 20 2009, 10:38 AM']I would suggest that those telling you to avoid it simply don't like the GUI or maybe have never put the time in to learn how to use it (something you're going to have to do with any DAW incidentally). I use Cubase (Nuendo), Pyramix and Pro Tools at work and once you know them they all do the same thing.[/quote] Then you would be suggesting wrong. I do know how to use Cubase, I just don't like it. You're right in that I don't particularly like the gui but that's just a small part of it. I don't like its quirks, I don't like its manufacturer and I don't like its support forums which I've had the unfortunate pleasure of needing at various points. But as you said, there are pro's and con's to all of them, and they all basically do the same thing. None of them are sufficiently "better" than any other to argue about. Its personal preference all the way here. But what's the one piece of advice I keep seeing on BC regarding beginner purchases? - Try a few and see what takes your fancy. Not buy the first one and learn to use it. I suggested trying something else is all, before the guy invests hours and hours in one particular package. Oh, I recommend Live to a lot of people on the basis that its very easy to use (even more so than my beloved Sonar) and its session view is great fun. I wish Cakewalk would steal that damn idea.

[quote name='lowdown' post='440045' date='Mar 20 2009, 09:55 AM']One other thing to consider. Cubase has a score and notater window, Which is great for midi editing.[/quote] Tis a good point if you're a reader. You might find the lack of staff view irritating. Because I use Live and Sonar (Sonar has a lovelyish staff view/editor) I can't say I've ever missed it in Live but it is definitely something to consider. [quote name='Al Heeley' post='440004' date='Mar 20 2009, 09:00 AM']I'm a vista user here. I'll have a go with Ableton - I have a demo copy (live 5.1). One problem is trying to work out which settings I should use - I have Asio4all, also creative asio, then theres directx options, creative multimedia full and half duplex and another one like wmp or something. Oops, just spent £80 on this top-of-range X-Fi Elite pro creative audio card, I was running of an on-board soundchip before, I thought this was a significant upgrade![/quote] In general, you'll use which ever one seems fastest. Ideally you'll want to use your Creative ASIO drivers. However, if they are pish (a lot are) then try Asio4All. Unfortunately mate, whilst its a definite upgrade and you might be fine with for a while, the X-fi is a high-end soundcard for gamers and media players. Not really for audio production. Not your fault you didn't know though - if you're just getting started with sequencers and computer audio, there's a hell of a lot to learn before you can do anything. Mistakes will be made.