SumOne

Yeah, it can sound better without anything, but I think it all depends on what music you play. It's like 'my ice cream actually tastes better without tabasco sauce on it'. 

Stuff like classic Blues, Motown, Rock n Roll, Reggae etc. often sound better without any 'hot sauce'! But some songs really need effects, threads like this 'Chorus, what songs need it?'  https://www.basschat.co.uk/topic/514762-chorus-what-songs-need-it/  Or, you'd have trouble re-crating the Bassline from Thundercat's 'Them Changes'  without an envelope filter, or Electric Wizard's 'Funeralopolis' without some heavy distortion/fuzz.

I wouldn't give up on the hot sauce, it just needs to be used where appropriate.

Nate Smith:

In the nicest way, it is worth remembering that audiences don't really care (unless they are aficionados that paid a lot to see your technical skill). Everyone with be supportive. 

The Heptones, Good Life

... nice bassline to play along to. 

If I'm playing 'clean' then I like a compressor early in the chain and quite subtle so it doesn't kill all playing dynamics but evens things out a bit before it goes through the preamp/Amp (and some compressors add a bit of a specific tone).

If I'm doing slap/pop then I have it set up a bit more like a limiter (high threshold, high ratio).

If I use things like an envelope filter then I like the compressor to be after it and a bit more like a limiter - so the subtle dynamics of playing get through to trigger the filter (or not), but then any really loud envelope filter peak noises get reduced. 

I feel that multi-fx are good for compression as you can take these things into account for different presets, or easily use more than one compressor/limiter in a signal chain.  

I've played a couple of small outdoor festivals and they usually lack the energy and audience connection of a more tightly packed indoor venue (ideally I'd like 100 club on a busy night sort of thing, I expect most people would prefer to have seen bands like The Who, the Clash, Sex Pistols, Oasis etc. there than a stadium), so I don't think a massive crowd is necessarily on my wish list - but need a good up for it crowd is needed. Anything else is a bonus for the mundane stuff (good sound, easy access, not too far to travel, free food/drinks). 

I tend to play Reggae and Ska (and Funk/Disco with Bernard Edwards as one of my favourite players/tones - and he used old flats) so flats are at least the perceived wisdom thing to go for  - but I then changed to roundwounds for a couple of reasons:

• Flatwounds seem like they would be smoother for your fingers but I found the sticky/grabbyness of them quite uncomfortable, roundwounds are actually more comfortable to play.
• An eye opener was hearing one of the Reggae greats Bass players (I think it was Flabba Holt, but not sure about that) saying he now uses roundwounds as you can EQ out the highs - but you can't increase highs if they aren't there with the flats. I tend to prefer old roundwounds that lose some high end but even with new ones EQ'd and then through an Amp/Cab it seems quite easy to make them sound like flatwounds but not vice versa.

Perhaps I'm missing something with flats though, do they actually produce more of a classic motown and Reggae low-mid frequency 'thump' than rounds? I haven't seen graphs that scientifically demonstrate this, my assumption is that actually there is no boost to those low-mid frequencies (if using strings with the same core) but the rounds introduce more higher frequencies (and potential finger noise with sliding), so it seems like the rounds have relatively more of that low-mid, but if you EQ out those highs on the rounds and you get the same thing. 

Is some of the perception because flats came before rounds? Rounds weren't widely used until the 1970s so anyone looking up what players used before then for Motown and early Ska and Reggae etc. will see that it was flats and try to emulate that? ...but If rounds were widely available back then those original artists might well have used them and EQ'd the highs out when needed.

New Adrian Sherwood album 'The Collapse of Everything' has just been released.

The title track gives a good idea of what the album is like: 

Tearfully say "We need to talk. I'm not ready for this kind of relationship - you deserve better, it's not you, it's me."

Then run away laughing and shout "Smell ya'later losers!" (try not to trip over at this point).

Give it a few years and it'll probably be impossible to tell if music is AI created.

I guess it'll mean that people making original music will need to up their game - no point doing anything generic and derivative.

Live bands might do alright, people will probably still want that interaction and 'realness'. 

'To celebrate the legendary roots reggae band - Misty In Roots’ 50th anniversary, are set to reissue their classic back catalogue, starting with their classic debut album - Live At The Counter Eurovision ‘79.' (Bandcamp link)

....which is good news as geting their records (either physically or digitally) isn't easy.

50th anniversary live shows later this year too. ♨️

People are going to say 'bigger is better' and go for a 37" Dingwall (which also sounds like a euphemism). 

Having owned them, I'd say there wasn't a huge difference in B sound between a 37" Dingwall, a 35" MTD, or my current 35" Ibanez EHB MS. More of a difference in feel. I have found 34" B is a bit too floppy so needs higher action to get a clean B string notes without fret buzz. 

What does seem to make a big difference though is a good strings and good bass setup, and having an Amp and Cab that can properly cope with 30Hz.

On 17/08/2025 at 11:02, crazycloud said:

Ibanez SR300, or a GSR200 if money is really tight.

 

I've used both my SR200 and 300 series and they're both great.

Agreed, for about £200 a well set-up second hand Ibanez SR 300 is really not that different to some £1k basses I've owned.

14 minutes ago, Reggaebass said:

Yes I’m finding that too, lately my YouTube has been flooded with AI reggae, some of it I must admit is really good but very clean like you say, also some are using pictures of original artists to draw you in, when I’m sure it isn’t them singing 

Yeah, I saw one posted that was touted as a 'new' Bob Marley and Peter Tosh song.....very obviously (for many reasons!) AI had basically been given a prompt to make it. 

For the sake of it, I asked AI to do a Reggae song about Chichester: https://suno.com/s/4N29U2W1xoc5Hrrh ....cheesy, but not terrible.

It is a bit of a concern as I've just started in an originals Reggae band that doesn't gig (in addition to my usual band that does gig a lot), so the only thing this new band does is record original music, but I can only assume that AI music creation will only continue to get better and more easily available so originals bands are going to really have to up their game and add something properly original/authentic to be relevant. 

A decent new dub album from Zion I Kings:

....my only issue with this and most other modern dub albums is they can sound a bit 'clean' and perfect to me, like it's not that far off what I try to make on a Laptop and that Laptop production process is what I can picture in my head. Whereas something like 1970s Black Ark type productions just give more of a feel of a hot smoky Jamaican ramshackle studio and live musicians.

The 'I can't hear myself at all - so will turn everything up full and then muck about with cables and power/mute switches etc' deserves severe punishment (or at least needing to buy the band a round of drinks). It's a pet hate of mine, I know it is easily done but is real amateur hour stuff that sounds terrible if there are punters within earshot, potentially breaks equipment, and is really dangerous for hearing.

.....that's not to say I haven't done it myself though!

11 hours ago, kiat said:

Bernard Edwards (various, Chic)

I think as with most players Bernard's sound was more about technique rather than equipment. He has quite a unique 'chucking' style. 

I don’t think he used effects pedals, and seem to remember hearing that his recorded sound was straight to desk.

He did apparently use quite old flatwound strings and most famously used a Stingray bass  - but he did also record with a Precision and other basses and made them all sound like him. 

IEMs. (Xvive with ACS custom) After being told by most of the band and online about how amazing they are I got some and found them a hassle for bass playing and combined cost about £350 for something I haven't ended up using.

Batteries needs charging, cable snags on things and makes noise as moved, sound cuts out sometimes and when it works the sound quity isn't great - poor bass sound (and this is with ACS custom moulded in-ears), relying on mixer settings etc, it just all adds complexity as I still need my Amp/Cab which I'm stood in front of as the PA isn't up to the task (so I don't need to monitor myself), and I'm stood next to the drummer so I can hear that main thing I need from the rest of the band anyway even if there weren't monitors (which there are - as the drummer needs them). 

I can see it being worthwhile if the whole band use them so no stage monitors, and if the PA wad good enough to not need a bass amp/cab.

I do also have ACS earplugs which are great though. 

I'm not saying Andertons aren't good, but if you buy pretty much anything online the shops legally need to let you easily return it for a refund within 14 days, defective or not - the buyer doesn't even need to provide a reason. 

"You must offer a refund to customers if they’ve told you within 14 days of receiving their goods that they want to cancel. They have another 14 days to return the goods once they’ve told you.

You must refund the customer within 14 days of receiving the goods back. They do not have to provide a reason."

 https://www.gov.uk/accepting-returns-and-giving-refunds

Earl Sixteen 'Concrete Rockers' album ♨️

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18 hours ago, Reggaebass said:

I don’t use any pedals or effects myself and never have, I’m just valve amp-cab and bass, I don’t really know anyone else who plays reggae using any either,

don talks here about how to get the scientist sound you sometimes hear, I seem to remember @SumOne and myself talking about it once 

 

Yeah nice, I like it, Scientist and Mad Professor both use that effect a lot.

I bought a Boss GX-10 partly to be able to do that effect -  small multi-fx with an assignable expression pedal for that EQ change and Reverb/Delay boost.

I do use fx a fair bit for Reggae/Dub, but usuall quite subtly. I have found that even just a standard Reggae bass sound can vary quite a bit between different  players and recordings so it can be quite worthwhile adding some compression, drive, EQ just for the core tone and to add some variety between songs (I don't know if it was on purpose or not, but some of the early Lee Perry recordings have some quite distorted sounding bass, and a lot of Robbie Shakespeare recordings sound edge of breakup sort of tube distortion). And then things like that Scientist reverb effect are good to use (sparingly!), or I ocasionally add space echo to the high end to trail off as the bass cuts out in parts like the breakdown or ending of songs, I quite like an ocasional bit of Phaser too.

This reminds me that I need to try and make a preset to get near to this extreme version of the Scientist effect with EQ, delays, and reverb: 

Damn it!  I had been getting quite comfortable just using my Boss GX-10 that has decent enough Tuner, EQ, Compressor, Drive, and modulation and delay effects - enough that I wasn't really after any indididual pedals. It is convenient and means I can get all my Amp + Cables + Bass stand + Effects etc. in one single relatively small bag for gigs. 

.....But I've just received an Octamizer in a part exchange - and nothing on a multi-fx quite gets that same analogue octave sound, and the GX-10 (or other multi-fx) don't quite get the analogue analogue filter feel of something like an MXR Bass Envelope Filter so I'd been eyeing up them again. And now this MXR Bass synth (and @knicknack's excellent video) is enough to tip me over the edge! The GX-10 is more of a stand-alone thing as it is a bit big to incorporate into a pedal board so it puts me on the path of selling it and getting indididual pedals yet again!