mike257

[quote name='bartelby' post='1041180' date='Nov 29 2010, 02:10 PM']The battery clip.[/quote] Crikey! That's a bit tight then. Shame not everyone has had the same experience.

Really? What did you need? The part they sent me is probably only about a quid's worth mind you (if that!).

I'm sure I've read that Blur's Song 2 was a Rat, that sounds pretty damn chunky. +1 for the Caleb Schofield love-in, the tone all the way through Antenna is just ridiculous good - especially on Seafrost, I'd love to nail that sound. Dude can really play too,

Just thought I'd share it with BC - I bought myself an Ashdown Hyperdrive about two years ago, which almost instantly developed a faulty footswitch. After a bit of waiting about, I got a replacement from the shop, but then in the meantime I somehow ended up in a country band, so the Hyperdrive stayed in the box. Fast forward to now, I'm getting a new noisy-arse rock band together, and get my Hyperdrive out, only to find the exact same fault as my first one!! After a couple of very helpful emails back and forth, I tell Ashdown's service department that it's probably not worth the cost of shipping it back and forth, and ask them to confirm the type of switch I need to buy to do a DIY repair. Two days later, and there's one dropping through my door, free of charge! Nice to see they'll go out of their way for a customer who's warranty expired 18 months ago! Top blokes, full marks!

My regular haunt has got a few Hartke bits, I think there might be an Ashdown knocking about, and there were some Warwick heads that always blew up! Keep my stuff in a locker there to avoid any of that messing!

[quote name='Tet' post='1033387' date='Nov 22 2010, 11:31 PM']Cool mate, get it arranged! Got a mate who's on here too (Under what name, though, I have no idea...), he'd probably be up for that. All geeks together, hahahaha.[/quote] Guilty as charged. Alright Tet, was wondering when you'd turn up, welcome to the party! Always up for a geek-out, would be nice to put faces to some other names round here.

So it's just me that thinks it looks the mutts nuts then? Oh well, I won't have to fight you all for the cheap 2nd hand ones in a few months then!

Loved her with Smashing Pumpkins, the solo stuff was pretty cool too, didn't know she was touring though! Gutted I missed it, sounds like a good one. So is she touring a new album then?

I owned both of these back in my youth - the Ibanez got gigged a lot, but had some issues with the neck, and (probably due to my own inexperience at looking after these things) ended up warped beyond playability, and has since wound up in a skip. The Squier was my first choice bass until the day I bought a Stingray. It's still in my collection, although it's been souped up with a Badass II bridge, Wizard pickups and all new pots/wiring. I actually took it out for a fair few gigs this year, and it still plays and sounds great. Based on that totally subjective personal experience (and my preference for 'classic' looking basses), I'd go Squier every time - although you should get your hands dirty with both and see how you feel about them.

I've got a California JM4 and absolutely love it - they're really well made basses, and I've never had a problem with how it sounds, it's great! Have been using it in passive mode lately, sounds great even without that fancy preamp.

[quote name='Low End Bee' post='1013099' date='Nov 5 2010, 11:17 AM']"One of our three singer/guitarists" That's just asking for trouble.[/quote] I found the most elegant solution to this most complex of situations. I've jacked it in! Bassist for hire then - let's see how that works out.

[quote name='Low End Bee' post='1013099' date='Nov 5 2010, 11:17 AM']"One of our three singer/guitarists" That's just asking for trouble.[/quote] Don't I know it!! The vocal harmonies were incredible - the ego clashes, not so much. I can't say I reccommend it!

[quote name='mike257' post='571472' date='Aug 17 2009, 10:29 AM']Amazingly, considering there's 6 of us, we come pretty close to managing it. There's three singers/writers in the band, one of whom was the driving force behind getting the band together in the first place, so he's the 'de facto' gaffer, but it rarely needs to come to one person to make the over-riding decision. .... Sometimes egos have to be massaged, and compromises have to be made, but we were all close friends who've played in various bands together before this one, so it all tends to work out in the end![/quote] Interesting to see this thread revived 12 months down the line - seems things have changed for plenty of us! My democratic, bunch of mates 6 piece has, after a fairly horrendous year of bad luck and bust-ups, become 4 band members and a session drummer. One of our original three singer/guitarists has got off in a storm of tension and unspoken grievances, and took the drummer with him. The remaining four of us, after resolving to carry on regardless, trained up a stand-in drummer and rearranged the set, with a view to not having to cancel any commitments. Fast forward a couple of weeks, and a guitarist is losing the plot, and now [b]all[/b] our shows for the rest of the year are pulled, and nobody seems capable of agreeing about anything. I'm sure it wasn't always this difficult!!

To be fair mate, most practice rooms I've ever used are in abandoned looking warehouses and down dark, empty looking sidestreets - most builders round here would have no better clue where our practice rooms are than the butcher, the baker, or the candlestick man, unless they were musos themselves. Even the cabbies usually can't find them! If the lads don't want to give you a second chance after you got lost in a new city, that's a bit tight, but that kind of attitude ain't gonna help you any either. I'd make damn sure I knew where I was heading to for an audition, between A-Z's, Google maps, and smart-arsed smartphones, it's pretty hard to not find somewhere these days! Don't take it as a knock though, hope things work out better for you next time mate

Practicepracticepractice. The more you do it the easier it'll be, but it goes if you don't keep on top of it. My old band was fast and heavy, and between two rehearsals a week and a couple of gigs a month, it became second nature. My current band has a much more relaxed vibe, and rarely presents anything 'difficult' technique-wise, and I've found that on the odd occasion I'm off having a rock-out somewhere, I struggle with things that used to come easily. Guess it's like any other excercise, gotta keep on top of it!

I've got Delano pickups in my Jazz-a-like Sandberg California JM4 - not the same set as you, mind. I've got the single coil at the neck, and a MM style (with a coil-tap) at the bridge. I A/B'd with my Stingray when I first picked it up, and found that my bridge humbucker, although not quite as full sounding, did a pretty passable impersonation of my usual tone. To be honest, that's probably more to do with the pre-amp differences (2-band vs 3 band) than the pickup itself. Coil tapped for the Jazz bass sound, it does the business no problem. To be honest, I don't actually use the bridge pickup at all when playing with my current band. I keep rolled right over to the neck and the bottom end is huge. I reckon they'll do the business pretty damn well in your Jazz, throw them in!!

Didn't know that about the low-end throttling - I've got a Shuttle 6 and use it with an Ampeg 6x10, and have no trouble shifting bottom end. I've never ran the volume past halfway, and I've used it with a couple of pretty damn loud bands. Personally, I don't know what I'd do with that extra power, as I barely run it past 3 or 4 at the moment, but I haven't tried one out to hear these tonal differences.

Is that you Danny? All the potential bassists are probably intimated by your 'just escaped from a L'Oreal advert' hair mate I've played in a band with this fella and he's a killer guitarist and singer - any bassists in the area who are interested would do well to have a go at it!

It's spot on about Billy Corgan in the Smashing Pumpkins. There's plenty of documentary footage and interviews where he and the other band members have been pretty candid about it. He'll do pretty much all the guitars and the bass because 'he can do it in fewer takes', and because he knows what he wants it to sound like. On the second album particularly, you can pretty much pick out the guitar parts that aren't his.