NJE

Sign me up (for a free trial), that looks great, thanks for sharing.

Sold and off to a new home!

Lack of use and some impending bills means I need to make a bit more of an effort to sell my Proton.

It sounds great, I particularly love the down sweep, and I like owning it, but I have barely turned it on since buying it. I have no use for it in my band so it seems a waste to just look at it.

This is in the raw metal type casing, and I have done my upmost to keep it clean and stop it oxidising and changing in colour. It has been kept on a pedal board, in a case with silica packets to prevent any moisture getting to anything, but it seems they are impossible to keep mint.

It has two very small strips of 3M Dual Lock on the bottom which I am happy to take off before selling. Comes with box and instructions.

I am happy to wrap it up and post if collection isn’t possible.

Just over two years ago I was done, I had no interest in playing at home or joining a band and my bass didn’t come out of the case for about a year.

An old band mate kept hassling me to help him out with his band, and after a few months I caved in and went along to help out with vocals (I sing lead on occasion) as they had a new bass player. Long story short bass player left and I have been practicing and gigging a little bit as they are a good bunch to play with.

The weird bit for me is that, I would not care in the slightest if it folded. There was a slight disagreement a few weeks back and I was even hoping that was the end of the band and I wouldn’t have to do it anymore. Not because it’s a bad band, but just the general stress and pressure and I have plenty of other things going on, two kids and work and a business project with a friend.

I have my main bass, I use a cheap Trace amp which my sax player owns, a few pedals which probably need to be sold and I am good. Not bought any equipment in years, but still like popping on here and window shopping.

I probably have more interest in my tenor guitar and ukulele these days.

I have very complex feelings about owning multiple expensive instruments and amps. I battle the guilt of owning expensive things that don’t get used very often, which is why at one point my two main basses were worth a total of £350.

Also after having some pretty expensive basses over the years, when I switched to cheaper gear I felt a strange sense of liberation and relief. I don’t know if it was just because I was less worried about minor issues or damaging them, but I was always finding fault with more expensive basses.

Now I am down to a MusicMan Stingray (which was insanely cheap) which I use all the time, a 5 string Squier which I don’t really play but it was a gift, and my backup is a Harley Benton which a good friend gave me, so I probably won’t sell that either.

I also wasted a lot of money on amps over the years, EBS, MarkBass and Aguilar but now use an old Trace combo that was £120 and sounds as good if not better than those other brands.

I play a few gigs and have a solid main bass I have owned for 7 years, so I don’t really look at bass gear anymore.

Overrated for me would be:

Markbass LMII - bombproof and very reliable, but I could not get a good sound out of it, dull and lifeless like my cab had a big quilt over it.

Aguilar Tonehammer amp and DB/GS cabs - again so so solid and reliable, gigged them for a while but the sound was just very dull and I was always fiddling with the amp and never happy.

Underrated:

EBS Reidmar - bought to replace my Markbass which was stolen. Worlds apart tone wise, clear, massive headroom, way more volume and just so tight and punchy. I didn’t care for the design of the casing but I barely ever fiddled with it at gigs.

Designacable - I am so surprised more people aren’t buying custom cables from these guys. I used them a few times for custom coloured cables at a time when most people just offered black. I have used coloured cables for years so no one can ever “accidentally” pick mine up and put them in their gig bag. Way cheaper than a lot of branded cables from bigger companies as well.

I have had mine 10 years and it’s probably the best but of kit I have bought. No zips, clips, seams or anything have broken and I will be honest I really haven’t taken care of it. It is starting to look a little scruffy and some of the piping looks rough now, but it’s been amazing.

I don’t know if the design has been updated, but no issue with the neck cradle on mine, it does the job and despite being loaded into vans, dropped and knocked over, all my basses have been perfectly protected in it.
 

I only ever use one strap and carry it on one shoulder a bit like a golf club bag, and leave the other strap tucked I. The back pocket. 

My guess is that they will be around combustion and DRoc standard prices so roughly £1700.

The NGs are over 2k now but they have the Darkglass preamp and matching headstock, so probably a bit more labour and cost in those.

If the quality and consistency is like the other Far East made Dingwalls I have played I think they will do well.

I have just watched a short video on Dingwall’s Instagram showing some models from guitar summit.

Sheldon shows two prototype Super PJ basses which he says are new models maybe coming out next year. I am hoping they are going to be far east made versions.

I have commented a couple of times on their posts that they should do a far east Super P or J model and always had a cryptic reply or a like, so hopefully one is on the way.

20 hours ago, LukeFRC said:

Tuner sometimes useful? Or not that kinda band? 

My sax player can’t play in tune so why should I 😄 

I may just use a clip on tuner, when the pedals make it to practice they usually just sit on the amp as the microtubes stays on all the time and I don’t use anything else really.

Here’s my mini board, all powered with a One Spot Pro underneath. I put this together for some fun at home after watching some of Ian Allison’s videos creating synthy type tones.

I only really use the chorus and Microtubes in the band so it’s farewell to the rest soon, but I do like looking at them 😄

I don’t think I have been particularly into the music I have played in any of the bands I have been in, so I wouldn’t go and see them live.

We play some fun stuff in my current band but that’s as far as it goes, it’s fun to play but I would never choose to listen to any of the songs at home. I guess I just like playing music as long as it’s done to the best of everyone’s abilities.

My oldest friend makes a very good living from music, but it took being open to any opportunity, flexible musically, and some clever ideas to find opportunities to make money in the less glamorous side of music.

He has worked in a lot of library music for tv etc, done recording session work for musical artists and also composers. He wrote guitar backing tracks, did dressage music, lots of things that meant he could write music and play guitar.

Through being professional and nice and easy guy to work with, he has now got movie credits to his name and is now getting into recording bands and producing, but that is not where the money has been for him.

He is a guitarist first and foremost, but he’s a talented multi instrumentalist now, just down to necessity. He jokes with me that he’s made more money playing ukulele than guitar.

So basically there is good money to be made, but be prepared to find a niche or make money from music in less obvious ways than being in a band, or recording bands, or even playing live at all.

We had an astounding gig in Chepstow a couple of weeks ago, a real confidence booster as it was the first gig with this band lineup.

In contrast, Saturdays gig was a function, black tie and ball gown type evening. It ran late so we were on at 10:30 instead of 9, and we had set up and sound checked at 5:30.

They were all hammered by 9:30 and the disco was playing songs that I swear were pulled from a school disco in the late 90s which the audience seemed to love.

We soon put a stop to that with a selection of soul/funk/soft rock, and we kept getting asked for ABBA and Oasis. I had one lady get very frustrated that I couldn’t talk to her about song requests while I was singing lead and playing bass. She got up on stage and was talking in my ear while I was playing. 
 

She was not offensive, she said we sounded good, but they wanted more modern music which we could t help them with. Anyway we had them dancing for a few blues brothers/commitments numbers but then got out and let the disco delight them with a Grease medley, some Whigfield, and Jive Bunny.

I think they are great, big unapologetic sing along pop with some darker lyrics and themes to discover when you listen properly.

They have been touring with a big band recently, and they have a polished big sound which is something you don’t really see much of now. It kind of reminds me of some big acts of the 80s and 90s in terms of production.

For ages I heard a line in Pearl Jams rearviewmirror wrong.

Original line: saw things, so much clearer

I heard: Sophie, so much cleaner.

There is a guy on Instagram who does amazing misheard lyric videos. One of his common ones is swapping out ‘the rain’ for Lorraine in songs. It ruins so many songs and is hard to unhear 😄

On 30/05/2023 at 17:39, dmc79 said:

EBS flat patch cables are great and take up very little space. I wouldn't go back to chunky patch cables since using these. 

Another vouch for EBS flat patch cables. I think they have three levels of them, I went for the middle ones with the gold jacks. They allow for a very compact pedal board.

I used to use online brokers like P4D and Parcel2go.

With P4D I used to get written confirmation they would ship and insure instruments to the full value I was asking so there was no room to argue if anything went wrong.

I then wrapped up the basses inside the case, but never locked the case itself in case someone wants to look at it at in customs (never happened).

I then wrapped the case up thoroughly and put my address and delivery address in multiple locations just to be safe.

I took photos at every stage of wrapping and packing so that they couldn’t argue it was insufficiently wrapped if anything happened. This saved me with a cab sale once and they had no room to argue with me that the courier was to blame.

Sorry if this is not appropriate for the thread, but could anyone give me any info on what the neck profile is like on a SB-2? I seem to remember playing a tribute one a while ago and it was very narrow but a bit more of a U shape.

what are the US built ones like, as there are a few around secondhand at the moment.

I have sung in bands both backing and lead, as long as I have played bass, so I guess I learned to do both at the same time fairly organically.

That being said, there are songs that I just cannot sing and play at the same time because of the melody and syncopation just make my brain hurt. Move on up by Curtis Mayfield is one example. It’s not hard to play but I just can’t do it.

If you can lock down a bass-line and know it so well it’s muscle memory that helps a lot. Also knowing the lyrics well helps, so you don’t have to think about what your singing.

Sometimes fairly simple songs are really tricky and sometimes the tricky ones can come easily because the rhythm and bassline slots nicely with the phrasing and melody.

I had one of these for a few years. I was going through a phase of not feeling I deserved expensive gear so sold my Stingray 5 or Roscoe Beck V, I can’t remember.

This performed so well in the soul band I was in at the time and the low B helped with all the key changes we did. Great bass that got so many good comments on its sound and look. It looked so good in band pics.

1 hour ago, neepheid said:

 

 

What was it about having multiple basses that you felt liberated from?

 

😄 I know it sounds a bit ridiculous, but I quite liked not having the option of multiple bases. I just got on with that bass and focussed on playing. I also didn’t have to worry about maintaining multiple basses, buying strings for them, finding space to store them etc. 

I am tempted to add another into rotation though.

It’s quite liberating going down to one bass. I have just played my stingray for about 6 years now, but am tempted to get a P or J or PJ for my 40th for a change.

All of my recent encounters with fenders have been poor or average at best. They just can’t seem to maintain any real consistency in a lot of the ranges. 

I played one of the Vintera Jazz basses at a big guitar store recently and it was just dreadful, shocking set-up, build was poor and it was just lifeless. I put back after a couple of minutes.

In contrast I played a Lakland PJ which was a similar price and it was an outstanding instrument, resonant, well made, well set up and sounded amazing. I would have loved to have taken it home but I really didn’t like the colour.

I have heard good things about the American Original/Vintage basses though, and the American reissue I played a while ago was a really lovely instrument.

I was thinking clear at one point. When I was taking the pickup cover off I thought it looked pretty good.