NJE

Your right the G#s are octaves, he uses a 135 on the low one, I found a video somewhere on Facebook where he plays bland street bloom and he explains in the comments. Here we go: https://m.facebook.com/sikthofficial/videos/1580623935330390/

I presume you play in a heavy band, and that the rest of the band have a certain look and their guitars follow. I imagine they are jumping on the trend as it seems every remotely heavy band out there are playing the same type of guitars and the NG3 fits that image. Yes the fanned frets work well for down tuning but it’s not the definitive solution. If you don’t know him already look at James Leach from sikth, the last time I saw him he was using a 34” scale Manson bass and I believe he tunes to drop C# tuning as well as G#-G#-C#-F#. His tone was massive and clear, you don’t need to follow trends and look like every other heavy band and buy a Dingwall. If you can try one and it’s right for you then go for it, but don’t be made to feel like your gear is inferior because of a poser guitarist and some bloke at the back who hits things 😉

That’s a great tune with great bass. I was really taken aback when I found out it was programmed and not an actual bass, it sounded so much like a ‘live’ performance.

My experience of not owning fancy amps and using one bass and not worrying about tone and ‘my sound’, comes from playing in a small function band, where I do honestly believe I could pick up almost any bass and amp and make it work for that situation. That situation is very different to being a recording musician. My very oldest and closest friend is a recording musician and has done some very high profile film score contributions and TV shows etc. In that environment, his instruments make a very big difference and react in different ways to what gear he uses. In that situation I fully accept and realise it is not just about the fingers, you need tools to do certain things and as such the concept of ‘the one’ is redundant. I think the overall message here is that we can and have all probably been far too caught up in the minutia of gear and specs when in most cases it makes almost no difference to the band or music we are making. That’s not to say it doesn’t have an effect on our playing or confidence because I know how much better I feel at a gig when my bass sounds ‘right’. That said the inconsistencies of playing live have got me to the point where I don’t really think preamps, woods, strings, pickup brand or much else will ever get me to a place where I have a consistent repeatable tone. But that’s just one mans experience and I like hearing everyone else’s.

I came to a very similar conclusion. My bass was always sent to PA from a DI and then the engineer always tweaked my bass for the room and overall mix. It rarely sounded anything like ‘my tone’ it just did it’s job. As a result I got rid of my Aguilar rig as it was just a fancy monitor in the end and to be honest in the mix of the other stage noise and the venue we were in, it sounded no better than any other amp I have used. I might as well have been using a cheap secondhand Ashdown (not knocking Ashdown, just stating they can be picked up very cheap for what they are). The same went for basses, no one cared what my bass sounded like, as long as I played my parts in time and in tune, no one gave a monkeys whether it was a 2 grand overwater or. £250 Squier and I gigged both. Actually I got more comments about the Squier! The grand conclusion for me was that as long as the neck felt comfortable and it was reliable and made at thuddy bass sound, I’m good to go.

Well to be fair my cheap might not be someone else’s cheap. Originally I only seemed to see roasted maple on the likes of Suhr guitars and then there was MusicMan which are almost 2 grand. Now we have Sire, Cort and even Squier using it on £400 basses. That’s a big chunk for me these days, but cheap compared to the premium brands who originally started using it.

I may be way off here, but I think the benefit is also that by roasting the wood you can make use of timber that would have otherwise been unsuitable for guitar building. I think that’s why we are starting to see it on cheaper instruments now as the process becomes cheaper. I think it was Roger Sadowsky that said he never used heavily flamed or Birdseye wood for necks (excluding finger boards) because it wasn’t strong/stable enough. Now he seems to be using roasted figured woods on NYC basses and the German stuff, so I’m guessing it makes a significant difference as well as being very nice to look at. I’m looking forward to trying/buying a bass with a roasted neck, I think it looks great and if it means the industry can make use of more wood then great!

Hopefully these images load properly, I might be in trouble with that green P5

Just seen it, looks like a fiesta red Precision and a nice seafoam green P5. Not doing anything to help my Sire GAS.

I remember being in Andertons and playing the Adam Clayton Jazz and being completely underwhelmed and disappointed by it. No life or character to it, the neck just felt weird and sterile for lack of a better word. Now some people may like a clean slate and blank canvas of an instrument to make their own and bond with, but it wasn’t for me. I put the AC down and picked up a Squier Vintage Modified PJ, and it had so much more character for some unknown reason. The neck felt nicer, it resonated more, the set up was better and it was just more fun. Wish I had bought it to be honest.

I remember when I was at Uni in 2002 walking around the small local pawn shops, when it wasn’t just cash converters. There was a tiny shop near where I lived and it was full of bikes and DJ kit and at the back some instruments. He had two early-mid 70s precision’s one fretted one fretless priced at £400 and £380 respectively. The fretted was sold but still in the shop and said I would take it there and then. Sadly he informed me some chap was paying it off at about £5 a week and he wished he could sell it to me. In 1999 I got a brand new American Standard precision from Cranes in Cardiff for just under £600.

No Zilla are based in Cornwall, well worth a shout.

It may be a long shot, but Zilla cabs may be able to do something for you.

There is a scene in a small bar? def not Abe Laboriel, although he sounds great too. edit...just found it at 6:30 in the film, great tone.

Watched this a few times, I find it quite calming like watching a David Attenborough documentary. There is a guy playing early on in the film, might be at the start actually, and his tone is just sublime.

Ooh that video looks good, I was looking at one by Scott Whitley? on YouTube which breaks it down but this has some tab as well which is handy.

I think I need to work at creating some time even if it’s just half an hour or so rather than just crash on the sofa. Being on Furlough has allowed me to go and ride my bike which is great because exercise is good for body and mind, but I still need to commit to other activities and create some space to do that as well. Keeping myself in tact....that is a great way of putting it. I do feel like I am just ‘dad’ these days, but good to know a balance can be achieved.

I love scary pockets, and Pomplamoose which is also a Jack Conte project. I just googled him and he is the CEO and co-founder of Patreon...very cool. Great covers, I would love to be in a cover band like that, incredible!

Don’t say that, I was the finger excuse to cover for my ineptitude 😂

It’s not unusual, but I really Wanted to learn Mandolin. Two of my friends have them and I tried playing a little and it’s basically a physical impossibility because my fingers are so fat 😄

After everyone’s responses I have actually been feeling a little more inspired and have been listening to a lot more music which has stoked the fires a little. Watching the whole Vulfpeck Madison Square Garden concert was really uplifting. I haven’t got the bass out for a proper play yet as we have been spending some time with wider family since things eased off, but I have started pulling my list of songs together. I am sure loads more will come to me but it’s a start. Most of these are obvious choices and achievable in my view. I’m not putting any Jaco on my list anytime soon: Rhythm Stick The Birdwatcher The Speedwalker Sir Duke Who did you think I was Might try and get the bass out tonight after the kids are tucked up.

Another big fan of Designacable here, great service every time, quick turnaround and loads of colour options which is great. It’s amazing how my cables stopped going missing and being ‘borrowed’ when they were bright red or green!

Times have well and truly changed in terms of more expensive equates to sounding better. One of my closest friends does heaps of writing and recording and has been on quite a few big budget film scores in the past few years, he uses Harley Benton basses and guitars for a lot of his work because they sound great. They may not feel as good in the hand and have a few rough edges compared to a £1500+ Fender but for him it’s all about the sound. I have owned some custom built instruments and some really cheap basses over the years, and I enjoyed getting a good tone from a cheap bass and in a pub/marquee/hall I would challenge anyone to pick an expensive bass over a £100 Harley Benton of the same style.

Hi gang, To be honest I think you are all right to a certain extent and I think it’s a combination of factors. When my first child arrived I still found time to play and gig and my wife encouraged me to play and I did. The bands I was playing in were good but due to everyone else all having kids and other commitments and moving, a couple just packed up fairly organically. Since then I have done some dep gigs but whenever anyone has asked me to get involved I either couldn’t commit fully to their schedule or I just couldn’t face playing what songs were on the set list. I think I have struggled with motivation for a lot of things over the past year, and use up what energy and enthusiasm I have on the kids and family. When they are in bed, I eat dinner, chat to my wife whilst a bad film is on in the background and then it’s bed in preparation for work and childcare which starts about 6am Some of it is just time and space, as I don’t have room to have guitars out anymore and my office/spare room is full of stuff like ubit said. Some of it however is just a general lack of energy for anything but the basics and I don’t know if that’s normal for someone with kids or whether there are some underlying issues I need to try and tackle. I have friends who still make time for their hobbies at weekends and dip in and out of family time as they please. I don’t judge, it’s their life and it must work for their families, but I struggle to justify taking many hours out of a weekend to do my own thing and leave my wife with the monsters 😄. I guess some of it is feeling a bit lost without music as I used to know it, i.e gigging and going out, but I need to experiment with getting that musical gratification in other ways.

Thank you all for taking the time to reply, I would love to reply to every single response because you took the time, but I will be here for hours if I do. I have found the whole thing very uplifting but more on that in a minute. I should have said that I have two young kids, a 3 year old and an 8 month old, and a year ago I started a much more taxing job than I had done previously. As a by-product of these things I started to scale back my playing because with my wife working unpredictable shifts with the NHS, I was not reliable enough to commit to regular rehearsals or gigs and didnt want to be ‘that guy’ that lets people down. In all honesty I already had feelings of not wanting to play with the band I had been with, so all these things gave me a good excuse. My Bass is great, plays amazing and I do love stingrays (this is my third) but I bought it as it was a good price and all I had to spend rather than being blown away by the finish etc and ‘having to have it’ if you get what I mean? I think everyone is right, a new bass may help in the short term but there are other issues. I should mention I only own this and an old squier 5 string jazz but rarely play that, and I haven’t bought a new bass in nearly 4 years which is why I pondered a change. I do have acoustic guitars as well, but like bass they have barely been touched despite being given a nice Martin by a family member. I am going to take all the suggestions on board about trying new genres, setting some goals and personal challenges. I have played the same material is so many bands for so long, but whilst I was out walking today I started to compile a mental list of songs I would just like to be able to play and I will work on from there. My mental state is not that sound at the moment like so many others. I have been on furlough since April and have struggled with just being at home with the kids 24/7. Thankfully listening to music still has the power to lift me out of darker periods and days so I take some comfort in that. I do struggle to find pleasure/enjoyment out of situations at the moment and even just re-reading my post and your comments has made me realise that, and I will need to start addressing some of that. Playing Bass was my identity for so long and it was all about playing live and the ‘buzz’ rather than anything else. I never quite got the satisfaction from playing at home but I do like a challenge, so I am going to compile my list and try and get a buzz in a different way. So just a thanks to everyone, combined with the replies here and a lovely walk in the sun, I feel happier and inspired enough to pull the bass out for a clean at least and see how we get on. Your a good bunch!