LITTLEWING

Just a quickie, I took the amp section out of my Squier 15w combo to make a 12" praccy combo and in between weekends of messing about I've forgotten which way the speaker wires go. There's one black and one white but I can't remember which is positive and negative. I'm assuming black is neg but things are never simple in 'ampworld'. Anyone have an idea?

At the end of the day, how often if ever is anyone going to find the need to remove their neck? Why not just glue the thing in once and for all? End result, one solid guitar.

Just to say, I have Prosteels on my Squier VM Jazz and Elixir Nano's on my Yamaha BBN5Mk2 which seem as though they were made for it, nice round 'middle' tone. I had Nano's on the jazz but found them a bit unbalanced in volume, especially the B which seemed to 'boom' rather than resonate, and so I tended to use the Yammy more. As soon as I put the 'steels on the Jazz I fell in love with it again and the now have the Yammy as a home noodler and a spare on stage.

Been using these for years. Never had any noises or any problems. Check out the artists that use them. Good enough for me! [url="http://www.award-session.com/cleartone_cables.html"]http://www.award-ses...one_cables.html[/url] (I use OBBM's amp to cab cables, totally brilliant. Haven't tried bass to amp cables though, probably should!)

I just fitted a set of five D'addario Prosteels to my Squier VM Jazz and recalled reading somewhere on BC about pushing the string down on the playing side of the saddle to make a slight 'break' angle rather than a useless 'arc'. I was a bit concerned that the 'steels weren't ringing as I thought they should and decided to give it a go. OMG, what a difference! They're ringing like a piano on all five especially the B. My only hope is now that this hasn't encouraged string breakage. We'll have to wait and see. Anybody else do this as the norm or am I the last to know???

We've all been here!! [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYlsSWW0rPI"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYlsSWW0rPI[/url]

The trouble with pubs/clubs is that they're all different sizes, stages/playing areas etc. added to the fact of people coming, going, a bunch that gets up and goes out for a cigarette, all changing the overall sound all the time. The mix you start with when you set up early evening will be totally different by 10 o/c. The best thing we do as a three piece is for me to set a comfy clean level with the drums then bring up the guitar to a sensible listening level along with the vocals. A bit of fine tweaking for 5 mins with bass mids and cutting bass off the guitar is the best you're going to get unless you're mic'd up to a decent engineer. A quick stroll left to right with a long lead as a final sound check and we've never had any complaints yet. In fact we get a lot of punters saying how good we sounded and not blasting the windows out like the last night's band.

While my Squier VM Jazz 5 string is an incredible piece of gigging tool for the money, I can't help thinking the bridge could be letting the sound quality of the B string down a tad. I'm using Elixir Nano's just now. What would you guys recommend as a good bridge replacement?

I've always been a Fender guy, particularly the incredibly versatile Jazz, (had a couple of very nice Precisions too in the 70's) but there's no way I'd personally risk a large wad of fifties on a new Fender. The QC issues over the years have put me right off. Last year I bought a Squier VM Jazz for less than £250 and have had no issues with it whatsoever. Apart from the usual initial fine tuning of the truss and saddles I've got the sound I want for about 60 different covers, getting quite a few comments at the end about the great sound and even 'awesome bass player' a few times which makes me feel good. For that price I'm over the moon and not exactly going to throw a fit if it gets a couple of dings. So, £1000 plus for a huge risk or less than a week's wages for a gigging tool of the trade which does exactly the same thing?

Maybe I didn't put the right words in my other post. What I'm after is a good sounding box to help a passive bass sound sweeter before hitting the amp. I can't afford an active Stingray at the minute so I'm looking at getting a sound I like without messing with the EQ on my amp too much and colouring things too much. I'd rather have a pleasing tone going in the amp and then using it to simply amplify and maybe fine tune things from there. What's good on the market?

Okay, what I'm after is close right now using the bass's tone control, a cross between Paladino when I want 'smooth' and Clayton when I want 'punch'. I may well be barking up the wrong tree in the fact that my 300 watts isn't doing it at volume, whereas 500 may give me what I'm after with more headroom.

I've never been a fan of stomp boxes for bass, I believe in the tone going in and out as natural as possible with my passive basses, but I keep thinking a little help may be needed to get 'that' tone with my Ashdown Mag EVO 2 300 and Ashdown Mag 8 x 10. I don't fancy spending a fortune on something I might not get on with, so any suggestions chaps? I may even have to concede in the end to an active bass. A great excuse to get my dream Musicman Stingray!!

My Ashdown EVO 2 300 head sometimes has a wobbly when playing a passive bass thru the active channel (simply to clean things up and use more headroom in the input). It sounds just like a speaker very faintly crackling starting to give imminent warning of dying although there's nothing wrong with the speakers, (it's an 8 x 10), as #1 I've put it thru another cab and it still does it, and #2 if I swap to the passive channel everything's totally fine. I know the active channel socket simply has a filter, so there's nothing wrong amp-wise. I'm thinking either dry joint or dirty/tarnished socket ring/tongue?

Cheers for that, Bill. I think I'll leave things just as they are and keep my tools locked up in the garage!!

I've just acquired an Ashdown Mag 810 and although it needs a bit of driving and I have a good 'scooped' sound with my Ashdown Evo2 300 head, I can't help thinking the cab could be upgraded with a couple of ports in the front of the sealed cab. I need the bass knob on full to get decent bass out whereas my old Peavey 410 TVX with bottom vent would have rattled the windows out. Would this ruin a perfectly good tuned box (Ashdown must know what they're doing!) or is it worth a couple of hours sweat?

Okay, here's a daft one, but it might make all the long-term difference. After a gig/rehearsal/home run-through, blah, blah, you lovingly put your baby back in it's case after wiping down the strings etc, etc. Now....is it best to stand the case up against a wall, lay it on it's side, or lay it on it's back? Discuss.

Just been laughing my tits off at all the above. I've done quite a few of them! Just a general thing that I do to alleviate gear left behind - I load the car exactly the same way every time, everything in the same order and then point at everything and verbally 'tick off' each bit. So far, it's never failed.

Now, I've been playing since God was in nappies, and until now I've never thought about string makers until my other two band members said to me the other day that D'addario and Ernie Ball strings are the same apart from D's coloured ball ends. Anybody out there know anything, or even shed some light on all makers/distributors?

Hi, this could be a zillion miles away or it could be the money shot. I had a Peavey 300watt 1 x 15" which was doing more or less the same thing. Turned out after a frustrated strip down to be a dodgy speaker plug connector on the board. A small screwdriver to pinch the conector bits tighter, and viola!! Perfectomundo forever more. Worth a look.

Hey Skampino, I don't know what your present tutor is like, but you really, really should contact Chris Wood. I've known him for a good few years and if there's one all-round nice guy and incredible player, it's him. He'll guide you along the right path in any avenue you choose, and you definitely won't look back. The silver lining is, you paid for a valuable lesson and learnt tons from it from that original guy. And yeah, I rehearse with my band at River Studios. It certainly[b][i] is[/i][/b] an awesome place full of truly awesome, lovely people.

IMO it all boils down to two simple things - your and your ears. If you like the sound and playability of a sub £300 instrument, buy the bloody thing. Why pay £2500 plus on a fancy name thing or replacement bits that do the same job, possibly mis-matched and sonically worse? I just bought a Squier Vintage Modified Jazz 5'er (£247 with £25 Fender offer rebate), and apart from half hour setting up properly out of the box, it's the best bass I think I've ever had in nearly 35 years. In fact, at the last gig, I had two players come up at the end to see if their eyes and ears weren't deceiving them. They couldn't believe the incredible sound coming at them from a 'lower' brand name. Me? I'm happy as a pig in the proverbial. Get over yourselves, FFS!!!