markytbass

Own gear and transport most stuff considered but main influences are Blues/Funk/Soul/Ska would be wanting to gig regularly. Live in the darlington area but would be willing to gig in the North East and further if required. Cheers Marky

David Steele of The Beat and Fine Young Cannibals and Horace Panter of The Specials

I'm using Rotosound jazz77 on my Cort bass and Rotosound tru bass88 on my Yamaha. I did buy some Roberts flatwound but found them unreliable one set would be ok and the next would sound dead good job they were cheap.

Whilst on the subject of voltages and electrical equipment I think (though I will have to confirm this) that if you were to sell a 2nd hand amp/combo etc that you have to provide a Portable Appliance Test certificate (PAT). I know when I was a sparkey we used to do a lot of business with a local auction house testing anything with a 3 pin plug on. Also some venues won't let you use untested equipment because of health and safety laws.

If you click on the pickguard tab on the right it shows more wooden pick guards. I would think it would be cheaper to make your own and shouldn't be too difficult (says the man who made a 5 minute job last a week). Its given me a great idea though, if you do make your own I'd practice on a cheap piece of wood first.

Cheers I will have a look at those. I have been informed by my wife that one of our friends has built amps and stuff over the years but he's not well at the mo so I will wait until he is better before pestering him.

I have been trying some flatwounds on both my basses. I have used Roto's Monal Flats and Roberts Flats. The Roto's 45-105 I found too tight and was tempted to go down to 40-100 but at nearly £30 a set I might wait. As for the Roberts the A-D-G seem ok but the E was too floppy and sounded some what dead. My next stop is probably going to be some Roto Solo55's preasure wound. I don't like steel strings they sound too zingy for me but nickle plated seem ok I have used Rotobass 45 & 50's in the past. They sound like a played in set of steels but slightly warmer and you can slap with them (if thats your thing).

Hi Has anyone atempted to build their own valve amp?. I am considering it as a summer project but was wondering what the up's and down's were, and where to source parts from. Any info would be a help. Cheers