WinterMute

On 23/01/2024 at 15:34, chris_b said:

I've got a Bass Centre price list and a Warwick Thumb was over £1000 in 1989.

I bought my thumb 5 from Bass Centre in 1988, I paid £875 I think, no hard case. 

They were rare and exotic beasts back then, it didn't seem like a lot when new Wals and Alembics were a lot more.

Just seen on Reverb, an absolute steal... https://reverb.com/uk/item/78407511-gibson-eb6-john-entwistle-1961-original

17 hours ago, andydye said:

thanks for checking that ma dude, I'm talking to Mr Shuker about adding a 6 aye, don't want as wide spacing as my old ACG but wider than my old Thumb 5, I've got between 16.5mm (Thumb 5) and 18mm (ACG) now as my spacing window

I had Alan build my Krell 5 string at 17mm which feels better than my SR5's at 17.5mm but not as good as my old Thumb 5 at 16.5mm...! 

I couldn't get on with 18mm basses at all, which is a shame as the multi-coil pups he uses are brilliant but only come in 18mm spacing.

Speak to Alan, he's usually got an answer for most questions.

15 hours ago, blunderthumbs said:

Rip you legend.

This was my 1987 Jaydee Supernatural series 3 MK before I sold it.

Without doubt the best bass I have ever owned.

 

I bought the same model the year before I went fully 5 string, it was a beautiful instrument, a little bit fragile for the real world I thought, but others seem to get on with them well enough live.

The guitarist in my first band had a JD flying V, genuinely didn't know he made basses back then, lovely instrument.

RIP John, thanks man.

On 20/01/2024 at 10:28, 51m0n said:

1176 and La2a are very expensive specialist comps that realistically you won't be using live in rack form.

 

The new UAD modelling pedals are superb though....

Had a play with the 1176 pedal, it's very good indeed, given that you probably wouldn't want to take a real 1176 out gigging, it's the next best thing.

dbx160x if you can find one, still one of the best compressors for bass on the market, or if you're very flush an Empirical Labs Distressor...

The secret with any in-rig compressor is where you put it in the signal chain and how you use it, too much compression is never a good idea.

The beauty of the 160x is it's soft knee and the auto attack release, which works very well in this unit, not so well in others, it's a very easy unit to get a good result out of.

If I had a choice I'd put a Distressor in the rack.

I don't know if this will help or hinder your needs, but the Rupert Neve headphone amps just about the best thing I've plugged headphones into barring some £10K japanese tube amp...

https://rupertneve.com/products/rnhp

Over time these are the constants:

Geddy Lee

Tony Levin

Mick Karn

Jaco Pastorious

John Stockman

Alan Thompson

Tim Commerford

John Paul Jones

That's a cracking bass, Alan's work is top drawer all round and he's a great fellow to deal with, congrats.

My Krell fretless 5:

2 hours ago, JoeEvans said:

Best thing would be a small, decent quality active PA speaker with a frequency response that goes down to maybe 40hz. Best option will depend heavily on budget!

I got a QSC K12.2 for rehearsals and potentially gigs, works brilliantly with the Quad Cortex, they do a 10" version too, it's plenty loud enough to hear over a hard hitting rock drummer, has plenty of interface options and sounds great. Not the cheapest, and other units from RCF and the like are available.

David Byrne's How Music Works is excellent.

1 hour ago, 2pods said:

Got mine just after Christmas.

 

It's a "Limited Edition" in black sparkle with gold footswitches, though I would have been happy with the classy, grey version as it was just the 3 that were in stock and they were all SE.

Just the same price as the "normal" QC though 

 

Looking forward to getting tore in after tomorrow.

Sounds funky, bit like that SR5 with the carbon neck that was on the Marketplace for a while...

Post a pic.

This year I've made it all the way through to Christmas Day without hearing Mariah Carey, Slade, Wizzard or George Bloody Micheal....

Long may it continue.

I'm off the sing along with Fairytale for the 15th time...

I try these things as they arrive and, whilst they are getting better, they really can't match the work of even the most basically competent mix/mastering engineer. Even the Nugen mastering suite templates are rubbish.

If you have no-one available you can turn to or you just can't afford to pay a professional/decent amateur, then maybe, but a little persistence and a little guidance can produce results that are objectively better than AI mix templates IMO. 

This may not always be the case, I think there's probably going to be a point where running your tracks through an AI mix device will produce serviceable work, but it's not there yet.

We had David Baddiel hosting at the Barbican last night, which made for some fascinating conversation about Geddy's Jewish heritage and his parents experiences in the camps. Alex turned up for the second half Q&A which was hilarious and moving by turns, I hadn't expected Geddy to be so candid about Neil Peart's passing.

What a fine night all round

.

Same architect did my live room...

Geddy Lee

Tony Levin

Mick Karn

Loads of great players on that list, but it's not a bassist's list without Levin and Karn.

1 hour ago, cheddatom said:

A wonderful session of lead vocals yesterday. This singer hates headphones and asked if there was a way to record without. Some engineers would refuse, others would try to set up a super accurate out of phase monitor system, I just handed him the SM7b, put my earplugs in, and turned the monitors up loud. He was nervous that it wouldn't work as he's never seen it done like this, but I know the guy, and he's LOUD, so when I played it back with the vocal solo'd, you can hardly hear the track at all, just his screaming voice! Ditching the headphones really loosened him up and we got some very "live" performances

If it worked for Freddie... etc.

Can't do it with a U47 however...😆

Always used Schaller, have them on my Bongo 5, they hold the strap off the body well and the new design has a grub screw in the collar that solves the old "working loose" issue that the original design suffered from.

Apart from the app itself, it's always useful having an iLok associated with a Protools install for plug-in authorisations, you tell yourself you won't be using them, but you will...

As BigRedX notes, there is a big "depends" on al studio technology, and what it depends on largely is the style of music, if one was tracking a Jazz album, the entire band could be in the studio, which would have been selected for the job, there would be very little in the way of dynamic range control and the edit and mix stage would be almost entirely free of time-based correction. 

If it was a Math-core metal band, the drums may well be programmed, the dynamics smashed flat and everyone playing their parts separately with multiple OD and punch ins, all to click. The edit/mix could be a sea of elastic audio and quantised edits. It's definitely horses for courses.

I'm not a fan of one size fits all, you have to approach each and every project from the perspective of discovering the best techniques to capture and enhance what the band /artist (and producer) are trying to achieve.

Certainly playing to click and applying quantise will make the engineers job easier in the long run, but does it make the outcome sound better?  The answer is "it depends".

7 hours ago, scalpy said:

Completely agree, although the quad isn’t exactly shabby (apart from to look at 😉🤣)

I loved the Quad, there's a real sense of history about it, but I love the flagstone corridor outside the coach house for a bit of violent drum room action.

43 minutes ago, TimR said:

 

Short of red light fever this should be a basic requisite of every band. Or at least have the guitar amps in an enclosure so the drum kit is bleed free. 

That's certainly one way, although drum booths were a good result if you were intending to replace ambience later in the mix.

I learned to mic bands in open rooms to minimise bleed, or to utilise it if there was no intention to fix the performances in post. I've run many sessions where the entire bands rhythm section is taken in one pass, and the take that was used was the one that felt best provided there were no terminal mistakes. That really did test the ability of 3 or 4 musicians to play a track without mistakes and whilst creating the groove dynamic and performance required.

There is a good reason that professional musicians are professional.

40 minutes ago, Suburban Man said:

In a way its a problem now that everyone expects to multi-track recordings with each musician playing one at a time and then mix down.  A lot of really great songs were done pretty much 'as live' followed by a couple of overdubs.  If you read Robbie Robertson's book about the early years of The Band, they learnt that they couldn't work in isolation from each other and even in the studio preferred to be grouped together so that they could pick up the vibe from each other.  I know that multitrack is the only way to get the 'polish' that is expected nowadays, but a bit of 'as live' isn't a bad way to start - is it?  Shoot me down in flames... etc. etc. 

Completely agree with both you and Robbie, the downside is that you need a recording space that is capable of housing a full group and sounds good enough to act as recording space, that's why the legendary rooms found their fame, Abbey Road studio 2, The Mill, Rockfield studio 1 (although the coach house is better for drums IMO), Knopflers GB studios, Konk, Rock City etc. 

The trend for total isolation and overdubbing came as studios got cheaper and smaller, you can record and mix to excellent results on a laptop IF you have a decent acoustic space to record and mix in.

I always track at least drums and bass together with guide guitars and vocals if possible, I'll only OD bass if really necessary, but the groove has already been established between the players, it fells better generally. If I can get the whole band together then the majority of the backing track goes down in one go and the overdubs are done to fix errors or add parts. Generally vocals are the only exception.

This does mean musicians have to be good enough tp play a whole song all the way through without errors however, this is not a given.

1 hour ago, Lozz196 said:

It’s funny but when I go into the studio I prefer to work to how the producer wants (aside from radically changing my sound or wanting different instruments to be used). Given we’ve chosen them based upon their results it seems best to work to their preferences. 

There’s a difference between an engineer led session and a producer led session. 
 

producers should set the style and tone of the project in consultation with the musicians, engineers interpreted that vision.

6 minutes ago, Dad3353 said:

 

I can't agree with much of the statement above ¨¨ (depending on the definition of 'better'...). To me, the studio crew should be responding to the way the musicians want you to work. Unless, of course, it's the studio doing the hiring of session folk, in which case I agree. Ideally, it's a symbiosis of like minds working towards a common goal, but if it's the group hiring the studio, it's the group that calls the shots, within the bounds of studio etiquette, naturally. Just my tuppence-worth. 

Isn't that what I said? It's what I meant... 

Studio engineers respond to the needs of the musicians, musicians shouldn't be compromised by engineers working practices.

Sorry if I wasn't clear.