Oomo

Any of you have absolute dealbreakers on what you do/don't look for in a bass? For me it's: 1) block inlays - for some reason I just can't stand them (dots are just about acceptable, but prefer side markings only) 2) neck dive - I've tried various things, but basses with neck dive just drive me crazy. I find myself constantly adjusting them, fiddling with straps, knocking over cups of tea when they dive unexpectedly, etc. Most other things I'm willing to live with though...

I'm hoping for the opposite - there's a lovely lefty fretless Wal on Reverb at the moment with an eye watering price tag of £8000. I just want someone to buy it so that I don't end up drunkenly trying to sell a kidney/heart/lung to afford it.

I'm not associated with them in any way, but thought it might be of interest to some lefties in the vicinity: https://www.guitarguitar.co.uk/news/141576/ No idea what the guitar to bass ratio will be, but happy for this sort of event to be encouraged.

I haven't gigged for a long time now, but definitely went through the same cycle a few times: 1. bored playing solo, miss playing with others 2. find a band 3. have great fun jamming/rehearsing 4. gigging, dealing with huge amount of time spent in cars, setting up/tearing down, uninterested crowds/venues, poor sound, tiredness at work next day, etc. 5. getting fed up with it all and thinking I'd rather spend 6 hours playing/practicing than 5h30m dealing with all of the above just for a 30m set 6. go to step 1 I think I'd honestly be happy stopping at step 3 and just find some nice people to play with, with no intention of gigging. But that never seems to be very easy, most ads/social sites seems to be full of people super eager to rush out and gig ASAP. 🤷‍♂️

Might be overkill, but for finishing advice, I can't recommend this book enough: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/156604.Understanding_Wood_Finishing It goes into detail on the properties of different finishes, misconceptions, etc. Definitely saved me screwing up more than one project...

I'm currently torn between this and the Darkglass Hyperluminal, that also gets excellent reviews, though the Cali 76 seems to be a bit more established.

For me it's always the time leading up to a gig/speech/flight etc. that I get most anxious about. More like a niggling bit of my brain that can't stop thinking about all that can go wrong in the lead up to the event (what if my car breaks down? What if I don't know the part well enough? What if I injure my arm at the gym the day before the gig? My throat's a bit sore what if I get too ill, should I cancel now? Etc.). Then in the day itself when it's too late to back out then (or when I get to the airport, speaking venue etc.), then I'm completely fine. I just get annoyed at the mental bandwidth it takes up beforehand.

Does anyone know what the difference between his reading book and the separate package courses are? Is the book a starting point, then the other courses a more advanced follow up?

I couldn't imagine Primus without humour.

Mostly just curious - do your basses tend to be in a certain price/quality range, or do you have a wide variety, and why? I've always wanted to try out a 6-string someday, and that got me thinking about what price/quality I'd look for. On the one hand, if I got a fantastic top end model, that I'd just want to play that due to sound/comfort (and sunk cost...), regardless of whether I got on with that many strings. On the other hand, a budget model might just be horrible to play in comparison to my other basses, and might put me off regardless of number of strings. Which also got me to thinking... if I ever got a really top end custom bass, would that ruin my other basses for me?

Was considering an OC5, but sounds like the new MXR might be worth holding out for (if it's favourably received...).

I think there's also a fight to get exclusive access to as much as possible (this happens with Netflix/Disney+/Amazon Prime etc.). Many people won't want to subscribe to many streaming platforms, so if your platform has exclusive rights to X% of music, hope is that people will pick yours, and eventually kill of the competition.

I sometimes wonder how to best approach learning with tasteful playing in mind. There often seems to a view that technique is in some way linear (i.e. that if you can play something incredibly technical, you can easily play something more laid back and tasteful), and often encouraged to work on things that are hard but less commonly used (e.g. playing harder songs, increasing metronome speed for exercises, learning double thumbing, tapping, pinch harmonics etc.). Could that time be better spent on learning to play with more restraint? If you spends hours learning a technique you'd use in 1 in 1000 songs, would be better to skip that technique entirely, to avoid the temptation of using it on the other 999 where it wouldn't be appropriate?

Don't forget to also slightly tweak the circuit each year, but keep the name/design the same. Then enthusiasts can argue for years over how the pre-2018 versions had a warmer sound and go for 2x the price, and how the 2019 versions with serial numbers between 234786 and 765866 should be avoided like the plague.

Every time I look at a Helix, I end up wondering if it'll be enough, and I should get the next model up instead. Then when I get to the top model, I wonder if I should consider a Neural DSP Quad Cortext instead. Then I look at the price and go back to considering the Helix Stomp again. Then repeat.

Another vote for Transcribe here. Been using it for years. Lets you change pitches, slow down parts, loop parts, change eq to better hear parts, and a ton more. It also has footswitch support for hands-free playback, which can be handy (or footsy?).

Same here. Although it's been years since I owned one, so maybe modern stuff like the Helix etc. are better in that regard. Another reason I never got on with multi fx units was that I'd always like some of the effects, and not others, then either be stuck with using something I hated, or buy a separate pedal to fill the gap, which is then a slippery slope back to separate effects But someday I'd love to try a Helix/Quad Cortex type thing and see what a modern multifx is actually like.

Yup, I'm a lefty too, and found the same. I've got one deliberately "left hand" pedal (an Area 51 wah I used to use on guitar), which was built with the input on the left and output on the right, so that I could use it with the right (left) foot for me.

To be honest, I'm the same when it comes to just using a couple of pedals, I'm super happy I can just carry around a tuner pedal plus something else and not have to worry about power/cables/plugs. I'm mostly bitter from one old pedal that I always powered by DC, but had a battery I'd forgotten was in there. After not using it for some years, found it'd leaked and pretty much ruined the inside (luckily it was nothing too valuable/irreplacable). That and the fact that I'm always paranoid that my battery will run out at just the wrong moment (that's never actually happened, so I don't know why I worry!)

Not about any effects in particular, but this came up in conversation with a guitarist friend the other day. We were talking about how annoyances with effects 20 years ago are exactly the same as the ones today, including things like: 1. Batteries - the first thing I ever do with effects is remove the battery and plug into to power. I always wonder whether effects could be made more compact and cheaper by just using DC power, and skipping the whole battery compartment/wiring entirely. 2. Different power requirements - I can understand the reasons, but always find it frustrating when a pedal uses some input other than 9V DC centre negative, and needs me to allocate yet another plug slot for it. 3. Non-descriptive button/switch/knob names - especially for effects I don't use often, I hate trying to remember what controls labelled things like "burn", "probe", "stab", "tweak", etc. actually do. 4. Non-standard sizes - sometimes feels like tetris trying to figure out how to layout everything. Sometimes wish there was something like EuroRack for effects pedals, with 1U, 2U pedals etc. that all fit together nicely. 5. Non-standard input/output placement - similar to the above, having a mix of inputs/outputs/power on side/top gets annoying. 6. Availability - it always seems like some of the best pedals that people use or recommend are always the ones that are no longer produced, or are incredibly rare. E.g. Boss OC-2, lots of the 3Leaf Audio stuff. But I can't see much of this changing, and still love using effects Is it just me, or has anyone else got a similar/different set of effects-related frustrations?

Sorry, I meant the octave sound specifically... Like you said, I didn't fancy sitting through hours of video in the hope of hearing it 😀 It looks like a fun pedal, but not sure I'd use 90% of what it does.

I've heard a lot of people saying good things about the Source Audio C4's octaver, but haven't found any audio clips of it. Anyone had any experience with them?

Probably late 90s early 00s were when I was active playing and saw/heard a bunch of Stingrays the first time round. No idea when the Ernie Ball takeover happened or whether they were 2/3 band eq though... (ah, simpler times!)

I used to love the classic Stingray sound from back when I used to play, but never owned one. I've come back to bass after a bit of a break, and keeping half an eye out for a 2nd hand one if it comes up at the right price. I'm totally confused about all the changes to models though... Seems there's now a Sub4, Ray34, Sterling, Stingray USA etc. I didn't pay enough attention at the time, but guessing an old USA model would be the classic Stingray sound I loved. Are the others just updated versions? Or cheaply made models that should be avoided at all costs? If they're anywhere near the classic Stingray sound then I'd consider a new model too of course...

Yup, needs to dry very slowly, or risks warping, cracking, splitting etc. It takes years normally, unless kiln drying, which can speed up the process. Typically the ends of the wood are also sealed after felling (as that's where the most moisture is lost). The moisture is lost more evenly across the wood, and avoids problems by the ends drying at a different rate to the rest.