Phil Starr

Oh! a bit more response than I was expecting! It's as if we are on the opposite sides of a chasm of understanding. I doubt very much that anyone here, if they've been playing a couple of years, doesn't know about scales and chord tones, or about which chords go together and form the structure of most of the songs we play (and by implication the circle of fifths). Even transposition is something you won't really avoid, even if all you do is the bassists version of using a capo... move your hand and play the same pattern. Whilst there are a few people who may play everything by a combination of a decent ear and trial and error and proudly proclaim it as the only way I suspect most of us are hungry for any bit of theory that would help our playing. The trouble is that when someone just says 'learn your scales' it's a meaningless phrase. I'm sure all of us can play a pattern of eight notes and probably know major minor and blues scales (avoiding the mixolydian word here) but if that is all there is to it how does that help? This is where the conversation usually breaks down with frustration on both sides. Most of us can play a major scale, up and down, starting on whichever root note we choose. If we can't we could learn to do so in a few minutes. Surely there is more to it than that? Even calling the notes out as you do it, well I can see that would be useful in learning the fretboard but is that really all there is to it? And how does that help in a practical sense? Honestly I'm not trying to be contentious, I know the ignorance is mine , I just don't get it and can't understand why the people who do get it can't explain what I have to gain. That's why I'm interested in what the OP gets by making the journey.

I'm probably in the same place as Bonzodog. I started with covers bands within months of picking up the bass and the pressure of always learning the next song. (just off to run through 50 songs I haven't played in a while for an occasional duo i play in for next week for example). I'm not averse to learning a bit of musical theory, it's really interesting and I'm confident that it would benefit my playing but I also know the benefits of just learning the songs and it's hard to take a step back for longer term thinking. I'm also confident that our OP will have picked up a lot of bits of musical theory on the way. Learning the scales is surely just shorthand for improving his understanding of theory. So I'm really interested in how he gets on, and how it directly affects his playing. Is it really worth my while in terms of stage performance to ease up on the practice and learning of songs to deepen my understanding of theory?

I have to share one early experience. We played a rough local pub, we were brilliant (for us anyway) in the first set but something went in the second set but by then the punters were well watered and we went down a storm. At the end of the set the landlord disappeared, he's apparently 'gone to bed' according to the bouncers protecting the stairwell. They then had a conversation, decide we were well worth the money, charged up the stairs, frogmarched the landlord down and stood over him whilst he counted out what was owed! Only in the West Country

well done

You might be able to remove the slide up handle mechanism from a suitcase and fix it to the back of the cab, but I'd recomment a lightweight folding sack truck. If it won't slide under your cab then just get some bigger feet fitted to lift it a little.

good luck

As to the 10,12,15 argument I think you have to listen to them and maybe do a bit of homework. Not all of them automatically use the same horn driver or horn. The crossover points may be different and the 10's will be slightly less efficient all other things being equal so the horn may be padded further down. I'll give you one example, my Yamaha Club speakers both have the same horns and drivers but the 12" S112's use the Eminence Deltas which have a huge peak in the frequency response, the 15's floor monitors don't and they sound much better especially on vocals, whereas you might expect the smaller speaker to handle the midrange better. I went along to PMT in Bristol armed with some decent vocal recordings and auditioned their range of PA speakers with a very patient assistant. If the Cardiff branch is as well stocked,,,,,,,,

With mixers I think you have a big decision. Keeping it simple,cheap and analogue with something like the Behringers or Yamaha MG's or going digital which will give you all the monitor channels and tricks you could possibly wish for and learning to use it. One other approach to monitoring for your backing singers are personal monitors, like the behringer B205D's [url="https://www.music-group.com/Categories/Behringer/Loudspeaker-Systems/Portable-Speakers/B205D/p/P0957"]https://www.music-gr...s/B205D/p/P0957[/url] you can plug your individual mics into these and then send it on to the PA at either mic or line level, or you could mix it with a PA feed if you preferred. They don't sound wonderful on their own but they are very mid forward and work well once the band are playing. I loved mine and upgraded to the TC version. Shouldn't have bothered, it's much better sounding but all the extra frequencies make it feedback prone. The advantage of this is that you each have to buy your own so no-one gets to walk off with the PA! you could use these with the simplest of mixers.

I'd say the RCF's are going to sound way better than the Alto's or the Yamaha's after comparing them directly. If you can afford them you won't regret their purchase. I've used the Stagepas system and it's a really good all in one solution, very easy to use but not as nice sounding as the RCF's, though still good. Yamaha stuff is soooo reliable. Behringer mixers have worked well for me, I used a 1204 for years and i still use an Alto equivalent for small gigs. The Yamaha MG series do sound better though. I wouldn't use their speakers though, they do sound good but I've heard a lot of distortion at high levels when people use them.

OK it's unlikely to be the capsule given the reliability of the SM58, more likely to be the transmitter inside the mic. You need to find out. I'd argue that the mic is not fit for purpose if moisture from the singer has penetrated that far into the mic. Either there was a manufacturing fault and it wasn't sealed properly or that there is a design fault if saliva could pentrate as far as the transmitter. If it was the capsule thenthat was faulty as Shure's have been dealing with singers spittle since 1962 (date of the first SM58) British consumer law pretty much assumes the customer is right unless they can prove otherwise. I wouldn't expect the mic to handle immersion in standing water but it has to handle the normal spraying with saliva and unless they can prove you immersed the mic you have a good chance, especially as it is under six months old. I'd write to them politely, pointing out that the mic hasn't been exposed to any liquids other than saliva and that it should be able to cope with this, it is an SM58 after all. You expect it to be repaired or replaced within a reasonable time mention the Consumer Rights act 2015 http://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/regulation/consumer-rights-act

Is it the Mic or reciever that is faulty? Water ingress is a generic term, any chance it's been placed on a surface swimming in beer? There's a general problem with a lot of circuit boards nowadays that they are particularly prone to water damage, lots of closely packed surface mounted components and multi layer circuit boards. There's also problems with boards made in China leaving the factories and getting damp whilst being shipped. Also rather than solve the problems it's increasingly common for manufacturers to have small indicator patches printed onto boards to show up any damp that gets inside. They open up repairs look for red and if it's there you've invalidated the warranty. Apple you know who you are! You probably are onto a hiding to nothing other than that they have to show that you allowed the water in. See how obliging GAK are, then consider whether you want to pursue it through the small claims court.

Honestly? Stop worrying about it. Musicality isn't something with a definition or something that can be measured out on a 1-10 scale and i'd say is more about how you interact with other musicians. You'll only find out if you have musicality once you join a band. I'll stick my neck out and say a lot of it is about listening to the other band members and adapting to what is going along around you but I suspect no two of us really agree on what it is. If your tutor is the musician you describe ask him about getting to play with other people. He may know lot's of other musicians and be able to hitch you up with them. Technically there'll be a number of reasons you don't sound like your playalong bassists. First you won't sit in the mix the way they do. If you are practicing you'll have yourself turned up so you can hear yourself over the original. That always sounds terrible, just listen to some of the isolated bass tracks or try mixing in the isolated track too loud over the original song. If you are listening to the bass in the original you'll be pausing slighly to hear that and are probably playing behind the beat. On top of that remember a top mixing engineer has probably spent hours getting just the right bass sound long after the bassist has left the room and may even have tidied up the sound and maybe over dubbed a second third or fourth take over the original to thicken up the sound or correct a mistake. You just can't compete so don't let it bother you.

Like most statements if you take them to extremes they often cease to be true but I think it's something that is very useful and true to a point. A lot of the time bass is heard but not noticed and the bass dropping out or coming back in can add real drama to a song without the bassist playing more than a couple of root notes. that's the point though, it depends upon the song.

Just a word of caution if you aren't an electronics expert. First unplug the mains, obvious but people forget. Be aware that some amps store a charge which can last for hours after the amp is disconnected so you can still get a potentially lethal shock some time after the amp is switched off. Finally realise that the amp is often fairly delicate once the case is opened, they aren't designed to have people poking around inside so be very gentle, I use an air brush but a soft brush used gently and sensibly is a resonable thing but be careful or you'll do more damage than the dust will.

Yep, another lover of carpet felt here.

I bought one of the cheap ABS cases https://www.amazon.co.uk/Stronghold-Rectangular-Bass-Guitar-Black/dp/B006F9T0W4. that brand doesn't seem to be available any more but I suspect they are all the same and badged, the Thomann version looks identical. I had some initial reservations about the hinges but four years on it pretty much looks like new, much tougher than I expected. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend one

Hi Jason, my initial thoughts are that with your two RCF's both with 15's you want something even more capable of bass in the bottom octave than they are or there is no point, and the RCF's are pretty capable. You've also got two 12" Bergs and your subs would have to produce those levels without distorting. Again something pretty capable is needed. Single 12's aren't going to do it and probably Behringer and Alto aren't either. You've got high end kit and you'll add nothing by going this way. Going for a couple of 15's would equal what you already have but dedicated subs would handle the deep bass better than the 15's in your RCF's. They'd also reduce the power going to the RCF's and help with thermal compression and intermodulation distortion. If you want to keep costs down I'd go for a single sub to start with and maybe add another if you need it later. Personally I'd go for the matching RCF and maybe start looking for used rather than going for a cheap brand. However.... Try it without any subs first. Make sure you use the bass filters on all your channels on the mixer except bass and drums, unless you have a 50Hz filter which you could use on those too. Keep the volume sensible and maybe roll off the bass a little if you are playing a really big venue. Remember the thing you are trying to achieve is better sound not more sound. Reducing volumes on stage just cleans all the muck from the backline out of the vocal mics and the better control of the PA means all your audience (more or less) get a better balanced sound. You may not need subs for anything but the once a year gig. Mine sit in the cupboard most of the year, the only run out they usually get is when we play a rowdy pub where the extra weight stops people knocking the tops over

Don't do it. Those speakers aren't designed for that sort of bass. Bass on recordings is usually (read always) compressed or at least limited, so it won't overload anything it is likely to be played through. Your raw bass signal has a huge dynamic range, so loud bits are very likely to be much louder than the speakers can cope with. At some stage you'll forget to be cautious or drop the bass or something will happen and you'll blow the speakers. More accurately only do this if you can afford to replace the 'high end speakers' from time to time. Sorry

If the screw has a stub clear of the surface you can probably get it out, but you may only get one chance, it smapped because it's a thin screw and it's in tight, there's a chance it you exert too much force it will snap again where you can't reach it. You have to avoid any bending forces on the screw, hold your pliers nice and straight. Heat works but use much more of it than you think, get it as hot as you can, you need to get it hot right to the tip, not just warm, all the way down inside where the timber will cool it. Before you do this think about how you will grip the screw, if the pliers won't grip and you turn then this will polish the stub making it harder to get a grip as you make repeated attempts. If possible I try and use a file to make some flats to grip. On large screws I've managed to get enough to use a spanner but this won't be big enough for that. When filing use some sellotape to protect the wood from the file. Good luck.

[quote name='KingPrawn' timestamp='1499633862' post='3332669'] I have found myself in a really odd situation. I'm involved with a band that has 3 other incredible players, two are classically trained and play day in day out orchestras etc. The lead singer is fab and decent guitarist. But.... There is a barrier in that the two highly trained players have to have the dots in front of them. They are really struggling to make the transition to learning a song without the dots. Equally the lead singer is struggling to get to grips with being handed lead sheets, as she is really an intuitive player. I find myself as piggy in the middle. I can just about hold my own with work between rehearsals. I really want it to work as when it gels it sounds great. Just wondering if any of you BCers have any tips to make this work? wheres the middle ground? [/quote] Is there actually a problem here that won't be solved by just spending a little time working together? If they are going to read the dots it's probably going to be completely correct, a bit like playing with a click track for you as a bassist. You are probably going to have to observe note lengths and pauses more accurately to tie in with them, what a great opportunity to work on your playing. If they want the dots they are going to have to write them themselves. For them that is the effort/cost involved in learning the song, just like the effort you put in learning it your way. Do they want to change, or see it as a problem? If not you probably aren't going to have a lot of luck pressurising them and why should they if they can play the songs beginning to end perfectly well. I'd imagine they've all done some training as accompanists so with the notes in front of them they'll still be able to follow a looser approach to timing/phrasing. I've seen the whole London Symphony Orchestra rise up as to a man and woman to support a struggling soloist. Most importantly I think a lot of really good music comes out of mixing in different skills, even playing Mustang Sally in a covers band demands little adaptations to the rest of the musicians. You are going to end up playing differently from other bands, it may take a while to adapt to each other but if you listen to each others ideas and playing it'll happen.

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1499850490' post='3334008'] Careful, there seems to be 2 different measuring systems at work here. The 1200 watts of the 210LNT is not RMS. It's AES which, while it's supposed to be the more accurate figure, is actually less than the RMS figure. A quote I've seen is that 800 watts AES is the equivalent to 600 watts RMS. The RMS figure will be about a third less. [/quote] For most people AES figures are probably more relevent than RMS, certainly a lot more reliable than any of the advertising scams of 'peak power' or 'music power' What would be the best test of a speaker? For most of us the most useful would be to blast music at full power for several hours and if it survives then that speaker can handle that power. AES is an attempt to do just that by soaking the speaker with music frequencies appropriate for the speaker for two hours. RMS power uses a single frequency sine wave and is often based upon temperature rise in the voice coil, if the speaker stays below say 250C then it passes. That's really good for a manufacturer as it gives them a way of testing a batch of speakers to destruction and is an objective repeatable test but doesn't give much idea of real life. The problem with real life music testing is to define music, Classical or Drum'n'Bass? To keep it objective we use all the frequencies filtered to an agreed standard for a set period of time so that speakers can be measured in the same way across the world and then compared fairly. There are two commonly used standards that are used to try and do that AES in the USA and IEC in most of the rest of the world. The UK is a member of the IEC and British Standards are aligned with the IEC as are DIN standards in Germany. The details of the testing procedures have slight technical differences from AES but give pretty much the same results and you'll even see manufacturers give a AES/IEC rating. So you can trust AES/IEC ratings, probably better than RMS ones. There is legislation around them and standard test procedures where something roughly like music has been put through real speakers. That doesn't mean you can't break a 1000W speaker with a 1000W amp or that you would blow it instantly with a 2000W amp, there's no legislation that can account for operator error More reading if you are curious from EAW http://eaw.com/docs/6_Technical_Information/StudyHall_and_TechNotes/Power_Handling.pdf and JBL https://www.jblpro.com/pub/technote/spkpwfaq.pdf

[quote name='gjones' timestamp='1499809322' post='3333829'] I know Callum, I'll tell him to give his sound person a pay rise. [/quote] I thought he was excellent. Great voice, some nice songs, loved the one about his dad. His band were just right too they all looked like they were enjoying themselves. The audience loved him but he can't have missed that. I suspect he's going a lot further. Wish him luck.

I was staggered at the incompetence really. I used to mix at festivals back in the 70's (think WEM 4x10 era and AltecA7's) It's not an easy job as you don't really get a soundcheck but in these days with digital desks you can simply program in your settings at the start of a tour. The changover was so slick, with teams of people wheeling on the drum riser and new lighting rigs, pyrotechnics going off on beat. Techs handing over ready tuned guitars. Session players in the wings for one song, or ready to take over if Brandon decided to drop guitar for a bit of audience interaction. Probably £1,000,000 worth of PA, nothing left to chance it seemed. I can't believe it was the lack of money that caused this, or plain laziness. I think there's a general hatred here for the Disco/RnB style bass mix but there's no doubt punters like a bit more bass and drum that used to be the norm. I also get the techs wanting to compress the drums in a live situation or trimming the upper end of the frequencies to clean up the mix and separate the instruments a little. For god's sake I'm a bassist. I like a lot of bass and drums but to let it overload the speakers and drown out the lead guitar. And they had someone there on the other stage who could do the job.

I saw the Killers along with Tears For Fears and Elbow at Hyde Park this weekend and the bass sound was awful. It's not the first thread on this topic but why do they do it? The PA at these big events is out of this world, they can pretty much have any sound at any volume they want, the control of dispersion is so good as is the integration of the relay speakers, you pretty much get the same sound at the back of the arena as you do up by the stage. So what was wrong, the bass was too loud and the kick drum even louder. The bass sound conveyed very little information. Tears for Fears used a Hofner look alike (Taylor I think) but you couldn't tell it from the P-basses we saw most of, and you really couldn't tell a P from a J even though some bands were swapping out between songs. You couldn't really tell a pick from a thumb. The bass was probably 10db above the rest of the mix and was distorting like hell on all the louder passages. Kick drum was at least 6dB up on that for a lot of the time, though less distorted because it was compressed to hell. There was almost a complete lack of mids and top for bass and drums. Kick and tom drowned out the cymbals snare and hihat. It just sounded like one of those in car systems with a boom box in the boot. the only band that got anywhere near a decent balance were Elbow though even then the synth bass was running into distortion. The Killers had the worse balance you could barely hear Dave Keuning's guitar if the rhythm section were playing and it stayed the same all through the set. Honourable mention goes to whoever was running sound for Callum Beattie on the smallest stage. Lovely kick sound as he was setting up but too loud in the first number. Then one by one the vocals and guitars slowly came up until by the end of the third song he had nailed the mix completely. I don't suppose anyone in the audience noticed it happening either, which is how it should be. You'd think the headline band would get the best sound guy, not someone who doesn't notice a missing guitar or his speakers hitting the stops. The bands were fabulous by the way.

My test is that it should sound the way it does through good quality headphones, and you are right, use your ears and if the combination sounds good to you then you have found the cab for your set up.