gjones

I've bought a couple of scratchplates from them. Pretty good service and good quality.

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1360975330' post='1979468'] I think this bassline (by Paul Martinez) pretty much sums up what I consider to be "good bass playing": [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAhPtFs918o[/media] Minimal, essential playing, occasional well-chosen drop-ins, superb groove. Do NOT be distracted by the rubbish miming! It's not a technically challenging line (I can play it, after all) but it contains everything you need, and nothing else. [/quote] Never a truer word spoken. A less confident bassist would have tried to jazz it up and made it crap. Edit: this is the crap version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqEQKgxKo_0

You don't need to be a virtuoso to be a good bass player. A bass player that plays for the song (instead of for himself) is a good player. A bass player who makes the band sound better (rather than draw attention to his expert, if totally inappropriate, slapping technique) is a good player. A bass player who inserts subtleties into basslines, that makes it interesting for him/her to play and also adds something to the music being played (rather than a flurry of pointless twiddles) is a good player. I draw parallels with my bands search for a drummer. We've had many drummers play with us over the last few months but we didn't pick the Simon Phillips wannabes, we picked the one who had the most sympathy with the type of music we play. In my opinion he was the best and he's a GOOD drummer . And we sound 100% better for making that decision.

[quote name='tubbybloke68' timestamp='1360858784' post='1977547'] Oh sorry I didn't realise everyone was aware of this one already, just thought y'know ... Begs the question why the bastards still allowed to do it on eBay though doesn't it? Not good really [/quote] It's back [url="http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Alembic-Series-II-bass-guitar-PRISTINE-AND-STUNNING-/290863311001?pt=UK_Musical_Instruments_Guitars_CV&hash=item43b8cde899"]http://www.ebay.co.u...=item43b8cde899[/url] His address on ebay is, [b]Field Of Dreams, Olympus Court, Swansea Vale Swansea SA7 0AQ,[/b] and is, according to google maps , an actual field off a business park in Swansea.

[quote name='guntherbuffalo' timestamp='1359730614' post='1959529'] I have read on one forum that someone replaced their speaker with a Eminence Kappa 450watts and got good results. May be an option. [/quote] That was me, and I have to say I got a bargain. It was an Eminence Kappa 4 ohm speaker B stock from Blue Aran which cost me £40. I've played trough it quite a few times and heard other bassists play through it at volume too. Although it doesn't have the high frequency response of speakers like the Kappalite etc, it sounds excellent to my ears (not everyone wants to sound like Marcus Miller). And of course it should fit fine into your Mag combo as my cab is of a similar size. I used to own a Barefaced compact, which many people on basschat say is one of the best 1x15 cabs you can buy. It cost me £540 and personally I don't think it sounded £500 better than the cab I own now.

[quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1360704799' post='1975226'] Haha, that's funny, but where's it from? I realise i may have just made myself a social outcast. [/quote] Your education begins http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V3SqxUomwk

[quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1360703201' post='1975167'] I've got dibs on "Milton"... so don't use that one, alright? are we all in agreement? Ok, cool. [/quote] 'What iz your name?' 'Don't tell him Pike!'

[quote name='spongebob' timestamp='1360674439' post='1974299'] I agree - modern bass sounds leave me cold. A background 'thump' with no definition is not bass. Melody, and adding to the song is! I did some recording recently, and TBH, was unhappy with the results. After much pushing, the bass was more defined in the mix than at first, but was still nowhere enough for me. I didn't want it out front, but clear enough to hear the lines, not just a deep thud - it's what it sounds like to me, anyway! [/quote] My theory is that the engineers are mixing with hi end monitors that can handle very low frequencies easily. But most hi fi speakers, that the track will be listened to at home, can't reproduce those lows. There was a time when studios had a speakers set up to replicate the 'home hi fi experience' and if the track didn't sound good on those it was remixed until it did.

[quote name='LukeFRC' timestamp='1360674474' post='1974301'] or your ashdowns ar broken [/quote] This

It doesn't help that the bassist in Suede plays a Rickenbacker in their latest video. They always a have a really woolly sound (unless you're Chris Squire of course).

'Full of Stars' by Turin Brakes. it's a song for a Summer's day. I love the electric piano. [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPXa1T1vyQY[/media]

[quote name='Lord Sausage' timestamp='1360613304' post='1973483'] Some have told CIJ is better, some MIJ. Others have told me it's just MIJ is for export, CIJ is for Japanese market. What's the truth?! [/quote] All the MIJ and CIJ basses I've owned (3 jazzes and a precision) were excellent.

[quote name='Currrls' timestamp='1360572923' post='1972342'] Hi guys hopefully someone could help me out with this. The band have just inherited a PA amp but don't currently have any monitors. I've got some old hifi speakers lying around though. If I soldered some jack plugs onto the end of the speaker wire and plugged them into the amp would this work? It would only be used for fairly low volumes at rehersals. And would this actually be any better than the cheap 20w guitar amp we run the vocals through at the moment? Cheers [/quote] For a while my vocalist used a pair of PA speakers that cost her £8 (she now has a set of EV speakers). Your hi fi speakers would soon be knackered if you put a decent powered amp through them. There's cheap PA speakers out there you just have to look.

Musical innovators and great artists are usually obessives. They will create art whether or not they have an audience. Since the record companies have turned into the equivalent of MacDonald's don't expect them to encourage or introduce groundbreaking artists. We'll have to do some digging ourselves. But since it's got so much easier to produce music and distribute it to worldwide audiences there must be some amazing stuff out there. It's just that ,maybe, we're just too set in our ways to go searching for it.

[quote name='thebrig' timestamp='1360435993' post='1970500'] Has anyone put together a [b][i]Warmoth bass[/i][/b], or does anyone own one? I keep getting drawn to their website, as I believe their bodies and necks are really top quality, and their finishes are supposed to be fantastic. The bass I have in mind would cost me around £600 with duty and taxes, that's everything including the paint job, except the pickup and tuners, which will probably cost me another £150. So all in all, it would cost me about £750, which is a lot of money for a guitar that I put together myself. I do have a fair bit of experience with self builds, but now I want to start a top quality project. What I want to know is, how good would it be, and how would it compare to a production line bass of similar value? [/quote] I really doubt a warmoth bass could ever be that cheap. Remember you have to factor in postage and duty at at least 25%. I imported a bass from the USA which cost £323 on ebay. By the time I got my hands on it, it cost me £510.

[quote name='ChrisF' timestamp='1360429979' post='1970320'] Youve got one of those on an upright bass ???? [/quote] It's the reason I bought it after getting advice on basschat. I no longer have the DB but comes in handy for electric too.

[quote name='ChrisF' timestamp='1360427297' post='1970218'] Hi all, My (cheaper end of the market) bass sounds ok acoustically, but when I plug in to my amp it sounds terrible. The amp is a very nice Peavey (my mates).... so Im thinking that it must be the pickup, which was about £20 quid on ebay.....and the fact that I dont have a pre-amp. Am I on the right track?? And which pickup and pre-amp would you guys recommend ?? I play rockabilly/punkabilly with some very loud guitarists ( how do you get a guitarist to turn it down??? ) and a drummer who would give Animal a run for his money cheers....Chris [/quote] You could buy a Boss GEB-7 graphic equaliser which is much cheaper than most pre-amps but does the business. I have one and it allows me to tweak my sound exactly how I like it. They cost £80 new and £40 secondhand. Here's a link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDA-kip-G8A

I'm sure it's a great bass as the standard Squier was fantastic value for the money. I don't think there is a standard Squier between the affinity and VM range anymore - at least I didn't see one advertised the last time I checked the Squier website.

As far as music is concerned, we all go through phases I think. Sometimes you just need a to take a holiday form a certain type of music or band.

[quote name='Daniel C-J' timestamp='1360327590' post='1968643'] Hey guys! Recently I had my beloved stingray stolen from me, heart braking as it was, a month has passed and I haven't been able to track it down on either gumtree, ebay or local pawn shops... I'm biting the bullet and having to buy a new bass. I've always been set on the stingray as I loved the tone for slap and funk ect (infact this time round i'm gonna try and find a 2eq one for growlier sound) and just felt SO right under my fingers, but are there any other basses I should consider looking at before I go for a stingray? Was considering a Jazz bass (have played them quite a bit) but my heart keeps taking me back to the stingray! Any advice is really welcomed! Dan [/quote] Where do you live? Put a picture, of your bass, up on basschat and basschatters in your area can keep an eye out for you. I recommend posting a message on facebook for people to look out for your bass too, as it gets shared around pretty quickly. A band, up here in Edinburgh, had the guitarist's stratocaster nicked and it was found down in London, a couple of weeks later, after he posted a description on Facebook.....so it definitely works.

[quote name='icastle' timestamp='1360282254' post='1968198'] Inti \ Antiloco is on a life skills sabbatical and won't be around for a while. [/quote] He's on the naughty step.

[quote name='wateroftyne' timestamp='1360272968' post='1968011'] It's great, innit? That guitar he uses is so bizarre. It's so 'un-JJ Cale'. Crazy guy. [/quote] It's a casio. It was some kind of synth guitar made back in the eighties I think.

[quote name='mcnach' timestamp='1360266949' post='1967865'] I nearly stopped reading this thread when I saw what it was becoming... but I'm glad I did not, because this that you wrote relates a bit to a conversation I was having with another BC member a couple of weeks ago when he visited my town and he came to a gig of mine. He is an engineer, and loves music and bass in particular. I started out towards engineering but I became a biologist, and I love music and bass in particular these days. The conversation we had was about how professional musicians must feel about us non-professionals discussing their field. I can only imagine it can get tricky. I am not sure how I would feel if I joined a conversation of "weekend-molecular-biologists". But I know how I feel when I read what some people who know a little (but not much) write about subjects I know a fair amount more than they do, and I can see their errors. It happened yesterday, for instance, when a colleague of mine received a chapter in a "book" that some guy wrote about human disease and cancer and diet in the western world... The guy clearly is no biologist, has no medical training or scientific training of any kind in fact... I was *annoyed* before I reached the second page. His lack of unerstanding was so vast that it would just not be reasonable for me to discuss it (I just don't have the time for it)... and had he been in front of me, I think he could have probably felt I was just an arrogant scientist belittling him because he does not measure to the standard I hold myself to. Hmmm. I can imagine a professional musician feeling similarly "unimpressed" by some of the ramblings of us, largely untrained non-professionals. Am I on the right track? I think this gets complicated because we are talking something we call "art". If we talk mathematics, physics, chemistry... we can be right or wrong and be certain about it to a reasonable extent. Biology is a bit "fuzzier", as we know a great deal, but there is a lot more that we don't know, and we work on the data we have, making assumtions and interpreting results... and next year's results can tell us that a certain "truth" we hold today, cannot be true for we found data that contradicts it. But we can discuss things using discrete hard data. But how do we discuss art? How do we discuss music? On the one hand, there are theoretical aspects or harmony etc that one can use. I know very little. My brother, however, trained for years and is a professional... Because I am interested in all things musical, I have been present when he and others were discussing the whys and hows about a certain composition my brother made... and it was quite amazing for me that there was a lot more behind the music than I had at first imagined, when I listened to the piece being played. For me, music is emotional, above anything else. That is enough for me (it just would not be practical for me to dedicate the time that would be required for me to learn so much that I should learn). But emotion is only one part of it. Other people can understand the music way beyond the level I can. And that's ok. I can accept that wholeheartedly. It does not feel good if someone puts me down, however, because I am stuck at that mostly emotional level. Why? It's a beautiful part of music. But, like I said above... I can see how someone who studies music a lot more deeply and makes it his profession (his life, in many ways), can feel exasperated sometimes with people who do not take the time and effort to study music and still carry themselves (or are seen as carrying themselves!) as "artists". It's a tough one, 'though, because art, music, generates passion. Something that connects with us so deeply at an emotional level, and makes us passionate about it... well, belittle someone about it and he is going to jump and bite your jugular. If I play a simple ska song, with no more than 4-5 chords and very simple bassline patterns... it makes me feel good. I enjoy it. Many others enjoy it. Then I hear the trumpets and saxophones doing their thing (a professional would have a better name for "doing their thing" and could appreciate some clever interplays better than my simple "makes me smile" emotion), and wait until the trombone comes in and sits between the trumpets and the bassline... When it works, it's beautiful, I enjoy it and people dance like mad to it. Great. I can imagine that from a purely musical point of view, that ska song can get boring before it's even started,, for some. I can understand and accept that, and I don't have any pretensions to create any great music... because I know my limitations very well. I enjoy music the way I can enjoy it, with the tools and knowledge I currently have. I admire those who go beyond that and can produce something more "elevated"... and just because I cannot understand the ins and outs it doesn't mean I cannot admire it and appreciate it to some degree. Obviously, my "review" about such a piece is not going to be of much use to that creator, as our levels are so mismatched... But I can still enjoy it, perhaps, in my own way. Is it necessary to call me ignorant (even if it's true I am not very knowledgeable, so I guess I am ignorant to some degree), a clown (because I enjoy the fact that others enjoy and are entertained by what I play), and a whore (because I take money for it)? You call that to one person... and they may respond or ignore it. You call that to a whole group of people... and you are going to get sparks flying. I have always tried to surround myself with people better than I am, in everything: when practicing judo, when playing guitar, when learning science... That's what pushes you it helps you improve. For that reason, I wish we could have a hundred people with your knowledge, ability and experience in this forum. I think that makes this place richer. I also want the "weekend warriors" who do not know what a chord is but have been playing bars for 20 or 30 years, for they have other things to contribute. And bedroom players of all skills and ambitions. And the gear geeks who know everything about the nuances between different envelope filter pedals... and those who are not very good players and don't know music, but are good at the electronics of things that can produce musical notes. I am sure we all know our place, something I think you criticised earlier. You do have a point, I concede, about people talking about things they do not understand as well as they think they do... but if it happens I am sure it's motivated by passion, a passion for music, that I hope you could relate to even if most don't pursue it as deeply as you have. And I wish you could accept that and not have to be condescending towards them (us)... I am not sure what you gain from contributing here, but you must obtain something or you would have left already, and I have been in the past annoyed at the way you say things (usually not so much the real content, but the form) but even with that I can see that you have something that could be of interest for me, even if I do not study music and lack the ability to comprehend music's finer details... I do listen a lot more than I talk, and read a lot more than I write. That's ok by me. My question to you: - in my ramblings above (sorry if it seems to jump a bit), have I touched a bit of why you say the things you say? - if the answer is yes, is it possible to say them without sounding so hostile? Obviously I do not want to and it would be too arrogant of me to try to change the way you are. But if it were possible to communicate your thoughts in a less confrontational manner, I know quite a few of us would rather enjoy having you around, for you clearly have a lot to offer... and I hope you find here something that's also of interest to you (most probably not from me, granted). Peace? [/quote] Very admirable but I fear you are talking with the voice of compromise and reconciliation I think your intended recipient does not speak the lingo. Let's wait and see........

[quote name='wateroftyne' timestamp='1360222572' post='1966797'] Don't feed the troll... [/quote] +1

Hope you find someone. If not l expect I'll get a call from Gaz.