gjones

It's an ABM EVO lll bought for £134 from Ebay a couple of years ago. Quite a bargain.

You have a guitar amp at ear height, my commiserations. It sounds a pretty dumb arrangement. If I was playing there, I would probably bring my own amp. Or ask the sound engineer to get the guitar amp as far away as possible from your ears (in a diplomatic way).

I would only use UK gear if it was stuff I specifically wanted, that just so happened to be British. I do have a UK built Ashdown ABM and a couple of Barefaced cabs but also have US built GK heads and a Markbass combo made in Indonesia. I have read articles which say that, as companies need less and less humans involved in the manufacturing process, cheap labour will no longer be a reason to 'offshore' manufacturing plants, in order to save money. In the near future manufacturing will be a mostly automated process, where labour costs are minimal and it will be more cost effective to base your manufacturing plants near where your customers are, to cut out the cost of transporting your goods over large distances from the factory to the consumer. Many manufacturers are already doing this.

As a teenager I was told, by the boyfriend of my sister who was a sound engineer, that bass soundwaves take a long distance to form, so you can't hear your bass correctly until you're 20 ft from your cab. That means the sound onstage doesn't ever sound like the sound 20 ft away. Harmonica players don't have this problem ☹️ What a bummer.

A couple of songs in my bands set require a B string but they aren't impossible to play on a 4 string (I just have to play some notes an octave up). The problem is that our singer tends to change the key of the song, to make it easier for her to sing. My 5 string is a G&L L2500 tribute, which sounds great, but I have 10 other 4 strings and I don't want them sitting at home gathering dust. Ahhh....first world problems eh?

These days sound engineers have spectrum analysers and other gizmos, which should be able to iron out peaks in the sound. Of course there may be some venues that you just can't ever get a good sound in.

The guitarists, although no spring chickens and probably pretty vulnerable themselves, are no fans of lockdowns and I suspect have sympathies with the ant vax/plandemic brigade. I suspect they would poo poo his worries about catching covid and I want to avoid confrontation if I can. Best to not have the drummer present, so that things can be discussed in a cool and thoughtful manner.

I'm happy to attend rehearsals until the drummer is ready to return to gigging in hot sweaty dives, if that's what the rest of the band want to do. I'm also happy to think about recruiting another drummer if they want to get gigging sooner. I think I'll break it to them after the next rehearsal on Thursday. The drummer usually shoots off pretty sharpish, so that will give me and the singer (who already knows about the situation) some time to discuss things with the guitarists.

I like the guy but you're right, I don't like him enough to allow him to hold us back from gigging.

I joined a band before the pandemic, we had a few rehearsals, then lockdown happened. After the lockdown I decided that I was going to push things along, get a set rehearsed and get everybody organised for gigging. Then the drummer told me he was vulnerable to covid as he had diabetes and had diabetes heart issues. He told me he didn't want to gig until 2022 at the earliest. This put a spanner in the works, as I was planning to get us gigging by the start of winter at the latest. So, although I'm still organising rehearsals, I'm not putting the same effort in to get us up to speed. After all we won't be gigging with our current drummer, until some time in 2022. So far I haven't told the two guitarists, as I'm afraid they'll either want to kick him out, or quit the band. Should I tell the guitarists or not? I'd like to know your opinions.

Actually I think that's the plan. He's playing with Saucerful Of Secrets, at the moment, so he's looking for a 60s look (i.e. Wem columns and Selmer amp).

It looks like a Selmer Treble n bass on a pair of Wem columns

That's the weird thing with sonic blue. I bought a Fender Stratocaster a few years ago, which looked white in the shop, when I got it home I realised it was Sonic Blue.

As @pbasspecial said, get a secondhand Barefaced Compact. I have one and it sounds much louder than the ABM 1x15 I used to own.

The strings on the Aretha track, actually sounded pretty tastefully done. Not syrupy, or over the top at all.

Bassists (including me) shouldn't obsess about P bass sounds. Your excellent video and the one below, show that there isn't much difference in the sound of different P basses. Especially when the bass is in a mix with other instruments.

I've never used him but I hear good things about Chris McIntyre https://www.mcintyreguitars.com/

I had to have an operation on my left hand due to carpal tunnel. I also had the same problem with my right hand but it wasn't as severe as my left and therefore my neurologist didn't feel it merited an operation. Since the onset of carpal tunnel, I've always worn a weightlifters wrist brace on my right wrist and kept my wrist straight when gigging. When I see the sharp angle some bass players hold their wrists at, when they play, I'm pretty sure they're at risk of ending up with wrist issues in years to come.

Go East Spandex Ballet Durex Durex Drip Drip Drip

£350 is a fairish price for a MIJ Silver Squier Jazz . I own one and they're good instruments. The pickups are darker sounding than your average Jazz Bass which I like. Mine was bought about 10 years ago for £250. They originally went for about £260/270 back in the early 90s. The ones you're probably thinking about were the early MIJ Squiers from the early 80s. They're a lot more expensive.

Strings do make a big difference to the sound of a bass. I've bought many a bass where my initial impression of it, when I get to sit and play it, is underwhelming. Changing the strings, to a different brand than it's fitted with, often brings it to life. I used to stick to Rotosound Swing Bass strings but have experimented with DR Hi Beams, Elixirs and Dunlop Super Brights of different gauges over the last few years. My favourites are the DR and Elixirs. It can be an expensive business though.

Not a stupid question at all. None of my basses, with onboard EQ, have a low mid control. So if I wanted to tweak those frequencies I would have to do it directly from the amp. And although, intuitively, one would assume that flat on a bass amp would be when all EQ controls are set at 12 o'clock, for many amps that's not the case. For example, on the Orange Terror Bass 500, flat setting is bass and treble all the way off and mids all the way up. I used the above Orange head at a local venue, quite a lot, and that setting sounded pretty flat to me. I then tweaked the sound from the EQ on my bass, which was often a 3 band Stingray.

Yes I think you're right. Bassists that play with big acts in large venues, are using IEM with a feed from the desk. The huge stack that they stand in front of on stage, is purely due to endorsement deals they have with manufacturers and is probably muted. One particular bassist, who shall remain nameless, endorses one particular boutique amp and cab manufacturer at every opportunity he gets but he also is a very big fan of his vibrating bassboard, which he uses with his IEM.

It sounds improvised and I doubt the original player would play it exactly like the record every time they played it. If I was learning this song I would start just start off playing the roots and fifths and then introduce fills etc, as I got more familiar with the song. Which is probably how the original bass player came up with the bass line.

Ed Friedland did a comparison of all the DR strings on the old Bass Emporium website. After listening to the various sound files I bought a pack of DR Hi Beams. I was very happy with them and I used them for many years. After buying a bass with Elixirs fitted, they are now my string of preference. But the basses I have, which are still fitted with the Hi Beams, still sound great. Never tried Sunbeams.