Pliskin

I bought BFD 1.5 from Chris, he was easy to deal with, good communication and the item arrived quickly and well packaged. Would deffinately deal with Chris again in the future. Thanks again!

[quote name='Finbar' post='1086330' date='Jan 12 2011, 02:10 AM']My Matamp GT200 is actually 19" wide without the case. Now if that doesn't sound like it could be made rackmounted with a little fiddling, I don't know what does [/quote] Yep, pretty sure all the large heads they do would fit in a rack without too much trouble.

That is if he's looking for valve gear, Matamp don't do any solid state at the moment although I hear on the rumour-mill that they might be working on some in the near future to satisfy the rackmount/huge headroom end of the bass market.

Almost everything is custom made to order at Matamp, although they currently don't offer any rackable amps I'm sure Jeff would find a way to make it happen.

+1 for Matamp, one of the oldest amp manufacturers in England and everything is designed and hand built in their workshop near Huddersfield. Some of the highest quality amplification money can buy. I'm not sure exactly how much of the Ashdown stuff is made in the UK now but I know that at one time the higher end of their product line was all made here, I have an Ashdown ABM 410 cab that says 'made in England' on the back plate. Some of the higher end Blackstar amps such as the Artisan series were handmade here but i recall hearing production moved to china. I also don't think they make bass amps :/

Cal came over to Sheffield to buy my Ashdown 4x10. He was a pleasure to deal with, good communication and a nice chap too!

I can't offer my experience with bass guitars really as I've only owned three; a Squire P-bass, Epiphone Thunderbird (both a few years ago when, as a guitarist I began to dabble with bass) and my current bass a '94 Warwick Thumb BO which I bought in January when I started playing 'properly'. I hated the P and the thunderbird and only ever played them when I needed to record something. The Warwick on the other hand changed me, I'm at a point now where I am starting to see myself as a bassist rather than just a guitarist who puts on a different hat once in a while. I'm not under any illusion that this is down to how much the Warwick cost but the thumb definitely has (for me) something the others didn't. It is right for me. On the other side of this, my Tokai love rock plays and sounds as good as any Les Paul I've tried and cost a fraction of the price!

Hi folks, I'm new to the board although I have been lurking for a while! I'm a sound engineer by trade and thought I'd say a bit about this subject. As someone has already mentioned, time/budget is a massive issue when recording and often corners have to be cut to get the job done. I'm not entirely sure why most engineers tend to cut those corners with bass over other instruments but I have a feeling that a lot of it has to do with the fact that a mic'd bass amp isn't always the easiest thing to mix well, and is often the instrument that sounds the least like it does 'in the room' once recorded. I don't think it's right to ignore the requests of paying clients but I would certainly suggest alternatives if the budget was tight, ranging from recording DIs to sample replacing drums. At the end of the day, it all comes down to: how many songs you want to record, with what budget and at what kind of quality. Bands booking a weekend to record and mix four songs should be prepared for the fact that corners will HAVE to be cut or nothing would get finished. Bearing this in mind, and on the basis that time isn't as large a factor an engineer should always be listening to the wishes of his/her clients. If time IS an issue, there are a couple of things you can do to make the process less dissapointing. Whatever your thoughts are about Line 6 gear or amp modelling in general, if the option is to either record a DI/sansamp or a decent amp model, the amp model is almost deffinately going to turn out better. This is especially the case if you happen to have one of the amps it models or something close. I'm not saying POD/Vamp/whatever has killer tone so much that you can at least get in the ballpark of your sound and an amp model, even if it's lacking some mojo and feel and isn't EXACTLY like the real thing is still far better than hearing that horrid lifeless straight DI. It also happens to be just as quick to record so grumpy engineers should have nothing to moan about Another option is one a friend of mine has been pursuing: Book a little time in a decent studio, just a couple of hours with a good engineer. Ask him to try a variety of mics in different possisions and record some test tracks, the goal being to find both a mic you like the sound of and the ideal placement for it. Once you've got the sound you like take lots of photographs, take measurements, write down any eq settings the engineer used. Now go and buy an Amp Clamp and that exact mic you liked the sound of and using your measurements clamp the mic to your amp in this 'perfect' position. The next time you record you can just plug a mic cable straight in and throw the other end at the engineer Hope that's of some help! Stu