Chris2112

Fodera...Fender can't even hope to compete.

[quote name='Pete Academy' timestamp='1327433936' post='1511204'] Probably the most pointless lesson ever. [/quote] If you had seen the Expert Village lessons on slap you wouldn't be saying that!

Mike Pope is sounding seriously cool there.

I don't think either player has done anything worth listening to for years.

I'm surprised he didn't strangle that slimy little toad of a salesman.

[quote name='bartelby' timestamp='1327414438' post='1510806'] Sounds interesting. A lot of the DM stuff is written on guitar then reworked into synth parts. Sounds like you're sort of going for somewhere in between their demo and studio versions. [/quote] Yeah, it's quite cool. Luckily Andy, the lad who is doing the synths and stuff is pretty handy so we've managed to get a few things cobbled together. And the Warwick sounds great for it, which is useful because I'm frequently jumping all over the board to get the best note for the part.

Dubios?

[quote name='Linus27' timestamp='1327394167' post='1510337'] Why Depeche Mode? You in a Depeche Mode cover band? [/quote] Not a cover band, though we are planning on doing a few Depeche Mode covers. I'm singing Gahan's parts and the usual singer is singing Gore's parts and playing synths. I'm covering various synth parts and melodies with my bass. It's quite a cool way of doing things. We don't have enough synths or triggers to play everything like it was (nor do we have access to Depeche Mode's massive bank of sounds and samples) but we're piecing things together. Can't do much today until I've got my Streamer restrung though. The best part is, there is nothing for the drummer to do! He can keep his 'sloppy' human time and we'll rely on the perfection of drum machines!

If you're looking for a big, crisp slap tone on the TRB you could try a Seymour Duncan preamp. The only thing you have to watch out for in these cases is corrupting the integrity of the midrange sound. SD can be quite 'brash' sounding to me in some basses, whereas say, Bartolini or Glockenklang might sound a little more culutred and balanced. Ultimately though, I think you could be barking up the wrong tree. TRB's, and especially the high end ones, are some of the best sounding 'production' basses you can get. If you want better you'd probably be looking at spending some serious cash with a custom builder. This thread has got me wondering how good a TRB would sound with an ACG/East preamp though!

[quote name='LawrenceH' timestamp='1327361160' post='1510147'] Playing piano parts on semi- or unweighted keys is rubbish and feels unmusical IMO. Even with weighted boards, a truly decent hammer action mimic is hard to find and a personal thing. Synth bass is fine for me on a cheap sprung board tho! [/quote] Yes, this is absolutely true. I used to have a Roland SH-201, and whilst it sounded great and was brilliantly laid out for tweaking your sound on the go, the keys were proper flappy-paddle items, which didn't feel great. But then if you want a synth with a really good keyboard on it you'll easily pay thousands of pounds for one!

This needs a link for the lazy amoung us!

To sum up what we've learned here: * Basses from smoke free homes are good *Smokey basses stink

I've got a new set of strings waiting to go on the Streamer, and a stack of Depeche Mode songs to start transcribing. If only my tuner hadn't ran out of battery! Means I'm having to hold off changing the strings until I can grab another 9v battery!

[quote name='geoffbassist' timestamp='1327327683' post='1509330'] Unique to them. You can't get the same results elsewhere so they charge accordingly. [/quote] Whilst Fodera are quite simply stunning, I can think of a few basses of similar design and construction, that would probably rival a Fodera in a blind test with ease. Fodera craftsmanship is superb and undoubtedly top level, but the gulf in the market has closed very quickly over the past few years and Fodera/Ken Smith etc etc can no longer say they are top of the leage simply because they are the best builders. And so I am forced to ask the question of what exactly is unique in Fodera basses? The Pope preamp? Possibly, but the best sounding Fodera (IMO) has a Haz Lab preamp in it! If you buy a Fodera preamp pedal I expect you could get some fairly similar results, though I refute that there is a distinct Fodera tone in the same way as there is a Wal tone, or an Alembic tone, or a Ken Smith tone. A big part of sitting down with a Fodera for the first time was coming to terms with the fact that it sounded great, but not particularly distinctive. There is some variation in the basses, if you go for Aero pickups, Barts or EMG's etc etc, and to me this is where the differences lie. I do think it's as much about the name as anything else, as evidenced by Hadrien Feraud getting a Fodera (as well as a US Ken Smith, and then promptly going back to his Ken Smith Burner!). Not that I disagree with that, Fodera have many great fusion players on their books (and maybe some not-so-great ones like Janek Gwizdala ). As much as I love Fodera though, I don't feel the craftsmanship is quite up there with Alembic. I find some Alembic guitars and basses a little fussy and ornate, but their ability to produce something that is absolutely flawless in every minute detail is spectacular.

[quote name='Shambo' timestamp='1327321982' post='1509202'] A couple of posts have been delivered with such sanctimony and vitriol as to take my breath away better than any cigarette could. [/quote] They won't give you cancer though. I remember my first Kubicki bass, a white 1989 model (#1777). That had been gigged in smokey pubs at some stage of it's life, and was an off-white colour (which I quite liked). What I didn't like so much was the fact that it always smelled slightly strange, the violent stench of the smoke had faded almost into the background, but there was an ever-present 'ozone' type smell to the bass, which had obviously seen a lot of Febreeze or Odor Eater before I got my hands on it. The case was a write off, the smoke was soaked into the fur lining of the case and it was a write off. I chucked it in a skip at the local tip the same day it came. The bass always smelled a bit strange. I don't think anything would have ever truely gotten rid of the smell of smoke and cleaning product from it though, I had it for over a year and even in a new case it still smelled like it did the day it arrived.

[i]Lie to me[/i] by Depeche Mode. Quite frankly, my favourite band at the moment. I usually relish driving to work on a nightshift, with the Alpine cranked up and the Depeche Mode pumping out, getting me in the frame for a night at work. I love this tune, one of their more 'atmospheric' efforts, deeply brooding and with some lovely synth tones. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlMBs_HUcxQ

Despite the fact that it takes a lot of work to be god-like slap player, this is a neat trick. I picked it up off Stuart Hamm's first instructional video years ago.