Thurbs

Yeah, a new owner here... I bought it as a "b-stock" from PMT in Norwich as it had a small scratch on the side, came with 6 months warranty and £100 off RRP. The foot-switch, case + Bluetooth module bumped the price up again soon enough! After it all arrived, I got it all plugged in and set up ready for a rock gig I had the next day. Setting up the Bluetooth MIDI was easy but I didn't have a lot of time to mess around so played it safe and used the "rock" library from Boss: https://bosstoneexchange.com/liveset/0e5eb187-a945-45c7-a506-c9767eaae25a/ (with some small tweaks). As an aside, it also has a "Bluetooth audio" connection which plays songs through the combo as well. Now I am incredibly lazy and am frankly miffed I have to bring anything more to a rehearsal / gig than a guitar, a old Zoom 9.1 ut effects box and some in ear monitoring. I have tried but failed to get any band to practice and gig this way and always end up with an amp and cab on top (I know proper first world problems...). So I looked for this box to replace the zoom, amp and cab to enable a "one carry" load in and plug & play capabilities. Honestly (and feel free to flame) this is becoming much more important to me than any "tone". The good news is this "one carry" goal is a winner, with a heavy caveat. Walking 100m or so is OK but after that I was swapping arms around to avoid increasing pain. I am sure the 110 with DI in to the PA would be much better for those in the tube / trains / long carries (and now on my shopping list). So on to the gig.. the band is a five piece with a loud drummer and two other guitars playing very "run of the mill" rock covers (think Dakota and Sex on Fire). It was in a odd shaped football type pub full of punters bouncing along with us. I had never played this thing beyond the 1 watt setting so had no idea what to expect. With 160 watts available and usually gigging with a 300 watt Ashdown I was expecting it to be quiet and needing some support from the PA. Being optimistic, I set the volume to half way at the sound check and this was bang on and gigged the whole night like this. I could hear it really well despite wearing some headphones https://www.amazon.co.uk/Behringer-DH100-Drummer-Headphones/dp/B093VZPW6T with no bass in the headphone mix. I did have the advantage of being about 4 feet in front of the cab so benefited from not just hearing it via my ankles. My old band mates came along to support me and were very complimentary on the bass sound. They said they could feel it as much as hear it and thought it had definition and clarity as well as a punch. There were two minor things which caused me an issue (other than the weight). (1) I used an lower octave effect to really create some depth to the sound (Zombie). It was ok playing a Bb, but a F really dropped the volume noticeably so swapped to the higher octave (if that makes any sense at all!) and it was all good. (2) The footswich switches are very soft compared to the Zoom so took a bit of getting used to. It also comes with guitar labels which are different to the bass and got confused mid gig a few times remembering what they should be. I have since noticed a sticker pack in the cab documents which I have stuck over the guitar labels and hopefully no more confusion! As for "tone", all of the recordings you can find on youtube are a faithful replication of the real thing. If you like those sounds, you won't be disappointed. I used a Fender Precision finger style on the gig and it was all the usual precision rock goodness with the bank of 6 channels you can pre-load on to the cab. Buyers remorse or conformation bias I hear you ask... I am pretty neutral tbh. It did what I thought it would do, was loud enough and made rock noises when needed. Wasn't too expensive, looks well made and robust. What more could I ask for? A roadie to carry it in for me. Yours, a satisfied and lazy old git.

Pretty average player here. Looking to gig as much as possible. Style no issue. Covers or origionals. Can sing backing play double bass and bass guitar. Can't slap. Have own gear, transport and teeth. Check out Band Mix and Sound Cloud for an Idea of how good (or otherwise) I am. Can't seem to pass any audition so please have low expectations! https://www.bandmix.co.uk/richard-thurbin/