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It ain't what you play, it's the way that you play it?


The Admiral
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I was in London for work on St Patrick's day and wanted to go for a beer, but avoid all the one day only faux 'oirish' crap that goes with it. In the mood for some live music, I ended up in 'Ain't nothin' but....' - the blues bar in Kingly Street, where the Franck Ash band were playing. Anyone who knows this venue, will be aware that it's a [b]really[/b] small place, with a tiny stage - about 9ft x 5ft (if that). Clearly you don't need a huge rig, and in fact there simply isn't room for anything bigger than a small combo - which brings me to my point : the bass player in the band was Winston Blissett (Kylie, Lionel Richie, Robbie Williams, Massive Attack etc) and he was playing a nice custom 5 string....... but through what I'm sure was a Behringer bass combo, and it sounded great.

I might have been seeing things, but it got me thinking about how much we sometimes might think you have to spend on gear, but is it as much about how you play, as through what? Clearly an expensive custom bass will give you a great initial sound, but the combo was more than capable of covering the low B.

Finally, what a great thing that you can see musicians as good as Mr B, with a really top notch blues band, in a small pub in London, and for no cost other than your beer. A great night - and no 'diddly eye'!.

A

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[quote name='dbass' post='1168076' date='Mar 19 2011, 11:31 AM']I agree to a certain extent Admiral.

[b]I think at lower volumes cheap gear can sound brilliant but I've also found it's when you push it at higher volumes it tends to start sounding it's value.[/b]

Also - the custom bass probably helped![/quote]


My thoughts precisely. That sounds like an amazing gig you went to! But my money is on him having expensive gear for the larger gigs. The bottom line is we all know why we spend sometimes insane amounts on gear, because when they're cranked they sound better than cheaper gear.


Dan

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[quote]which brings me to my point : the bass player in the band was Winston Blissett (Kylie, Lionel Richie, Robbie Williams, Massive Attack etc) and he was playing a nice custom 5 string....... but through what I'm sure was a Behringer bass combo, and it sounded great.[/quote]

Was it his Ken Smith? I saw him with Massive Attack and he was swapping between that and a Stingray 5. The guy is a bit of a monster, when they played this tune live [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6OKZ7NQhq8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6OKZ7NQhq8[/url] it felt like the bass was literally punching me in the stomach... something I consider to be a great thing at a gig like Massive Attack!

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Acoustically the Blues Bar is not a normal place. The bass amp probably wouldn't have been Winston Blisset's. Because of the stage size, the sound limiter and acoustic problems that the Blues Bar has with bass frequencies it provides gear for the band, so the Behringer would have probbaly been the house bass amp.

From sessions with the likes of Tina Turner, Kylie and Cher to deps with my friends Jimi Hendrix tribute band, I guess Winston Blissett's got to play everything to pay the bills. He good though, isn't he.

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[quote name='chris_b' post='1168121' date='Mar 19 2011, 12:12 PM']Acoustically the Blues Bar is not a normal place. The bass amp probably wouldn't have been Winston Blisset's. Because of the stage size, the sound limiter and acoustic problems that the Blues Bar has with bass frequencies it provides gear for the band, so the Behringer would have probbaly been the house bass amp.[/quote]

Plus this monster Mesa rig used here with Massive Attack may have been overkill for a small Blues combo ... :)



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[quote name='The Admiral' post='1168063' date='Mar 19 2011, 11:20 AM']I was in London for work on St Patrick's day and wanted to go for a beer, but avoid all the one day only faux 'oirish' crap that goes with it. In the mood for some live music, I ended up in 'Ain't nothin' but....' - the blues bar in Kingly Street, where the Franck Ash band were playing. Anyone who knows this venue, will be aware that it's a [b]really[/b] small place, with a tiny stage - about 9ft x 5ft (if that). Clearly you don't need a huge rig, and in fact there simply isn't room for anything bigger than a small combo - which brings me to my point : the bass player in the band was Winston Blissett (Kylie, Lionel Richie, Robbie Williams, Massive Attack etc) and he was playing a nice custom 5 string....... but through what I'm sure was a Behringer bass combo, and it sounded great.

I might have been seeing things, but it got me thinking about how much we sometimes might think you have to spend on gear, but is it as much about how you play, as through what? Clearly an expensive custom bass will give you a great initial sound, but the combo was more than capable of covering the low B.

Finally, what a great thing that you can see musicians as good as Mr B, with a really top notch blues band, in a small pub in London, and for no cost other than your beer. A great night - and no 'diddly eye'!.

A[/quote]

That's a good point though, I've heard some great tones from players on small gigs and mooched over after the performance, wondering what fine gear they must use to achieve this, and I've often been pleasantly surprised
by some of the basic equipment used.
I also think if you've pre- hand knowledge of the gear about to be used in someones performance, it can 'cloud your ear' as such, rather than enjoying it for what it [i]actually[/i] sounds like.

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I completely agree as far as amplification is concerned with a few exceptions. You pay peanuts you get monkeys. I've never bought cheap amps or cabs cos there's more that can go wrong with inferior components and you never want to muck around with anything involving electricity.

As far as bass goes I'm all for gigging anything as long as it can be adjusted to be playable. Its only a couple of pieces of wood and some metal after all.

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A good bass goes a long towards getting a great sound through virtually any 'working' amp (i.e. it helps if you're borrowing a less than decent amp at a gig or rehearsal that it's not falling apart!) so if the speaker in the cab/combo is half decent the most of the EQ can be dialled in from the bass - and then it's just a question of volume levels, which in a small venue are likely to be far more within the limits of a 'cheaper' amp's capabilities. I've heard similarly great tones from Laurence Cottle using just his Yamaha 5 string through a whole variety of amps - a lot of a great sound is actually in the fingers first and foremost, bass second and then your amp... being a great player helps most of all!

M

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[quote name='RhysP' post='1168216' date='Mar 19 2011, 01:38 PM']....There's every chance his bass was DI'd & was using the combo for monitoring....[/quote]
Not at the Blues Bar. Think small, cheap, tatty and very low tech and you'd still be overestimating this place.

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[quote name='chris_b' post='1168264' date='Mar 19 2011, 02:20 PM']Not at the Blues Bar. Think small, cheap, tatty and very low tech and you'd still be overestimating this place.[/quote]

Absolutely right - there is no monitoring for the vocals, let alone any of the musicians, or DI facility - and the PA is a wall mounted powered mixer, with a couple of 1 x 15 + H cabs hanging from the ceiling. The keyboard player actually sat in the audience at the edge of the stage - and everyone played backline only, Musicman 1x12 for guitar, a Vox keyboard amp, and the aforementioned Behringer, which I suspect was, as has been suggested, a loaner from the venue. Even the drums were completely unamplified - very old school, but sounded great.

The bass was the one in the Massive Attack Mesa stack picture above. I'm not good on custom makes, but a large inlaid 'S' on the headstock. Sounded awesome.

A

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If it was backline and vocal PA, then it's not really fair to compare it to bigger rigs.

One of the important things for me (and probably every bassist) is how the bass sound cuts through the mix. That can't be compared at this kind of gig to a fully PA'd gig. As Dan says, the difference in gear quality really starts to shine through at higher volumes. If cheap gear really did sound as good as expensive gear, you'd see a lot of big artists going around with it and you don't. There's enough people that have good sense not to waste money that you'd see some. The only example of cheap gear being used by the kind of artists that can have anything they want is Hartke.

As much as gear like Squiers are brilliant for the money, they do fall short of more expensive gear.

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[quote name='The Admiral' post='1168273' date='Mar 19 2011, 02:27 PM']... there is no monitoring for the vocals, let alone any of the musicians, or DI facility - and the PA is a wall mounted powered mixer, with a couple of 1 x 15 + H cabs hanging from the ceiling. [b]The keyboard player actually sat in the audience at the edge of the stage.[/b][/quote]

:) that image has brightened my day.

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I played there with a 5 piece band and me and the harmonica player stood in the audience at the side of the stage! It was a difficult load in and parking was a problem, poor sound, long hours (3 1hr sets starting at 10pm) and the pay just about covered the petrol! Not my favourite gig!!

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[quote name='The Admiral' post='1168063' date='Mar 19 2011, 11:20 AM']I was in London for work on St Patrick's day and wanted to go for a beer, but avoid all the one day only faux 'oirish' crap that goes with it. In the mood for some live music, I ended up in 'Ain't nothin' but....' - the blues bar in Kingly Street, where the Franck Ash band were playing. Anyone who knows this venue, will be aware that it's a [b]really[/b] small place, with a tiny stage - about 9ft x 5ft (if that). Clearly you don't need a huge rig, and in fact there simply isn't room for anything bigger than a small combo - which brings me to my point : the bass player in the band was Winston Blissett (Kylie, Lionel Richie, Robbie Williams, Massive Attack etc) and he was playing a nice custom 5 string....... but through what I'm sure was a Behringer bass combo, and it sounded great.

I might have been seeing things, but it got me thinking about how much we sometimes might think you have to spend on gear, but is it as much about how you play, as through what? Clearly an expensive custom bass will give you a great initial sound, but the combo was more than capable of covering the low B.

Finally, what a great thing that you can see musicians as good as Mr B, with a really top notch blues band, in a small pub in London, and for no cost other than your beer. A great night - and no 'diddly eye'!.

A[/quote]


I have to say, like I've said before, some of the Behringer stuff can sound pretty good. The build quality is probably lower than bigger names, and more likely to fail after a shorter period than a higher brand... but soundwise, some of it it's really nice. Maybe because they copy nice gear :)

My practice amp is a Behringer BXL450A and I really like it. I bought it when I did because it was cheap. I kept it all this time because it's good.
I also had a 300W head heavily inspired in the Ashdown MAG series that was pretty cool.

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Just to clarify the point I was making : clearly you are never going to get a hi fi sound from a £200 amp, by comparison with a £3,000 stack, but I was pleasantly surprised by how good it sounded. I do think that there is a tendency to assume that if you don't have (and/or can't afford) top end gear then you aren't a serious musician, and it's impossible to use anything other than 'pro' gear and sound good. You wouldn't try and play Wembley with a 15w bedroom combo, but equally you don't [b]need[/b] an 8 x 10 500w stack to play blues at the Dog and Duck.

I've also seen the complete opposite of the situation I described initially - that of using modest gear with a great outcome ; where a band has thousands of £s worth of kit and can't play at all - guitarists are frequently guilty of this in my experience!

A

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The whole 'pro' gear thing is bullshit for the most part. I've seen plenty if professional players using gear that doesn't cost thousands of pounds and they still sound great. The cost of the gear has nothing to do with anything.

You could easily use a little 15 watt combo at Wembley if you wanted,if it has the sound you want-you'll be mic'ing it up anyway.

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[quote name='Doddy' post='1168416' date='Mar 19 2011, 04:11 PM']The whole 'pro' gear thing is bullshit for the most part. I've seen plenty if professional players using gear that doesn't cost thousands of pounds and they still sound great. The cost of the gear has nothing to do with anything.

You could easily use a little 15 watt combo at Wembley if you wanted,if it has the sound you want-you'll be mic'ing it up anyway.[/quote]

Just what I was going to say. If you find an amp that has that sound you crave does it matter that its £150 or £1500?

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