Barefaced - Watch & Learn You Big'Uns!

[Acebassmusic]

After sending Alex an epic e-mail describing the sort of sound / cab I was looking for I ordered my early Xmas present 2 weeks ago, a Barefaced Big Twin T

Had it delivered today by FedEx....wooohooooo! Like a 10 year old I couldnt wait to open my new prezzy......oooh me likey! Nice finish, great fittings, sexy black grill, cracked casing.....uh?......eh?,,,,,what?......noooooooo! Holding back the tears I realised that the corner of the cab had been damaged in shipping Ah well, these things happen, nothing that cant be solved. So....I dropped Alex a message letting him know of the problem.

Cab delivered by FedEx and signed for : 11:22 am
Opened packaging : 11:26 am
Notified Alex : 11:33 am
Alex replied with solution : 11:35 am

Response time to customer : 2 mins.....[b]yes thats right... 2 MINS!! Priceless [/b]


After many years of getting used to half hearted or no responses from companies who just want to take my money and only give a service if they feel like it, this is a wonderful change. All these big corporates with their "customer (un)service centres" should watch and learn from Alex and Barefaced. Great communication and service all the way.....

Alex has one very happy customer.....and thats even before I plug it in and try it! Thanks Alex.


Mike

[wateroftyne]

Amen to that - Alex has always been very responsive and helpful, and I'm not even a customer.

[Lozz196]

Agree, I`ve had amazing customer service from Alex.

[discreet]

Respect for Alex here, the guy works hard and has the patience of a saint, particularly when dealing with unjustified criticism from people on bass forums who don't know what the hell they're talking about!

[Happy Jack]

My most righteous rig of all now comprises a [b][color=#ff0000]Super 12[/color] + [color=#008000]Compact [/color]+ [color=#0000ff]Midget[/color][/b]. I've had to buy an 1100W power amp to do it justice.

Now all I need is that gig at the O2 ...

[ShergoldSnickers]

I might get a bit of a delay with the sound up here but I still should be able to hear you.

PS forgot to add - always had good service and sensible advice too.

Edited December 10, 2011 by ShergoldSnickers

[Lozz196]

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1323531026' post='1464280']
My most righteous rig of all now comprises a [b][color=#ff0000]Super 12[/color] + [color=#008000]Compact [/color]+ [color=#0000ff]Midget[/color][/b]. I've had to buy an 1100W power amp to do it justice.

Now all I need is that gig at the O2 ...
[/quote]

The above, as well as possibly the loudest rig in existense, is just pure greed Jack

[Fro 20]

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1323529431' post='1464244']
" ..... and has the patience of a saint ..."
[/quote]

Consider this excerpt of an important email I sent to Alex in the back-and-forth as I was ordering my cabs :

"...custom gold-sparkle flame-job duratex, ...pimped out (fake) tiger fur-lined handles,.. oh and chrome round metal grills on each driver.... oh, and I want a cutout for my tremendous package when I bend over to pick it up..."

So for like a whole 5 hours I'm anxiously pacing around, waiting for a reply. Why is it taking so long for him to answer such an important email? Then I realized it was like 4am there in the UK. Well, doesn't he get an audible alarm tone when my emails come in? This is important, he should get up and answer me right away !!

Alex, beware: THIS is the level of reality your target market is on as you introduce your cabs to America.

Anyways, the next morning the reply is there, which is basically "Settle down, Son"

A month or so later I had my cabs. On the day I got them Alex was very prompt in replying a few times regarding some fine tuning/tightening, some bank problems I had in sending the $, and about power levels. It's been 72 gigs, and the cabs (BB and BBT) are basically as loud as I can get them every show (usually with about 550 watts apiece from a qsc 3120) They still look and sound new, and have no doubt improved my playing

[JohnFitzgerald]

Here's a little question regarding watts.

I see Alex recommending plenty of Watts to work with the Barefaced cabs.

Unfortunately, my Trace is an AH150, which is 150 watts.

I'm not going down the road of what is a watt, depending on who makes it.
All I'll say is that they seem to be fairly healthy with this one.

My main beef with my current Peavey 410 is monster weight.
With the Trace pre amp gain set just so, I need between 1.5 and 2.0 on master to give me the stage volume I want.

How would this work out with a Barefaced ?

I won't pretend I understand, but am more than willing to move with the times and not have to move a monster weight cabinet any more.

Would my 150 Watt Trace elliot (which I love to bits) do the job with a barefaced cabinet ?

[Merton]

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1323531026' post='1464280']
My most righteous rig of all now comprises a [b][color=#ff0000]Super 12[/color] + [color=#008000]Compact [/color]+ [color=#0000ff]Midget[/color][/b]. I've had to buy an 1100W power amp to do it justice.

Now all I need is that gig at the O2 ...
[/quote]

You madman! The S12 is a stonking cab, why would you need more than that on its own?! What amp are you aiming for?

I'm now running an S12 with a GK MB Fusion and
I have been reliably informed by everyone that it is the best sound I've had

Edited December 10, 2011 by Merton

[alexclaber]

I have an idea for a clever bit of javascript on our website to help explain this, as all my word based explanations keep on failing!

Our EMS cabs (Midget, Compact, Super Twelve, Super Fifteen) don't need any more power to reach a given loudness than any other cabs of similar size - there's a very direct inverse correlation between how large a bass cab is and how much power it needs to play loud. The bigger the cab (or stack of cabs) the less power you need.

The reason people think our cabs need lots of power is because if you downsize (not downweight - new word there!) then you need more power to reach the same loudness. Also if you want to get the maximum loudness out of our cabs then you need lots of power because they can handle lots of power - but there is no downside to that ability to handle lots of power, it's only a benefit.

So our S15 would need less power than your Peavey 410, our S12 would need a bit more, our Compact would need yet more and our Midget would need loads more, to reach whatever dB SPL you require. If you regularly hear your amp clipping then you're using all the power it has (it doesn't matter where the knobs are pointing). If you don't then you're not. If you can only go a little louder than you normally play before hearing clipping (distortion) then you have maybe 1-2dB of headroom. If you can go a fair bit louder than you've got maybe 3-4dB of headroom. If you can go almost twice as loud then you have maybe 6dB+ of headroom. So with a 150W amp, if you're hearing clipping then you're using all 150W. If you have 1-2dB of headroom then you're using about 100W. If you have 3-4dB of headroom you're using 50-75W. If you have 6dB+ of headroom you're using less than 30W.

[JohnFitzgerald]

Alex

We're very much a band that likes to keep backline levels sane and let the PA do the heavy lifting. That's why I don't need monster sound levels. As I said previously, my amp on 1.5 - 2 through the Peavey moves all the air I would want.
I would hope that means I've got a fair bit of headroom there. Using your yardstick above, it seems that I may have somewhere between 4-6dB of headroom.
Must go and look at the wieght of the Barefaced cabs again.

[Happy Jack]

[quote name='Merton' timestamp='1323547340' post='1464538']
You madman! The S12 is a stonking cab, why would you need more than that on its own?! What amp are you aiming for?

[/quote]

Yup - got me in one.

I doubt I'll ever actually play the entire rig more than once, but Lego is more fun if you have more pieces to plug together and the Barefaced modular system works in much the same way.

As for the amp, in trying to find sensible alternatives to the Powersoft Digam I came across http://www.soundindustry.co.uk/acatalog/W-Audio-1100W-1U-Amplifier-Horizon1100-47.html

It seemed altogether too good to be true, so I spent an hour there on Friday with Brian, the owner of Sound Industry.

And bought the amp.

1100W from a 2-channel switching amp with a fast slew rate, in a 1U casing that weighs 10Kg, and all that for £250.

And seeing as I was already more than halfway to the Coast (sounds good, that, don't it?) I carried on down to Brighton and had Alex playing my '66 Precision through the new amp into a Compact+Midget stack and into the SuperTwelve.

Mmmmmm ... nice.

Once I've gigged the amp a few times, I'll write a review.

[AttitudeCastle]

A little off topic but Mike do you think i could try out your gear some day?

I saw you before when you played in Banchory, and sounded good!

And you also have a gear list of things i've always been curious about

We should have a mini aberdeen bass bash me thinks!

[pantherairsoft]

I've been using my Big Twin T for a few months now and it is without doubt the best sounding cab I have ever used. Effectively a full range PA in a single cab - Ideal for what I do. I am currently driving it with 1400w, BUT this is not because I need the power for volume. Before this I was driving with 350w and it was SERIOUSLY loud! My increase in headroom is to exploit extreme EQ settings (Huge boosts of 40-50hz sub) which is labour intensive on amps (while not massively musical in 'cenventional' bass playing - but perfect in my live Drum & Bass stuff).

Shep

[Acebassmusic]

[quote name='AttitudeCastle' timestamp='1323604315' post='1464833']
A little off topic but Mike do you think i could try out your gear some day?

I saw you before when you played in Banchory, and sounded good!

And you also have a gear list of things i've always been curious about

We should have a mini aberdeen bass bash me thinks!
[/quote]

We should have a more local "bass bash" as there are several of us up here in the northern wastelands. I was thinking of going to Moffat but cant fit it in this year

Banchory! Blimey the last time I played there (The Stag) was about 5 years ago. We're at the Globe in Aberdeen this Friday (16th) if your round and about. Alex has said to use the cab until he can get me a replacement so I might just be tempted to give it its maiden run then.

[ead]

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1323531026' post='1464280']
My most righteous rig of all now comprises a [b][color=#ff0000]Super 12[/color] + [color=#008000]Compact [/color]+ [color=#0000ff]Midget[/color][/b]. I've had to buy an 1100W power amp to do it justice.

Now all I need is that gig at the O2 ...
[/quote]

It is you causing the recent seismic events?

[jimcroisdale]

[quote name='JohnFitzgerald' timestamp='1323544195' post='1464505']
Here's a little question regarding watts.

I see Alex recommending plenty of Watts to work with the Barefaced cabs.

Unfortunately, my Trace is an AH150, which is 150 watts.

I'm not going down the road of what is a watt, depending on who makes it.
All I'll say is that they seem to be fairly healthy with this one.

My main beef with my current Peavey 410 is monster weight.
With the Trace pre amp gain set just so, I need between 1.5 and 2.0 on master to give me the stage volume I want.

How would this work out with a Barefaced ?

I won't pretend I understand, but am more than willing to move with the times and not have to move a monster weight cabinet any more.

Would my 150 Watt Trace elliot (which I love to bits) do the job with a barefaced cabinet ?
[/quote]

Depends which cab you are wanting! It will defo be enough for some of the 4ohm cans like the Super 12, but probably not for the 8ohm LF based cabs like the Big Baby.

Jim