Portable solution for busking on bass - new amp or battery/inverter

[mcnach]

You get an idea of the size...

[tonyquipment]

how'd it go??

am very curious to see how you got on with it!

[mcnach]

It went great!

We played for just over an hour, maybe an hour and 15min. We just wanted to get together and organise ourselves a little. We set ourselves at a crosspath in the park and it was not very busy... but we still got a small crowd and somehow made £47. We will definitely repeat when there's actually some people
But back to the amplifier...
It sounds good, and it is definitely loud enough without distorting. We had 3 acoustic guitars and voices, unamplified, plus trumpet and saxophone, and the drumer brought a cajon. It would be really easy for me to overpower all other instruments with bass, and sound good.
At £148... I think it's perfect. Really happy with it so far.

It comes with a wireless microphone, the kind that you wear around your neck and has a stem with a "lollipop" that stands in front of your mouth. I don't think it sounds very good... but it may be useful to reinforce the cajon, perhaps. Tomorrow we are trying again. This wireless has a separate volume... but the two jack inputs work from the same master volume, which is a pity, as you cannot plug two things at once and control their volumes independently... But I'm happy to ignore the small shortcomings and just see it as a portable busking bass amp. Anything else is a bonus.

I did not play very loud, but we are now thinking about getting some Roland MicroCubes for the guitarists, so that they can use their electrics and sound a litttle more like "us". That will also allow us to sound a *tiny* bit louder than with acoustics, so my amp will have to work harder but it wll be ok, I am sure. I just don't know how long the battery will last but I will find out pretty soon!
We don't want to be loud 'though... busking in many places in Edinburgh seems ok as long as you keep the volume down. The minute you become loud the problems start and we don't want to go there.

From my experience with the Crate TX15,,, the QTX QR10PA is a much better sounding solution, and not much more expensive. The built-in MP3 player and radio could be cool too in other situations: a colleague at work who goes fishing a lot saw it and thought it would be perfect for their trips.

[mcnach]

[mcnach]

There, pictures from yesterday. It's really portable... and sounds good!

[Rainbass]

[quote name='mcnach' timestamp='1374013574' post='2144344']
It went great!

We played for just over an hour, maybe an hour and 15min. We just wanted to get together and organise ourselves a little. We set ourselves at a crosspath in the park and it was not very busy... but we still got a small crowd and somehow made £47. We will definitely repeat when there's actually some people
But back to the amplifier...
It sounds good, and it is definitely loud enough without distorting. We had 3 acoustic guitars and voices, unamplified, plus trumpet and saxophone, and the drumer brought a cajon. It would be really easy for me to overpower all other instruments with bass, and sound good.
At £148... I think it's perfect. Really happy with it so far.

It comes with a wireless microphone, the kind that you wear around your neck and has a stem with a "lollipop" that stands in front of your mouth. I don't think it sounds very good... but it may be useful to reinforce the cajon, perhaps. Tomorrow we are trying again. This wireless has a separate volume... but the two jack inputs work from the same master volume, which is a pity, as you cannot plug two things at once and control their volumes independently... But I'm happy to ignore the small shortcomings and just see it as a portable busking bass amp. Anything else is a bonus.

I did not play very loud, but we are now thinking about getting some Roland MicroCubes for the guitarists, so that they can use their electrics and sound a litttle more like "us". That will also allow us to sound a *tiny* bit louder than with acoustics, so my amp will have to work harder but it wll be ok, I am sure. I just don't know how long the battery will last but I will find out pretty soon!
We don't want to be loud 'though... busking in many places in Edinburgh seems ok as long as you keep the volume down. The minute you become loud the problems start and we don't want to go there.

From my experience with the Crate TX15,,, the QTX QR10PA is a much better sounding solution, and not much more expensive. The built-in MP3 player and radio could be cool too in other situations: a colleague at work who goes fishing a lot saw it and thought it would be perfect for their trips.
[/quote]

Thanks, mcnach for this suggestion - I went out and got myself a QR10PA for busking, and busked at the weekend with two guitarists with smallish (20W?) guitar amps. They needed power, but my QR10PA gave me a nice, middly tone (not a trouser flapper, but that's OK!) and lasted the full two hours with no issue. A great solution!

[mcnach]

[quote name='Rainbass' timestamp='1378754544' post='2204328'] Thanks, mcnach for this suggestion - I went out and got myself a QR10PA for busking, and busked at the weekend with two guitarists with smallish (20W?) guitar amps. They needed power, but my QR10PA gave me a nice, middly tone (not a trouser flapper, but that's OK!) and lasted the full two hours with no issue. A great solution! [/quote]

Glad that you found that useful too!
It's a pretty cool little box, eh?

I am using a Zoom MS60-B with it now, for EQ... but I suppose one could use the amp simulations in that pedal (or similar) to find a better bass tone. Either way, using an external EQ pedal (or on-board EQ in your bass) helps a lot. When I used it with the Precision it worked but it was not that inspiring.

[kristo]

Has anyone tried one of these with an acoustic bass? Looking to pick up something for busking now. :-)

[Happy Jack]

[URL=http://s1128.photobucket.com/user/h4ppyjack/media/Just%20Stuff/Music%20and%20Musicians/tn6L7qS_zps2d5ddf7b.png.html][IMG]http://i1128.photobucket.com/albums/m496/h4ppyjack/Just%20Stuff/Music%20and%20Musicians/tn6L7qS_zps2d5ddf7b.png[/IMG][/URL]

[mcnach]

On 16/07/2013 at 23:26, mcnach said:

It went great!

We played for just over an hour, maybe an hour and 15min. We just wanted to get together and organise ourselves a little. We set ourselves at a crosspath in the park and it was not very busy... but we still got a small crowd and somehow made £47. We will definitely repeat when there's actually some people
But back to the amplifier...
It sounds good, and it is definitely loud enough without distorting. We had 3 acoustic guitars and voices, unamplified, plus trumpet and saxophone, and the drumer brought a cajon. It would be really easy for me to overpower all other instruments with bass, and sound good.
At £148... I think it's perfect. Really happy with it so far.

It comes with a wireless microphone, the kind that you wear around your neck and has a stem with a "lollipop" that stands in front of your mouth. I don't think it sounds very good... but it may be useful to reinforce the cajon, perhaps. Tomorrow we are trying again. This wireless has a separate volume... but the two jack inputs work from the same master volume, which is a pity, as you cannot plug two things at once and control their volumes independently... But I'm happy to ignore the small shortcomings and just see it as a portable busking bass amp. Anything else is a bonus.

I did not play very loud, but we are now thinking about getting some Roland MicroCubes for the guitarists, so that they can use their electrics and sound a litttle more like "us". That will also allow us to sound a *tiny* bit louder than with acoustics, so my amp will have to work harder but it wll be ok, I am sure. I just don't know how long the battery will last but I will find out pretty soon!
We don't want to be loud 'though... busking in many places in Edinburgh seems ok as long as you keep the volume down. The minute you become loud the problems start and we don't want to go there.

From my experience with the Crate TX15,,, the QTX QR10PA is a much better sounding solution, and not much more expensive. The built-in MP3 player and radio could be cool too in other situations: a colleague at work who goes fishing a lot saw it and thought it would be perfect for their trips.

 

still happy with it!