Righteous tone

[alexclaber]

One of those pre-Peavey Trace Elliott 500W heads (the smaller sister to the triamp thing from about 1999), a Mesa/Boogie 1516, DI'd to the oversized FOH in the Prince Albert in Brighton, played by a young chap who'd only switched from guitar 6 months ago, with a fairly cheap 4-string P/J thing. Not his rig, don't think he'd touched any of the settings on it, yet the resulting sound was the closest I've ever heard to one of the overdriven but not fullbore distortion sounds Tim Commerford got on RATM - Evil Empire.

Said bassist was frankly flabbergasted when I told him this - am guessing the stage sound wasn't as perfect but out in the room it was one of those - "that is IT" moments. Good playing too.

Alex

[steve-soar]

Pedals? Pick or fingers?

[alexclaber]

Fingers, no pedals. And I swear the all the settings, bar possibly the volume and gain, were left exactly the same as the owner had them. The valve drive section was switched in, and by the sound of it there was some compression going on. As you can imagine I have quite high standards when it comes to tone so it takes a lot to impress me!

I didn't like to tell him it's probably the best tone he'll ever get in his entire gigging life and that it'll all be downhill from here...

Alex

[MythSte]

I do love it when you see someone who just gets it right, even better when theres evidence to suggest they didnt mean too! I remember one guy playing a Yamaha RBX or something with a pick into the house SVT-3pro and it had such a perfect grindy rock tone. Couldnt recreate it if i tried. i remember going up and fiddling with every knob possible and getting no-where near it, ah well!

[SisterAbdullahX]

[quote name='alexclaber' post='627575' date='Oct 16 2009, 09:12 AM']One of those pre-Peavey Trace Elliott 500W heads (the smaller sister to the triamp thing from about 1999), a Mesa/Boogie 1516, DI'd to the oversized FOH in the Prince Albert in Brighton, played by a young chap who'd only switched from guitar 6 months ago, with a fairly cheap 4-string P/J thing. Not his rig, don't think he'd touched any of the settings on it, yet the resulting sound was the closest I've ever heard to one of the overdriven but not fullbore distortion sounds Tim Commerford got on RATM - Evil Empire.

Said bassist was frankly flabbergasted when I told him this - am guessing the stage sound wasn't as perfect but out in the room it was one of those - "that is IT" moments. Good playing too.

Alex[/quote]


Last time I was back up in Newcastle I heard the sound of a bass playing busker, probably 50 yards or so away, playing solos and grooves with no accompaniment. He sounded so good that I was actually scared to go and investigate closer in case it was a 16 year old kid, and I'd have to give up and sell all my gear in disgust at my own ability. His sound was just as a bass should sound for me, thick, not a hint of clackiness, but defined all through the register, almost Jaco-esque. On the way back to the car I walked past said busker, packing his gear up and counting his money, he was a black guy playing what looked like an old Ibanez or something, through a little no-name amp on a trolley! I know people pay silly money on basses and amplification to reach their idea of "tone", this guy looked like he'd spent about 200 quid on bass and amp and sounded just incredible!

Anyone know who he is?