Guitar Nerds Anonymous

Ever hear of the mythical Brisbane Mosrite stash?

He keeps it in his workshop! There are Mosrites all along the walls of the shop as well, you should check out his blog he's a really cool guy...

Matey's just ordered me that Space Echo and I've also found a sweet deal on a PP2+ on Gumtree down in Sydney, less than £100... Shouldn't really be buying all this stuff right now but hey-ho... :D

AU$79 for a Pedaltrain PT-1 clone, you can't really argue with that... That's less than £40!

Copped!

Although this is Guitar Nerds... Are there any opinions on the Orange Bass Terror about? I'd like something with a tube preamp, as my TC Electronic amp sounds a little cold and neutral for my tastes...

TC Flashback looks spot on actually, having the loop function as well would be good.

My replacement was playing one of those last time I saw my old band, through one of those isobaric 2x12 cabs and it sounded great. I don't know how hard he was running it to keep the volume up with the rest of the backline though.

@Murphys_Law Yep. I've got one, done a zillion gigs with it. It is bonkers loud (unlike all the other 500W switchmode heads, it can put out all its power into 8 ohms as well as 4 ohms). Sound is warm and thumpy, distortion is nice (you can tame the gain by swapping one 12AX7 for a 12AT7). Fan's a bit noisy for home. The tone stack is very limited, though understanding it helps ('flat' setting is bass full off, mids full on, treble halfway). Basically it's a one-sound amp but a very loveable one. Also, just discontinued, so there are deals around.

I tried a TC450 at a show and found it a bit too compressed and synthetic-y for my tastes. The other probable contenders for something warmer and less neutral would be the Ampeg PF500, the Aguilar TH500 (bit upper-middy and slappy for me) or the not-quite-out-yet Tech 21 VT500 (keen to try one of those).

Thanks all. I usually run my amp completely flat and use as much tone from the instrument itself as possible. Gotta see how it works out with the Orange of course. I'd just like some slight distortion and character... something the TC amp lacks.

Bonkers loud is good. I run the small TC 250W thing into a 4 ohms box and never had any issues not being loud enough. I like digital power amps.

Edit: @rickster Do you use the DI out at all? The gigs I'm playing pretty much all require a DI onboard. Post EQ and Post Loop would probably be best..

Pretty sure the DI out is post-both. Early models only (I think) have a scarily hot DI signal... I carry a -30dB inline attenuator in case the desk doesn't have enough pad. Never had any trouble, sounds good.

Big review here with all the spec, flat settings, bench test etc... http://epublish.panaprint.com/publication/?i=76122

Wonderful. Sounds like exactly what I need want.
Thanks for the link. #rep

Pedal board arrived and it's great, I'm sure it isn't as refined as a PedalTrain but I'd rather pay ~£40 than £200 for one TBH... Not really a problem for me...

Also quite tempted to buy a Chibson Les Paul for this tribute band, £150-£200 isn't a great deal of cash... I know I'll have to spend a bit more to get it sounding and playing right but what do you think? Controversial, I know... *semi trolling*

Once you've spent the money on pickups, electrics and set up, you'll still have a slightly poorly put together guitar with shit tuning pegs. Won't that end up being the same price as a s/h GLP anyway?

I've read a lot of opinions where people rate certain cheapo guitars equal or above Epiphone/cheaper Gibsons. From what I've had in my hands, these people have no ears and no eyes or have never actually played or seen the guitar they are comparing the chibson to.

Btw your tele is amazeballs

True, true... I know it's crazy but it sounds like a fun project... There's a guy selling cheap guitars at the Sunday market here who does jobs for sweet FA, he's an old Manc so we're already into footie banter... That's exactly the kind of person I'd take it to to change bits and pieces on it... Pie in the sky tho', still got a power supply and speaker cab to buy...

I hope the Tele comes back sounding as good as I remember...

Rick, you mentioned playing bass through a guitar amp the other day. Care to elaborate? I had an idea about putting a s/h peavey Classic 30 through a 1x15 closed back bass cab to amake a bargain basemant B15-esque all valve bass amp for recording. Is this mental?

.dble pst

I use a Dave Hall Amps tube pre-amp/DI thing for warming up my tone before going through not particularly inspiring amps; it really does the trick for me & is a much cheaper option than buying a whole new amp.

Though now I'm the only person in my band using an old solid state amp I do kind of want to splash out on a monster full-valve head. It's a slippery slope.

That is a rather interesting option and may well be what I'm looking for. Will investigate, thanks!
I'd like to break up my sound from the very, very clean and neutral sound I'm running at the moment to something a little more gritty. Maybe a preamp will do the trick.

I actually own a Peavey TB Raxx preamp (2x 12ax7 I think) but I never quite got on with the sound, as it's very mid-ish and honky.

On further investigation:
These DHA look a little DIY. I wouldn't mind some soldering myself, do you per chance know if there's any DIY tube preamp kit around?

Great thing about recording is you don't need huge volume unless you're capturing the sound of the space you're recording in as well, so you could just mic up the combo as is without going to a 1x15. Start with the volume right down and bring it up to where the bass starts to break up and then just roll it back a bit. With a decent mic and preamp you could probably get the bass response you want by messing about with the proximity effect if you find the amp lacking at the bottom end. Split the signal before the amp and mix the direct sound and the mic sound to what you want.

They do look a little DIY yes - I think you're dealing with Dave Hall himself when you email so I wouldn't be surprised if it's a man-in-shed type operation. They sound very good though; the EQ has treble, bass & sweep-able mids so there's a decent range of sounds.

I've seen quite a few guitar amp DIY kits around but bass amp/pre-amp kits seem quite thin on the ground (and the amp kits get very expensive for decent power). I doubt it would be too difficult to adapt a guitar one for bass but you'd need to understand what you're swapping out.

I've read a lot of opinions where people rate certain cheapo guitars equal or above Epiphone/cheaper Gibsons. From what I've had in my hands, these people have no ears and no eyes or have never actually played or seen the guitar they are comparing the chibson to.

This is so true. The bass player in my band used to swear by Tokai Les Paul copies, and a couple of his were my back-up guitar if my LP BFG broke a string in a gig. But no matter whether Japanese original or Chinese reissue, they couldn't hold a candle to the real thing in terms of playability and sound.

True. I wouldn't want to put bass through a guitar speaker at any volume really. Especially not an open backed cab. This plan is also scuppered by the fact I don't own a classic 30. I used to years ago. I loved the sound of my Starfire bass through it until I blew the speaker. I just thought that it was a good example of a cheap and cheerful, moderately powered valve amp one could pick up second hand. Just a thought like.

Fair enough, I've only ever fried one speaker and that was with an analogue synth and too much resonance.
Do you already have the 1x15? A smaller speaker could have a better freq response at the lower power. Maybe a 1x12 or a 2x10 with just one speaker hooked up?

Nope. It's an entirely theoretical exercise. I'm after a fundamentally retro bass sound. I have plugins aplenty but just have a vague hankering for a better bass sound on my home recordings.

Tbh it' snot really on my priority list. Was just idly wondering how it would sound.

Can't wait to get my Sigma back fom Chandlers. Been playing the little Guild a lot in the meantime. Trying to get back into fingerpicking after letting it slip of late. Figured out an arrangement of "The Art Teacher" by Rufus Wainwright yesterday. No thanks to the internet which is stupid.