Category: Bass

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Bass

Just How Heavy Can a U-Bass Get?

I've had this cool Kala U-Bass for a few years. (I did a video on it back when I got it.) I've used it on a few things, especially when I want a sort of Latin-flavored Ampeg Baby Bass sound. (That solidbody upright from the 1960s is largely forgotten, except in Latin dance bands, where it's considered the classic bass.)

But I've recently started rehearsing with a new band featuring my pals Jane Wiedlin, Pietro Straccia, and Dawn Richardson. And for perversity's sake, I decided to try using this little uke bass as the sole bass in band. (And Dawn hits those drums pretty hard!)

The above video demos some sounds I concocted using Fractal's AX8, the "light" pedalboard version of Axe-FX II, the company's flagship amp/effect modeler. I'm quite encouraged by the results! AX8 has no power amp, so I've been plugging into one or both of the Fishman LoudBoxes I use for my solo looping gigs. And if we play somewhere with good monitoring, I can just bring the uke bass and a small shoulder bag. Total lazy old guy gig!

The sonic missions were pretty simple: Amp up the lows. Nix as much of the ugly piezo pickup quack as possible. Concoct enough patches to make a nice, interesting palette for a set. There's still more to do, especially in terms of modifying my technique for the instrument. I'm still not quite comfy to the super-short scale. Also, I'm too accustomed to resting my picking hand on the body or bridge, and the piezo loves to amplify those thumping and scraping sounds.

But overall, I'm encouraged. Plus it's just sick fun. :)

Categories
Bass Digital Effects guitar Recording

Logic X is Here!

Nnnggg...pedals.
Nnnggg…pedals.

Apple released the long-awaited Logic X a few minutes ago. And it’s dripping with cool new guitar and bass stuff: a fabulous bass amp modeler. Lots of new virtual stompboxes. Vast new libraries of guitar tones, and newer, smarter ways of accessing them. More product info here.

FYI, I’m the furthest thing from an unbiased source: Apple is one of my clients, and I was a major indie developer for this product. But hey — the guitar features here are seriously bitchin’.

More details and examples in the coming days!

Categories
Acoustic Amps Bass Digital DIY Effects Gigs guitar Music Pickups Recording Technique

Tonefiend Book Week is Coming!

Tonefiend Book Week 2013

Next week at tonefiend we’ll be talking about our favorite guitar/music books. I’ll write about some of the titles I find especially useful, inspiring, or entertaining, and I hope you’ll chime in with some of your recommended reading.

Since there’s so much potential material here, I suggest we focus on a different book category each day. Here’s my proposed schedule:

Tonefiend Book Week is strictly an experiment, and a selfish one at that. If the past is any guide, the obsessive geeks experienced and sophisticated players who frequent this site will introduce us to lots of lively lutherie-linked literature. And I’ll do my best to keep up!

So scour your bookshelves, real and virtual. This shit is about to get real promises to be a most edifying conversation.

Categories
Acoustic Amps Bass Effects guitar Recording Uncategorized

The View from Here

IMG_6230

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you may have noticed a recurring pattern: I attend some interesting event and promise to report on it, only to get subverted by work, crowds, jabbering with old acquaintances, and jetlag. True to form, I’ve spend the first two days either demoing TriplePlay, or staggering to the coffee bar. Yesterday I spent hours staring at these Guitar Grip guitar hangers, which are mounted on the wall right next to the spot where I’m playing. They remind me of the human-hand candelabras from Jean Cocteau’s La belle et la bête.

It’s been fun playing for so many hours, though I’m still not very good at the MIDI guitar/drums thing. I was having a fairly disastrous moment when John McLaughlin came by. Isn’t that always how it is? You’re having an off day, and then you look up and see that frickin’ McLaughlin. Is it just me, or does everyone hate that? :shake:

This is my first time here, but the old hands tell me that the show is relatively dead, and that a lot of manufacturers have either already given up on Messe, or are planning to next year. We’ll see what transpires tomorrow afternoon and Saturday, when the show opens to the public. (So far, it’s industry-only.) And I really will try to scope out some gear!

IMG_6239
Stay classy, Marshall!
Now we're talking — refrigerators!
Now we’re talking — refrigerators!
Categories
Amps Bass Digital Effects guitar Pickups Recording Uncategorized

Grüße aus Musikmesse

It's wet. Will it be wild?
It’s wet. Will it be wild?

Howdy from Frankfurt, where I arrived this afternoon to attend Musikmesse. United Airlines was its usual scuzzy self, though a nice flight attendant found a place for me to stow my guitar. And my pedalboard seems to have arrived in fine shape, even though I had to checked it in its soft but reassuringly padded Mono case.

I’m here as a demo artist for Fishman’s TriplePlay, but I should have some downtime to poke around and look for cool stuff. I’ll keep you posted!

This event is gigantic — more than twice the size of NAMM. And even on a setup day like today, you can tell how loud it’s going to be, especially since they don’t enforce volume restrictions is stringently as they do in Anaheim. (I’m told it’s like Saturday afternoon at Guitar Center, squared.) And my demo area just opposite the big, loud Gibson stage. It’ll be an adventure! 🙂

Any of you guys ever been? Got any advice to share?

Categories
Bass guitar Technique

Playing with Pain

ouch

I’m lucky — I’ve never suffered from any playing-related pain. (I mean, other than expected stuff, like spurting blood all over a guitar when you bash it a little too hard, or picking up a soldering iron by the wrong end.) But I’ve been blissfully untouched by carpal tunnel syndrome, numbness, arthritis, etc.

Until recently.

A few months ago, my left thumb joint started aching. It didn’t directly affect my playing — all those clams in my videos happened on their own! But it scared the crap out of me.

My doctor suggested it might be non-degenerative arthritis.

“Arthritis?” I squawked. “But I’m only . . . oh, yeah, probably arthritis.”

Which it may well be. But it also occurred to me that I had been indulging in a new behavior for the last year or two, and wondered whether it might be contributing to the problem. See, I’m almost as addicted to my iPad as I am to flatwound strings. I’ve embraced the post-paper lifestyle, and I use the iPad for most of my reading and much of my correspondence. I keep it on my workbench while I solder, use it as a remote in the studio, watch movies while working out, and most important, use it to read comic books in the bathtub. I usually support it with my left hand, with the modest but constant 1.44 lb. weight centered right where I was hurting. I migrated to a .68 lb. iPad Mini a few months ago. Lo and behold, the pain has receded — for now, anyway.

That's got to hurt!
That’s got to hurt!

But it makes me realize how much I take for granted the simple act of pain-free playing. Then I think of all the players who have either been derailed by playing-related pain, or who persevere despite it. And that’s not even taking into account injury-related pain. (Hello, Django!)

So has guitar playing ever become a pain for you? (No, working with singers doesn’t count.) Were you able to overcome it by modifying your technique, or through therapy? Any words of wisdom to share?

Categories
Acoustic Amps Bass Digital DIY Effects guitar Recording

NAMM I Am

It's that time again, folks.
It's that time again, folks.
It’s that time again, folks.

“It’s the most won-der-ful time of the year…”

Oh wait — that was last month. Now it’s January. NAMM time!

I’ll be there for the duration, partly to hang out with my Pure Guitar pals, and partly to meet with Fishman about the upcoming TriplePlay release. But mostly to gawp at the weird shit admire the musical instrument industry’s latest offerings. :oogle:

I’ll be posting my findings here, and also doing a little write-up for my friends at Create Digital Music, one of my fave musician sites.

Actually, I have this perverse fantasy of spending an entire show in Hall E: the Anaheim Convention Center’s low-rent basement/dungeon, a dark, inhospitable region where Fender and Gibson fear to tread. That’s where the industry leaders of tomorrow rub elbows with mad scientists and perennial laughingstocks (AKA “my peeps”).

Any of you guys going? And if not, anything special you’re curious about?

Categories
Bass guitar Music

Resolutions, Anyone?

Resolutions 2013

I tend to regard the New Year’s resolution like New Year’s drinking: not necessarily a bad tradition, but one I feel no guilt about ignoring most years.

But since I have some specific musical goals in 2013, I figured I’d share ’em — and open the floor to anyone who feels inspired to disclose his or her sonic goals for the coming year. Please post your personal promises to comments!

Here’s my short list:

Continue reading “Resolutions, Anyone?”
Categories
Bass Effects Gigs guitar Recording

The Effect-Order Follies

This effect order ALWAYS works great!

Weird, isn’t it? You can explain the rules of thumb for ordering your guitar effects in about ten seconds, but you can still get stumped after years of experimentation.

You probably know the conventional effect-order advice, which goes something like this (in order of appearance):

  1. Distortion effects (fuzzes, distortion, overdrives)
  2. Modulation effects (phasers, flangers, vibratos, tremolos)
  3. Delay effects (digital or analog delays)
  4. Reverbs (analog or digital)

And that’s good advice, as far is it goes. But you don’t have to dig very deep before encountering alternatives, exceptions, and arrangements that make no sense whatsoever, but still sound great.

How, for example, do you deal with the following?

Continue reading “The Effect-Order Follies”
Categories
Acoustic Amps Bass Digital DIY Effects Gigs guitar Music Pickups Recording Technique

Who Dares Predict Our Fretboard Future?

We care about the future, because that's where we will be spending the rest of our lived.
“We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives.” — Criswell, Plan 9 from Outer Space

UPDATE: Wow, I can’t believe all the cool stuff folks have been posting to comments. I find myself feeling quite inspired about the future of instrument — when I’m not laughing so hard I spit coffee all over my laptop. Thanks for all great ideas. Keep ’em coming! 🙂 :thumbup:

Prophecy is for suckers. Who’s stupid enough to go on record with bold prognostications about the future of music and music-making, given the near-certainty that the words will reappear someday to bite you on the ass?

Well, me. And, I hope, you.

So I invite my fellow foolhardy loudmouths to join me in sharing their half-assed guesses wise and well-informed predictions about our brave new fretboard future.

The author of the most compelling prediction wins one of my hand-built stompboxes. So does the author of the one that makes me laugh hardest.

Post your predictions to comments. I’ll go first. 🙂