Are y’all playing synth bass?

[Naigewron]

My setup, covering synth bass and also some Mellotron, B3 and ambient pads. I play synth on 4-5 songs in the set these days, either partially (switching to bass halfway through the song) or all the way through.

Synth bass provided by a Bass Station VST, which works pretty well. At the moment I'm only running free VSTs, but I'm not above paying for good ones if I need to.

The brain is a Microsoft Surface Pro 4 (basically a Windows laptop in tablet format), running Cantabile Solo to host VSTs and manage patches, MIDI routing, etc.
The controller is an iRig Keys Pro 37 (one of pretty few decent controllers with three octaves and full-size keys), and the interface is an Arturia Minifuse 1.

 

[Michedelic]

I recently broke my right shoulder and have had to put the bass down for a while.

It’s been tough as it’s my sole source of income, but to try and keep productive I’ve been playing on my Novation BassStation 2.

I’ve never gigged with it before and have a lot of pedals to cop synth tones, but I’d really like to start using it at gigs once I’m back out playing.

I was just curious how many of you play synthesizer bass and also if you have any advice what to practice for someone new to keyboard based instruments.

Also not sure where to post this; apologies if it’s in the wrong spot!

I did, some 40 years ago when new wave/synth pop had become a thing, and the technology to process bass guitar to get those sounds just wasn’t quite there yet. I had no keyboard training whatsoever. I had aquired an old Vox Continental organ earlier to noodle around on, but for this I picked up a Sequential Circuits Pro-One, a monophonic competitor to the Mini-Moog. Having had no previous experience, I had no problem playing lines with my right hand, while working pitch and vibrato controls with my left. As far as what I was playing, I just used my intuition, figuring out all the standard/classic basslines as well as being inspired/guided primarily by these two tunes…



But it eventially fell by the wayside, I moved on to a variety of other stuff musically, and effects pedals kept improving when I wanted those sounds again.

 

[bobyoung53]

I was in a band that opened for Pimps of Joytime 11 or 12 years ago. Their guy had a Hofner violin bass and a Minimoog. It was a completely unexpected combination and was really cool.

That and being a Rush fan all my life, I've thought about carrying around a small keyboard like a Little Phatty so I could double synth lines. As awesome as that would be, I bet the schlep would win out in a short time and I'd start leaving the keyboard at home. So I've not done it.

If I were going to get a synth bass it would be some kind of a Moog, probably a Minimoog, those things sound unreal.

 

[Krakmann]

Salud!

I wish you a fast and full recovery!

In one of my bands I play synths as sub, but it's "keyboard stuff", not bass parts. In other, sometimes I play keys instead of bass, but again, it's not to play bass, but synth parts.