hmmm.... so i've read allot more just now and the cabs seem great.
However I can't see the point in them in a band context?
Sure if you're pulling off solo work then i'd guess they're amazing.
In a band context you might as well not have a rig and dial straight into the PA with a monitor stack in ear shot and spend the cash on an awesome amp/bass?
I suppose in smaller gigs where you just have a PA for vocals then it makes sense or if you just want to make your own cab (which I imagine is a good enough reason in itself).
I'm not sure if this is a fad that'll blow over or not yet personally...
The band context is
the whole point of their design. Very few players are using only IEM's. Using a bass rig as an onstage monitor for bass is typical for about 95% of the working players out there. The problem with most cabs is off axis response. Most cabs can be dialed in to sound great,
but only if you stand right in front of them. Even then they may only sound great until you need them to really put out some serious volume if needed.
So let's say your rig does sound great
to you onstage. what about everyone else? What about your fellow bandmates? How well do they hear you? What about the audience? And it's pure nonsense if one thinks that stage sound doesn't bleed into the room and conflict with the FOH sound. How many bands play in a soundproof room onstage?
A lot of rigs sound great to the player only and can sound like crap to everyone else. At higher volume gigs, those same great sounding rigs can be a major pain to the soundman who is trying to get the bass to sound better than the mud that is emanating from the stage. And at best, even if the bass rig sounds great out front, from the stage, most of the time it sounds that way in only certain parts of the room.
fEARfuls were designed to make bass sound great anywhere onstage or the room. Best off-axis response. Deep clear lows, mids with clarity and the ability to remain that way even at high volume.
Just like when the dinosaurs ruled the earth and all there was, was the giant SVT fridge, and then along came 410's and 210's, and of late the lightweight heads, it's definitely not a fad. It is a paradigm shift in how bass is amplified. It's about bass players tossing out the old notion that "
Nobody but bass players care how bass sounds". They do care and fEARfuls are in response to that. It's about bass players dropping the selfish attitude that "
It sounds good to me and that's good enough". It's about getting your sound out to everyone in the clearest way possible. It's about taking a professional attitude in the way high quality sound system engineers have been caring about for eons and finally applying it to bass. Two or three way systems have been around for a long time. NOT with these drivers, crossover and this design they haven't.
