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Last night's backline.......not impressed.......

#24
DWBass said:
I had the gain at noon, master volume at noon, bass at 2 o'clock, treble at 2 o'clock, both mids at noon (I never boost mids...). I could hear the bass well enough to get through the gig but it was just lacking that booty on stage and anything below low E basically was almost non existent. The venue had all the mains flown above the stage and had subs underneath the stage. Again, it may be the stage but I usually experience the opposite. Usually a lot of boom and I have to dial it back. Dunno.........just weird.

On another note, this place was run exceptionally well. We were greeted by the manager and given the rundown. They had a 'green room' prepared for us with a menu. We chose what we wanted to eat. They brought it to us. There were snacks, water, soda, energy drinks. Crowd was kinda subdued though but applauded nicely after each tune. Toward the end we had a few of them up and dancing. Nice standing applause when we finished up. BL took pics with patrons. We all packed up and headed home. 1hr,15min drive. Not bad.
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The gain knob on the Tone Hammer is sort of like a hpf/lpf in one. Turning it up makes the amp sound more vintage. It shouldn’t have been too bad at noon, but if your bass is fairly hot, that’ll cut out a decent amount of lows. If a really clear modern like sound is what you were looking for you should set the gain to 0. That being said the sound is not for everyone. I prefer the AG over the tonehammer.
 
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#25
DWBass said:
Ok, had a gig, last night, at a well known venue in Richmond, VA. This was my backline.
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I though Aguilar was supposed to be the bees knees! Nope. This rig had zero booty and something was buzzing. Couldn't tell if it was a speaker or cab bracing. I had to ask the soundman to add my bass in my monitor. Could barely hear anything below low E. SMH. I had my rig in the car but they wouldn't let me use it. Could have been the stage. Soundman mentioned a lot of bass players complain about the rig.
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Clearly that amp has been abused if it was buzzy, lacking volume and always gets complaints.
 
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#26
That's a shame. Possibly a bum cab or connection? I would have loved to tried that Aguilar rig though.

I was a bit nervous at my gig last night. This was my backline amp:

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Sound guy...who was incredible btw...had it mic'd by casually running an SM48 through the top handle and resting it against the speaker grill right at the middle of the speaker cone. I plugged my LB-100 right into the normal channel, dropped the gain, tweaked the stacked EQ a bit...got TONS of compliments on my sound. I guess sometimes you get lucky, other times you don't.
 
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#27
I bought a TH500 for a backup and since i was playing a lot at the time, i put it on top of my main amp and would switch ams between sets so i could figure out how to set it without having to diddle with it forever if i had to use it for a while. No matter how hard i tried i could never get it to sound right, my band mates even noticed and mentioned they liked the other amp better (BX500). No expert so the only way i can describe the difference was the TH sounded thin, anemic, lacking in the balls department. It was not a terrible sound but it was not what I wanted/needed so i let it go.
 
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#31
SLO Surfer said:
as mentioned above, yes, their control knobs (eq, gain, drive, and master) are not intuitive and work in relation to each other much different than other amps do. Do a little research on these amps and you’ll find most people say there’s a learning curve to get around. It honestly is a poor choice of amp head for a back line rig where many bassists will use it without being familiar with it. This is probably why it’s not working right, too many bassists have probably miss used it and damaged it. I have a TH500 and would never have my gain OR master at noon, cause that would nearly blow my cab. My master is usually around 9oclock and gain a little less than that with my 4ohm 700watt cab.

I’m guessing that rig has been abused and isn’t working right. Just setting everything at noon (not gain or master, bring those up slowly from 0) should have gotten plenty enough lows.

A lot of people recommend turning the gain to 0 and the master up high on these amps, then use the gain knob as your volume knob.
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Hmmmm....def won't ever buy one of these amps. I'm quite happy with my Markbass (and GK) amps.
 
#32

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#33
DWBass said:
Ok, had a gig, last night, at a well known venue in Richmond, VA. This was my backline.
Link Removed
I though Aguilar was supposed to be the bees knees! Nope. This rig had zero booty and something was buzzing. Couldn't tell if it was a speaker or cab bracing. I had to ask the soundman to add my bass in my monitor. Could barely hear anything below low E. SMH. I had my rig in the car but they wouldn't let me use it. Could have been the stage. Soundman mentioned a lot of bass players complain about the rig.
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Well...it is a backline rig. Probably not in great shape.
 
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#34
Maynjo said:
The gain knob on the Tone Hammer is sort of like a hpf/lpf in one. Turning it up makes the amp sound more vintage. It shouldn’t have been too bad at noon, but if your bass is fairly hot, that’ll cut out a decent amount of lows. If a really clear modern like sound is what you were looking for you should set the gain to 0. That being said the sound is not for everyone. I prefer the AG over the tonehammer.
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Now you tell me. I did notice the gain was turned down and I could still hear a signal. Habit had me set the controls like I do on my Markbass amp. I played a passive P-Bass for the first half of the show. Active Lakland 5 after that.
 
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#37
fhm555 said:
I bought a TH500 for a backup and since i was playing a lot at the time, i put it on top of my main amp and would switch amps between sets so i could figure out how to set it without having to diddle with it forever if i had to use it for a while. No matter how hard i tried i could never get it to sound right, my band mates even noticed and mentioned they liked the other amp better (BX500). No expert so the only way i can describe the difference was the TH sounded thin, anemic, lacking in the balls department. It was not a terrible sound but it was not what I wanted/needed so i let it go.
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Exactly my experience.
 
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#40
DWBass said:
Ok, had a gig, last night, at a well known venue in Richmond, VA. This was my backline.
Link Removed
I though Aguilar was supposed to be the bees knees! Nope. This rig had zero booty and something was buzzing. Couldn't tell if it was a speaker or cab bracing. I had to ask the soundman to add my bass in my monitor. Could barely hear anything below low E. SMH. I had my rig in the car but they wouldn't let me use it. Could have been the stage. Soundman mentioned a lot of bass players complain about the rig.
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Broken. Something is definitely wrong, they should replace that thing. Used 410's are dirt cheap nowadays and perfect for a standing backline that doesn't get hauled anywhere else.
 
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