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Mxr bass synth sb301

#161
Well, after ordering it in early August, my MXR finally showed up last night...just as I was leaving the house to go to the gig that I had hoped to be able to use it for!
My trusty Korg G5 worked perfectly for the show, so not a real loss. But I'm hoping the MXR can replace the G5 plus two other pedals that I had to drag along for this band's repertoire.
We shall see.
 
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#162
Bob_Ross said:
Well, after ordering it in early August, my MXR finally showed up last night...just as I was leaving the house to go to the gig that I had hoped to be able to use it for!
My trusty Korg G5 worked perfectly for the show, so not a real loss. But I'm hoping the MXR can replace the G5 plus two other pedals that I had to drag along for this band's repertoire.
We shall see.
Click to expand...
You will love it. It is like an instrument, it will take some time to get accustomed to it. I highly recommend getting the MXR non-latching switch to simplify changing presets. Have fun.
 
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#164
rcmbass said:
I highly recommend getting the MXR non-latching switch to simplify changing presets. Have fun.
Click to expand...
I also highly recommend getting a simple tap/switch pedal to cycle back and forth through the presets much more easily. Doesn’t have to be the MXR tap pedal, there are lots of options out there. I got mine from Saturnworks.
 
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#165
rcmbass said:
You will love it. It is like an instrument, it will take some time to get accustomed to it. I highly recommend getting the MXR non-latching switch to simplify changing presets. Have fun.
Click to expand...
I’m searching… Are you using this with the synth pedal?

1764426929999.png
 
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#168
for anyone who might be interested, I had one of these laying around and tried it out today with my recently acquired SB301 and it works great for cycling through patches. you have to make sure to set the polarity properly, when it’s set the “wrong” way it just constantly scrolls through the patches. so if you have a keyboard sustain pedal around give it a try before you spend money on a footswitch.
 
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#169
fretless714 said:
for anyone who might be interested, I had one of these laying around and tried it out today with my recently acquired SB301 and it works great for cycling through patches. you have to make sure to set the polarity properly, when it’s set the “wrong” way it just constantly scrolls through the patches. so if you have a keyboard sustain pedal around give it a try before you spend money on a footswitch.
Click to expand...
Already ordered the Tap, it’s small, metal and will mount next to the MXR synth right on my pedal board with minimal space. 👍
 
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#171
Bob_Ross said:
So what can an MXR Tap do with the MB301 when it is in non-latching mode?
I.e., what else can it be used for besides cycling through presets?
Thanks.
Click to expand...
The MXR TapTempo is non-latching/momentary only. It cycles thru the presets of the MXR Bass Synth one after another.

It does have internal dip switches to change the polarity.
 
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#172
Bob_Ross said:
So what can an MXR Tap do with the MB301 when it is in non-latching mode?
I.e., what else can it be used for besides cycling through presets?
Thanks.
Click to expand...
The MXR Tap only cycles through presets with the MXR Bass Synth, and doesn’t do anything else with specifically the MXR Bass Synth.

rcmbass said:
It cycles thru the presets of the MXR Bass Synth one after another.
Click to expand...
It can also cycle through the presets one before another. If you hold it down for 1-2 seconds it cycles backwards through the presets, which is actually pretty handy with the 9 presets to cycle through.


FWIW tap pedals are stupid simple to build if you are interested. I’m not, but I got a momentary switch/normally open tap pedal from Saturnworks for $24. There’s a 20% holiday promo code on their website right now. That Saturnworks tap pedal works perfectly with my MXR Bass Synth, and looks way cooler on my board than the MXR Tap would. Plus their customer service was beyond excellent when I wanted to adjust my order after it was placed.
 
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#173
SLO Surfer said:
The MXR Tap only cycles through presets with the MXR Bass Synth, and doesn’t do anything else with specifically the MXR Bass Synth.


It can also cycle through the presets one before another. If you hold it down for 1-2 seconds it cycles backwards through the presets, which is actually pretty handy with the 9 presets to cycle through.


FWIW tap pedals are stupid simple to build if you are interested. I’m not, but I got a momentary switch/normally open tap pedal from Saturnworks for $24. There’s a 20% holiday promo code on their website right now. That Saturnworks tap pedal works perfectly with my MXR Bass Synth, and looks way cooler on my board than the MXR Tap would. Plus their customer service was beyond excellent when I wanted to adjust my order after it was placed.
Click to expand...
You are right, way cooler! I have two other switches from Saturnworks. They are awesome. They allowed me to change my order at the last minute as well. I high recommend them.
 
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#176
Matt Dean said:
Ordered at the beginning of July, Arrived this past Friday. Diminutive little bugger. And I would say from my initial run-through, it is all that! I watched the IMA video (it's all that too) which provided a good orientation. Now I need to start integrating it into my band.

View attachment 7379448
Click to expand...
Is that a Fair Circuity pedal? If so, which one?
 
#178
rcmbass said:
Is that a Fair Circuity pedal? If so, which one?
Click to expand...
sunbeast said:
The bare pedal appears to be a Sanford and Sonny Bluebeard fuzz (a Big Muff variant made by a bassist and loved by bassists, but I think long-discontinued now). There are rumors that it is a GGG kit Muff circuit with maybe some slight mods, I can't verify.
Click to expand...
@sunbeast is correct: that's a Sanford & Sonny Bluebeard, a modified take on the 1973 Ram's Head variant of the Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi. The Bluebeard is the best-sounding Muff I've heard on bass guitar. Leaves room in the midrange for the electric guitars to cut through while filling out the mix around them, with a treble that's not overly buzzy. I prefer to bypass the tone circuit. I think this is how the Bluebeard sounds best.

I believe the connection with General Guitar Gadgets is that some of the early Bluebeards (before introduction of the tone-bypass toggleswitch) were built by JD Sleep, GGG's owner, and thus a version of the Bluebeard's schematic was (is?) available on GGG's website. JohnK's website states that "After carefully studying the original, I found that the one posted on the GGG web schematic is actually NOT 100% correct. The Bluebeard was based on a 1973 Ram's head muff with a few modifications that are not included in the GGG schematic, including the later versions with the tone bypass switch."
 
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#179
Zzounds fufilled my months-long backorder over the weekend; pedal should arrive tomorrow.

Question -- I plan on running this thru my Sonicake Matribox Pro II effects loop - any experiences on running the pedal just solo vs part of a chain with amp/cab/etc? I plan to experiment either way, but figured I'd ask.
 
#180
Erithon said:
@sunbeast is correct: that's a Sanford & Sonny Bluebeard, a modified take on the 1973 Ram's Head variant of the Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi. The Bluebeard is the best-sounding Muff I've heard on bass guitar. Leaves room in the midrange for the electric guitars to cut through while filling out the mix around them, with a treble that's not overly buzzy. I prefer to bypass the tone circuit. I think this is how the Bluebeard sounds best.

I believe the connection with General Guitar Gadgets is that some of the early Bluebeards (before introduction of the tone-bypass toggleswitch) were built by JD Sleep, GGG's owner, and thus a version of the Bluebeard's schematic was (is?) available on GGG's website. JohnK's website states that "After carefully studying the original, I found that the one posted on the GGG web schematic is actually NOT 100% correct. The Bluebeard was based on a 1973 Ram's head muff with a few modifications that are not included in the GGG schematic, including the later versions with the tone bypass switch."
Click to expand...

Final thread-derail post!
I've read a bunch of somewhat conflicting info on the Bluebeard/GGG situation. Sad that JohnK decided to capitalize rather than democratize based on his tracings/comparisons, but previous digging into the differences have shown little tone-related differences between the two circuits from those who supposedly traced the Bluebeard version and compared. The only verified differences being some power filtering additions and a resistor to the LED on the Bluebeard not present in the GGG-tuned Muff. Its kinda annoying the mystique around these simple circuits, I never got the impression that Sonny was the kind of guy who was trying to make bank on the design to begin with though I wish he'd have just OK'd GGG to sell the design as a Bluebeard if he isn't going to have anyone make them for him anymore.

Edit: found some posts from @Feral Feline at PedalPCB forum compiling much of this info including sources: Sandford and Sonny BlueBeard Fuzz schematic?

I built a GGG Muff long ago (sometime soon after he first offered them) and I wasn’t super impressed by it, though nearly my whole rig has morphed since then so who knows what I might think today. I ended up modding it into a Russian Muff variant that I much preferred then replaced that shortly after with a Wren and Cuff Tall Font after a few more “doomy” Muff variants that I didn’t gel with. It’s all personal taste of course, but the TFR has gotten me what I want from a Muff enough that I've only briefly flirted with other Muffs over the last dozen+ or so years that never stuck for long. I’ve never personally liked a Muff with tone-bypass that I’ve tried as I’m more into the lower-gain thick (moderately scooped with Filter cranked up) Muff tones that the Russian variants tend to do well and for me the tone filtering of a good Muff is where the magic lies, again all subjective. I have a bunch of pedals not getting used, maybe I’ll try to trade into a few new fuzzy things to experiment with to get through the winter.
 
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