I believe the term is 'designed in Denmark, fabricated in China' as mentioned in this article. But suspicious that the website does not disclose any information about it.
- M
Last edited:
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My Dirt Bender - Another Jounal
- Thread starter el murdoque
- Start date
- M
Someone recently posted a block diagram of the Le Bass in a thread and it looked like the Blend in Hot Fusion mode taps after the A preamp, so still blending pure A preamp with A-B series preamps. I’d guess when you have it turned all the way down you have 100% A preamp and when all the way up you have 100% A run in series with B sound. The blend shouldn’t be taking any signal from the latter when rolled down, they are two static signals being blended together (though you will hear less gain as a result of more clean blended in). It’s a pretty novel thing as far as I know and the reason that pre attracts me!
I am familiar with that use of those terms.
But on the device itself it says
Made by East Sound Research, Denmark
Designed by Holm Malmquist
So it was designed by Holm Malmquist, Made by East Sound Research and fabricated in China.
The manual clears that up nicely:
When you run hot fusion (A into B, red backlight), then the knob controls the volume of A going into B, so it's basically a pre gain or mid gain boost you can have there.
When you run cold fusion (A and B parallel, blue backlight), the knob controls the volume of A in the mix.
Agreed. As you said: "they've tried to hide the fact that the device was made in the far east and trying to make it look like it was made in Denmark". I find it somewhat problematic that they are not upfront with the information.
Ah I just realized I was thinking about the EBS Microbass 3, which also has multiple preamps and a series option- but in that one the Blend control in the series setting blends between the series and clean channel. Sorry for the misinfo! From this thread: EBS Microbass 3 Blend knob when in series.
I had never had any interest in the EBS til I read that tidbit. Now I’m more intrigued by the Le Bass (not to mention that I don’t really trust EBS QC)
I feel like this was meant to be somewhat snide/dismissive, but there is an actual market out there for that music, and the pay is not terrible from what I've seen and heard!
Well, maybe not the bass-playing-the-melodies bit specifically, but video game music re-creation is definitely living through an era, as the kids may say. So I'd say you're onto a potential winner with this fuzz lol
It's been a while since I owned the Microbass 2 and 3. I liked the 2 a lot better on paper, but the 3 sounded much better in the clean channel.
For my personal use case, the comp and the tuner were too much, I'd not use it as a standalone unit and put it on a pedal board.
On top of that, the drive channel was 'meh'.
Some more noodling around with the Le Bass.
I see some good and some that I would have liked to be different - therefore bad.
Let's start with harsh criticism.
-The volume of the Fusion channel is really hard to match with the other channels. You get useful sounds out of it, but the volume will be all over the place.
-The cab sim is really useful in channel B and in fusion, when you have drive, but it kinda muffles the output of channel A. I would have liked to choose cab sim for either channel.
-another mids control for channel A would have been nice.
Let's say something positive:
I tried the Le Bass as the only unit. I'm playing a Jam on Friday and was looking at some kind of minimal setup to bring, and since the Le Bass has everything built in. When I play the bass raw into the mixer, it sounds - like a raw bass played into the mixer. Decent DI signal, no color.
Activating channel A, and you instantly get some flavor, the bass sounds a lot more expensive.
Activating channel B can give you a very different flavor. It seems the intuitive thing to do would be to set A to a modern sound, a bit of a bathtub so you get massive, articulated lows and airy, sparkly highs and then set B to a vintage tube amp style. more mids, less sparkle, but instead of the sparkle, some hair on top. In the medium gain settings the Le Bass is very civilized and that bit of hair should sit well in many styles.
I see some good and some that I would have liked to be different - therefore bad.
Let's start with harsh criticism.
-The volume of the Fusion channel is really hard to match with the other channels. You get useful sounds out of it, but the volume will be all over the place.
-The cab sim is really useful in channel B and in fusion, when you have drive, but it kinda muffles the output of channel A. I would have liked to choose cab sim for either channel.
-another mids control for channel A would have been nice.
Let's say something positive:
I tried the Le Bass as the only unit. I'm playing a Jam on Friday and was looking at some kind of minimal setup to bring, and since the Le Bass has everything built in. When I play the bass raw into the mixer, it sounds - like a raw bass played into the mixer. Decent DI signal, no color.
Activating channel A, and you instantly get some flavor, the bass sounds a lot more expensive.
Activating channel B can give you a very different flavor. It seems the intuitive thing to do would be to set A to a modern sound, a bit of a bathtub so you get massive, articulated lows and airy, sparkly highs and then set B to a vintage tube amp style. more mids, less sparkle, but instead of the sparkle, some hair on top. In the medium gain settings the Le Bass is very civilized and that bit of hair should sit well in many styles.
Glad to hear your enjoying it!
The Clean channel is actually bassman inspired so it will add a little colour to your tone — it is still a very high-headroom pre however and a good foundation for any pedals your front-load Le Bass with. In terms of the Fusion Mode, to enter this, push the two foot-switches together, you can then select between cold fusion and hot fusion with the dedicated switch. In Hot Fusion, the Fusion Level knob determines the level of Channel A that will boost Channel B. In Cold Fusion, the Fusion Level knob determines the volume of Channel A that will be added in parallel to Channel B.
Let me know if this helps to clarify things a little!
I do like the series preamp idea, and the way it’s implemented on the Microbass 3 allows you to blend clean with the series channels which is pretty interesting. Are there any other pres that you have tried that have series operation like this besides the EBS or Le Bass?
Small report:
Yesterday, I was at a friend's bar, because he hosted a jam session.
The turnout was quite weird. The bar was packed because the last session hosted there was great, but there were hardly any musicians present.
No one touched a bass the whole night except for me, so I played a lot.
What was also quite weird (but good weird) was how the crowd reacted to everything. They were super supportive. A guy came up and asked to play one or two of his songs. He stumbled through one song, rhythm all over the place, his voice reed thin, and you could see that he was super excited and super anxious - but the crowd cheered him on and gave what support they could, and instead of chasing him off the stage, they encouraged him to go on and play another one - which gave him a feeling of security and he improved significantly.
I really liked the positive vibes there.
But let's get to the most important part of this: Was I rawdogging it again?
Don't fear. I'm not THAT brave. I bested the crowd last time, but was it due to the tone in my fingers or was it sheer luck? Better not to provoke Fortuna.
I brought pedals.
I forgot to take a pic, but my setup was this:
-Crowther Prunes & Custard, running off a 9V battery I put inside
-Two Tones Le Bass, running off its own 12V wall wart.
Somewhat rawdogging here, no comp, no pedalboard, no tuner. Pedals on the rug in front of the drum kit - but not entirely naked.
I set up the Le Bass with channel A providing a clean tone with heaps of bass and channel B with a more mid forward sound and just a touch of hair.
When the jam went towards reggae music, I used channel A and when it drifted more towards guitar driven sounds, I went over to channel B.
The P&C saw more use than I would have hoped, because it sounded quite funny and more than once, the jams took unexpected turns, where I was able to go ape-excrement and sizzle around a bit.
I was happy with the versatility I got out of that mini rig - and also quite happy with the plug and play capabilities of that setup.
Yesterday, I was at a friend's bar, because he hosted a jam session.
The turnout was quite weird. The bar was packed because the last session hosted there was great, but there were hardly any musicians present.
No one touched a bass the whole night except for me, so I played a lot.
What was also quite weird (but good weird) was how the crowd reacted to everything. They were super supportive. A guy came up and asked to play one or two of his songs. He stumbled through one song, rhythm all over the place, his voice reed thin, and you could see that he was super excited and super anxious - but the crowd cheered him on and gave what support they could, and instead of chasing him off the stage, they encouraged him to go on and play another one - which gave him a feeling of security and he improved significantly.
I really liked the positive vibes there.
But let's get to the most important part of this: Was I rawdogging it again?
Don't fear. I'm not THAT brave. I bested the crowd last time, but was it due to the tone in my fingers or was it sheer luck? Better not to provoke Fortuna.
I brought pedals.
I forgot to take a pic, but my setup was this:
-Crowther Prunes & Custard, running off a 9V battery I put inside
-Two Tones Le Bass, running off its own 12V wall wart.
Somewhat rawdogging here, no comp, no pedalboard, no tuner. Pedals on the rug in front of the drum kit - but not entirely naked.
I set up the Le Bass with channel A providing a clean tone with heaps of bass and channel B with a more mid forward sound and just a touch of hair.
When the jam went towards reggae music, I used channel A and when it drifted more towards guitar driven sounds, I went over to channel B.
The P&C saw more use than I would have hoped, because it sounded quite funny and more than once, the jams took unexpected turns, where I was able to go ape-excrement and sizzle around a bit.
I was happy with the versatility I got out of that mini rig - and also quite happy with the plug and play capabilities of that setup.
Enjoying?Glad you’re enjoying that P&C.
I honestly am contemplating the next step, which would be ripping off the Doom2 and the PX-101 off my pedalboard and replacing them with the P&C.
Super stoked to hear Le Bass working out well for you! Sounds like a killer mini rig indeed!
This arrived today:
The dual or “Badder” Bob is described on the Analog Man as a dirty clean boost. “Clean” in this context would probably be better rendered as “flat” or “transparent.” There seems to be a minimal drop in the lower end of the EQ spectrum, easily compensated for with one click of the bass control of my API LLX, which I normally run at or very close to flat. There’s also apparently a very high end roll-off, but it must be somewhere above 5K Hz, because I didn’t notice it. Other than that, it seems to pass the signal pretty well unadulterated by any EQ shenanigans. But it can get pretty dirty.
Each side of the pedal, one footswitch and one knob, is an independant Bob, volume and overdrive increasing in about equal measures as the relevant knob advances. With both sides engaged, the right Bob (yellow LED) “feeds” the left Bob (red LED) and a wide range of gainy sounds at any amplitude from nil to a lot ensues from a series of complementary adjustments. Each side is capable of a 20 dB boost, according to the Analog Man website. I’m not sure exactly what is produced when both Bobs are dimed, but it is many dBs. Having some pedal downstream that can dialled down well below unity is required to make much use of the louder settings, but with both Bobs maxed out (and the next pedal near the bottom of its range), right Bob appears not so much to be feeding left Bob as sodomising him with a large, spiked appendage, perhaps the sort of thing our Jounalist might sport on his forearm
. Unpleasant to the ear as to the mind’s eye, unless you’re into that sort of thing, and fair play to you if you are. My tastes are a little more pedestrian, and there’s much to be savoured within the Bobs’ mutually acceptable ranges.
There’s much more to figure out, not least regarding the best position in my chain, but it’s been a long day, and I’m already mildy traumatised.
The dual or “Badder” Bob is described on the Analog Man as a dirty clean boost. “Clean” in this context would probably be better rendered as “flat” or “transparent.” There seems to be a minimal drop in the lower end of the EQ spectrum, easily compensated for with one click of the bass control of my API LLX, which I normally run at or very close to flat. There’s also apparently a very high end roll-off, but it must be somewhere above 5K Hz, because I didn’t notice it. Other than that, it seems to pass the signal pretty well unadulterated by any EQ shenanigans. But it can get pretty dirty.
Each side of the pedal, one footswitch and one knob, is an independant Bob, volume and overdrive increasing in about equal measures as the relevant knob advances. With both sides engaged, the right Bob (yellow LED) “feeds” the left Bob (red LED) and a wide range of gainy sounds at any amplitude from nil to a lot ensues from a series of complementary adjustments. Each side is capable of a 20 dB boost, according to the Analog Man website. I’m not sure exactly what is produced when both Bobs are dimed, but it is many dBs. Having some pedal downstream that can dialled down well below unity is required to make much use of the louder settings, but with both Bobs maxed out (and the next pedal near the bottom of its range), right Bob appears not so much to be feeding left Bob as sodomising him with a large, spiked appendage, perhaps the sort of thing our Jounalist might sport on his forearm
. Unpleasant to the ear as to the mind’s eye, unless you’re into that sort of thing, and fair play to you if you are. My tastes are a little more pedestrian, and there’s much to be savoured within the Bobs’ mutually acceptable ranges.There’s much more to figure out, not least regarding the best position in my chain, but it’s been a long day, and I’m already mildy traumatised.
Okay, that's the first time we brought up hardcore gay fetish practices in the Jounal, at least the first time I can remember that, but it is what it is. The Clown from Down Under is obviously only describing what the good people of AnalogMan packed into that pedal. Whatever floats whomever's boat. I don't judge.This arrived today:
right Bob appears not so much to be feeding left Bob as sodomising him with a large, spiked appendage, perhaps the sort of thing our Jounalist might sport on his forearm
There’s much more to figure out, not least regarding the best position in my chain, but it’s been a long day, and I’m already mildy traumatised.
As long as you don't identify as a dirt pedal, that is. If you are, I do judge a LOT.
So can you set the Bob in the back to rip & tear and the Bob in the front below unity to catch? How does that sound?
Well, this isn't directly related to the Le Bass, but in terms of how this Two Notes stuff holds up in a studio/recording context... May I present the closing snippet of a song from the upcoming album. It just received the full mix treatment from our producer, and I gotta say I think the bass ended up sounding better than I would have expected! Please excuse the lack of in-song context for the decapitation conclusion to this jam, I promise it makes more sense when you hear the whole track LOL
Recording chain was: modded Squier Jazz > Sushi Box Underground Accelerator (the requisite "dirt" in today's equation) > Broughton Omnicomp > Broughton HPF (only set at 40Hz, to help clean up any sub-rumble) > Two Notes Torpedo CAB M+ (with the Mesa Subway 212 IR engaged). The strings weren't super, super fresh, but in this section of the song, I decided to hit them like a silverback gorilla, in order to coax more grit out of the Sushi.
Recording chain was: modded Squier Jazz > Sushi Box Underground Accelerator (the requisite "dirt" in today's equation) > Broughton Omnicomp > Broughton HPF (only set at 40Hz, to help clean up any sub-rumble) > Two Notes Torpedo CAB M+ (with the Mesa Subway 212 IR engaged). The strings weren't super, super fresh, but in this section of the song, I decided to hit them like a silverback gorilla, in order to coax more grit out of the Sushi.
