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My preamp journey

#701
Michael Vee said:
Jefe, the MCBB looks really interesting. I'll enjoy hearing your thoughts on it. Are those shipping right out- will you have it this week?

Edit: For those interested, here's the scubaduba thread: Motor City Big Block DI I'm working my way through it now.
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So had a chance to mess with it this morning, and @scubaduba hit it on the head. It's a pretty unique box and the tonal changes aren't subtle. So far I am totally digging it.

This might be one of those boxes that I keep around for special needs, or I might attach this to the Helix. One of my issues with the Helix is that "on the fly" tone changes can be a little hard. This can help with that, I think. I need to hook it up and see how well they play together.

But yeah, it's a cool little box.
 
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#703
Comings and goings - I decided to sell the AMT - it's a great little preamp, but I'm trying to stick to a "if I'm not using it It's gonna go" mantra. It's also nice to know that gear isn't just sitting in my closet and someone is getting good use out of it :-)

With that being said, I'm also focusing on unloading basses. I'll be popping a few more up in the classifieds today. I just picked up an Alembic Stanley Clarke and it's killer!

Also, owing to my fickle nature, I bought an Origin Bassrig 64, sold it, and now I'm buying one again. Looks like I have a use for it after all.

I'm also looking at a Sushibox UA. I tried the two previous versions with the Fender tone stack, and foolishly sold them, but I haven't tried the new UA. I'll be cruising the classifieds.

The Motor City Big Block DI is still cool :-) I'm still trying to find a place for it though, but I dig the tones coming out of it. It's a very nice little box and the fact that it can do so much without needing power is a big plus.
 
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#704
moon-bass said:
Comings and goings - I decided to sell the AMT - it's a great little preamp, but I'm trying to stick to a "if I'm not using it It's gonna go" mantra. It's also nice to know that gear isn't just sitting in my closet and someone is getting good use out of it :)

With that being said, I'm also focusing on unloading basses. I'll be popping a few more up in the classifieds today. I just picked up an Alembic Stanley Clarke and it's killer!

Also, owing to my fickle nature, I bought an Origin Bassrig 64, sold it, and now I'm buying one again. Looks like I have a use for it after all.

I'm also looking at a Sushibox UA. I tried the two previous versions with the Fender tone stack, and foolishly sold them, but I haven't tried the new UA. I'll be cruising the classifieds.

The Motor City Big Block DI is still cool :) I'm still trying to find a place for it though, but I dig the tones coming out of it. It's a very nice little box and the fact that it can do so much without needing power is a big plus.
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An Alembic! Bro you're my hero.Back when it was all I could do to keep myself in strings, I'd stare at their pictures in bass player magazine like it was porn.
 
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#705
Michael Vee said:
Are you keeping the Color Box if you like the MCBB?
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So I'm thinking of selling the MCBB. It's a great little tone sweetener, but I prefer the Sushibox Finally at the end of my Helix mostly because I can dial in some dirt.

I don't do any recording, and most of the places that I play that I would need a DI box either have their own backline or a preferred DI they "need" to use. I once got into a nice discussion with a sound guy about how he insisted on using this ratty old Beringer DI because he "knew" it.
 
#706
kevmac said:
An Alembic! Bro you're my hero.Back when it was all I could do to keep myself in strings, I'd stare at their pictures in bass player magazine like it was porn.
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I owned an Alembic about 20 years ago and didn't care for it. This one came up and someone kept talking about how "easy" it was to play so I went for it. It's a sweet, sweet bass.

Funny enough, I used to stare at Carvin catalogs when I was a kid. When I got financially stable later in life I bought quite a few ... And other than the V440, I intensely disliked every single one.
 
#707
moon-bass said:
I owned an Alembic about 20 years ago and didn't care for it. This one came up and someone kept talking about how "easy" it was to play so I went for it. It's a sweet, sweet bass.

Funny enough, I used to stare at Carvin catalogs when I was a kid. When I got financially stable later in life I bought quite a few ... And other than the V440, I intensely disliked every single one.
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We really must be related.My mom's from New Orleans. I still own a V-440 and I love that bass.I played a ton of gigs on it.That and my old Pilot .
 
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#708
kevmac said:
We really must be related.My mom's from New Orleans. I still own a V-440 and I love that bass.I played a ton of gigs on it.That and my old Pilot .
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Well, I'm originally from Pennsylvania, but New Orleans is home! But I also do love a good Pilot, that's another bass that I miss that I sold.
 
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#709
@Michael Vee asked how I got into playing bass and my background.

So bear with me y'all and let me indulge myself. I grew up in a very rural area of Pennsylvania, and I grew up very poor, even considering for the standards of the area. My family was well below the poverty line - I had to share clothes with my older brother. I was also very smart - my reading and writing tested off the charts when I was a kid. I was different, I didn't fit in with my peers.

Fast forward to my 12th birthday and my older brother, who played guitar, brought his band over to our house and I picked up a bass for the first time.

I loved it. The first bass I ever played was my friends black and maple Squire P bass. Over the next year I taught myself how to play + while other kids were up partying, I was down in the basement learning "Rock you like a hurricane" from tab in Guitar Mag. I saved up, bought myself a Squire P Bass (sunburst and rosewood - I hated it, but wanted to like it because I was a big fan of Steve Harris) and started playing out. I saved my gig money and after a few months I traded the Squire and $90 and picked up a pewter Fender Jazz Bass Special (I still have that bass).

I think my early years influenced my gear choices - the Jazz neck on the Fender, and my first amp was a Fender Bassman 20 that I borrowed from my friend.

So, at 13, I was playing in a (mostly) metal band, and I was playing in bars and clubs. I couldn't even drive, but I was hauling gear in thru the back door. My band would throw a party - all of our friends would show up, the owner of the bar would shut the door, and we'd have a ton of teenagers drinking in a closed down bar on a Saturday afternoon. It was glorious.

I played in bands like that all throughout high school, even opened up for some bigger bands at some of the clubs/bars in the region. I also played bass in the jazz band in highschool - the high school had a nice Rickenbacker. Also, true story, the band director hated me and act threatened, in front of the entire class, to stab me with the "best musician" award for my senior year.

I left my hometown for college, did some college.bands for awhile, dropped out of college and then threw myself into playing out all the time. At one point I was in seven different bands, some really bad and some fantastic, and a few that had some level of success, including opening up for some national acts and playing large festivals. Of course, there were plenty of biker bars in between!

It was also around that time that I started making decent money, so I picked up my first new bass - a 1995 USA Jazz in Olympic white. I played every bass in the local store before I bought that bass - I had it narrowed down to a rosewood/alder and maple/ash Jazz Bass and picked the rosewood - sounded better for rock and metal, IMO.

Long story short, I played in a bunch of bands, started getting more gear, eventually met and married the absolute wrong woman and was pretty much forced to play in churches. For several years I played in a regional mega church - every week I played in front of 10,000 people .ore on holidays.

A few years of that and then I moved across the country to Seattle for a better job and then amassed even more gear. I played in a few bands in Seattle, most notably a high end corporate/wedding band and a jam band - the band leader had a great idea - he'd put a huge bowl of weed in the practice room and whoever came by could smoke as much weed as they wanted, as long as they played. Some of the best players in the city came by to play with us.

I then got a divorced, and my evil and bitter ex wife forced me to sell most of my gear out of spite. I moved to New Orleans and the rest is history. I haven't don't as much playing here as I would like, my day job keeps me very busy.

I should also say that I married again in New Orleans to an absolutely amazing and wonderful woman that encourages me every day. She's an absolute dream, and I couldn't ask for a better partner and wife. She's wonderful, and is almost a gear enabler :) I am a lucky man to have her.

So, I've been playing since I was 12, gigging since I was 13, and my birth year bass is my white 1972 Jazz. Almost 40 years now, more bands than I could remember more gigs than I could count. And of course, tons and tons of gear :)
 
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#710
I think the mini board is done. I haven't changed it since I got the Bassrig back. I'm extremely happy with it, it's reliable and easily portable. Checks all the boxes!
 

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#714
And then on another thread, one of the TBers had the same idea that I had - to make a preamp board, with preamps that I love that didn't make it to the main board.

The empty space is for a Billy Sheehan drive pedal that is inbound.
 

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#718
el murdoque said:
...I can see you tried for a bit on the bottom row and with the Noble and the Alix before giving in to old habits and tossing the rest in that pedalboard sized dice cup of yours.
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TBH i was drinking a bit of bourbon that night ... maybe I started to lean to the right.
 
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