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Thunderbird Club

#57,601
ProgressiveDoom said:
Yeah the wave of heat continuosly flowing out of the furnace.
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Sheesh, my electric bill at least doubles from December through the end of February. And we haven’t had a single day in the teens yet. Cant imagine what you folks have to pay to stay warm
 
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#57,603
lowend1 said:
Scott, has the modification they did to the cutaway area on the Classic IV Pro (for upper register access) reverted to the original?
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No seems the same as the CP, I don't think the cutaway is moddified as much as on both basses the bridge is moved forward so therefore the fingerboard / neck is moved forward.
 
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#57,605
dukeorock said:
Sheesh, my electric bill at least doubles from December through the end of February. And we haven’t had a single day in the teens yet. Cant imagine what you folks have to pay to stay warm
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I need to invest in building a fireplace or just place a 45 gallon drum of burning wood in the main living quarters where my wife,son and dog can cozy up to for warmth. Just gotta figure out a ventilation option.
 
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#57,606
Dr_Feelgoood212 said:
Around here, we usually use natural gas, or in rural areas, propane or fireplaces, to heat houses.
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That makes perfect sense. My house is all electric and we don’t have a fireplace. Sure wish we did
 
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#57,609
dukeorock said:
That’s what I’m thinking. These days, except for a small minority who still love big tube amps, unless a SS amp weighs under 5lbs, you can barely give em away. I’ve heard people in gen pop talk about 10lb amps as though no one could possibly be expected to hoist such a boat anchor. Same with cabs. Goes a long way toward explaining why so many bass players sound so awful. Not that a light rig can’t sound good, it just ain’t my primary consideration every gig.

All that to say, seems like a great time to snatch up nice SS and hybrids. Even GK rb amps are cheap and those are great amps! I’m just getting oddly nostalgic for old Sunn, Marshall, Sound City and the like
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I agree. The concept of a light, compact bass rig appeals to me as much as the next guy, but I'm not sold on the reliability and serviceability of amps that are smaller than a car stereo. I am one of those tube amp guys, but a couple years ago I picked up a Crate BT350 head in Anvil case for cheap. I love this thing. It is the only "professional" bass amp that Crate ever built, and its roots are decidedly Ampeg. Tube preamp, onboard chorus, 350w@4 ohms (410 with the limiter off, supposedly). When you're used to the weight of all-tube stuff, it ain't too bad.
 
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#57,610
ProgressiveDoom said:
Yeah down here more than so, unfortunately. I'd like to know who the fn' moron was that thought this land was prime real estate and an ideal location to create a society in. What was he thinking?, where did he find so many clowns who believed in that same vision enough to act on it?.
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My sister has a theory about the city we were born in. A boatload of fun-hating Calvinists went as far away from their origin point as they could find and sailed up and down until they found a miserable wind blasted, damp, grim mudflat that depressed even themselves, and said 'this is PERFECT'.
 
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#57,611
godofthunder59 said:
No seems the same as the CP, I don't think the cutaway is moddified as much as on both basses the bridge is moved forward so therefore the fingerboard / neck is moved forward.
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That's good. I'm impatiently awaiting a shipment of VPs (including mine) to show up at the vendor's warehouse. Unfortunately, it seems that the container ship keeps stopping for coffee on the way over...
 
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#57,612
lowend1 said:
I agree. The concept of a light, compact bass rig appeals to me as much as the next guy, but I'm not sold on the reliability and serviceability of amps that are smaller than a car stereo. I am one of those tube amp guys, but a couple years ago I picked up a Crate BT350 head in Anvil case for cheap. I love this thing. It is the only "professional" bass amp that Crate ever built, and its roots are decidedly Ampeg. Tube preamp, onboard chorus, 350w@4 ohms (410 with the limiter off, supposedly). When you're used to the weight of all-tube stuff, it ain't too bad.
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Agreed. It’s not like I want to carry as much weight as possible, but if something I really love is heavier, so be it.
 
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#57,613
PillO said:
I had suspected so, but I have issues with that solution. For a 9 year old, the Apple tax on the device makes it economic folly to purchase. The iPod touch has been relegated many pages back in the website, and the device has not been refreshed/revised for 3+ years indicating to me that it is being EOLed when the current stock is depleted. And, with a windows PC, you must install iTunes; I have had many issues with iTunes, from re-arrangements of songs/artists/albums to persistence despite being uninstalled (getting rid of iTunes is akin to getting rid of nasty malware).
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In an effort to keep this from hijacking a thread or starting an argument... I'll just say that "Apple World" looks, smells, tastes, feels, and works very differently from "Microsoft World". If you've been working with Windows based machines for years, it can be very difficult to adapt. You pretty much hafta go into an apple with a clean slate. The intel and experience you've acquired over the years of using PCs... means jack friggin' squat if you're trying to acclimate to Apple. That adds up to a lot of frustration, and claims that Apple sucks, and so on. I used to mess around with upgrading, drive speeds, RAID arrays, overclocking, and the likes... as well as debugging and repairs for friends and family. One day, I decided I was sick of of it all, so I sold off my room full of PC crap & got a Mac Mini & decided I was gonna figure it out. The adaptation period was not without its frustrations, but has been totally worth it! I've forgotten more than most will ever know about PCs, and don't miss it a bit! My ex-wife and children still use that same Mac Mini today... and it still works as good as it did the day I brought it home! I also have a MacBook from 2009 that does great for me too. It's obviously not as fast as new machines, and some of the software isn't even updatable anymore... but as far as it's general behavior and usability... they are both as good today as they were then. There's a whoooooole lotta PC's that have found their way to the landfill during the time that I've had my old Macs;)
As for any financial or socio-political issues you have with Apple... I won't speak to those. I have plenty of those with Bill Gates & Co. I just chalk that up to each of us living our own lives, and making the decisions we make because we are who we are. Neither is right, neither is wrong. Equating electronics to basses... it's kinda like me with this StingRay I got for Christmas. No matter how hard I try... it's not a Thunderbird, and I can't make it be a Thunderbird. That sure doesn't mean it's not a good bass... I just gotta learn how to use it.

As for the iPod Touch... I believe it was "rev'd up" between the iPhone 7 & the iPhone 8... so they're not all that far back:)
 
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#57,614
dukeorock said:
Played pretty much all of my basses yesterday through the rig I have set up in a spare bedroom. Lately the rig has been a Mesa M9 and a proto sealed 212 with three, 3” mid drivers. It’s a neat sounding cab, but won’t be going into production in its current state. It really is a great sounding cab though, so I’m happy to have it in the practice room. The M9 is a very interesting amp. Very thick down low, very zingy up top (same can be said for the cab, so it’s a potentially dodgy rig for many basses). It has lots of usable eq, so you can shape it to whatever you like pretty easily. Onboard compressors almost always suck, but the one on this amp is actually quite nice.
View attachment 2854236
My parts/Warmoth bass is the closest thing to an MM I’ll like ever own, though it’s fully passive. It has a Nordstrand Bigman pickup in an MM shell so it didn’t require any routing.
View attachment 2854238
It’s a really great sounding pickup. I just don’t love it’s location. Not enough thump so far toward the bridge. I can eq it into something really interesting, but I think it’s gonna get a second pickup further forward before I’d ever use it live. The obvious thing would be a 2 band pre, but that’s never going to happen. No active basses for me! Worse case, it’s a great bass for recording situations where less deep lows are needed. The plan is to add a second Bigman and send it off to JIO to make it look cooler when funds allow. Awesome bass, but not quite ‘there’ yet.

Next I messed with my 35” scale custom Drake.
View attachment 2854262
I can’t recommend TV Jones Thunder’Blade pickups highly enough. Just incredible pickups. It’s a very big, aggressive sounding bass. Soon it’s going to get new strings for some new Prayer Flags recordings where me and Harlowe will be tuned to Drop C. The 35” scale on this bass makes drop tuning really easy. Just gotta figure out what guage strings I’m gonna want.

Lastly, I played my T Bird.
View attachment 2854268
When it comes to basses and amps, I’m not afraid to tweak settings to get what I want, but my favorite basses and amps sound great in their most neutral settings. You can play around after that, but their native voicing should be there already. That’s where my T Bird shines. Plug it into any amp I own with everything at noon and it’s the best sounding bass I own, for what I like.

So my takeaway is, if you have to tweak your gear too much to find ‘your’ sound, maybe you don’t have the right gear yet. Just a thought. Looking forward to doing this all over again when the Traynor shows up!
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I always enjoy your commentary. I just started working with the bass within the past year, and one lesson I learn every single time I pick it up, is that it's NOT a guitar! The way you describe sound, and what you do to achieve it, makes sense to me. So I'll be following you around & picking up these little morsels of wisdom you leave laying around;)

What kinda bridge is that on your Drake?
 
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#57,616
dukeorock said:
When it comes to basses and amps, I’m not afraid to tweak settings to get what I want, but my favorite basses and amps sound great in their most neutral settings. You can play around after that, but their native voicing should be there already. That’s where my T Bird shines. Plug it into any amp I own with everything at noon and it’s the best sounding bass I own, for what I like.

So my takeaway is, if you have to tweak your gear too much to find ‘your’ sound, maybe you don’t have the right gear yet. Just a thought. Looking forward to doing this all over again when the Traynor shows up!
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Just remember that 'everything at noon' is 2-10-2 on the Traynor passive tonestack. All of you SS amp users tend to forget that.
 
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#57,618
kat888 said:
My sister has a theory about the city we were born in. A boatload of fun-hating Calvinists went as far away from their origin point as they could find and sailed up and down until they found a miserable wind blasted, damp, grim mudflat that depressed even themselves, and said 'this is PERFECT'.
Click to expand...
Kat I think your sister may be onto something.:thumbsup:
 
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