big bassy debut!

well we survived our debut with mollys chamber.  learning 30 new trax in 2.5 weeks was a daunting task to say the least and we put our best foot forward.  some missteps along the way but we kept things pretty bassic and low key in order to put the best sound out.

here’s a pic of the stage that night:

mollys stage at black cat

it was nice to have some light at the back but also odd to have some light if u know what we mean.  good times and good ppl at the venue and can’t wait to return!  the black cat pub and grill on dundas has a sweet menu and plenty of wellington on tap so that made the evening even better!  a few songs into the night though we developed for the first time a thumb blister:

thumb blister after the first set

we’ve been trying to incorporate more thumb into our playing and we think the mix of the outburst of energy and lack of a decent callus gave us the blister.  we worked around it for the rest of the evening but it was defo difficult and the thumb was burning hot by the end of the night! on the advice of just about every1, we did not pop it and have let it heal on its own.  so far, so good.

peggy at the jam space

in other big bassy news, our 2×10 ampeg has found a new home at the jamspace for Mollys Chamber.  it suits the tone of the band nicely and puts out just enough to keep up with the jam volume.  peggy is a heavy one so hopefully she stays put for awhile!

current rig

our current rig for shows:

eb3 with tu3-sft-bassballs-bf2 into a little mark 250 and a 1×15 fender bassman

lots of headroom and sound.  we can dig! can’t wait to take this rig out again soon!

bassmorgasborg II

before we get to the bass, as we’ve stated previously we are keeping up with are drumming on a every other day basis.  we think its a good to keep tabs on the ol’ kit and tricks just in case and to help keep that sense of what its like going.  anyways, the other day we responded to an online request for a drummer to come out to a casual jam and play along to some songs by the Clash.  well, being that the Clash are our fave band of all time, this was a no brainer for us and we wholeheartly took up the challenge.  we blasted thru 15 or so songs in 2.5 hrs and at least 60% of those would have been stage ready IMHO.  it was crazy good and met all our expectations!  plans are to have another go at some songs in sept.  can’t wait!

peggy's buddy!

we scored a bass cab the other day.  15″ that can handle 300w easily.  its pretty darn big and weighs about 60 lbs but the price was right and its not like we’ll be using it at every gig.  the plans are to use it mainly for outdoor shows.  we took the grill off as it was rattling and then took the Fender logo off that since the look of logo wasn’t that retro.  the rattle was the grill hitting the edges of the speaker so we added some weather stripping to the points where the 2 were touching and put the grill back on.  it bows out a bit but sounds great now and thats what matters.  we plan on taking the direct out of peggy the amp and feeding that into a PA amp(thats all we have for a head right now… ah, the search for a bass head is ON!) and enhancing the low end signal that way.  we plan to debut it next weekend at one of our outdoor gigs.

peggy's buddy with the grill on!

finally an update on our pedal situation.  we were not using our EHX bass big muff as much as we woulda liked and our BBE sonic stomp was always in use but we never quite 100% happy with what it was doing to our sound.  so we’ve been casually searching for a replacement for both and we think we found it with a Catlinbread SFT.   it not only add some variable grit to our sound but also is quite nice at allowing us to tweak our tones.  we took it out to our gig last weekend.  we had only really spent about 30 mins with the pedal to make sure it worked and sounded ok.  it took about a set to get used to her sensitivity(it responds to how hard or soft u play!) and once we locked in a setting that was right for the sweet reggae vibe it was perfect the entire night!  any pedal that inspires you and makes u anxious to get back to playing again just so you can hear it HAS TO BE GOOD! its also likely that her sensitive side will make us a better bassist in the future.  here’s a pic of the august pboard set up.  looking at the pic makes us think that less is more. the sft is a good step fwd in usefullness and quality so we can’t wait to enjoy it more!

august pedalboard!

bassmorgasborg!

wow,  crazy times.  we wish there were more hrs in a day but alas we meet again blog with so much of interest on our plate.

a recent summer evening gig at a private party with Those Handsome Hooligans was sweet.  not only was the pool and fire pit on prime display but we had a great time playing tunes in a laid back atmosphere and we led a wee open mic thang happen as well.  we brought peggy the amp out and she stood up to the outdoor test.  perhaps it was because we put here near a huge bolder to let the rear sound reverberate or perhaps she just loves to rawk!

the next day was an acoustic duo set with the lead singer of TooNice.  interesting just the 2 of us playing with no percussion and very little in the way of back up vox from yours truly.  a well attended store opening that responded well to the low key reggae vibe!

and now we get to the big part… we’ve gotten on the iphone bandwagon.  let just say that there are a slew of new gizmos that come out and they are here and gone in a matter of winks but we can forsee the iphone being one of those items that has legs, can have some amazing staying power and is well worth the investment.  in the last week alone, we’ve more easily been able to facebook, tweet, email and share photos in ways and speed we never could have imagined a few wks ago.  for instance, TooNice played a reggae fest this past saturday and we posted soundcheck photos of us and by the time our set was done, fans had  already commented on them. then we were able to tweet our progress from the festival to our night gig in newmarket.  we are now huge fans of the device and we’ve only just begun.  our next post will be done via iphone just to say we could do it and did it.  theres more more news but til then….  here’s a soundcheck pic from the iphone!

TooNice soundchecks in the rain at Reggae Muskoka 2011!

peggy part 2

so we took peggy apart the other day:

we gather that if u understand electronics this makes sense.  we could barely make heads or tails out of it.  basically we checked to make sure nothing looked cracked or broken or wasn’t connected.  after poking and proding, we nervously put her back together with the hope that she’d be better but the issues still remain.  we’ll have to bring her in to see whassup.

as for her trial replacement, we got the traynor dynabass 200 for the weekend.  our first gig was last night and she was just ok.  we need 400w and not 200.  though our bandmates liked this amp as it was a improvement over peggy’s current state it was still not up to snuff for our liking.  the one highlight for us during the evening was we did get the darn thing to feedback when we wanted it to.  sounded so sweet to our ears and something peggy’s never done.  regardless of our amp trial and tweaking the entire night, the show at the wild moose near haliburton was an historic fun filled evening and we can’t wait to return!  playing their grand opening was an absolute honour!  the view of the lake and the sun setting was worth every km to get there.  good times and even better ppl.  one huge lesson we learnt though for the next time we play a muskoka evening show outdoors in the summer, bring bug spray!

toonice at the wild moose grand opening!