...well, OK but amplification is needed. It's an electrophone after all...so some good amplification is reasonable

well a preamp.I mean I have to feed the amp a high quality signal without loading the pickups...so that's not extra stuff.It's just like a transmission to get the power to the wheels. It's part of the system. So that's fine

oh...and EQ. OK, well I'm just tailoring the frequency response. After all, most things aren't voiced for stick.

Compression? well, of course, but I'm not running it as an effect or anything. I'm just evening out levels. That's more like signal conditioning that's not an effect.

Oh, and reverb. Hey, it's a naturally occurring phenomenon. Now we can't all play in ideal acoustic environments in this day and age so really it's not an "effect" as such. So I'll just get a little reverb.

Oh the chorus and echo? that's just to give a little animation to help the listener get a full experience. Tht's not for me oh no,if it were just for me I would just put the headstock against the wall and listen that way. I do it for the audience...I'm a giver

The synth unit? well, I am playing solo so it adds an accompanying layer. Besides, I used paypal. Paypal isn't real money and the wife won't see it in th monthly statements so it doesn't, technically, exist anyway[/quote]

Yeah, it starts with a good pre--amp, eq and compression with me. In looking at pcgonzales' board, I am reminded of how tempted I am by the Sprectrcomp for the bass side. That would be the only effect I run on the bass side. My sound is basically the Stick direct through an SP2 with the melody side going through a Xotic SP compressor and a HOF mini. That summed up on a QSR K12 is basically what's for sale. I run that safely on one channel.

on the other channel, I have been experimenting with smaller pedals and with great delight I might add. The Alexander and Chase Bliss pedals add hours of reply value given the tweaking you can do in real time with expression and tap. It's a whole new world.

These past two nights, I've been able to work on the charts for the Bell group I am going to play. Very excited to be back in the pit, reading and performing.

The older I get, the more I gig, the less I want to carry stuff. And constraint being the mother of creativity, I’d rather concentrate on expanding my repertoire than piling up stuff I don’t need (which doesn’t mean I’m immune to GAS attacks) [emoji23]

I'm with Olivier on this. I've burned through the gdp of a small nation on gear through the years. Now I'm down to minimal gear with lots of options. What's in the pic, plus a Softstep2, volume pedal and one or two k12s. Perfect for bass or stick.

I bought the Strymon Trio, then parts to build two fEARful 12/6/1 cabinets, then the Behringer DCX2496 UltraDrive speaker management system. I'm still working on which amps to purchase for the six individual channels.

Just wanted to say, Robstafarian...that's funny.

At least to those of us who remember the specifics of the story.



(Yes, now I'll be watching it again sometime this weekend.)

Mark Sandman apparently (I only heard it from a documentary --- the wife and I really liked morphine), in th _treat her right_ days had a minimalist policy that everyone had to carry thir kit in themselves in one trip.
From what I understand, it was mainly for creative purposes...but instrument, stool and polytone is sort of a restaurant classic

I've never really started buying pedals, although I do like experimenting with sounds. That for two reasons: lack of money and the fact that I started out on the Stratocaster guitar in 1969, and I typically liked to play through a Marshall (or sometimes Meza) with just the guitar's volume knob by my right hand's pinky. While everyone was gearing up with volume pedals (Stave Hacket etc inspired) I just found the pinky on the volume knob more useful in a musical situation. When I started getting hired by bands to play out I already had "that sound" and was expected to deliver it, so I kept my pinky around the volume knob for a long time, without buying any extra gear.

But to feed my interest for sound experimentation I used other instruments on the side, like flute, sax and EWI. For those instruments, I put together a few racks with delays, harmonizers etc and a patch-bay to switch between alternative wirings. Then I found out that I could get those my own favorite sounds from Eventide's boxes and I got into renting an Eclipse and a Lexicon Jam Man, later to be replaced by an Oberheim Echoplex Delux. Had a TC Electronics FireworX too for a while. Then I sold all physical boxes and started making up those sounds on a laptop, inserted into my instrument signal chain.

Then I skipped the laptop too. Today I rather use the virtual boxes inside my Fractal Audio AxeFx2. I keep nine sound patches that I switch between while performing; and this is for Stick, guitar as well as flute and sax. Same nine "virtual effect boards". The AxeFx is bigger to schlepp around than a laptop but it really gives you all vintage effects in-the-box with a very open system for signal routing and cross modulation. To achieve that I don't use Fractal's own MIDI control pedalboard but a third-party MIDI pedalboard named Gordius Little Giant. It is almost as open as a laptop software system, but with the sound of vintage pedals. To buy those pedals would cost twenty times the price for the unit, and I'm very happy with it. It feels I have been given a truck-load of sound boxes for free

I also have a system in software, for doing real-time Musique Concrête, containing about 50 commands that I have been using now for more than ten years without changing it. The software (Mobius) is freeware and I wouldn't be able to keep my performing skills on that system if I should buy more stuff. Generally, I like the idea of learning effects "like instruments", keeping them the same over a long period so you can "find your own sound" through them