ShortScale.org

I'm looking to get in the saddle of actually coming up with songs and tunes. I'm looking for a set up which allows me to loop and play over parts including using some octave down pedal to simulate basslines - esstentially I want to be able to jam with myself and save down the results so i can pretty much have a song written and know the parts before I sit down at the PC to record it. I'm thinking two footswitch Digitech Jam Man and maybe a whammy or some other cheaper pedal for the pseudo bass.

Any other options worth looking into?

MXR Blue Box (or clone of) for bass sounds? Quite cheap on ebay. I recently got a DIY one with some extra mods to it, its a fun pedal. (see my soundcloud page for octave fuzz + Bluebox mix effect to see how it sounds)
Jamman Solo - I have one, but yet to use it since buying it (off ebay again and selelr included 4Gb SDcard, which was nice)

Just chiming in to say don't buy a Bluebox. Haet.

M9 would do all these things very well, but maybe not quite cheaply enough. Is there a Behringer octave down pedal?

you could buy a cheapo 2nd hand bass for the price of an octave pedal, and audacity is free and has a loop function. that's all i do.

Drum machine

a guitar amp modeler/pedal hooked to a cheap tape deck. keep it next to your bed and when a cool riff/idea enters your head, get up and immediately record it. after a while you'll have a tape full of ideas to work on.

benecol wrote:Just chiming in to say don't buy a Bluebox. Haet.

This.

if you want something to help get ideas down then look at the irig for your iphone Dave, it has a 4 track recorder, effects, looper, import backing tracks (drums) & octave pedal if you don't have ze bass and if you do it has bass amps. I use it to get ideas down all the time. when I have parts I like I upload them to sound cloud for the bassist to add drums and bass parts and then we work on them at practice.

I bought an interface from George to do something more with it but as I have to practice a lot at home with the irig I use this most of the time. Also, you can run your pedals through it as well which is great.

Thanks for the suggestions guys - I'm definitely looking for something to easily jam with myself wihtout having to stop and press record on my PC and that just to clarify. I do want a shortscale bass at some point but its more like RECORD GUITAR BACKING, STOMP, RECORD FAKE BASS, STOMP, RECORD LEAD LINE, STOMP IMPROVISE VOCALS = REPEAT UNTIL SONG STRUCTURE FLESHED OUT

^^ that's the kind of experience I'm seeking.

M9 / 13 certainly look good but possibly too rich for me...not sure...

buy either a behringer clone, or one of the boss oc-2/oc-3's which can be had on ebay for around £40.

then buy a used rc-2 or jam man for around £100 and you have a lot of versatility
buy a dd3 - dd6 for the hold function, but be prepared for short sample times although at a reasonable price (£50-60)

Now that the m9 is out, DL4's can be had all day long for around £120-140. Maybe a slight overkill with the delays, although the looper is phenomenal for on the fly recordings.

Boss RC2 is my recommendation.... I also use micro pog for layering simulated bass exactly as you're describing. However, any Octave down pedal will do the trick. Chilli Dog Dano I like for cheapness.

You could get both units for about £100 buying used.

£80-85 rc2
£15-20 cheap octave

stewart wrote:you could buy a cheapo 2nd hand bass for the price of an octave pedal

110% correct with regards to functional octave pedals. And even the best octave down won't sound very much like a bass.

All of this reminds me of something cool, Dave.

Maybe Mike/Aen/LRC could confirm this if they saw it: If I'm not mistaken, last November when I was in SoCal for Fredo's birthday, I got to mess about with one of his Jazzmasters that a sizable nut groove mod to accomodate fat-and-low E and A strings, both tuned an octave lower. Was heaps of fun to get all the toanz, could imagine it being a fun deal to track both parts with.