Blastronaut

Lately I've been using that Chats song "the price of smokes has gone up again" as a rough guage of Aus Dollars to pounds. If it's was $48.50 for JPS a few years ago (and assuming Australia is taxing tobacco higher than we are) I'm assuming closer to £800-£1000. Insanely cheap for something like that that's handmade, even before thinking about the body being chambered. I quite like the Mosrite shape, It's all wrong at first glance but after a while something about it just works. Bit like that song Anthem by the Wildhearts.

For what it's worth when I was typing "I'll get my coat" I did think "this is definitely not the first time ive said that here".

Ah for fuck sake. Yeah you're absolutely right. I'll get my coat!

If nothing else Strandberg really deserve some credit for surviving the 80's and 90's without ever really changing.

Ah cool. Well ignore my edit about Fuzz Faces. The Zendrive is a serious favourite of mines. The voice control is a bit unconventional but really intuitive. It's basically "more gain on tap at the expense of low end frequencies" or "more low end but less gain on tap". Stacks really well with other overdrives too, but on its own it's basically the Hellacopters "High Visibility" sound.

Fuck is the Dark Dove modelled on? I've just about had an aneurysm trying to work out what it's a reference to. Sure I'll kick myself. I've just seen there's a Zendrive patch on the Helix. Strikes me as something that might up your street and worth playing around with. Edit: a quick search suggests the dark dove is a fuzz that doesn't play well buffered signals so I'm assuming it's based on the Fuzz Face. I'm really curious now, especially since you're running it after a TS. I know a few folk that swear by running it after buffer Fuck sake, I hate what I've become, this is heavy anorak territory.

That sounds more likely, they're definitely a bit of an acquired taste. I might be wrong but I think they stopped making them roughly around the same time the Scandinavian Death metal scene decided "this is our pedal!". Seems there's wazacraft reissues of that out now? Fuck knows who is buying them. Is this a new version of the thing you (and I think maybe Gemmill?) got recently? For some reason I vaguely remember commenting about a fanned fretboard that this doesn't seem to have.

I honestly think I've made it sound way more complicated than it needed to be. Change nothing, just plug everything into the fx return instead of the front of the amp. Fucking about with the helix settings is optional but maybe worth experimenting with.

Rule of thumb is if you think of line level as around 0dB, instrument level would be -30dB and mic level -50dB. You were bang on about the preamp taking a guitar pickup signal above line level. Even a boost pedal (Rangemaster +32dB/MXR microamp +24dB) takes it up to line level territory. I think Boss are still making them, they're just not as cheap used anymore. Im sure there was a time you'd have struggled to even give them away.

You should all also try this out with a Metalzone if you ever get the chance. Ola knows.

Not quite, it's instrument level which is somewhere between line level and mic level. Not really all that import though for this because: Totally. There's no risk here. Think of everything between the amp front input and the effects loop "send" as just another pedal chain.

You'll be fine. Shouldn't need to change anything, effects loops are essentially designed with bog standard delay and reverb pedals in mind.

Keep your pedal chain as normal but instead of running into the front of the amp like you normally would, run it all into the "return" of the effects loop. The pre-gain on the amp head as well as the EQ controls will stop working since you've bypassed that section. Then in the helix you can add another patch at thenend of whatever you've set the helix to effectively replace the bit of the physical amp youve just bypassed. I'm probably not describing this well, it's not complicated. I'll get my etch-a-sketch out after I've had another coffee. I'd say just the pre-amp model but he might not even need that, chances are he's already got the helix doing something similar already. Worth experimenting though, won't break anything. Sammy's got the idea. In the 80's and 90's you'd do the exactly the same with the things like the Tech21 Sans-amp instead of the helix. Also handy for times when you've blown pre-amp tubes and don't have a spares with you.

Actually fuck knows if it would even work. Any of you fancy trying it? Guitar> Helix > Effects loop return and have the helix model your amps preamp that you've just bypassed. Im really curious how well it works, if it works at all.

That's fucking amazing tbh. There you go Tom. Nae excuses next time you get shafted with a solid-state head with an effects loop. Ah I jest, you won't get the same response from a solid-state power amp, but at least you could rule out the solid-state preamp being the issue and hopefully get closer to the sound you're used to if you ever in a pinch like that again.

With the Helix, can you create a preset with a preamp patch at the end of the chain? I'm curious, maybe @Andrew or @Gemmill can weigh in. I ask because most preamps in solid state amps are essentially just distortion/overdrive circuits pedal circuits, just running at 24V rather than 9V. Definitely the case with that orange amp. Issue could be that you've essentially been running another distortion pedal that you cant bypass after your Helix. No use to you now like, but I'm thinking try plugging the Helix straight into Effects Loop return and bypass the amps preamp completely if you're ever in that situation again. If the helix preamp thing I'm asking about is a go-er that could be a winning solution.

That's a bit shit man. Hopefully didn't interfere with your set too much. As an aside, you're not still rocking a pedal chain of basically "just a Rangemaster" are you? Let me know if so, I can't have shit I've made sabotaging yer live act.

Someone give this man an enema. It will give him a sense of accomplishment.

Mrs B was just telling me they apparently opened for the Rolling Stones a few years ago when they were still touring the wee club circuit. Heard someone describe IDLES as "punk for Tories". I'd be lying if I said I didn't largely agree.

Jesus that's bleak. Good shout though, well up my street, Cheers Sammy! It's almost the antithesis of Dan Deacon's Wham City.

Ah I jest, he's a good lad (actually that's a lie, he's a terrible person but a good mate). I'll earmark one for you, been trying to multitask like a manic octopus since we moved again in November and struggling to keep up with things so I'm hesitant to offer much in terms of timeframe beside "sometime in February".

Fair. Walked into that like. Yeah probabaly made about a dozen or so. Actually I'm having a weird stand off with an old mate that I could fucking swear I gifted one to but he's adamant I didn't. He runs a local pub so we have this situation where I stop by his work when I'm passing and he refuses to charge me for my first pint but makes a point of reminding me he never got his Mr Sparkle pedal. So I have like three more Mr Sparkle enclosures lying around that I'm stubbornly refusing to finish wiring up until the free Guinness well has dried up.

I could swear a few year ago I read something about a study into online sales that looked into whether higher base prices with free shipping were more popular to buyers than the same item with combined price and shipping working out cheaper than the alternative. Hilariously, folk would flock toward the more expensive option that had "free shipping". If I mind right the catch was that the folk that went for the "free shipping" option were (by orders of fucking magnitude) more likely to return the it. Amazon have had us all for idiots. Hoodwinked half the population into paying a monthly subscription for their "free shipping and no questions asked return policy".

Even set it up as something he's not looking forward too. "Minibus full of rival fans, 700 mile round trip. Not even fussed about going but I've sort of promised this busload of folk I don't even want to spend time with that I'd organise this. Honestly like!"

I dunno, he's accomplished what seemed impossible for Liverpool under FSG if you ask me. I thought he was getting found out just after he fell out with his sidekick Buvac, but then he kept winning big trohpys and reaching finals. After a while I had to just accept he wasn't just milking the Buvac playbook anymore. Some of the football they played when he arrived was batshit mental and incredibly entertaining. A lot like Postecoglu at Celtic. Mad shit like signing Steven Caulker and playing him as a Striker. Just tearing up the rulebook, but that was all Buvac in my eyes. I'm convinced Klopp was just as surprised as everyone else that theyre top of the league right now after last season and is wisely getting out while his reputation is still mostly intact. Fair play to him. He's kept Pep on his toes for the best part of a decade and humiliated Man U a good few times. For that alone he gets a bye from me.