Elias

http://www.sturmey-archer.com/products/hubs/cid/5/...

I was watching Premium Rush and noticed that my BMX bike doesn't always go that fast. Could I get a fixie like that and go faster? Maybe even win some races doing bar spins at the finish line? I want a really fast bike like that.

How many fixies did you pass today?

Seriously.

http://images.craigslist.org/00F0F_GH6ZixVa4P_600x...

That thing is hideous. The standard placement of the Line 6 logo is just painful. It looks like a cancerous growth on the face of the amp.

I understand that Line 6 doesn't make the only ugly amps but they are the worst offenders and I just don't understand why. The company has little to brag about. Their main selling point is that their amps rip off other company's tonally via digital modeling. Why not rip off other company's better aesthetics too?

http://medias.audiofanzine.com/images/normal/galli...

That looks better.

http://middle8reviews.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/...

That's pretty.

http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/wiki/images/c/c9/...

Who wouldn't want one of those?

Even this cheap Peavey

http://loyalkng.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/pea...

And this piece of junk Crate

http://profile.ultimate-guitar.com/profile_mojo_da...

Look better than this fancy Line 6 half-stack

http://www.sonicftp.com/news/images/snamm05_line6_...

Even when Line 6 tries to go retro it ends up looking awful like a Star Wars Episode 1 spaceship...

http://line6.com/podstudioux2/images/ux2screenshot...

This is aimed more at the pro musicians here. Obviously I know to bring my bass, amp, necessary cables, a backup bass, etc...

What I'm wondering is what else you bring. I'm setting up a bag that will hopefully give me what I need to deal with any foreseeable and fixable problems.

Right now I have:

Screw Drivers

Allen Keys

Crescent Wrench

Nut Driver

Needle-nose Pliers

Combination Pliers

Wire Cutter

Cable Stripper

Knife

Scissors

Duct Tape

Electrical Tape

Zip Ties

Soldering Iron (and solder and flux)

Multimeter

XLR Cable

1/4" Instrument Cable

Various Adapters

Thinking about adding some common guitar hardware, tuner cleaner (for pots), and a drum key. Some of this is aimed at problems that we could fix the night of the gig. Some is aimed at issues that we couldn't but that we could DIY while playing on the road.

What else would you have?

Played a gig recently that left me wanting to kill the sound engineer. The first song said it all. 15 seconds in this loud low-freq feedback started. By 30 seconds we had stopped playing. I turned my amp off and so did a few others. We had to yell at the sound guy to get him to handle the mic that was feeding. That didn't happen again but the rest of the night was filled with mics ringing. I was mad by the end of it.

Have you ever strangled a sound guy? Would you?

The guy was nice enough. Just not competent.

http://soundcloud.com/frenchreform/dont-kid-yourse...

Just finished working on this. What do you think? It's kind of got an indie-rock/new-wave vibe I think. Is there anything you would have done differently?

My band just released our first EP. On it we put two songs that we felt were A-sides and a throwaway B-side. But here's where I get lost. Our throwaway B-side has the most plays of any song we put up, even though it was at the end of the track listing. Multiple people have told me that it was their favorite song. I'm having a hard time understanding this. I don't think it's a very good song at all. Can you give it a listen and clue me in to what I'm missing? Especially some of the musicians here? I want to know what me and my band are missing that a song we think is one of our worst is getting one of the best audience reactions. If we can understand what makes it tick we'll be a much better band.

Here's the song none of us our proud of and everyone likes: http://soundcloud.com/snowcal/dont-kid-y%E2%80%A6

And here's a song we feel is light-years better than it: http://soundcloud.com/snowcal/hold-you/

What are we missing? I'm just trying to figure out what we did right, because I don't understand it right now. What's better about the B-side?

My band just released our first EP. On it we put two songs that we felt were A-sides and a throwaway B-side. But here's where I get lost. Our throwaway B-side has the most plays of any song we put up, even though it was at the end of the track listing. Multiple people have told me that it was their favorite song. I'm having a hard time understanding this. I don't think it's a very good song at all. Can you give it a listen and clue me in to what I'm missing? Especially some of the musicians here? I want to know what me and my band are missing that a song we think is one of our worst is getting one of the best audience reactions. If we can understand what makes it tick we'll be a much better band.

Here's the song none of us our proud of and everyone likes: http://soundcloud.com/snowcal/dont-kid-yourself/

And here's a song we feel is light-years better than it: http://soundcloud.com/snowcal/hold-you/

What are we missing? I'm just trying to figure out what we did right, because I don't understand it right now. What's better about the B-side?

https://soundcloud.com/snowcal/dont-kid-yourself/

Just wanted to know what you guys think. Been working on this pretty hard.

My band just finished working on our first EP. What do you think? I would love to hear any thoughts and opinions.

http://frenchreform.bandcamp.com/

Hey guys, my band just released its first EP (it's my first EP too but some of the band members are more experienced). Was just wanting to know what you guys thought of the songs. Thanks.

http://frenchreform.bandcamp.com/album/e%E2%80%A6

And if you like it, like us on Facebook too!

https://www.facebook.com/FrenchReform/

Cheers.

Hey guys, my band just released its first EP (it's my first EP too but some of the band members are more experienced). Was just wanting to know what you guys thought of the songs. Thanks.

http://frenchreform.bandcamp.com/album/ep/

And if you like it, like us on Facebook too!

https://www.facebook.com/FrenchReform/

Cheers.

So, in the process of mixing an EP and I was just looking for another set of ears. Lemme know what you think and anything that you'd change to improve it. Thanks.

https://soundcloud.com/snowcal/01-hold-you/

https://soundcloud.com/snowcal/02-plus-minus/

So, in the process of mixing an EP and I was just looking for another set of ears. Lemme know what you think and anything that you'd change to improve it. Thanks.

https://soundcloud.com/snowcal/01-hold-you/

https://soundcloud.com/snowcal/02-plus-minus/

Last night I went backpacking with a friend. We hiked about 10 miles into the wilderness before finding a nice spot to pitch tents right around dusk. Made a fire, ate dinner, all the good stuff. I walked to the creek nearby (75 ft) to get some water. And as I lean down to fill up a bag my flashlight points upwards. Out of the corner of my eye I see something bright. Centered my flashlight on it. Dang mountain lion across the creek maybe 50 feet away. I calmly decided not to get water and walked back to my friend pretty slowly where our tents were. Figured better to avoid a mountain lion attack w/ him present, and I have a little trick for hostile cats that I'd left there.

He'd already doused our fire and our hopes of relighting that were dim. So we sat there shining flashlights into the surrounding bush like sentries for awhile. We saw eyes a couple times but the vegetation was pretty heavy around us. Eventually we stopped seeing eyes. And we were planning a simple in-n-out. Plenty of batteries for that, but not enough to run flashlights all night long.

We eventually decided to call it a night. I had a lot of trouble sleeping. Every twig snapping, every little noise, kept me up. An hour and a half later I heard steps on the ground outside my tent. And then suddenly the cat meowed. I kinda poked my head up to look through the mesh screen on my tent and there's a mountain lion 5 feet away from me. Separated from me by lightweight tent fabric. I slowly laid back down and grabbed my knife and flashlight. It eventually went away. An hour later it came back and wandered around our campsite again, meowing occasionally. I didn't bother to look that time.

I know they say to get big and mean and try to scare mountain lions away, but what do you do when they're 5 feet away? That ship has already sailed. If I'd tried to scare it away it would've savaged me. My only thought was to try to aim for the throat and if that target didn't present to bury the knife in its torso. But that doesn't really save me if it decides to attack.

Pretty fearsome night. I didn't get much sleep with 3 very close (50 ft, 5 ft, could hear footsteps on grass and meowing) encounters with a mountain lion. Got a few hours of shut-eye around 9am and made the hike out. What do you do?

There's a bluebird in my yard. It won't fly away when you approach it. Just hops away from you. I'm guessing it's too hurt to fly. Which is bad news for it. We have a friendly but feral cat that hunts in ours and the neighbor's yards all the time. It won't survive the night. And getting killed by a cat doesn't seem like fun.

I'm thinking about grabbing my shovel and making this quick for the poor guy. I don't want to, but I think it'd be compassionate. What would you do?

Problem. I've got a gig Wednesday and my Gallien-Kreuger head has decided to fail on me.

I've got a nice Trace-Elliot head that I use as a backup, but it's just not working for my current band's material. It creates mud. I don't want to use it.

I know there are a number of seasoned musos on here. How does the process of renting a head work? How do I do that? What sort of price can I expect to pay? I really need a GK head. A 400 or 800 would be fine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fY0XDRGwL8M/

We do it a little different live, but that's about what we're aiming to have for a recorded version.