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Post by Marshall on Oct 5, 2023 8:44:33 GMT -5
Good luck fitting all that on your Prius bumper sticker!! And slave labor to work the land.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 5, 2023 8:16:54 GMT -5
I made some recorings of the new pickup. And the SBT picks up very well, except it's bass heavy and kinda tubby sounding with where I decided to place it. I may move it around a but (later) to see if I can get a better balance.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 21:50:33 GMT -5
When does your shipment arrive? AS soon as I get your account number from Sweetwater. I have to admit I think it's cool. Nice ergonomics (so the reviews say). I love the meaty sound of the neck pickup. But I'm not an electric guy. And I won't drop that kind of coin on anything. Plus the sounds the review guys are getting have effects added. I get lost when it comes to effects and pedals.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 20:16:44 GMT -5
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 20:05:32 GMT -5
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 19:48:09 GMT -5
A guy at last night's Open Mic at Madcats in Palatine played a Music Man Kaizen guitar to heavy metal backup tracks. He's from Germany and had a Goth look (with painted face sort of like KISS). I looed up the guitar. It's a $4k instrument
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 19:02:25 GMT -5
There’s a benefit to immigration. You get an expanding population and, thus, a growing economy. Look at China and Japan and countries with a shrinking population. You want Social Security, you need an influx of working aged individuals to keep it afloat.
Of course, it’s beneficial to control who and how many such people you allow in. Therein lies the rub. And Congress can ‘t get their act together to legislate meaningful immigration policy. So it’s left to the swings of the POTUS to make impromptu policy and enforcement.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 18:54:33 GMT -5
“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” Live up to our promise. That was a different age. The statement should have read, “Give us your white European masses, and will give them free land we’ll steal from the indigenous people. “
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 13:58:14 GMT -5
I owe a lot to the Soundhole. Without you guys I never would have known about the Big Skinny wallet.
Changed my life.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 13:54:38 GMT -5
I was napping. Dammit !
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 8:10:18 GMT -5
Land of Mayberry RFD. Social media makes for puzzling interpersonal navigation. We "meet" people and even form something similar to friendships. It's not really friendship. We're not there for them, nor they for us. Yes and no. In online friendships we share more of our personal thoughts than we do with most people we physically meet. Yes, the lack of proximity makes it hard to lend a helping hand in difficult times. But the depth of sharing enriches our lives in ways that normal interaction doesn't seem to do. Maybe by drilling down in areas of common interest, we form bonds with people that we wouldn't form in real time face-to-face. Is it better than real time? No. But it's very worth while. I remember getting together at a concert with Chicago Bob and Robbie Joe with our spouses after we had taken our first trip together to Kansas City. Sue was amazed at how much we knew about each other and how close we were. She said it was like we grew up together, instead of spent a weekend together. Of course there was a "real" component to our relationship. And I suppose that's an important component to this whole thing. I know for a fact that I "hear" your voices in my head, for those I have met, when I read your words.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 7:58:31 GMT -5
Since Waffle House never made it as far north as New York, and there's one right across the road, my daughter insisted I go there for breakfast today and "take selfies and send them to me." A musical friend of mine wrote a song "D'Lila." The opening lines are: "I met her in a Waffle House. She was wearing a see-through blouse."
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Post by Marshall on Oct 4, 2023 7:47:41 GMT -5
The longest playoff losing streak in the history of major league baseball is now over! 18 in a row since 2004. Over. The monkey is dead!. Bells are ringing! Choirs are singing. Trombones are zinging! These things are always important to the fans. For the players, yesterday means very little. None of them were around that long. Seize the day.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 3, 2023 15:59:07 GMT -5
I have a couple FG180 & 160 Yamahas hanging around here somewhere. Those old 70s Yamahas are really quite good guitars for plywood. I'm pretty sure the FG335 is a solid top and laminated B&S. I tweaked the truss rod again and trimmed the saddle a little, and it plays very nicely. The frets were leveled at some point in the guitar's history, so they are pretty shallow; more so than I would prefer, but really no problems playing the thing. Should be great fun. I think I'll take it to a comfy Open Mic on Thursday and give it a run live. I drilled a strap button on the heel and stuck on one of my guitar-strap-collection items on it.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 3, 2023 10:24:35 GMT -5
All's well that ends well.
It was somewhat of an adventure. Drilling into the back to miss the rod, yet be close to the middle of the back. Then fitting the endpin in. The new placement for the SBT was easy. It's on the North side of the bass X-brace, running parallel with the brace. Installing the sound hole Mag, I noticed it was going to be sitting high compared to the fingerboard, so I shaved some of the cork off of the pickup ears to lower it when mounted. That worked fine. I strung it up with new Elixir Nanoweb Lights PB. And it plays pretty nicely. Still the action is a little high. To be perfect it probably would need a neck reset. But I'll try to tweak the truss rod later. And there's still room on the saddle. I have no interest in a neck reset.
When I plugged it in, it sounded great. The PowerTap Earth has a mixing wheel. All the way counter clockwise is just the Mag. Roll it all the way clockwise and you get (supposedly) 50% mag and 50% SBT. I rolled it to the SBT and am quite happy with the amped sound. The SBT is not pronounced, but it tames the electric sound of the Mag. Gives punctuation to the sound rather than altering it massively. That's what I'm looking for. So, I'm very happy with the pickup. Even though the SBT is not optimally placed, it still does what it needs to do to tame the Mag. At least to my taste.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 3, 2023 7:43:31 GMT -5
Excellent ! Fareed's discussion on Democrats and Immigration is dead on.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 3, 2023 0:03:02 GMT -5
Had I known there was a Bridge Doctor in there I wouldn't have bought it. The guy at the show had another earlier Yammy big body. But it wasn't strung up and I didn't want to mess with a guitar that might need a neck reset. This one looked good and stable. Sounded good too. So, I popped for it.
Oh well. Could still turn out to be a good thing. (Hard to beat the price at $220)
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Post by Marshall on Oct 2, 2023 23:51:04 GMT -5
Yes there's a pearl dot in the bridge.
I'm afraid the braces were shaved down when the stinkin thing was installed in the guitar. So, I am seriously concerned that the top would have SERIOUS problems if I remove the stinkin thing. The guitar sounds (acoustically) quite nice now with the thing installed. And If I can get the pickup thing worked out, it could be beneficial to have the Doctor in there, as I expect this guitar to not-be-treated very nicely in the future. Not that I purposely abuse anything. This is going to be my alternative to carbon fiber guitars which are not made to any specifications I can live with.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 2, 2023 23:38:17 GMT -5
Yeah, it's a Bridge Doctor.
And the X-bracing looks very shallow.
No, I'm not going to remove it. Too much trouble. Well above my pay grade. But the present plan is to drill another endpin hole away from the dowel. I've identified a location under the top very close to the bridge plate that i can try the SBT. It won't be directly under the saddle, but I've had success before with moving it before, though not as far off as I will have to do this time.
The underside of the top is pretty rough. I took some sandpaper to the place I'll try the SBT and smoothed that out nicely. I sawed off the old non-electric endpin so it's flush (slightly indented) in the side. I removed it before trimming it, and then I glued it back in the hole. It lines up with the rod of the Doctor. I want that all solid before I drill a new 1/2" diameter hole for the electric endpin jack. That'll be tomorrow.
The pickup is the Fishman Power Tap Earth. I haven't tried that before. This was going to be my experiment and comparison to the Skysonic I have been using. But the non-optimal SBT location may not give me a good comparison to the Sky. Though my other preferred option is to install a Skysonic I have in the drawer.
Oh well.
The action was a touch high, so I tweaked the truss rod and sanded a touch off the saddle blank. There was plenty of extension above the bridge. I'm hoping that will be beneficial.
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Post by Marshall on Oct 2, 2023 21:44:36 GMT -5
I used to try working (when I was working) and listening to Pandora. But I found every few minutes I'd stop and have to listen intently to the song being played. I'd surf for info on the new artist I heard. And I'd even check if they were coming thru town anytime soon.
. . . . , I had to stop listening. I couldn't get any work done.
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