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Fourstrfury said:

Dependent on which president you want to use.

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In the context of discussing price, the 1st prez is conventionally the reference

Day 1 with the Tempera Hybrids yesterday (barely used set purchased here on TB), very excited so I played a gig right after installing them on my Kay, took the whole night for them to somewhat stabilize tuning-wise, to be expected lol.

I changed from Aquila Red Spring synthetics, which i love but are unbowable - something i wanted to get back to in a jazz setting.

Temperas are soft and low tension, as advertised, and they’re steels so they’re a tiny bit more work on the right hand than guts, but very doable. The A/D are booming in a good way, G is great, the E is a bit floppy in tone/feel, so will see how these things come into their own over time.

Overall loved the tone acoustically and they are very focused thru the amp. Bowed, it sounds really nice too, interestingly sounded a little more gut like than i would’ve expected (that scratchy-in-a-good-way thing) but probably because it’s a ply bass. Still plenty of depth tho.

Of note, the jack to the Realist Lifeline pickup is normally installed on the tailpiece, held on by passing strings thru its brackets. The Tempera mounting doesn’t really allow for that so the jack is now mounted on the bow quiver.

Anyway, i will probably miss guts again one day and may try a Sonores synthetic flavor (but which ones??? Grr). But will certainly give these excellent strings a fair shake for the foreseeable future.

I am very seriously thinking of Temperas on the carved juzek i use for orchestra to replace Spiro Weichs (my 1 yr old set there just doesn’t sound like previous sets, not sure what’s going on…). But that bass has a C extension and I’m not certain I’ll love a floppier long C string. Anyway, will chew for next year as I am committed to the 2024 Spiro challenge

Finally, Thx to everyone in this and other Tempera threads - all your updates have been super helpful!

Heiwa said:

I tried to watch the video but my brain was like

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my brain is like this all the time

What I like about the Boss Core is you can make an effects block behave GLOBAL. This is potentially a powerful tool to maintain consistency over multiple presets.

Also you can set up the rotaries to control your favorite parameters, which is really powerful for live situations where you want to be able to make essential changes real quick (e.g. a mids EQ on the 'to-amp-output'). You do not have to menu dive, those parameters are always right in front of you (in play mode).

Something to consider with the Boss Core is you can not set foot-switches 1 2 & 3 to switch between preset 1 2 & 3 (you can only scroll up/down).

Prodigus Filius said:

Anyhow, the lighter fretboard in the vid, which I assume is maple, leads me to the question, Were any Gibson EB-0's or EB-3's produced with maple fretboards?

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Not officially.

Whether a "one-off" custom build for some trade show or someone famous was produced I can't say.

What a bunch of tools!

A Yamaha BB434M IS a real bass, as they are fine instruments regardless of ability.

I rock a cheap BB234 for gigs, and if I was fired because of having that bass, I’d ram it through the guitarist amp.

After a second test of the V2 Aux In and headphone out, it seems to be a mono device. Thats the reason the fidelity sounded so poor. If anyone else manages to get stereo operation from the aux in feature, let me know.

Why would you need the Megallen at all? You mentioned having a rig on stage, but if everything goes through the IEMs, than you’re not going to hear much of the amp anyway. Save yourself even more to schlep.

bassicmike said:

I saw those. Interesting.

My cello is a cheap beginners instrument - probably not worth the investment until (or if) I get something decent.

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Get some peg paste if you haven't got any and you'll find the more you use the tuners the easier they get to use.

I would also look at getting your amp checked out, not a lot there, could be a simple fix.

dagrev said:

Thing like this remind me of one of my favorite songs. The whole album is great.
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Thanks! I love that song! The "Inner Tube" part is very Eno.
Agree, it's a great album and the sleeve and it's attention to detail is brilliant (Inner sleeve having the same pattern the cheap plastic table cloth has etc.).

lomo said:

......and how many dead presidents are required for admission?

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Dependent on which president you want to use.

Frank approves.

Updated review​

It's come to the end of my time with the Artifakt, I want to thank @Quatschmacher for the kind loan and ability to try it for couple of weeks. It's been fun trying it and I've been left wondering how I can justify buying one!
I'm going to try and compare it to other stuff I've had and own and, possibly because I'm not personally financially invested in the pedal will hopefully be objective and not overly positive and gushing about every single thing!

Summary​

This pedal is brilliant and really fun. But for us bass players you need to realise that the "low-fi" tag is true, but also a way to make it easy to understand for guitar players. For us it's part multi-fx and part modular synth. The filter is worth the price of admission alone.

Using the Pedal - what they've done right​

I've owned a source audio C4 before, and while the sounds were killer it annoyed me slightly, with access to only 3 presets and 4 controls on the front face it felt so limited into what you could do. Basically I had it that it was set up and there was no adjustments in use, and I built a little midi switcher on a Adafruit trinket m0 which let me switch presets.
With the Artifakt they have solved a lot of these issues for me - the extra controls, and ability to decide what they are make things flexible and tweakable, and the 16 presets plus 7 engines gives you 33 presets available from the front of the pedal. Enough for me.
It's made a massively usable pedal that's fun to use.

Fun​

It's fun to use, that's the first thing as you're reading to take out of this.
I work in design/marketing so allow me to put into my world.... The source audio brand feels more technical audio engineers and musicians making great effects pedals that sound great and try and squeeze the most out the technology. It's often easy to use initially but allows you to get increadibly complex if you want. There's a seriousness to what they do and feel more like tools than toys.
The Artifakt is kinda different, it's doing quirky sounds, it's accessiblity and it invites you to play and have fun. I can't imagine the SA would have done a humourous launch video dressed up like they were in the 1950s and mucking about - but they could have done.

As a multifx​

So back to my suggestion - don't think this as a lo-fi pedal for bass, think of it as a multifx with a fixed order of bloack and then things that join it up.
Will it replace your HX stomp's functionality? No. Can it do everything a H9 can? No. Will it do synth stuff like a C4? No. Is it freeform creativity (and hardwork) like a Zoia? No. Does it let you run 4 reverbs into each other like a MS70-cdr? No.
So what's the point?
It sounds great. Really really good, it might be my taste but I like the SA sound. I think all digital modellers have a sound, and recorded they sound great, but live you can feel the difference. Compared to it (all my very subjective opinion) the HX stuff sounds a little compressed, the H9 sounds extremely processed and polished and the MS70-cdr has tone sucking flatness (not tried the newer unit). All usable and good - but the Artifakt (and C4) feels raw and unapologetic.
So what are the blocks then? and for me they sit towards the end of a pedal train, after my preamp I use for an amp sound.

The blocks​

lets get this out the way.
I don't think I would ever use the Noise, Signal failure or Vinyl noise. If this is a failure of my creative imagination so be it, but for bass sending the sound of a cable randomly and periodically failing through the subs of a venue is a quick way of being asked to go do something else!
EQ - it works and EQs what you're doing
Glitch - was fun in presets but didn't play loads with it to form an opinion. It would be cool to work out a musical way to use it. There's some good presets of predictable glitches.
Destruction - nice, I like the way it didn't run away with gain levels, distortions were a nice thing, sample rate and quantiser too. Ring mod is an acquired taste I've not acquired but some patches sounded like bells which was cool. I mostly sat in the distortion section...
Delay/reverb/timebased had some lovely chorus in it, and flange and decent reverb. Reverb and delay can get really low fi and reflectiony. Everything is really tweakable and usable for bass. Only slight negative is if you use delay much there's only a short delay available. (I've seen somewhere 300ms quoted which would be about what a Bucket Brigade chip would do?)
Tremolo sounded like a tremolo
Ladder filter is killer and the main thing you will want to get this pedal for, it just sounds good.
Compressor worked and compressed, I didn't play much with it but the ability to but it before or after the blocks was nice
Old gear - if you want your bass to sound like it's coming through a vintage radio it will do this. But I imagine the times you would want to create "what did electric bass via my grans old phonogram sound" is fairly limited. For us this is a High Pass and Low pass filters block, and then multi band graphic EQ - I used to have a HX stomp and playing live didn't love the cab sims, and didn't love IRs as it all felt less immediate, so used to use a HF/LP filter and a bit of eq to make it sound a bit like a bass cab. This can do that. Subtractive EQ seemed to sound better than additive. But it's good.(and you might be able to set up the footswitch to change to your grans radio if you need that... )

Things that join it up - LFO and envelope​

So my first play I switch the Ladder filter on and it filters and doesn't envelope... role my eyes "typical SA they stuck the envelope somewhere else" I think ... and scroll down and... there's loads of options. Find the filter control and the filter envelopes like you would expect.
But then there's loads of places you can send the filter... and LFO - and this is where the Artifakt starts to get super interesting - that you can route things to change according to input signal and LFO - which opens up to all sorts of things in a really fun and accessible experimental type thing... last night I had some kind of pulsing fuzz thing that only became apparent it was pulsing when the filter (not envelope) closed. very cool.

Setting the controls​

Making a patch is a two stage process.
1 - what do I want it to sound like.
2- how do I want to interact with the controls to control this. A good example of this is there MuTron factory patch where the bandwidth sets the range in high low and medium like you would with a real mutron.
This is where the multifx comparison falls down as it's more like setting a new compact pedal per preset.... (though I think you can switch blocks off via midi if you wanted)

Comparisons to other things​

This is where it gets super subjective and compares to what I own...
I recently bought a PastFX PF101 filter - compared to that it's close tonally. Quatschmacher borrowed mine for a bit and there's his equivalent in the Neuro library. The Artifakt is obviously way way more flexible and can do multiple filter type sounds (and down) but lacks some of the analogue warmth of the PF101 and subtle musicality I've been dealing the PF101 for.
I've had a few chorus pedals, and a year or so ago Switched from a Tech21 bass boost chorus to a Providence Anadime - the Artifakt is an equal to both (without the detune chorus of the bass boost chorus), can do the low end filter of the Anadime, and because it doesnt' need to have the BBD low pass filtering out the clock noise it sounds brighter and more airy. There's also two versions of chorus which sound differnet. It's very nice. Anadime simpler to use...
Compared to the H9 I've currently got - I prefer the modulation and drive distortion sounds to it, H9 has more verb options but for a basic reverb for bass the Artifakt can do that in a low fi style, and delay the H9 can just do more. (plus pitch stuff)

Conclusion (AKA will I be buying one?)​

If I hadn't bought the PF101 then defiantly - as it is I'm not sure - it would need to push something off my board
I moved away from my old HX stomp to a collection of analogue and DIY made pedals and one digital one doing the reverb type things - currently this is a H9. I find the H9 is be good but not perfect for bass and clearly designed for guitar, and for everything but the pitch stuff could replace it with the Artifakt... with the additional end of chain "cab style" eq which I used to use a Schalltechnik Vong for .... hmmm
Overall - ignore the Lo-fi tag us bass players should check the Artifakt out - it's fun.

PhR75 said:

A new preview of my hopefully forthcoming album project (instrumental ambient soundscape stuff in general). So nothing radically new ain't happening but I recall someone here liked my previous track so...
No T-Birds on this unfortunately but at least a 12-string guitar made of sheet metal.
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Thing like this remind me of one of my favorite songs. The whole album is great.
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I started out as a guitarist so when I switched to bass guitar the OFPF made a lot of sense. However, once I started upright, Simandl 124 became an absolute necessity for my hand.

I now employ a hybrid technique where most things below the 7th fret get the Simandl and above gets the OFPF.

This is not a hard rule, it’s quite flexible when soloing and messing around.

As others have mentioned, I’m glad I put significant time into both and can generally employ either as the music dictates.

And now when I play a super shorty like my UBass I feel like Steve Vai doing these crazy interval stretches! I’m like dang - maybe I need a 30” 24 fret six string! Then look for my next thread on how to get fired from any corporate gig lol

That Proton, tho…incephenious.. its like your grandma’s first words to you.

MCF said:

I ask myself that hourly. Especially today. When an L.A. gangbanger, convicted felon for multiple charges including illegal firearms possession and bank robbery, threatened me and my family during a deposition. Simply because I was calling him out on fraud he’s trying to commit.

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Hate that for you. Can he not be charged for that?

In my band I use a blue colander tremond (rat type), but I’ve also used a hm-2 and eqd grey channel with good results.

MCF said:

Around that time, she and Susanna Hoffa were my “IT” girls. Since the Bangles were SoCal based, we saw them a lot as openers early on. I’m not ashamed of liking them. The music grew on me. Mainly because of her voice. And looks. And they were really good live. Sorta why I love Linda Ronstadt from a few years earlier.

I was thinking about this awhile back. Growing up in SoCal made me an eclectic listener. I wonder if my tastes would have developed differently had Mom agreed to let Dad move us to Cocoa Beach in ‘68.

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You do have a very very wide range in your musical likes. I'm impressed by that. I like what I like, be it classical, blues, rock, bluegrass--but there's a lot I can't stand in all of those categories. Punk and dark metal are things that never had any appeal for me, however.

Just a thought- US Customs has been known to open packages, damage the contents, and carefully repack them. Usually they leave a notice of inspection of some sort.

Anyway, i hope you get it resolved. Nice bass.