Vital Signs - Featuring SX Ursa 2 and Sansamp YYZ Pedal

[Mossman]

In memory of "the professor".

[zisme]

that was smokin' moss!

[ID10t]

Frigging wow man, that was fun.

[bleys21]

That was awesome! There are some serious fret stretches in there, not sure my hands can do that without breaking some fingers lol

[doc-knapp]

Felt like I was watching Walt Weiss cook up some meth! This was awesome.

[toomanycats]

Now that's what I call "bass growl." Crazy good tone there @Mossman and excellent playing!

[Mossman]

Thanks guys! I put a lot of work into this one, on both the musical side and the video side. This is a song that I've known forever... or, I thought so, anyway. I remember putting a lot of time and effort into learning that rolling arpeggio riff, and the solo, but I always dogged it for the rest of the song, and never really learned all the nuances. Like those double stops that he plays at the beginning, and throughout the song? I said: "nah, it's too hard to hit those on the fly from the other end of the neck... I'll just play single notes somewhere closer". I also found out that I had been playing some parts in the wrong positions, so I had to kinda re-learn the song all over again, and pay a lot more attention to attack, note length, expression, etc. But at least the hardest parts of the song were already under my fingers. In a way, the hardest parts became the easiest parts (at this point, I can play that arpeggio and have a conversation at the same time ), and the "easy" parts became the hard parts.

I don't want to tell you how many takes (and over how long a period of time) it took before I was satisfied. My disease (perfectionism) was in full force for this project, and the end result is by no means perfect (if such a thing exists), but I decided to settle on a "good" take before I completely lost all of my objectivity.

On the video side, I decided to use my fancy new cell phone with 4 lenses and 4K capability (no, I didn't shoot this in 4K), because I was tired of the shitty results I was getting from my video camera (though I think I figured out why that was), and at first the video it took looked even worse than the camera! I felt like I was cursed! Every time I buy a camera, or a device, thinking it will solve my photo/video problems, it turns out not to be nearly as good as it should be. Well, after some hair-pulling and frustration, I finally got it to take some good video. I'm still not exactly sure how I did it. The camera on this phone has got all kinds of pro-grade features, and I don't even know what half of them do, so I left those controls alone. I just experimented with "general" settings like resolution, and aspect ratio, and what-not until I got good results. Of course, it didn't matter, because I had to render it at 720p anyway (1080p runs like dog-poop on Bitchute), but it still looks better than the "Money" video.

Now that's what I call "bass growl." Crazy good tone there @Mossman and excellent playing!

Thanks man... That's the Sansamp Geddy pedal (the "Geddal"). That thing's the nucking futs! I've tried all kinds of methods to replicate Geddy's tone(s) ever since I started playing bass, but I could never quite get there all the way. The traditional advice is usually: "Just play a Jazz Bass/Rickenbacker and throw some dirt on it", but that doesn't cut it. The trick is; you have to split the frequencies, and keep the lows and low mids clean to retain the bottom and punch, and distort the higher frequencies for snarl. When you put distortion on a bass, the low end tends to drop out, leaving you with all snarl, no punch.

It's not a magic box though. I had to do a fair amount of tweaking to match the tone for this song. The manual has a number of diagrams for various settings ("YYZ", "Rickenbacker", "Geddy's Personal Setting", etc.), and I thought I could just use the YYZ setting for anything on Moving Pictures, but it was not at all appropriate for this song (neither were the other settings). It's easy to think of Geddy as having a particular tone, but it varies quite a lot from song to song. Fortunately, I found the isolated bass track and used that to match my tone to... and I don't think I would have ever come so close otherwise. Geddy's bass sounds nasty awful by itself, but it sounds great in the mix. I was even surprised at the difference in sound between playing by myself and playing along with the backing track. It really glues everything together, and much of the rougher edges get knocked off.

[LancerTheGreat]

That was absolute fire! I've always planned on learning some of the older rush songs, just never have got around to it lol.

[Mossman]

That was absolute fire! I've always planned on learning some of the older rush songs, just never have got around to it lol.

Thanks man... You should do it. Making these last three videos has been real rewarding for me. I haven't worked on songs like this since the last time I was in a cover band, and I didn't realize how much I missed really getting down and learning a song inside and out.

[sabasgr68]

Great! Have not heard much Rush stuff, but sounds very good, and again, you make it look easy!

Cheers...

This video looks better, btw.

[AnotherJim]

That was awesome! The timing of this is interesting to me as I was looking for this very song on my IPOD today

[Mossman]

Great! Have not heard much Rush stuff, but sounds very good, and again, you make it look easy!

Cheers...

This video looks better, btw.

Thanks Corduroy!

That was awesome! The timing of this is interesting to me as I was looking for this very song on my IPOD today

Aaah... Synchronicity.

Oh wait... wrong trio.

[Narsh]

Oh hell yeah! I really need to get Rush back in the rotation again.
Well played and well recorded Mossman!

[Mossman]

Oh hell yeah! I really need to get Rush back in the rotation again.
Well played and well recorded Mossman!

Thanks Enrique... that's a big compliment coming from you.

[jhull54]

Sounded fantastic, man. Wow! Those Ursa basses are pretty nice.

[Mossman]

Sounded fantastic, man. Wow! Those Ursa basses are pretty nice.

Yeah, amazingly so... I've bought a few SX basses over the years since 2008, and they've always been good (with upgrades), but they've never been as good as this one is. And to be honest, it didn't really need any upgrades. I did swap the pickups... Not because the stock ones were bad (in fact, I was quite surprised by how good they sounded), but because I prefer a particular character in a Jazz Bass pickup. I left everything else stock.

I used to say that SX basses were comparable to MIM Fenders (after ditching the cheap hardware and electronics), but I can say without any hyperbole that this bass plays and feels just as good as the American Standard I used to own. In some small ways it's even better.

[jhull54]

Yeah, amazingly so...
I used to say that SX basses were comparable to MIM Fenders (after ditching the cheap hardware and electronics), but I can say without any hyperbole that this bass plays and feels just as good as the American Standard I used to own. In some small ways it's even better.

That's good to know. I have never played a Fender. I have the bass below, and use it for my recordings, and occasional church P&W group, but I've always thought it was a pretty great bass.

EDIT: And--super playing on that tune. I'm a roots and fifths guy, so hearing that is great inspiration!

https://www.rondomusic.com/ursa2mnpro3ts2.html

[Mossman]

That's good to know. I have never played a Fender. I have the bass below, and use it for my recordings, and occasional church P&W group, but I've always thought it was a pretty great bass.

I have an Ursa 2 HUM from the same time period (with the 1.5" Ash body and paddle headstock), and I was pretty impressed with it right out of the box! I still modded the hell out of it, though. I routed the neck position for another MM humbucker (it had a single-coil neck pickup, and I never cared for the SC/HB combo), and I eventually swapped the neck for one from a Squier VM Jazz. The neck was great (one of the most consistent things about SX guitars and basses), but I just couldn't get over the headstock (and I tried!). I also put a Badass bridge on it. Mine didn't come with a high-mass bridge, and to be honest, it didn't really need one, but I had a spare Badass laying around, and I figured I might as well use it.

It's the ballsiest, most aggressive sounding bass I've ever owned... I call it the "War Hammer".

Interesting note: I figured they made those Ash basses 1.5" thick to cut down on the weight, but they must be using a lighter grade of Ash now, because my new one is 1.75", and it weighs about the same as the War Hammer.

EDIT: And--super playing on that tune. I'm a roots and fifths guy, so hearing that is great inspiration!

Thanks! I appreciate that! I'm glad I could provide some bass inspiration.