I wanted a Mustang Bass type thing for years, tried a Squier Vista Musicmaster, Squier MB, even swapped out the Squier neck for a MIM neck, nothing felt right or inspired me. I was watching the MIJ Fender reissues climb and climb in price and then this came up locally - more than the MIJs but not crazy more, and all-original including case. Tried it out and it just went "click". Strung with some pretty old flats but somehow covers the range from nasal twang to deep thump with its one pickup.

Most expensive thing I've bought so I have to get off my ass and clear out the racks. But the search is over.

I saw a vintage mustang next to a reissue. The price difference wasn't much. It's crazy.

I had a squire mustang bass for a minute. It was awesome. I think it was another forum member's for a short bit, too. I bought it because I knew one of my best friends would love it and absolutely kill playing it. He ended up buying it from me and did the thing.

These I’ve had forever but I had a chance to compare them while I was chasing down an issue with rack gear. I thought I had blown a goddamn ribbon elsewhere but nope it was something else.

Beyer M201 vs M88 on voice

M88 better for speaking and just all around

M201 reads as more “vintage” and sounded better when I sang better. Sounded worse when I sang worse. Nasal sounds corrected with the barest eq from mixer. i’ve read about these being cool for overheads and want to try that one day because I bet it sounds like shit

Both had pretty strong plosives but the M201 was worse in that regard. Fine mics! Can’t wait until something else breaks so I can try another one.

Who can fix a Urie LA-22 with one channel that compresses like hell over not much signal?

Kniferide wrote: Wed May 14, 2025 4:27 pm

penningtron wrote: Wed May 14, 2025 3:45 pm

Kniferide wrote: Wed May 14, 2025 3:25 pm
This is one of the best compressors there is and it's free. If I only had one compressor plugin to use it might be Kotelnikov.

Thanks for the tip! I just tried it out for 2 minutes and instantly liked it on the 2-buss in a "preserve the mix, just make it louder" way. I'll try out some of the drum smashing settings later..

TDR's free EQ and the other little compressor they have are also very good. The Kotelnikov is kinda the go to I want an FMR Really nice compressor style plugin that you can make really invisible.

I'll review these here instead of the Mastering thread (I'm using them for mixing anyway):

TDR Kotelnikov: Remarkable. I love every setting I've tried so far, that does the thing it says it does and well. The FMR RNC is a good comparison, in that they're both way better than they have any right to be.

TDR Molotok (the 'other compressor', stripped down free version): A little darker and maybe more 'vintage' sounding than the Kotelnikov? I'm sure I'll find some applications where that makes sense but by initial impression is the Kotelnikov probably does the thing better.

TDR VOS SlickEQ: Intended as a mastering EQ I think. I'm not gonna use it that way, so I think for now I'll use it as a subtle sweetener on some instruments or sub-mix busses (a little more 'air' here and there type thing). Kinda like the AIRWINDOWS stuff in that respect. I don't understand a lot of the settings yet (the 'German' setting seems to have the most personality but I haven't listened that critically yet).

Can't complain for free plugins. Everyone should get the Kotelnikov at least.

I have the paid versions of all of those and agree with all of that. I never really use the Molot compressor for mastering but for mixing it can def do some stuff.

You have to work really hard to make Kotelnikov sound bad, it's really a remarkable piece of work. Only thing it doesn't really do is Distressor Nuke/1176 all buttons in total crush, but there's a million other things for that.

Slick EQ I also don't use that often but this is a good reminder that I should. The German high shelf is pretty unique, it's like a 2-stage shelf, super broad, really nice on the right source.

The paid versions all add some useful features and they're still super cheap.

I built up this (relatively) cheap JM parts guitar recently and it turned out really nicely. There's not much of note aside from the pickup which was probably the most expensive single part on the guitar (~250CAD); it's a humbucker styled after teisco gold foils (kind of a cosplay, what if?-type thing) with two rubber magnets, low output and low inductance. I've mostly been a single coil person, but I wanted to try something different with this and I really like the sound of a low-output humbucker. It's quiet, kind of mellow sounding, but it still retains some of the particularity of the goldfoil sound. Also way cheaper than the mojo uk option.

The rest of the parts are pretty normal:
70s tele deluxe neck (I paid $75 for the nexk 20yrs ago and it's been on 2 other guitars already)
body of unknown origin (cheap reverb pickup)
AVRI tailpiece
AM Pro 7.25" bridge
Herad gold ano pickguard

I need to order some new tuners for it but it's otherwise a fun single pickup ripper.

Awesome. Gives me a little bit of Harmony Bobkat vibes. Super cool.

Yeah that looks cool af, especially the pickup/pickguard combo. Jealous!

mdc wrote: Thu May 15, 2025 10:02 am

I built up this (relatively) cheap JM parts guitar recently and it turned out really nicely. There's not much of note aside from the pickup which was probably the most expensive single part on the guitar (~250CAD); it's a humbucker styled after teisco gold foils (kind of a cosplay, what if?-type thing) with two rubber magnets, low output and low inductance. I've mostly been a single coil person, but I wanted to try something different with this and I really like the sound of a low-output humbucker. It's quiet, kind of mellow sounding, but it still retains some of the particularity of the goldfoil sound. Also way cheaper than the mojo uk option.

The rest of the parts are pretty normal:
70s tele deluxe neck (I paid $75 for the nexk 20yrs ago and it's been on 2 other guitars already)
body of unknown origin (cheap reverb pickup)
AVRI tailpiece
AM Pro 7.25" bridge
Herad gold ano pickguard

I need to order some new tuners for it but it's otherwise a fun single pickup ripper.

Can I ask where you got the pickup? My buddy Matt makes some off the wall guitars, https://www.instagram.com/maranger.instruments/ - if he didn't make that one he probably wouldn't mind buying them on occasion

penningtron wrote: Thu May 15, 2025 9:19 am
TDR VOS SlickEQ: Intended as a mastering EQ I think. I'm not gonna use it that way, so I think for now I'll use it as a subtle sweetener on some instruments or sub-mix busses (a little more 'air' here and there type thing). Kinda like the AIRWINDOWS stuff in that respect. I don't understand a lot of the settings yet (the 'German' setting seems to have the most personality but I haven't listened that critically yet).

The Modes seem to affect the Q of the curves a little, subtle and not a gigantic change. I use German and Russian the most for no real reason. The calibrate is the amount of Saturation in dB added to the signal, and the other modes change the eq curve of the saturation. 90% of the time if I'm eqing something I just grab The Reaper EQ or Fabfilter, but I use Slick EQ on Guitar and Synths and stuff when I don't want to get in too deep fucking with EQ, A 3 band is good enough. It's a good EQ for free. I actually like that the free version doesnt SHOW you your EQ curve. Forces you to just listen.