From: pturner@sedona.intel.com (Pete Turner)
Subject: Re: Peavey MIDIbase and amp questions
Originator: pturner@sedona
Keywords: Peavey MIDIbase, AlphaBASS, Pearce BC1
Organization: Intel Corporation
Distribution: world,local
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 17:56:44 GMT


The following is an email conversation that Doug Wellington and
I had about the MIDIbass...

From pturner@sedona.intel.com Tue Jan 26 10:55:03 1993
From: pturner@sedona.intel.com (Pete Turner)
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 93 10:43:15 -0700
To: DOUG@Arizona.edu
Subject: Peavey MIDIbase and amp questions
Reply-To: pturner@sedona.intel.com

Hi Doug,

Sorry I didn't get back to you immediately; I was in an unexpected
class (my boss signed me up and forgot to tell me).

Sorry that you weren't the first, but I did get my hands on one
at Milano's Music in Mesa (if you've ever heard of them). 

What did I think? -- Well, I came to the conclusion that if I were
to win the Bass Player Magazine contest, I would *not* be displeased
(especially since it includes lots of sound goodies with the package).
But, if I were to consider buying one for myself...I just don't know.

First off, I didn't like the feel of the fretboard, and at close 
inspection, it discovered it's more like the decking on my friend's
fiberglass windsurfer than a fretted instrument. It (literally) was
some kind of plastic with this "deck tape" like stuff where you fingers
would expect to find wood. As far as playability goes, I guess it was
okay -- I try not to be too critical of instruments that haven't been
set up yet, and the one I had was clearly far from the action that I
like to play with. In addition, in my hands, it felt like one of those 
old Fender Mustang basses in my hands -- I think I've just gotten use 
to playing Ibanez long scales with 24 frets (by the way, did you buy
the SR900 you were after?).

The next thing I noted after playing the rig for about 15 minutes or
so, in order to get clear control over the synthesized tones, my 
playing style had to take a hit. It seems as if I was having a problem
with the attack or sensitivity because to make the tones clear (or to
even generate at all) I had to play with no mutes or other "analog"
impact as I played. I assume that the sensitivity is something that 
can be changed  -- as I swapped around the patches, the sensitivity
seemed to vary.

The tones that the synth module come with are not too exciting. I played
most every one for at least a few minutes, and overall, somebody at
Peavey must love bells/bell-like tones 'cuz there were a shitload of
them. All-in-all, I found a few I liked, and thought could be useful
in a recording/stage showing, but the rest were so-so...That was day
one.

A few days later, after confering with a few friends more experienced
with synthesizers, I hit the shop again. I played with the tones again,
then decided to get bold -- one of the things that I've always liked
about the MIDI concept was the fact that you could trigger from one
source and be playing another. It was time to see how the MIDIBase was
on this front. Next to the display rig, there was a Peavey PCM3 (I think;
it was a Peavey synth, but now I'm not so sure about the model number).
I turned everything off and rewired the midi outs from the converter box
to the synth (I guess this is a good point to mention that the MIDIBass
is a three way system: bass/trigger, midi-splitter, and sound module).
This is where things get weird: I had the bass running into the splitter,
and took the lines from the sound module and ran them to the synth
instead. I had the bass in my left hand and was punching through the 
patches on the synth with my right. I was kinda plucking strings with
my pinky to get a tone generated for the new patches. It seemed all
was well, and I settled on a rather bland Nine Inch Nails-like distorted
pop synth sound, then turned my attention to the MIDIBass. Before then,
I hadn't paid attention to the fact that I had closed the string-circuit
on the G-string with my index finger as I plucked with my pinky (there by
producing an A note), but no matter what I did, I couldn't get the synth
to play anything other that E, A, D, or G. It was tracking the velocity
and all the other MIDI parameters, except the true "note-on" data.

This really confused me: everything I had thought about MIDI was being
chucked out the window. So, I reconnected the original tone generator,
and started to play again -- everything was fine. So I (guessed) that the
tone generator actually played a part in the MIDI encoding (somehow).
I rewired the synthesizer to be getting the out signals from the tone
generator -- same story; I could only get E, A, D, or G. 

Since then, I wanted to go back to figure out this mystery, but haven't
found the time. I've passed a lot of theories through my head as to why
it behaved that way, but none seem to make since at all. In my opionion,
the synth should have ignored the MIDIBass entirely 'cuz they weren't on
the same channels, or it should have responded to every note from the
bass.

-- 
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