Gutbucketeer!!

Sir, you're back, while I've been away for a month or two.

Where is it that you play, I'd like to visit and see you for real?

Tis good to finally read a word from the wise, esp as Reggie kinda withered on his own vine

But you did misspell my name, so I guess nobody's perfect, least of all me.

But my basses are, at least as close as you can get and they got more resonance than you can shake a stick at Mister.

Yes sir, siree.

Have you actually checked out any of my sites yet cause I don't know where you got that resonance idea.

Or was that just your gut instinct?

My playing may be a different matter, but the light-weight super-strong string I use and the cross-string method I employ for resonation makes playing so easy and the instrument so tonal that I too can play for hours without gloves.

And I'm talking playing man, Red Hot Rockabilly Blues Inspired New Age Progressive Skiffle, not tapping out a back beat to some old-school Ken Colyer foot-tapper

To me the word Bass, when applied to these instruments is a misnomer, sure I can get a bass note and plod along in the background but I don't wanna!!

I can and mostly do play my T-Box more like a lead instrument and often find myself following the vocals and running against the damn drummer.

Your cross-piece design for the stick on the tub-top (or bottom really) sure gives you better control but you are always going to be limited by the lack of flexibility in the standard upside down tub you traditionalists still use at the moment.

With my little stick-cup and light-weight strings I can play the string from super slack to tight enough to cut a mans hand off.

And because the open end of the tub is now the right way up you get more of the sound coming out of it, tho according to fools jewels not for the reasons I thought.

Still serendipitous genius eh?

You shouldn't cut up your old tub just yet though.

Least wise not til you've tried some of these ideas out on a cheap new one first.

I like what you've done with the wooden lid but the sound is still trapped inside (muffled) cause you got your box on upside down.

It's not a backless banjo because the strings meet in the middle of the inside of the box.

So here's how to make the sound come out of the tub.

1. Turn it up the right way round
2. Cut 4 small holes on opposite sides.
3. Thread a piece of thin gauge plumbline cord through these holes to form a cross inside the tub.
4. Tighten these cross-strings as much as possible, use a stick through each loop to really tighten them.
5. Tie a similar piece of string through the middle of the cross so as to tie all the loops together.
6. Measure and tie this string to the top of your playing stick while the top is bent over to be above the centre point - about 45º.
7. Place one foot inside the bass, watch the cross-strings!! - a small piece of carpet or sheepskin down here makes it more comfortable for your foot to stand on - or you can also attach an exterior bass base.
8. If you can attach a stick cup on the lip of the tub use that, otherwise place the stick on the floor
9. Start picking

I'm not sure what you mean by a tuned port google says it's a type of turbo-charged fuel injection system and if so sir I take my hat off to you.

And put my crash helmet on.

I think though that you may mean some type of balanced output for plugging your bass into an amp or PA?

Well the easiest way to amp a Tea-Chest (which then means it don't matter which way the sound comes out so long as the joints don't creak) is to stick a little stick-on piezo-pick up on the outside (these are about £15-20 in music shops or Amazon and are sold primarily to let classical guitars, violins and mandolins etc be amp'd up without cutting holes in them.

These have a cable attached with a standard jack plug which you can then plug directly into any amp or PA that has a guitar jack input.

To get the best out of this type of unbalanced output though is to first plug the jack from the pick-up into a DI Box which then transforms it into a balanced signal and which has an XLR socket to attach a mic cable to.

A competent sound-engineer can thus transform the dullest of T-Tubs into the richness of tone more often associated with regular instruments.

I'm good tho because I stuck at learning how to play guitar and then when I finally learned how to play three chords, I kinda naturally how to find the right note at the right time for whatever other people are playing.

People ask me how I play it and I usually answer "Magic" hahaha

Nice vids and mp3's but I can't hear you too well without my headphones which I can't find at the moment and the vid clip doesn't show your tub,cept for a quick flash of the wooden top (bottom).

Send us more tho please.

In the meantime go and see me at http://www.youtube.com/nervouspaulvis#p/u/6/tWPAxbAnsIY

and tell me about resonance!!

Chow4Now

Paulvis -(: