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Probably a bit more practical though: the classic warning sign

I can see this thread going on for ages...

Just before Xmas I bought a set of Hipshots for my MIM Precision. The bass itself is great, but the tuners weren`t so, and as I`m going to be using this bass on a few overseas gigs this year (I ain`t flying with my US basses) wanted the tuners to be as good as I could get them. Reviews read, Hipshot HB7s ordered as a direct fit on MIMs. Except they weren`t, all screw-holes lined up ok, but the supplied ferrules/bushes were too small, and the Hipshot tuning pegs rattled in the Fender ones. So I e-mailed Hipshot asking where I could purchase a set of these, and they said just send us your address and we`ll put a set out to you, no charge. Received them today, fit like a glove. Quality customer service imo, so a big thumbs up to them. And have to say, the tuners are a real quality bit of kit, much smoother than the stock Fender ones.

That's not the words, it happened to me in Venezuela where a friend invited me to dinner with his family and at the table I asked his youngest sister if I could have a spoon and suddenly a deafening silence and after receiving what seem like an eternity of stares I asked if I said something wrong...

I was close, I said '92!

Lana Del Ray is just awful, I don't understand how that rubbish exists. Not a legal viewpoint. The melody of the song, the inflection in the vocals, the misery, it's a "tribute" to Creep undoubtedly. I would rather Radiohead issued a complete cease and desist against her career.

I guess for 99% of gigs you won't be sustaining notes on the bass guitar for very long, so fair enough. Personally I like to play some weird stinky poo and sustain is often essential

Update. A full refund has been issued with no comment. I should receive in 6 days. So a happyish ending :-)

+1 To the OP - In my experience a bass that sustains well usually sounds better than average on the rest of the notes. Sustain is essential to have but that doesn't mean that you have to use it on every note, but if you need it and the bass can't sustain then it's not a good instrument.

Problem solved on the Line 6 forum. Go to command centre and select one of the 'lightning bolts' at the top. Then just enter all the midi details that correspond with the channel and patch of the Strymon, save and job done. Each time I solve a problem like this I marvel at how good the Helix is. Probably the best designed piece of kit I have ever used.

For me its a great tool for dynamics. Letting it ring sounds great, but also adds to a sudden stop of silence. You may not notice if if you had decent basses. I had a usa precision which had loads of sustain, then i moved to a cheapo jazz copy and the difference was amazingly bad! The sustain couldnt even last a bar never mind any longer.

Great question. I think it’s just another tool for us to use depending on the music your producing. I find it really useful in a lot of the Fretless stuff I play. It lends itself to using sustain as the very nature of Fretless is the ambiguity of the note. The “left hand wobble” it has its place

I listened to them this morning and have to agree. But then again supposedly Radiohead were sued for ripping off 'All I Need Is The Air That I Breathe' by The Hollies, so they haven't really got a leg to stand on!

Trace Elliot Series 6 Type 7215 GP7 1X15 300W Combo Back in the day, I was one of the few bass players who didn't use a Trace Elliot rig. When I saw them on sale at that time (late 80s/early 90s) they seemed quite expensive and I got the impression they were solely for Mark King-alikes who favoured the now-infamous slapping style that was all over the place then… In short, it was a hairdresser’s amp and not suitable for muscular Ampeg men such as myself. So I didn't ever have the Trace experience. In the intervening years, I've explored pretty much every other brand and every possible format of bass amp and cab with varying degrees of satisfaction. But then I saw more and more threads about old Trace gear, both here and elsewhere and was intrigued… …mainly because some threads insisted Trace gear sounded terrible, Trace owners wore waistcoats and looked at themselves in the mirror a lot, Trace was a one-trick pony and the gear was incredibly heavy because it was full of concrete. Others praised Trace to the skies, citing a big sound, a huge variety of tones not available elsewhere and claiming lifelong allegiance to the cause. Some very polarised views, then… but they can’t both be right, can they? This cognitive dissonance will not stand! So when I saw a Trace combo up for sale on BC, I thought ‘why not?’ It can only be terrible. Or great. I’ll find out. Got the combo home and plugged in my Jazz Bass - it sounded terrible. So I fiddled with the EQ for a while and it was better, but not great. After quite a bit of fiddling and button-pressing and bone-headed persistence, I got some acceptable results, but there was an overall baked-in aspect to the sound I couldn't seem to get rid of, a sort of Marcus-type twangy vibe. I fiddled for a bit longer (fnarr), upped the input gain quite a bit, then loaded a play-along CD into my Linn system which I set at near-battle levels, to see what the combo would do in concert, as it were - and suddenly there it was - without changing anything, the tone was at once lush, muscular and taut - and without the twang, or rather it was still there, but it now served to make the notes articulate and present, without being in any way offensive. Nice tight bottom end, too - I eased down the 50hz slider somewhat to avoid speaker stress, raised the 100Hz a db or two and all was good. Very good. It is a big, chunky sound that puts a stupid grin on your face. I strongly suspect it will be a cracking live amp. Trace obviously made gear that was meant to be taken out into the world and gigged with a band, not used solo in a bedroom. Tip: Leave the Mid Pre Shape button alone and avoid the ‘smiley face’ EQ curve. A word on LOUD: According to physics, a watt is a watt is a watt, but any layman will tell you that valve watts seem louder than solid state watts. I can tell you that Trace SS watts seem louder than, er… other SS watts. And by some margin. I need to do a lot more research, but apparently this 7215 combo delivers around 180-200 watts into its internal speaker which provides an 8 ohm load. There is an additional output socket on the rear of the combo to allow an additional 8 ohm cab to be used. It will then produce the full 300 Trace watts into 4 ohms, which must be truly seismic. All GP7 combos use custom Celestion drivers, it says here. In use, it comes on at least as 'loud' as a regular 500W @ 4 ohms Class 'D' amp and that’s without using an extension cab. I can’t imagine ever needing one - the combo on its own is punishingly loud and must have been astonishing back in the day, largely because it’s astonishing now. It is also built like a tank and the spec of this one puts it at a scrotum-busting 35kg - however I don’t think it’s genuinely that heavy, as it’s a do-able two-handed lift into my hatchback. Lift with your legs, lift with your legs… huppp. Having said that, I wouldn't like to carry it very far… Barefaced it is not. I now keep a folding sack truck in the car. And a truss. So there you have it. As you know, I've been on the gear merry-go-round for decades. Could it be that if I had bought this combo in 1993 I wouldn't have needed anything else and could have put an end to amp and cab GAS right there and then, saving myself a fortune in the process? We’ll never know. Will I now recommend that you madly rush out and buy up loads of old Trace gear? I will not. Because I don’t want the price to go up. You probably wouldn't like it, anyway…

As said a long way up the thread - why would you not value sustain? Ok my first (and still favourite) bass has exceptional sustain, and so I most naturally play that way - but I can play a controlled staccato by damping when it's wanted, or let a note ring for two or even three bars when that sounds right. I can play an open string and let it ring as a drone while I develop the line on the other strings. I can hold a single root note for each bar through a frenetic lead guitar solo so I'm just anchoring it and not distracting from it. I can run a slow gentle bassline through a blues or folk ballad and keep in that groove. When I play my son's super new MIA Fender P I just feel frustrated, the notes die so quickly that I don't have the range of expressive options I'm used to. Fair enough if you're just playing punchy rock'n'roll, but much beyond that, sustain opens up so many musical options, how could you not want it? All imho of course :-)

Agreed. Bit like drum mics - any drum mics will do (within reason) - it just depends how much you want to faff with working the sound to the desired results. Other mics may get you there directly/quicker.

As promised... 150x150px

Absolutely. Jealous. I was playing in the late 90’s when it was all unkempt hair and parkas. Tragic.

But only partly, right?

See. That green/blue (not to mention the outfit) it looks nice

I've just been reading through the responses on here. Have I got this right:- 1) Some people have basses which need modification to get sustain. 2) Some people smack their basses so hard the strings come off the bridges 3) 99% of people bash away on rudimentary basses and amps where sustain is not required. All I can think is gor blimey. But seriously, have we finally found a differentiator here between the designs which were got right in the long and distant past (but need modification to make them sustain so weren't that good after all) and the more recent makes and more recent iterations of 'vintage' designs which amongst other things, correct this flaw. Good grief - you learn something every day 😂

He does sell PCBs, but even with my embarrassingly large farnell discount it only came out a few quid cheaper to source the bits myself, so for the convenience I plumped for a kit.

I've never been hugely fussed - except I know I don't like Rotosounds. They have a really corse finish that puts shivers up my spine. Not in a good way!! I've been using SIT strings for a while and get on well with those. They're a bit tricky to get in the UK though.

How aboiut a little blue flame inside the circle; a bit like the British Gas one (but not the same, obviously )? ETA: Ooops! crossed posts. Still think it's a good idea in blue though...

Well I was going to change the british gas icon to orange I'll run a poll once we have a few suggestions!

Still more than a pint costs, and I know which I'd rather have!

I have. It cost me a whole fiver, and frankly, I was done.

Ah yes that rings a bell. When I ordered mine Mark @ Ashdown told me that I'd just nipped in before the price of neodymium was expected to increase. I didn't realise they'd stop making them altogether tho. Shame as they're bloody good cabs.

-

Would it have coincided with the massive increase in price of neodymium magnets a few years back?

Put together this video yesterday, quite new to recording so excuse the EQ! but I think it represents the tone of this bass quite well

A little more progress

Or if you are 'down with da kids'... skonnz?

Could they also explain what 'money' is, as I am a bass player as well..

show off

Sustain is one of those things that comes up time and time again in bass guitar discussion. I've never known a bass that couldn't sustain a note longer than I'd ever reasonably want to play it for. I've known some cheaper instruments have a particular decay of certain harmonics that made it sound 'weak' or as if the fundamental fades quickly, but they have been few and far between.

Just out of interest that is very close to the shape I use on my Ashdown JJ head .

Nice playing, the EMGs compliment the Ibanez well and the amp sounds great. If it is good enough for Victor Wooten

To all the lovers of Tapewound strings...you should be buying Status tapewounds!! Well, if they had any in stock... (When)They're available in 40s and 45s and are priced at around £16 for a four string set. The medium length are long enough for your typical 34" scale bass even though Rob doesn't advertise them as that - if you ask Dawn she'll confirm that I have bought several sets and that they've been fine. I use them on several of my basses and get loads of positive comments. I think Disgrace of Bass was the last, on Thursday just gone. Nick Smith loved them. Now the reason, for those who don't already, to hate me...when I found out they were running low, I, and two other BCers, bought up the last 10 sets they had. I recently sold a fretless with them on and the buyer doesn't want them. I've a few "spare" sets but they're not for sale. Tonewise, if Leo had fitted these to his basses way back when we may never had steel or nickel strings.

Absolutely no reflection on your Maruszczyk or its quality, but I'll be surprised if you find an SB315 is much of a step down!

So he's not a deviant then? Phew!

Not again, please.