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It was nice meeting everybody and I found the guitar makers presentations fascinating. Well worth the drive!

I`d bet on small intimate gigs with a lot of ambience, Pete

We had a blast of a gig at The Inn, Greatworth near Banbury last night. I expected a country pub with a couple of chilled out villagers. No, we got a pub full of the most ‘up for it’ party people we’ve seen for ages! Greatworth appears to be the kind of village where everyone goes out to the local at the weekend; it’s just far enough out of town that it’s easier to stay in the village than start getting into taxis etc. We were squashed into a corner of the bar which meant we were eyeball to eyeball with the friendly crowd, who made us very welcome incidentally, which I always enjoy. Pretty much the whole pub was up and dancing from the word go, and didn’t sit down all night. We were still playing at midnight, they wouldn’t let us stop. Really good tone from my MIM Jazz Deluxe and Genz Benz rig, sounded great. When we were packing down I asked the landlord if the residents minded bands playing into the early hours? ‘No’, he said, ‘they’re all in here!’ We left having made some new friends and a return booking for later in the year - can’t wait to go back!

Ozric Tentacles - Paper Monkeys

Well done folks another cool n casual outing on a nice sunny day. Maybe next year if im around i can bring along a mcmillan 12 step for anyone thinking of midi backing in their band?

A great afternoon out. Thank you.

@Jabba_the_gut shows us some wood ... and templates

We find out who was really responsible for JFK's assassination? Westside Distribution to close citing "falling profit margins?" Darkglass to lower prices of pedals? Ashdown to admit that the Geezer Butler head is total pony? Miranda Hart to become the new Gibson CEO? There is so much good news out there, I wait with baited breath.

@Andyjr1515 shows us more roll than rock in the live veneering demonstration

I’m always very happy when I get to play with my DB112 cabs on a decent stage, they put out a lovely old school round sound. However, if I had to buy two new replacement 112 cabs, I wouldn’t buy two new ones, as the prices have gone pretty mental and here in Europe there are plenty of reasonably priced alternatives!

Looking at the bridge in more detail, it’s screw points are at each corner, so replacing the bridge will involve drilling new holes and filling existing holes. No big deal, but as changing the bridge is purely for cosmetic reasons I might just leave it and get an ashtray. Here’s what I think of it so far...

Got the top shaped and arm carve done, just got the belly carve to do tomorrow I wasn’t 100% happy with the top horn so I took a little bit off the bottom to thin it out a tad which I think looks better

And it begins! Bass players are even talking to each other instead of having a slap-off 😂

Mine arrived yesterday too. Not had long with them but definitely very happy. Far more bottom end than I was expecting and good separation of lows, mids and highs. I'll tweak eq today and then save an eq setting for them on the XR18 so I could pull that up if I ever need to use them at a gig.

I had a really nice JJ jewel, which I used at work to take soul band rehearsals. It had got knocked over once before and had a hairline crack around the neck pocket. One day we were working on ‘performance’ and they decided I should demonstrate the Pete Townsend leap I was on about, which I promptly did. Upon landing, I felt the strings go slack and the body drop, which I caught. Looking down the neck was completely separated from the body. I put the dismembered guitar on the floor and the trumpet player asked me ‘Is it dead sir?’ When I confirmed i thought it indeed was he picked up his instrument and played the last post as solemnly as he could manage, the cheeky begger.

Mine are really growing on me too... Undoubtedly great value and I'd highly recommend!

Got the body all cut and sanded..... I should get the shaping done tomorrow, but I now need to wait till the neck and pickups arrive so I can make the router template hopefully they should be here by the end of the month.........

My 1st gig of the year was on Saturday night depping for the Flotonics. Their singer is our function band's ex singer and asked me to dep about 4 months back. It's been 4 months of slowly absorbing 30 old skool soul numbers. The 2 rehearsals leading up to the gig impressed me. The guitarist has a cellar full of equipment so you just bring your instrument and plug in (drummer has the choice of 2 kits). We rattled through 28 tunes in about 2hrs and then chat over a pint in the pub. No other band I've been in has that work rate. Gig itself was in Laverstock just outside Salisbury. Nice, friendly boozer but with a hen night on as well (mmm...pub rates with a party going on!). During soundcheck one of the party seemed very drunk and started making herself known to the band, telling us to keep playing and asking us "do you know any Queen?" She must've passed out soon after as I didn't see her again all evening. Once we started the hen party were right there dancing and only stopped for fag breaks and the bit where the hen kisses/gropes/tries to purloin a pair of pants from a punter. Odd venue for a hen do but in the end they were our crowd and enjoyed it most, everyone else just watched. 1st gig playing 5 string (ibanez sr1205), 1st gig depping. Very good musicians so I really worked hard for this gig. Drummer Ley was in a band signed to CBS in the early 70s and you could tell, his drumming was some of the best I've had the pleasure of laying down a groove to. Singer is ex pro too. Guitarist and keys are of equally high standard with fantastic BVs. They seemed to enjoy my take on some of the basslines and were very complimentary (I hope they weren't just being nice). Anyway, job done. I'm happy, punters were happy, rest of band happy. Looking forward to their bassist dropping out again .

Thanks for the Wal link – I see that the rareguitarheaven outfit get some rather scathing reviews – I'll almost certainly get someone around these parts to build it for me as I'm a fussy git – I'll make a fresh post once the build is underway, don't hold your breath though!

I hope the pedal will be centre piece on the table, and a prayer said before playing it

I have been waiting this pedal for about 2 years, about the only thing that stopped me getting the amp

Apologies, that was cruel. I got distracted as I had a chainsaw in my other hand. Aaaaannyywayyyy i suggest booking an early Friday finish next week as I think we will all be wanting to get home for the postie!

@Al Krow Swap tall for thick wasted and the tall award goes @CameronJ

What's the matter, no kebab last night

Maybe he was playing with food poisoning.

My Warwick Corvette used to be Dan’s. I bet his Dingwalls are looked after better than the Warwick was...

It's BASH DAY!!!!!! And a splendid morning for it too See you all later.

I feel so privileged to be playing with these guys. They really do put their heart and soul into every performance. This is one of my favourite moments from this gig. Everyone is right on the money here. Strangely my IEM mix had deteriorated (I'm not entirely sure why) to the point that I really couldn't hear any sax at all. So, its been quite nice listening back through all the video to what our multi-talented guy stage right was doing - he also plays bass and drums as well as guitar, sax and being able to sing!

Livin the dream Blue!

Skindred- Big Tings. loving it.

Now that is sexy. Thinking of selling of a couple items to buy one. I hope the wife and goldfish find a good home.

I currently have one, even though I have replaced it, but I’ll still happily share my thoughts I bought mine after watching quite a few different video reviews, at the time I had managed to get through a Darkglass Alpha Omega, Sansamp VT Bass DI, and a Sansamp Deluxe Programmable Bass Driver. Each pedal was great for certain tones, but I struggled to find that perfect type of distortion. The Alpha Omega was far too much of everything and I really struggled to find a sound I liked. The VT Bass was nifty but the drive was more tube like and not gritty enough for me. The BDDI was a bit better, but I found it heavily coloured my tone and that in order to get that Sansamp sound, you had to really compress your tone and I felt I was loosing too much of my tone. After a couple of videos of the Battalion, straight away I much preferred the distortion on it, and the added features of compression and a noise gate, as well as an extensive EQ section for both clean and distortion. I managed to sell the last Sansamp and it paid for it comfortably. Straight away when I plugged it in, it felt more neutral, my clean tone wasn’t too coloured by any tube emulation, it gave that tiny bit more control over my tone instead of only relying on the amp. The distortion was instantly more to my taste, it was merely finding the sweet spot for the blend and I was loving it. I used it for in-ear rehearsals many times and never had a problem dialling in my tone. The compression is actually pretty good for what it is, I use a TC Spectracomp for my compression so I never needed it too much. The fact you can’t adjust the compression ratio/threshold etc...does put some people off from using it, but set to about 10 o’clock seemed to be the best place for me. The noise gate is a cool extra, but as some reviews make note of, it’s not the best, it’s functional but a bit clunky and can give unwanted noises in your signal chain. I’ve only recently replaced it with a Darkglass B7K Ultra V2 after being impressed by the new cab sim options and more options for mid control. So since then it’s been sat on my desk looking sad for it self. I would recommend it for its price and features alone, it’s a great bit of kit even if you don’t use everything on it. I hope that helps mate

Mine landed this morning. Luckily, I've had a day off for a long long weekend so them dropping through the door was good timing. Haven't spent long with them but initial thoughts are that they're AN AWFUL LOT of ear candy for not a lot of money. Considering the cost of them, they sound pretty impressive. I A/B'd them against my 1964 Ears V8s. TBH, the V8s sounded far more convincing, controlled and "expensive" than the KZ10s but given the huge cost differences, I'd not be surprised. But, and here's the but, whilst the KZ10s sounded more "agricultural" in the upper mids and top end, a bit of EQing sorted some of that out. They've massive low end. Really impressive for such a cheap pair of phones. Again, pulling back a tiny bit of the lows really helped tighten things up. All in all, I can't believe how good these are for the money.

Not gear, but when our singer fell off the side of the stage at one gig i couldn't stop laughing for the rest of the song. I am not a nice person lol.

Just bought a P bass harness from Tomas. Arrived super quickly and a great guy to deal with. Many thanks.

Forum rules don't allow rickenbackers in the bc marketplace because the bods at rickenbacker are a bit mad.

And an update to this, I`ve now used my MIM Precision with the Toneriders in a couple of times and have to say I`m really pleased with them. My sound nirvana is the Fender Custom Shop 62 Reissue, as per my US Standard Precisions, and these Toneriders are very near to those indeed. I`ve just ordered another set for my other MIM Precision, and am now going to gig my MIMs rather than take my US basses out on the road.

Met up with Al Krow on Saturday for a VK 210 swap. Great gear and very easy process. Also had a great time geeking bass and band stories. Great to meet another bass player of a certain age

Tuning should always be done silently, or as silent as possible for acoustic instruments. Not a soul in the world wants or needs to hear the sound of tuning.

Looks really nice, Thats definitely one of the nicest looking Ignition basses I have seen, in fact that sunburst is done better than a lot of the contemporary series Hofner's I have seen, I love my Hofner CT club bass but the ignitions being fully hollow (CT series is semi hollow) are tempting (will be a few years before I can splash out on the German made Hofners)

She’s naked, but she’s beautiful. Thanks for the steer @John_P!