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Thanks for the above folks, having done a little bit of digging around I found he has numerous ebay identities - five at least (some are linked to the account he bought with and some are not - and several comments on guitar forums about him doing what he has done here, sometimes even before he'd actually bought the guitar in question! He has a refund, I get to keep my 4003S

I got a half page in Bass Player magazine this month. What a hoot! I think I did the Q&A about ten months ago...I reckon half that gear and rig has found new homes now.

And some more piccies in the garden sun! I replaced the original string retainer bar as I got a comment that the Hipshot one on the ash bass I made looked much better. I quite agree!

UPDATE: as recommended, spoke to Ashdown, fantastic response as people said on here, so they stepped up to the mark, main option was to pop into Ashdown, they’d sort it there and then...then take it home...fantastic service but then the problem of location popped up....so me and the guy had a good laugh about that...genuinely nice guy to talk to....hadn’t heard of that type of problem with that model....so next suggestion , get in touch with retailer for exchange. Past experience, some retailers to be truthful don’t have the player at heart but this time (and I’m happy to name them now) PMT stepped up to the mark, said it’s not good an amp should fail on its first outing, arranged for a new model to be delivered and the faulty one uplifted at the same time...THE NEXT DAY! and as I’ve said, there is a stretch of water involved which usually complicates things and adds to cost as well. So new amp working well and I’m really happy. Apologies to other replies on here, I’ve had a hectic week, our “original” band has just released our first single and video to accompany it, and our covers band has been rehearsing non stop and playing at the same time...3 gigs this weekend coming , one a big outdoor show....so again, apologies for delay in replying and a BIG THANKS to those of you who offered advice, even the lend of gear and especially PMT and ASHDOWN for the fantastic service... heres our video by the way, love it if you could like our page and like and share our video. https://www.facebook.com/EndlessDivision/

Well the pedal gets a big thumbs up from me! Playing along to my (ex) band’s albums which were pretty light in the bass department, it delivers such a ‘produced’ tone that it just sounds like they’ve been remixed / remastered with better bass! I thought I was getting this effect from my B3K also, but now that tone sounds completely off. It’s funny how our ears adjust - I’ll probably change my mind next week! It’s made me change my technique for the better too, forcing me to play with a lighter more consistent touch and only dig in when I want to hear distortion. You can get a lot of sound variation just from how you play.

The band I was in, Inter managed to get a record deal. We were part of the post brit-pop scene and worked our rears off playing as much as humanly possible to build up a following. Started to get a name for ourselves and released a song on the Pet Sounds label and then later on our first single, Happy Ending in 1997. This got noticed by John Peel who said it was his favourite single of 1997 and gave us our first John Peel Session. This promoted us even further and it got to the point where Virgin were trying to decide to sign either us or The Stereophonics. They chose the Stereophonics in the end but we still managed to get a half decent record deal. We were all about 28 and got about £36k advance each for 3 years plus £5k to buy gear and then royalties from merchandise, sales etc. Going to the Bass Centre with £5k to go buy whatever I wanted was the best feeling in the world. I bought a Stingray, a Status and a massive top of the range Hartke rig 😊 We recorded our debut album at Loco Studios in South Wales which was where Oasis, The Manics, Stereophonics and many others had recorded stuff. The studio was also owned by Geoff Downes of Buggles fame and John Payne of Asia who both played on the album. We lived at the studio for three months in our own cottage and even had our own chef 😊 Our producer was Mark Wallis who has recorded with everyone but is most famous for recording the IT Bites album, The Primatives album, The Smiths, The Travis album and was the engineer on U2's Joshua Tree. Prior to choosing this producer we came very close to going to Seatle and recording the album with Rick Parasher who recorded Pearl Jam's Ten album but we told the record company no as we wanted to sound English still and not end up sounding like an American band. The album, titled Got My Nine sold 7k copies in the first week and we released 3 singles, National Paranoia, Speed Racer and Radio Finland. All got mainstream radio airplay and led on to a second John Peel Session, a live Virgin Radio Session and an XFM session. Also one of our tracks was used to advertise Casio G Shock watches in an advert for Spanish cinemas. We also did other TV stuff with tracks being used on Eurosport and Rebel TV. Q Magazine gave the album 4 out of 5. We continued to tour which was amazing with our own crew etc. and were doing really well but then things started to go wrong. We were getting offered some big things like going on tour with Feeder in Germany, film soundtracks, gigs in the States but the record company was saying no to it all. To cut a long story short, we found out we were being ran as a tax loss so initially the record company were happy to pump money in to us (the album alone cost £120k to record etc.) but as we started to get more successful they put the brakes on. We were literally being hung out to dry and missing out on great opportunities which at the time made no sense. Anyway, they breached contracts so we sued them and won and that was the end of it. It was incredibly hard work, constantly recording, touring, song writing, promoting, photo shoots, interviews etc. but I have no regrets as I lived my dream for 4 years, the best time of my life with the most amazing experiences. Plus I still get the odd royalty payment now and again 😊 More details below. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter_(band) Other things I've done is go on tour with Paul Weller in another band, supporting him for 4 nights at the Roundhouse in Camden and recorded an album at his studio in Ripley. He also played on the album and I had to teach him to play this piano part that we wanted. I've been the Bass player in a video for a charity song that ELO were recording. Played at Brixton Academy using The Levellers back line. Supported Cactus World News and Let Loose and best of all chatted to Andrea Corr whilst making a cup of tea 😍😍 Now I play in an amazing 50s and 60s cover band, doing about 100 gigs a year and totally loving it.

No worries Peter! Now sit back and watch the 2nd hand prices soar!!! 👍

I don't currently, but have a strong desire to start an Ian Dury tribute - as the vocalist

Started cutting and gluing!! I'm going to try to make 2 or 3 of these to try a few different things. First off is a sapele body, wenge veneer and maple top. The maple should look quite good when oiled (I'm hoping!!) Glued up sandwiches.... To make running wires through the body easier, I drill holes before gluing the two halves together. I then insert a straw in the hole to prevent any glue clogging it up when the halves are joined. To ensure I don't drill too far into the body, I draw the rough direction of the hole then mark the length with masking tape on the drill. The side have then been joined Then the outline of the bass is rough cut ready for routing

OK, one last time, these are small but the ones out there are far away.....

When I lived in Austin, used to go to Ed's bass emporium. Also watched him close up on upright, gigging in a duo with a guitarist at a pastry shop. My wife and I were front and center and the only one's giving our undivided attention. He sat with us during break and couldn't have been nicer. Quite the class act and wonderful musician.

I was in a band in the early 80s in Leeds... 2 of the members went on to become the Utah Saints, one went and joined the Rollins Band and one - the son of a famous agony aunt - went on to become a famous tv foodie and restaurant critic. I stayed resolutely unknown.

Great to see Ashdown on it!

Also where are you based? Would likely be much easier and in fact better for us to sort directly for you rather than shipping unnecessarily to the retailer and back etc if they are a distance away as you say...

Hi Torby, That's not good. Can you let us know a few more details and we will have a look at what we can do to get you sorted. Amp Model - Serial Number - Date Purchased - Retailer purchased from -

Cheers. That's given me more to look at. As if choosing wasn't hard enough!

You specify a case, butvthe gig bag which I think is included is more than up to the task

70 feet from my back door in my studio. Sod paying to rehearse or record again!

Yeh - you've hit the mail on the head - 3 times the size and 3 times the price of some separates. The Mooer Mod Factory does look good on paper - but the review (below) seems to be a fair one 'warts and all' and another instance of you get what you pay for (not always the case, I know)! Actually the query has been driven, in part, by my slight disappointment with what my Zoom MS-60B seems to be capable of delivering. I spent an hour knocking my MS-60B patches into shape with the ToneLib editor (which is such a good piece of free software for Zoom multifx pedals - I found the interface and editing was a bit tortuous before this excellent bit of software was made available). I basically need the MS-60B to cover off: tuner, and occasional use delay, tremolo, chorus and HPF*; I've got dedicated pedals for the rest. The MS-60B is just fine as a tuner, passable (but not amazing) on delay and HPF but I really struggled to get a tremolo that came close to the rich / vibrant tremolo I had previously got set up (with little effort) on my B3n. I guess the difference in processing power between it and the MS-60B is starting to show. The B3n is a great headphone / home use pedal but going to take up too much pedal board real estate given the occasional need for the various effects I'd be using it for. [Update: one of my fellow BCers suggested adding the 'Air' effect to the Tremolo and the Delay to give it a bit more reverb and that seems to have worked well] *and possibly bit-crusher after today's exchange with @dodge_bass! Most likely singly rather than together, although I can certainly see situations where being able to use in combination may be nice (but not critical) The Line6 stuff is also a little chunky and I guess if I was looking at the Line 6 m9, we're kinda getting into Helix HX territory in terms cost / size (and I guess I'm holding out for a Helix HX Mk2 with DI & headphones out and aux in and then I can upgrade my B3n! ) Mooer Mod Factory Review (on dV247): "Great idea, poor execution" 21.05.2014 Having seen some brilliant demos of this pedal, it took me a long time to reconcile with the fact that it actually doesn't sound that great at all and is very impractical for live situations. The most annoying factor is the significant DROP IN VOLUME whenever the pedal is engaged (for any of the sounds). Unfortunately, there is no volume control to offset this problem. It's unfortunate that Mooer went through all the trouble of making a pedal with such great features, but failed to get the details right for each of the features. When considering that it's a pretty low-priced pedal that takes very little pedal-board space, one of the first thoughts is: can I keep it for one or two good sounds? You be the judge: Chorus: not great, but okay; basic chorus effect is usable, but when tweaked, it doesn't blend well and sounds metallic and hollow. Flanger: does not sound like a flanger at all; no amount of tweaking will make it sound like a half-way decent one; in comparison, Mooer's Elec Lady is miles ahead and is a beautiful pedal, if you want a great flanger. Phaser: it's all right, not great; It is quite mild and no amount of tweaking will bring it to those sharp phasers used for cutting funky rhythms; if mild phaser is what you want, this will do. Envelope phaser: I was unable to find any good use for this. Tremolo: too mild, disturbs the guitar's tone. Stutter: I did not find any useful applications for this. Vibrato: I'm not a fan of this effect, so my opinion is negatively biased. Univibe: misleading function name -- did not resemble anything like the EH small stone (univibe). Auto-wah: I'm not a fan of this effect, so my opinion is negatively biased. Touch wah: envelope sweep not sufficiently responsive to be interesting; controls not sufficiently versatile to adapt to various forms of playing or signal output strengths. Envelope ring modulator: I'm not a fan of this effect, so my opinion is negatively biased. In summary, I am negatively biased for some of the features, but the ones that were of interest to me were somewhat weakly executed. I will keep the pedal for its small size and the usable chorus and mild phaser. It's hard to find even just these two sounds in such a small pedal. Although I will have to compensate with volume every time I engage the effect.

When I was at Ashdown a couple of months back the discussion got round to Sica speakers, more to lighten the load of my ABM410 than to increase power handling, and I was advised that they would make the cab sound "tighter".

Yep, on a gig like this I`d ideally try to be invisible, as in play for the songs, be solid and do the job that we`re there for, making the band sound good.

At a beer festival in rural Bucks last night, early evening slot so punters were still sober enough to recognise the choons! We played outside in a tent with 1 power socked and a coupla lumps of chipboard for the drumkit in persistent rain..It was brilliant! 1st outing for our new singist and he had a whale of a time...and we got asked back, so something went right My mic stand beer holder in shot there too...being put to its proper use!!

Here are two tracks from the Slowlight Quartet (as was). You can probably hear similarities to that 2nd track (dinosaur) it’s just going a bit more electronic....

Noel Gallagher is doing some decent tunes in my opinion, unlike his brother

wow, I mean WOW! what a cool post. I can't imagine breaking strings, on mine they just lay on the grooved barrels, I don't see how it could even happen... I play soft, and so far so good. LOL I like mine too much to change a thing, and my fingers ache just thinking of plucking so hard to break a string, but go for it my man, I found you on fb so I'm looking forward to hearing the power! but to have 5 Zodiacs is a heartwarming thing to hear, great to know there is some love out there for them! I'm thinking mine is taking over as #1, it's just that good. crazy how there's such a drastic difference with the white / rosewoods and confirms my suspicions that those were generally the ones which got these a quasi-bad rep, what a shame. my maple / burst with a bit of buckle rash was somebody's player and this gave me more confidence in choosing it, it paid off, or I simply lucked out ...just as good. how some of these could have thinner necks is shocking, if this neck was any thinner / skinnier it wouldn't exist! I like some chunk but damn if I didn't acclimate fast, it's super comfortable except at the nut where it just disappears. I'd been looking long and hard for the huge sound I'm getting and now I'm trying to ween myself off the desire for and old Gibson mudbucker or similar Fender Tele now that I've got that beefy tone, without the bad kinda mud. HAIL THE ZODIAC! https://www.facebook.com/chrismuzzbass/

We played an excellent little café-bar in Worcester on Friday... Only downside was that it was tiny - stage was the width of the supplied drum-kit plus bass amp which meant guitar amp and PA were in front of me and drummer with no vocal monitoring. And because the guitarist/singer was right in front of his guitar amp and in front of us he was in a little world of his own amongst the audience which made seeing cues difficult! Still, we played reasonably well, there were positive comments from the "crowd" and heard from the owner that a group of people were dancing in the main bar area, which was unfortunately shielded from us by a wall. Roll on Hereford next week - where we only get a 30 minute set and there's 10 bands on!

It's a shame he's not up for trades, I have a pre CBS P Bass, could add some cash too...

If you want to play it more often, Mick, I'd suggest you stop leaving it lying outside on the lawn ...

I have seen many advertisements of this nature over the decades and they really have absolutely nothing at all to do with forming a working band. A cursory analysis of the content reveals that the advertiser's true (if unconscious) purpose is to find some friends with a common taste in music and politics, and a desire to 'have a laugh together'. And - as in a lonely hearts ad - he'd like to see a picture of the respondent. Really, all that stuff about "dare to dream and believe in what their (sic) doing and would want to stay in the band" is the 19 yr-old male guitard's equivalent of "cosy evenings by the fire and looking for a long-term relationship". IMO, a band of this nature "rehearses" often but without direction, talks a lot, has loads of hissy fits about who likes who better and seldom if ever performs in front of an audience.

In the olden days it was possible to do things with hand tools - and still is You can plane wood to thickness using a number 5 jack plane, a good straight edge and a pencil. It takes a bit longer but can get just as good results, especially if you make yourself a sanding table by gluing 6 sheets of 120 grit to a sheet of mdf

85/86 I was writing songs with a guy who was an amazing singer but had difficulties with various addictions which had more or less brick-walled a promising career for him. We were taken under the wing of record producer who was well known up here in Scotland at the time and he bankrolled a proper full scale studio demo. He then hawked the tapes around various record companies and Polydor was the keenest. So he and I went down to London to meet with the record company. In the office, the A&R guy was going crazy about the songs - "This stuff is perfect for the States", "Fantastic Songs", "Great Singing and playing" etc. etc. As we left the meeting with hugely positive vibes, we held it together until the lift arrived and as soon as the doors closed, my producer friend was punching the air with delight. He had a lot of experience in the business and reckoned that a lucrative deal was virtually in the bag. Two days later, Polydor call him up. "It's XXX XXXXXX singing, isn't it?" was the question. Unfortunately, my singer's reputation for drug use and related unreliability cast a large shadow and the idea was dropped instantaneously. Fast forward about a year and I'm earning a crust playing for various cabaret acts. One is a Drifters tribute act and the promoter/ manager has the habit of bringing to the UK former stars of Motown or whatever who's careers have slid somewhat from the heady days of the 60s. One of these is Ben E King. As we're a Drifters band, we are chosen to back Ben E. for a tour. It all kicks off inauspiciously in the usual way for those things at that time with a smashed windscreen in the tour van in the middle of the night driving down from Scotland to the Isle of Wight- the first date of the tour is the end of season party for the staff at some holiday camp. That wild weekend was a story in itself but the tour went on at equally salubrious venues for a while till one day Ben got a call during the soundcheck. No mobiles - he was called away to the telephone. When he reappears, he says that apparently, due to the recent release of the Rob Reiner movie Stand by Me, his song of the same name which we open the set with every night has just gone to No 1 in the Uk charts! Suddenly, we're part of a 60s revival tour and are playing to packed houses in big venues that you've seen on tour schedules by the big bands - Liverpool Empire, Colston Halls, Bristol, Edinburgh Playhouse etc. Talk about 15 minutes of fame? Then Ben went back to the States and that was that. These two episodes in their own ways are my nearest misses but what the heck - I've now been playing the bass and gigging regularly since 1973 and I'm still going, still learning and still enjoying it!

You and your fetishism...

Just don’t mention the feet.

A Barefaced with peeling Tolex, surely not, next you’ll be telling us that the edges chip really easily, the handles are coming loose and there’s a strange rattling noise inside the cab. . .

Dakota - Stereophonics Hate.

Yamaha really are a great company. I can only see positive results with this. Whilst the Helix wasn't for me (at this current stage) the quality of it was fantastic. Let's hope they bring out some reliable lightweight SVTs!

Mull of Kintyre, fortunately one song I've never heard anybody else attempt (though no doubt someone will now post a youtube link of a cover version). Last year in a moment of madness I bought a season ticket for the first time in about 20 years, for football team I support, Forest (I know, I know, but my Dad started taking me when I was about 8), won't be doing that again, they play this bloody song twice a game, at the start of each half so the crowd can sing their own lyrics to it (mist rolling in from the Trent etc) hate it hate it. The most twee song McCartney ever wrote, from the master of twee songs.

@Ashdown Engineering are very helpful here.

Yep - Ashdown are a fantastic company to deal with.

No - we had it installed. Here it is fairly soon after installation (with a diddy 1x8 cab I knocked together) ...it has dulled down and gone silver/grey now though. Bloody heavy stuff!