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With interest rates low I haven't bought an ISA this year. I managed to persuade Mrs Tut that a vintage bass would be a great investment and to my amazement she agreed. I'm not really a precision man but I reckon they're always going to be pretty good for resale. I've got little hands, so when this one came up reasonably local on here, with a 'B' width neck I decided to make further enquiries. Having asked the seller (from this site) the relevant questions, I put a lockdown deposit down a couple of weeks ago and drove over to Berkhamsted yesterday for a socially distanced collection. She's a 1974 model. All original with the only issues being some battle scars and a broken tip to the scratchplate. I got it home and gave it a thorough check over and I was immediately struck by how resonant it was. It was supplied with flats and had a bit more relief and a slightly higher action than I'd have preferred. I've already got a P with flats on so I set this one up with rounds. I've adjusted the relief, finding the truss rod to be working perfectly and pulled the action down to a more than acceptable 2mm at the 12th fret on the E string. A couple of the tuners are a bit stiff, which I can live with. There was a pretty serious crackle on the input jack but this soon disappeared with some switch cleaner. Pushed through my Peavey VB-2 and Big Baby 2 it gives a lovely classic rock tone. Although bought as an investment, it's inevitable that I'll gig it sooner or later, so I've equipped it with some Dunlop straplocks. Happy Tut! Some pics below - enjoy!

I have had the privilege to work on a couple of Wals since I started this crazy hobby and, without any hesitation, they are my favourite basses. Everything is SO well engineered and the instruments just feel and sound - great! It's one of the absolute delights of the regional Basschat Bass-bashes because the kind folks round here let maniacs like me actually pick them up and play them. So, anything that I can do that can keep a Wal working or get playing again is always of interest. So you can imagine how excited I was to be contacted by our very own @Fishman who explained that he had some Pro 1e components and could I get it all playable again. 'Sure! Send them to me." Gosh - a Pro 1e! Happy Days The box was smaller and lighter than perhaps I might have expected. Well - maybe it's a particularly lightweight version...even MORE exciting because sometimes they can, indeed be on the heavy side Oh...that's odd... Well - definitely a Wal! That is the best pickup in the industry in my opinion: Well, OK - I'll admit that @Fishman did mention that it needed a new body. And the fretboard is coming off and being replaced with an ebony fretted one with a couple of AJR swifts at the 12th, requested by @Fishman so that there can be no ambiguity that this isn't a full genuine Wal (oh...and because they DO look pretty cool ) This is the kind of job I can slot in while the relevant machines are out for @Jus Lukin 's build (my cellar isn't big enough to leave the bigger stuff in situ) so it won't be a super fast affair but I am looking forward to it. Oh - and I've got a lovely piece of lightweight swamp ash for it (ignore the outline - don't worry, it won't look like a Fender I'll keep you guys and gals posted

Bass arrived this morning played it for a couple of hours and I love it. If you're looking to nail the Peter Hook sound and more this is the bass to do it just add a chorus pedal and your done.

Well, I had one of these a while ago in Pillar Box Red with a beautiful maple neck. It was stunning and played superbly but weighed about 10 and a half pounds which was too much for me. I loved it though and the sound from the 2eq preamp was just so right. Anyway, this one came up a short while ago for a very good price and weighed in at just a shade over 9lbs but even from the photos I could tell it was absolutely filthy. I spoke to the buyer though and negotiated a good price for it and thought I'd take a chance. It arrived yesterday, scarily, by Hermes, so I wasn't entirely sure it would ever arrive. Anyway, it did and after renewing my tetanus shot, I went about taking it apart for a good inspection and a clean. It's all-original but the previous owner must have sweated like a horse (think Barry White wearing a Cagoule while doing star jumps in a sauna and you have the right idea). I replaced as many screws as I could as they were rusted through and gave the pickup a good clean with a toothbrush and a bit of WD40 as the pole pieces were black. The neck is good and the frets are fine, but the body has take a bit of a bash over the years but it looks like good honest gigging marks to me. The back however looks like to was played by C3PO with his shirt off. Buckle rash? It looks more like woodworm. Nonetheless, it's going to be played, not displayed. I restrung it and then went about intonating it and setting up the action. It was a nightmare: everything was okay apart from the A string which kept choking out around the 9th fret. I tried everything from adjusting the relief, saddles, adding a shim and even tapped the frets with my wife's crafting hammer but it was no good. It was only then that I noticed the brand new A string from Ernie Ball had dents all the way along it. I replaced it with another string and well, problem solved. After all that faff, it plays great and sounds really, really good. I'm very pleased with my afternoon's work.

My BBPH arrived this afternoon and after about an hour of playing and 20 minutes of tweaking I thought I'd give a few first impressions. The fit and finish is superb. A typical Yamaha in that respect. No sharp fret ends, a lovely gloss finish with satin for the neck and headstock except for the face which is gloss. The back of the neck feels great to play and won't get sticky even on those hot and humid days I guess. I initially thought, urghhh, steel wounds and I immediately ordered some nickels. I hate the coarse draggy feel of some steel wounds. The action was okay, quite playable but I could see room for a little setup work. Fitting the supplied battery was interesting. The battery door is quite flimsy and thin and isn't attached by a ribbon. The battery pops in and immediately pops out again as it's sprung from inside. You have to hold it in place and use the door (that's now on the floor) to secure it properly. If the flimsy door were to fall off the battery would jump out. The tones available - awesome. I was completely blown away in passive and active doesn't add a huge boost but it gives greater control to sculpt the tone from the single pickup. I'm not sure what modifications have been made for Peter Hook's preference but bass and mids are very useable with extremes I wouldn't use and treble more so. The chosen frequencies seem great for what I do, pop, rock and blues covers. When tuning up I get a feel for neck stability as say my Fender will waver a little on the tuner while settling down with the one piece neck. The tuner was bang on, it's a lovely stable 5 piece neck! It's slightly neck heavy but nothing that a forearm on the body doesn't address. The tuners seem robust and function well. I initially found the centre detents on the EQ controls difficult to find but after adjusting the pots a few times the centre position was much more distinct. After playing for an hour I was finding the strings becoming pleasant to use. I realise that Mick has identified them as D'Addario nickels (strung through body) and I can go with that now and they are actually great. I won't change them now they've bedded in a little. The bass came with very little neck relief (a smidge) and a reasonable action, in itself a good sign. The saddles had been adjusted to follow the radius of the fretboard, a pointless exercise that can cause issues. I flattened them out and wound down the saddles a good deal. The action is now spot on, quite low, no buzziness and still only a tiny amount of neck relief. So the fretwork/neck is great. I'm very impressed. A couple of minor issues went away with playing and the quick setup I did took the bass in a very positive direction. Maybe stick a ribbon to the battery door? Oh and the proper Yamaha badge (no decal this) on the headstock is a nice touch for this motorcyclist. Peter Bass shed:

You're GASsing like a proper old Basschat lag now... Well done, carry on.

Sometimes making just a small effort pays off 😂

Officially, all four of these basses are white.

Quick update the barncaster bass is now the skacaster bass!

Just a quick intro to say hello. I have been playing music for about 25 years and have been a bassist for about 4 years. I joined my current band Oneyedog about 3 years ago and am never happier than when playing music with others. Of all the groups of instrument players to be a part of, couldn't be happier it's the bass community. What a generally lovely bunch of people. Hope to be of help in posts at some point or at the very least contribute an amusing quip or two. See you in the forum!

So why do I make sure I have the timber and some of the hardware before I make a proper start? Well, for a through-neck the geometry has to be right otherwise it is major grief. Whereas on a bolt-on you can alter the neck pocket and neck angle, with a through neck that angle has to be right. And - as many of you know - when it comes to neck angles, a few mm here or there can make a big difference. And so I need to have hold of the actual bridge and see how far forward and back the saddles will go, and how much actual usable adjustment there is in terms of height. I need the fretboard blank because I need to know what my finished fretboard depth is going to be so that I can draw the string line against the bridge movement limits and that lets me work out the neck angle. And then with the actual neck blanks available on hand, I can work out the most economical way of achieving that angle (eg, can I get two splices from one blank or not) So today - with the bridge here and now the timber blanks in hand, I've got out the long rulers and set-squares to draw up the geometry. So first - on the bridge, where do the saddles sit in relation to the base and how much intonation movement is there? Then I can I work out where the bridge - and therefore the bass body - needs to be in relation to the nut. On intonation range, the Nova bridge score is off the scale. First, by fitting a dummy string, I could work out the maximum and minimum practical intonation movement achievable without string interfering with the bridge components. That worked out, I could now set the Bottom E right back and the Top G right forward. That gives me a whopping 9mm usable intonation movement! : But that's not all. Because there are four positions that each saddle unit can be fixed to : That gives an additional 38mm movement from the furthest forward to the furthest back - a total of 47mm!!! We're into multi-scale territory without even having to fit the individual bases (which Nova can supply in any case ) So top marks on that one. And it takes ALL the worry out of fitting the bridge in the wrong place (not that I would EVER do that ) The saddle height range, however, is more limited. I could only get 5.5mm reliable height adjustment of the saddle (reliable meaning where I could still fit the locking grub-screw). However, the base is generously thick (bodes well for the tone! ) at 6.5mm and so if, like me, you intend to sink the base into the bass top, you can practically sink it up to a further 6mm without interfering with anything, giving a total 'design safety factor' of around 11mm in the event of the neck angle not ending up quite to plan. So two big ticks for Nova. Then I hit what I thought was a snag. I always keep sets of 'setup' strings so that I don't k****er new strings with all of the build set up and stringing and restringing stuff. So I just pulled a random test string from my bits drawer - and then hit what I thought was a snag. The ball end was too big to allow the adjuster to slide into the saddle-holder: That's odd, I thought. I checked that it was fully seating and it was. While not overly difficult to fix - either by deepening the ball end socket on the unit, or filing the ball end down - it seemed unusual that this wouldn't have been picked up in such a well engineered item. So I opened a pack of new D'Addario strings and: Perfect. So I then tried a Newtone big fat B string: Perfect again. And all the other makes I had in the drawer. I've no idea what make the first one was that I tried, but my conclusion is that this isn't an issue with the Nova bridge - it is more an issue with that particular string manufacturer's balls... Tomorrow, I will finish calculating the angles and start getting a few neck splices cut. Oh - and yes - we're going for a 9-piecer: Thanks for looking

No. It’s staying, it’s a very very lovely thing.

My Lightwave Saber fretless with Heavyweight Wal...

There you go.

Having played in both covers bands and originals bands here's my take: I have to say up front that I learnt to play because I wanted to be a songwriter/composer and therefore I am probably biased toward playing music that I have had a part in writing but: Before I'd actually done it for my self playing in covers bands (so long as you were doing the right kind of music) looked like it could be a lot of fun, so when the chance came to join a covers band one of my good friends was in I jumped at it. For me the whole experience was a big disappointment. They had a set list full of songs I'd enjoyed as a teenager so we should have been great, but I always felt that were simply weren't doing the material justice, without actually being able to put my finger on what exactly wasn't right about our performance. Often when playing gigs I felt that the audience would have been better served with a DJ and a well chosen playlist. In several cases dissecting the songs so I could learn how to play them killed off any enthusiasm I might have to listening to them in a non-band context - there are more than a couple that I liked beforehand that I will be quite happy to never ever hear again. The other problem was that the originals band that I was also playing in at the same time, was doing much better in just about every aspect of being in a band. There's a big myth about covers bands making more money than originals, and while I didn't actually "make" any money out of either, the originals band always had cash in the band fund to pay for things like the rehearsal room, fuel for the van, recording, and producing merchandise items. The covers band money seemed to disappear in a never-ending round of repairs and upgrades to the PA and lighting systems and despite having the cheapest rehearsal space ever, each band member was expected to pay their share of the costs each time. Another thing that never gets taken into account is payment versus time spent and expenditure by the individual band members. A gig with the covers band would take up a good 6-7 hours of an evening, being at the venue early so we could set up both the band equipment and the PA and lights before most of the audience got there, and often still be there after the last punter had left packing everything away again. With the originals band we could (if we wanted) arrive about 20 minutes before we were due to play. The PA and lights would be supplied by the venue (and have been for every originals gig I have done from the late 80s onwards) so we didn't have worry about them, and often drums and backline would be as well. We would usually stay until the end, because that's when we'd sell the most merch, but we could have left at any time after we had finished playing. The originals band would travel together in the band van, or if we knew that there was a decent backline supplied, and the gig was less than a couple of hours away, we'd all cram into a single car with our instruments, keeping the travelling costs down. It also meant that everyone including the singer would be there to help carry and set up the gear. The covers band would turn up each one in their own car, and invariably someone with an important part of the PA or lighting rig in their car would be late. With the originals band there would almost always be free drinks and, more often that not, food supplied by the venue. I can't ever remember getting fed and/or watered playing covers. And while the gig fee for the covers bands was usually higher, after merch sales the originals band would almost always come away from the gig with more profit. I ended up having the quit the covers band because the originals band was playing almost every weekend, and no longer had time to be in two gigging bands no matter how infrequent the other band's gigs might be. And while this particular originals band stopped gigging 5 years ago (we've never officially split up) I still make money from them in the form of PRS royalties, record sales, and streaming/download payments.

Just take a music stand, then people will be so angry they won't even notice.

Talking of which, my effort this month appears to be a jazzy musing over a bass improvisation of Auld Lang Syne. Just got bagpipes and robot chickens to add! And I'll get my first apology in now...

Here we are with Black screws, although some look silver in the light!

I also had a Status GP, Aria Steve Bailey, 2 Fender Marcus Millers, a Sadowsky RV4...and a 75 p. they're all gone now, and what remains above is the culmination of much research. Also bought a new interface and a Zoom H4n

Heres the whole Ibanez family that's staying after recent purchases.

Oh man, this band looks and sounds like a whole lot of fun! Really enjoyed that.

At least refusing to ever play in a covers band means that you're not so far along the Dunning-Kruger spectrum that you're not capable of recognising that you're not a good enough player to be able to manage it. FTAOD, I'm in one covers band, one originals band, and two bands that play both originals and covers. And I like winding up snobs on both sides.

Big shout out for Thomann. The bass I ordered (B stock) wasn’t in stock. So not only did they offer me a brand new bass at the same price, the guy offered to know off a few more quid “for my inconvenience”. Quite amazing service.

I had the Cali I passive VS4s for a while. Gigged it regularly and tbh couldn't really tell the difference sound-wise between it and my backup Fender MIJ P bass. Gratuitious Sandberg pic.:

Just a heads up that Octogenerian Legend Ron has been uploading a lot of old tracks onto his You tube channel recently . Some duo stuff I didn't know existed :

I've started another build which is a tele/precision hybrid I've seen lots of precision bodies with a modified telecaster pickguard but I haven't seen any the other way round so I thought I'd give it a go I've used some recycled pine I had kicking about for the body, Its going to have a maple/maple neck, Tele style headstock and I'm going to finish it in a solid Butterscotch/Blonde White-ish colour not sure about hardware colour yet as both I think suit the colour really well 👍🏻

Re. the Spirit - I totally agree on the awkward balance. I'm going to use it as a lap bass! Played only while sitting down. It's got a clever foldable 'arm' that stops it slipping down. I'll write a quick NBD-cum-review soon.

If you’re currently struggling with the lower frets on your current bass, then I wouldn’t consider a Steinberger style bass to be honest. Usually full 34” scale length, they are notorious for having an awkward design/balance which makes the neck seem further away than more conventional designs. I loved my Hohner version but had to sell it because of this. The only remedy is obtaining a bracket which extends the neck strap button making the body of the bass hang better when standing, but they are hard to source I believe. Also whilst having a compact body they do vary in weight, mine being around 7lbs IIRC - not a boat anchor by any means, but not as light as you may have thought. Certainly try one out (on a strap!) before buying.

My mate at PMT says there are 10 on the way, so I’ll pick one from those

I have a stingray 4. I'm always wary of taking other people’s ‘sounds’ as quite often they have effects that we are not privy to in play. Plus everyone has their own voice in the fingertips. I’m sure Mick karn or Tony Franklin could pick up my bass and still sound like themselves (alas not Mick anymore.) while the influence to check out fretless has come from a number of players some I couldn’t even name after getting into the YouTube rabbit hole on certain nights, I’m more fascinated by the freedom and expression that people get, I’m not after one particular phrase I’m excited to learn the whole language. weight isn’t really an issue, I may have the chance to get something together with some friends after lockdown but it’s not something that’s a rush I’ve not set a budget if the right thing comes along I’ll buy it. Tubes were always my preference but I’m not sure how good modern amps are now at modelling as I’ve been out of the loop for 25 years

I have a couple of Ric’s. A 4001 with rounds, that is a total rock/funk machine, and a 4003 with flats, that is smoother than Barry white sliding down a slide covered in butter. buy it, if u don’t like it, sell it. you will like it. (Just don’t measure it against a Leo)

Ok, back to Spector: Early Christmas present from BD. Just saw on BD' FB page that Mark got hold of the last two Spector Euro 77 LE 😀 I have the 77 myself and I can tell you that this LE is amazing, super nice and thin neck, killer sound (P bass on steroids) and for a great price. Check it out here: https://bassdirect.co.uk/bass_guitar_specialists/Spector_LE_4_SE_1977.html

I've been in very few bands that didn't play at least one original song. That includes the cover bands. If I get a vote in a band, I'll judge the song not who wrote it. Labels are a pointless distraction, unfortunately, too many originals bands aren't original at all. The better bands (of any style) play songs that are interesting. IMO a good covers band beats a bad originals band every time, and vice versa.

A big thanks for all the feedback, I take note of all the comments, "I'll keep on keeping on". Started home recording my new stuff yesterday and will try and get back to the studio before Christmas! 😎

4003s jetglo in the mail and inbound next week.

You probably don't need a Ric at the moment but the weather is set to get colder next week so if you have an open fire a Ric would be perfect.....and you'll be doing the world a favour.

My blues band played for the BBC for nothing but 'lunch and exposure' and it actually did us the world of good At the start of 2019 we were a brand new band, had our first rehearsal in January. Our first gig in March, I think. Our guitarist sent one of our rehearsal recordings to a guy from BBC Radio Suffolk, Stephen Foster, and invited him to come along to our second gig. To my amazement he did. To my further amazement, he really liked us and invited us to play at the Ipswich Maritime Festival that summer. No money but food, big BBC stage right on the quayside. What that gave us was a chance to perform on a big stage with a huge sound system in front of lots of people. The guitarist's son recorded some of it on his iPad and that ended up giving us the best live demo that a new band could have asked for. And it opened the door onto the blues festival scene in Suffolk this year, which is pretty lively (but of course everything was cancelled). Nevertheless we got many gigs on the back of the recordings nd will no doubt get many more once it gets going again.

Well seeing as everyone else has actually answered the question you asked, I will now answer the question you didn't ask. Although it's not a rotor cuff injury for me, I have also struggled with playing bass and back pain for years ... 15 of them, in fact. I ended up owning a variety of VERY light basses (including far more Hofners than was good for me) and that all helped a lot. BUT By far the biggest result came from years of steady, constant Pilates exercises. It's not a quick fix and it ain't spectacular, but By God! is it effective if given time. There are plenty of valid alternatives. Yoga and Alexander Technique spring to mind. In your case, given that your problem is injury-related, a decent program of physio would probably be the best option - though I suspect you've already been down that route? The important thing is to deal not just with the symptoms (by selecting lightweight gear) but also the causes, as far as that is possible. Ultimately, dealing with the causes will do you far more good.