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This x 1000 Here’s a true story: A guy comes into my record shop and pre-orders a CD. Not a new one – a cheap re-issue. He’s super-excited. On the day of it's release, he’s outside the store when I arrive, almost hyperventilating with excitement. I open up and dutifully trudge to the back of the store (slightly peeved that this guy has delayed my morning coffee by 10 minutes) to retrieve his disc. He rips off the cellophane. His hands are trembling. And then he bursts into tears. Unselfconsciously, a grown man is so happy to purchase this music that he is weeping in front of a sales assistant. Being an Englishman, I have NO CLUE what to do in this situation, so I go to the other end of the counter and avoid eye contact while he gets it out of his system. Eventually (10-15 minutes later) he is composed enough to pay me and leave. The music that reduced him to tears was... ‘The Very Best of a Flock of Seagulls’. I have sold thousands of releases by ‘Good’ artists - everyone from Nick Drake to Radiohead, from Bach to Coltrane, but the only person who ever wept for joy on purchasing a recording was the guy who bought ‘The Very Best of a Flock of Seagulls’. I dare you to tell him he's wrong.

I don’t know if it’s an unpopular opinion but it’s caused a few ‘discussions’. There’s no such thing as good music. There’s no such thing as bad music. There’s just music you like and music you don’t like. That’s it.

Another one. I could go all day on these but I'm trying to ration myself. Eric Clapton is the most overrated guitarist of all time. Absolutely dull as dishwater.

Received yesterday (Thank you Anderton's and DHL). The beast is quite impressive in real life. It's a bit more complicated than what I thought to get acquainted with the Fanned fret system, especially trying to play in the upper register (wher we can agree a bass player shouldn't be playing 🙂 ) The bass arrive all set up and almost in tune. Which is great. The bypass between passive/active is seamless, volume-wise. No difference in volume which is quite a feat as generally as soon as you add distortion, you need to lower the volume. Not impressed by the tone knob (not a huge difference between on and off, but has a great effect when the disto is on), but the pickup selector works wonder. The neck is perfect. Fo me. Meaning it's not as thin as you might expect from a "modern" instrument. The 18mm string spacing adds to the fullness of the neck. It'll need a bit of time in order to get fully acquainted with this one, but the assembly the overall quality, the very broad rang of tone between active, passive and 4-ways pickup configuration makes it a fantastic instrument.

I lucked out when I bought my mandolin some 15+ years ago. A mid range model that happened to be particularly well made. I've played the same model when others have had one and this one just lucked out when they selected the wood - all solid wood and a tone to die for. I was playing country type stuff on it with my fairly basic playing (theory being that as a bass player, I could manage the transition to an instrument that has 4 string tunings too). Over lockdown I started mucking about with my old mate from Sixth Form playing 80s Alternative / Goth stuff on old folk instruments. My mandolin playing suddenly skyrocketed the second I stopped trying to play country style! I upgraded the tuners first. Then I flipped the knobs to wooden ones, changed the bridge cover to all black and it grew from there. I had some mandolin grommets shipped over from Nashville to deaden the sound of the strings behind the bridge and further worsened it's environmental footprint by getting an arm rest from India. Finally I got @TimAl to design a fantastic custom pickguard for me and a unique goth rock take on old folk! I think it has turned out pretty well and I look forward to taking it out locally across a few shows over the summer. I appreciate it's a bit niche for most of you but if you like looking at pretty instruments, fill your boots... (& yes the hard case further demonstrates my attention to the pose!)

In 1987 after releasing 'I got my mind set on you', George Harrison received votes for Best Newcomer in the Smash Hits readers Poll.

Noticed 'This is Spinal Tap' was being repeated on the TV and realised I'd never watched it all the way through so recorded it. Sat down to watch it with Mrs YFS and after around 30 minutes she got up and left the room saying 'when it finishes I'll tell you something'....anyway after it finished I asked her what she wanted to say. She explained she'd never got into metal as a teenager during the 60's and 70's and bands like Spinal Tap had passed her by( and she did not like that sort of music anyway). I gently explained it was all a spoof anyway! Moving on to last night at rehearsal with current band. We were looking at 'Handle Me with Care' by the Travelling Wilburys as some low-hanging fruit for the festival set and got to discussing the members of said band. Someone mentioned George Harrison in connection with the Beatles, our bandleader said " You mean George Harrison was in the Beatles, I never knew that'? Mouths dropped.....!

I have wanted to give my alembic a facelift for ages and when i saw Cosmo Valdemar's bass at Jaydee being prepped for respray, it gave me the confidence to get mine refinished from see through purple to clear finish, had a refret and new knobs. And it now looks brand new except the pickups. I will be looking for some way to make them look new.

My '76 Series. Love it. My dream bass since I was 15. I got it for an excellent price, but I'm still coming to terms with owning something so valuable...

It’s your bass of course, and I can fully understand why you’d do it, but to me that would be like putting a brassiere on the Venus de Milo......😢

*must not think smutty thoughts about a 'hardening cupboard'*

OK - onto the final knockings, I think @fleabag has asked me if I can replicate a decal that he designed for the last time he threw down the gauntlet. Anyone remember this? I still wake up from time to time in a hot sweat about that challenge of challenges! Anyway, against all odds, I have found the original email to who did the decal for me so, all being well, that will be with me soon. Timing could be spot on because this is now at the 'fully harden before final polish' stage - another way of saying it will go into a cupboard for a couple of weeks. Here it is:

Facebook and the likes are making it much harder to access information on their sites without logging on. As someone who doesn't participate in social media, I have given up clicking band links to FB/Instagram, etc. as it's usually a dead end. I'm a music buyer and a gig-goer but I've no interest joining Facebook to find out when your next gig is. I am not going to chase your information around the internet. I'm sure I'm not the only one, so I'd recommend every band have their information somewhere which doesn't require a log on. It doesn't need to be your own website, but don't put your info exclusively in the FB basket and think you have told the world.

Exactly. It's the way of the world. Absolutely pointless moaning about it if the companies involved can't, or won't enforce it. Whether the people who can afford the originals like it or not, these things exist, and while ever they do, I will buy them, simply because i can't afford the high prices "originals". The hard truth of the matter is, if it wasn't for companies like Behringer and HB, I and millions like me couldn't afford to be musicians. Why should music be yet another thing that's only available to the rich? Long live the rip offs! Now I'm off to put on my Aditoff tracksuit and Reebark trainers, and go to the shop for a lovely packet of McTitties biscuits.

I did get an apology and their side of the story this morning which I have accepted. I had got frustrated by their lack of communication after what felt like a collosal slap in the face which made a bad situation feel even worse. We are friends again.

18 May 2007 - joined latest incarnation of Basschat (having been a Member of various short-lived predecessors). Post Count = NIL. Zero. Not a sausage. Bugger all. 18 May 2022 - older, greyer, happier. Post Count = 13,897 So that's 2.54 posts per day every day for 5479 days. I've got it under control. I can walk away any time I like.

My ears are 100% cloth; I heard no difference between any of the comparisons. I could not tell, if played back blindfold, which body was which.

Many thanks to @Aidan63 for putting my name forward I'm one of many 'Basschatters willing to help other Basschatters' - and there are some very skilled folks amongst them - but Aidan is clearly in cahoots with MrsAndyjr1515 in her objective to keep me down in the cellar for as long as humanly possible. @evan47 did indeed get in touch and we have had a pm dialogue over the last week or so to talk through the issue, the potential remedies and risks. And this morning the neck arrived. And it's a thing of beauty. But it does have serious problems. The obvious one is the one we know - the trussrod has snapped: And that the neck is bowed even without the strings on: In fact, it's bowed a lot! Measured against my levelling beam, a full 2mm at the centre: @evan47 has a bass he can still use and so this will be very much an 'in between other stuff'. I probably won't start the fretboard removal until the weekend, but needed to at least confirm that the board is going to be removable. And so out comes my travel iron - ideal for the job - to do a test to see if the glue will soften with reasonable levels of heat: After about 10 minutes, I pressed a single-edged razor against the fretboard join to see if the glue had softened enough. Success: So we know it is going to be possible to remove the board. But before that, I will need to do something the other end. The veneer that has been used on the headstock matches the body and is beautiful. But it curves up and is bonded to the fretboard. As such, I am going to need to use a razor saw at the front of the nut spacer slot to cut down so that I can release the board without lifting the short piece of fretboard running up to the headstock and glued to its veneer: Once the board is off, we will be able to see what's going on and how best to fix it. With that apparent set-bow, it will need more than just replacing the trussrod.

graffiti in a public loo😆

at some point it's wise to stop digging and move along... edit: I mean it in the nicest way I can

I too would have been extremely awkward and self-conscious but I guess I might have offered a high-five or asked how long he'd been into the band, or what significance it held. Depends on how busy the store was and if you;'re prepared for a 20 minute tale of teenage angst and nostalgia I'm not sure I've cried over a long anticipated release but some purchases have left me silent in awe on first listening, so I can see the importance of music to people as touchstones in their life - good on him for being able to express himself.

Maybe as an experiment, in the midst of this gentleman weeping hot, fat tears of joy as he held the music that had enhanced his life and possibly soundtracked a number of his significant life events, I should have said, "Sorry mate, that music is sh!t." I'm sure he would have agreed with me and we'd have a good ol' laugh at the whole thing. Or I'd end up picking up my teeth with a broken arm.

Engine Trouble Demented Are Go

IMO yes. I pay £10/r for a .co.uk domain. I won't comment on hosting as it's on a bigger package with a load of other site. Our website gets loads of hits, we sell a load of merch through it, a lot of people check the gig list on it. We do well on Facebook/IG but a lot of people don't use this, or don't use it much, and without the website we'd be missing a load of people

You know you're playing an Unpopular Opinion thread right when you get personal insults in response

Has the effect of placebo on tone been considered? An instrument may just be the sum of its parts but if someone really believes it sounds better and it gives them confidence they will most likely play it better.

By referring to Mumsnet...? I can't work that one out. BTW I came close to locking the thread but I'll hold off in the hope things get back on track.

Not that anyone's particularly interested 😂 but I had the speaker out tonight. Not many clues, but a quick Google of the number on the magnet suggests to me that it's an Eden speaker. I think 300w RMS, 8 ohm impedence. I was only curious because it sounds SO good. Mystery solved, I think. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Thanks ped, there’s some nice people here, I’m glad to help out when i can 🙂

Little to report other than I'm considering having my fretless fretted - that way it would get much more use. It's just sat in a mate's studio at present. I still play fretless but could get by with something a bit less elaborate. This all might be a bit nuts and I've certainly not convinced myself yet. A look at that lovely unmarked board certainly makes me think twice

I can't stand DJ's, and I find it utterly ridiculous that people would flock in their thousands to watch, what is essentially a human CD multi-changer flouncing around on stage like they're actually creating something.

It’s much better to learn the floating thumb technique for muting than relying on a rest.

One more sleep to Collection Day! Put the kettle on, @Cosmicrain, I’m coming for you! 😁

My '84 Spoiler. Love it. I thought about a black refin, but resisted so far.

I haven’t finished connecting all the cables up but have done a rearrange on my new (home made) board to fit the GX-100 in. I will lose the separate tuner at some point. Pleased with it so far but may swap the GX to the lower tier.

I really do like the look of the 4 banger but I suspect that other than switching the distortion or fuzz on as a party piece I'd never use it in a gig scenario. So I guess all the extra spend would be wasted on me.....Starry Night though....

The current (BBC) trend of combining popular performers with Orchestras. What is that about? So many of the songs rely on their simplicity to be effective but adding an Orchestra seems to be an attempt to 'posh up' songs, but for whom?

Well played Bagman -that took a minute or two to land.

@rushbo if that hat happened to me I Ran away as well difficult situation

They wouldn’t be able to sell stuff cheap then because they would have development overheads . Lidl sells “rice krunchies” and “nutty Ella” , everyone knows they’re knock offs but they’re cheap and usually OK. This is no different

Genuinely under-appreciation The Blue Nile Kate Bush The The Public Enemy New Order

Too commercialised. The early stuff was pretty good but the experimental pineapple remixes are just wrong.