Leaderboard

So the sanding continues, getting it smooth enough to start the tru oil next week… but I do like the ash control cover I made! Not perfect, I know the grain doesn’t match (what would be the chances!) and I need to plane about 1mm off the top so it sits flush, but it’s a lot better than black plastic! moving forward finally… another 6 weeks and I reckon she will be all back together!

Here's a heavily modded '66 Precision on Reverb, whereby the mods were likely carried out in the 1970s (ie vintage themselves!) Will be overly tinkered with for most people's tastes (and certainly for the collector) but in my opinion it looks quite cool and I would guess it's a great player's bass. https://reverb.com/item/58282987-fender-66-precision-bass-with-rosewood-fretboard-vintage-70s-mods

This one..?

I've somehow joined one of my favourite bands for a short tour. Can't wait 😀

Evening all, I thought a few here may be interested to see and read about a new bass that arrived for me a couple of weeks ago from Germany, a 2001 Basslab L-Bow. This is a company that I've been interested in for a long time because I have something of an affinity for 'high tech' basses. I've been into those sorts of instruments since I was sixteen, when I got my first Kubicki Ex Factor. Over the years I've sought out basses of a similar ilk; designed by forward-thinkers who sought to create a great instrument by rewriting the rulebook. Basslab had always been on the periphery of my sphere of interest because it seemed like I was unlikely to just see one in the wild. In the UK, I can recall just two being for sale on the forums I regularly visit and that's going back nearly twenty years. However, they seemed like such a unique proposition that I always had a tab on that page in my mind. Well, just recently I found out that for over a year my work had been failing to pay me an unsocial hours payment for overnight work. With that in mind, I decided to casually look and see if there were any interesting basses around. I spotted this very cool 2001 L-Bow on the Basslab website and made some enquiries with the company. I was soon speaking to the builder, Heiko Hoepfinger, who was handling the sale on behalf of the owner. After a couple of weeks of discussion in setting up the deal, payment was made and the bass was shipped. A couple of weeks of the bass sitting in customs followed and I picked it up as soon as I could. Despite it's wild looks it has an instantly familiar feel. It may appear 'alien' but in terms of form and function it is nailed on to perform. The instrument is hollow, being made of the 'tunable mixed composite' material with some carbon fibre inside for reinforcement/shielding. The body skin is around 3-4mm thick with the rest of it being hollow. Interestingly, Heiko indicates that the shape and construction was chosen specifically with tone and feel in mind, so the unusual looks are nothing more than a byproduct of putting function first. The famous 'bow' connects to the headstock and gives the impression that the neck is extremely strong, stiff and resonates freely. The 'bow' is actually angled backward from the plane that the neck is on so it doesn't obscure your vision when looking down at the neck. The neck is of a medium thickness with pronounced, flat shoulders in an almost squared 'D' profile. It is very reminiscent of a first generation Status Stealth bass I used to own and is very fast. The fretboard is flat, coated in the same finish as the rest of the bass and adorned with a single bass clef inlay at the 12th position. It's an unusually fast and easy neck to play. I can usually get on well with pretty much any neck but I prefer some shapes to others (my favourite being Spector NS necks). I really like this one. The bass is extremely light, probably between 3 to 3.5kg at the most. It balances very well on a strap and in the classical position. On the right knee with out a strap the small lower horn can lead to a fairly insignificant neck dive, however I never play without a strap and I only discovered this in testing. The upper strap button is on the back of the 'bow', ideally placed to allow for the optimum balance. Because of this, I'd recommend a locking strap. The body is small and sculpted and I absolutely LOVE the relaxed position it allows for my right wrist. I can easily play however I should fancy over both pickups without any feeling of stress or strain. The controls are offset on the lower bout, being mounted in a curve that keeps them out of the way of your plucking hand but still easily visible and in reach. The ergonomic facets of the bass merit the most discussion because they are inherently tied to the physical experience of playing the bass. It is probably the most comfortable and least physically demanding bass I've ever played. The tone on the other hand is superb but perhaps more 'tradtional' than you might expect. Whilst you can spec your Basslab instrument with whatever you should fancy, mine happens to have Kent Armstrong pickups and a Da Capo preamp fitted. It produces a rich, bright and superbly focused sound. The low B string is extremely rich and resonant and the sense of volume across all the strings and positions is just uncanny. I am extremely fond of basses that have this quality. Chords on the L-Bow are just uncanny for their richness; the intonation is almost eerie and the clarity between notes is fantastic. The overall tonal character is modern, bright and open sounding with a very strong midrange. The output between the neck and bridge pickup is superbly balanced, such that I find myself using the neck pickup blended in now more than I ever have done before. I've been absolutely obsessed with the music of Casiopea over recent months and I have been giving this bass a workout to some of their albums. If you see one of these basses around or get a chance to try it, I'd recommend that you do! I am looking forward to playing it with others and whilst I expect a few surprised looks when I first get it out of the fitted soft-case that it came in, other musicians will surely warm quickly to the tones it produces. Space to store instruments is the primary limiting factor in stopping me from buying basses, however I can safely say that this will one be a keeper so I can now count myself one space short. Now, let me edit in some pics... [MEDIA=imgur]aDp0KFJ[/MEDIA] [MEDIA=imgur]gES4XMu[/MEDIA] [MEDIA=imgur]66Xmz1O[/MEDIA] [MEDIA=imgur]jUgtmSq[/MEDIA] [MEDIA=imgur]ASVnU4p[/MEDIA]

Having no patience, I got some Uni Posca Ivory Pens today and had a go. Only the first layer, but I’m pleased with how it’s looking.

Was he Marty McFly? 😀

This is what it amuses me to call my whiteboard.

Aha..! Just the piece I need for my puzzle..!

I was going to buy a Wal, until I saw the wait time (and price haha). So I’m going to have a go at building one. I’m going down the Walbucker/Lusithand route, so it’s probably the best shot at getting something similar, sound wise. The bridge is the only thing I can’t replicate, so I’m using a Schaller 3D. It’ll have locking jack and balanced DI XLR outputs. Watch this space!

James Guthrie's long-awaited remix is finally out on streaming platforms and actual physical circles, and it's a revelation. Sheep is astonishing, and the bass part (whoever played it) on Pigs x 3 is marvellous. Check it out... https://pinkfloyd.lnk.to/Animals2018Remix

Not in the least bit helpful to your project, but it remined me of this so here goes anyway! My son was going for an engineering apprenticeship, and needed to complete a small project. He asked me for ideas and I said I wanted t ore-house my tiny marshall amp into a cigar box to go with my cigar box guitar. Needed new pots too. Here's a pic. Learning/experience points included: Sourcing a box on-line sourcing pots Learning difference between linear and log pots (tone and vol) Creativity... handle is a drawer handle, speaker grill is a potato masher head, used an 'o' ring to strap it shut Physical build Soldering We ordered some chicken-head knobs which never arrived 😞 . He wrote it up into a great journal with pics and text. He recorded a short video on his phone of it being used with the CBG and played it t the interviewer. And yes, he did get the apprenticeship...... but defected from engineering to project planning by the end of the apprenticeship!

It looks like there may have been a scam over at Talkbass this morning. Just flagging as a PSA in case anyone shows up here too selling anything too good to be true. https://www.talkbass.com/threads/3leaf-doom-2.1577660/

I've gone through quite a few Fenders over the years, and here's what's left now: 73 Precision sunburst & rosewood (probably the best Precision I've ever played) 75 Precision black & maple 75 Telecaster bass custard 77 Telecaster bass black The Precisions are both all original. Both Tele basses have been refinished.

Yes - it's not perfect (this shot is probably a little flattering!) but I'm really pleased - and quite relieved - how this is looking: And before strings and strap buttons, but everything else included, 6lb 9oz, of which the painted body itself is only 2lb 7oz . So probably the playing weight will be just a couple of ounces over the target 6.5lbs

This bass comparison spreadsheet I set up a while back may be of interest to this forum, as they're all short-scale. I've done all I can to make it accurate but can't guarantee it. It's not got everything on it - just stuff I've either owned or been particularly interested in - so if anyone wants to send me missing data I'll update it. Short-scale bass comp.xlsx

I really think there should be a section of this forum, purely devoted to incredibly neat boards. I feel a Zen-like sensation of calm and stillness when I see a well ordered, compact pedalboard. This is lovely - kudos, sir.

Here's what I do. Nowadays I rarely have anything pre-prepared, so I'll just see what inspiration hits me. Open PC. Open Cakewalk, open new session, drop in two drum loops (beat/fill), set tempo, plug in guitar into audio interface, set levels and see what happens. Mainly I'll just noodle for about 15 minutes and if nothing useful happens, I'll just close everything down and go and read a book.

My favourite era for P Basses is the late 60's/ early 70's, primarily because of the neck profiles. I don't enjoy playing basses with a 1.75 nut width, so the pre -CBS Precisions are not really my cup of tea. An A or B width nut is much better for me. I certainly think a good Fender from my preferred late 60s/early 70's era sounds just as good as the Pre-CBS examples. (To be honest, I think a lot of the modern Fenders sound just as good as the old basses. But that's a whole other discussion/ heated argument 😄) I don't own any old Fenders nowadays but I have had far too many over the years to be romantic about them. I think you can find gems ( and duds) from every era, and what constitutes a gem(or a dud) depends to a great extent on the tastes and expectations of the player. I wouldn't pay the going rate for a vintage Fender bass nowadays because to me it's Rolls Royce money for an old Ford Capri instrument, but others may have a different view.

Baggy Straussers ～ Madness

D.I.V.O.R.A.K. Tammy Wynette

For years that was the only bass I owned , and it got a lot of play around the eastern circuit here. Went through three hard shell Fender cases getting tossed in and out of ratty old trucks and vans before I switched to well padded gig bags. Looks like it went through the Boer War , but still plays wonderfully. It seemed that everybody played a Pbass in those days , and they all felt different. I had to put some nail polish on the bridge because otherwise the posts would fall. At the time most advised me to get a brass nut, Dimarzio pickups and a BadAss bridge but I left mine stock. Funny how all the basses from that period are all stock now because back in the day most that you’d see on stage were altered. And you had to route the bass for those early BadAss bridges. Now earlier in this thread I mentioned the tv logo basses were inconsistent , but I didn’t say bad. But if you played the dozen you might see in a music store they all felt different. It was around 74 when the really heavy ones started to appear , and many at the time believed they had greater sustain. They were often the first ones sold. Today I’m thankful mine is quite light. And despite being an old Pbass guy , these days I mostly play shortscales. It’s mostly retired , still feels wonderful when I do pick it up. At the time I thought it was all the bass I’d need and I missed a lot of opportunities to buy vintage basses that were going for a song. I was an idiot. Pre CBS basses we’re just called used , and we’re much cheaper than the new stuff.

Just thought I would share my thoughts on my latest purchase. I picked it up locally and my expectations weren't that high, as the prospect of a "passive ray" seemed to strange to me. I have to say that I'm pleasantly surprised at how good it plays and sounds. It sounds great, that ray sound really sings. Other things that I had heard were "they are really heavy; finish is horrible etc.". Again, pleasantly surprised as it feels great in the hand. Plays well and weights 9lb, which is my ideal weight. Anyone else playing or have playing experiences of these? I would be interested to hear of the live experience. Picture attached as proof! 😉

UPDATED 18th October '22 --‐--------------------------- Date now confirmed as: Saturday 22 April 2023. Location confirmed as: Radford Care, Prospect Street, Radford, Nottingham, NG7 5QE https://www.radfordcaregroup.org.uk/prospect-street/ Exact times and costs TBC. ‐-------- Alas there was no 2022 Midlands Bass Bash. 😢 @jebroad had organised the 2019 and 2021 events with style, but has moved to pastures new so the venue wasn't available for 2022 and the event didn't happen. For 2023 we need to get organised. Otherwise those folks down in Surrey and Somerset will be gloating! First we need a venue: Do people have preferences or suggestions? @petecarlton will look into a venue near Nottingham, I can look around the M42 east of Birmingham. Anyone else have a possible venue? As for dates: the last two were in May, and I seem to recall they being on the bank holiday weekend. A Saturday in April maybe? (Almost) all suggestions welcome

To help me "get my groove back" after losing my gear in the fire, the BC family was wonderfully generous in helping me out ... it's all about the bass! I've received a couple of older Zoom effects processors and they are going to form the core of my signal chain (All the elements of the Phoenix Rig were gifted to me by generous BC members ... I cannot express how grateful I am!) The Zoom units are quite powerful in the processing they can perform and can sound quite good, however there are a couple of "challanges" to the way I setup the effects and gig. Configuring patches This is done on the unit using the small display and controls. I came across a free application called Tonelib that makes the process of building and configuring patches significantly easier; it's a funky bit of software! Selecting patches when playing Sadly this is suboptimal! With one or two footswitches, it is hard to go directly to a patch, there is support for scrolling through a list of patches but it is not ideal. After some research I found that a few clever folks had figured out that the Zomm processors accept MIDI commands to select and reconfigure patches and effects. And so I am building Stompz. It will be based on the Raspberry Pi that did not get baked in the fire. Yesterday I went into my makerspace and spent several hours starting the physical assembly. The enclosure is the back of an offcast of an outdoor light a bit like this Is is almost perfect for the job. I drilled and filed a few holes for the foot switches and an expression jack socket. Stompz has 5 footswitches, an expression pedal jack input and a small OLED display panel (I've yet to figure out the best way to mount this so it's currently just sticking out the top) It will be based on a Raspberry Pi that did not get baked in the fire and, apart from the foot switches, is made up of items that I have been able to salvage from the flat or are offcasts ... super economical! The finished Phoneix Effects Chain will look like this At present the only thing in Stompz is a USB battery that is powering both Zoom processors. The foot switches are laid out so that it is easy to press two adjacent switches, so from a UX perspective it will be possible to have 5 x Switch press 5 x Long switch press 4 x Pair switch press 4 x Long pair switch press. This will allow for some quite powerful manipulation of the unit during a gig, either turning on/off individual effects, selection of preconfigured pedalboard layouts and snapshots. The OLED display (I might add another as it is quite small) will display what Stompz is up to and indicate what each switch will do. Stompz connects to each Zoom using a USB cable, which provide both power and will carry the MIDI data; The Zoom MIDI message format is not officially documented, but there are various resources on the web from which I should be able to build a full list of available commands. At present I have successfully been able to change patches on a Zoom but I believe it is possible to reconfigure patches as well as the various settings for each of the effects in a patch. I'm hoping that I can do this without killing any audio tails as it will allow me to drive some of these changes using the expression pedal. With the two Zoom processors connected in serial the rig will support a total of nine effects in a chain; I'm toying with the idea of running them in parallel which might allow for some splitting of frequencies for different processing ... not totally sure how I would wire this up yet. I'll be writing some bespoke code to allow for: Defining the action of the footswitches. Configure/manage/select "Pedalboards" (A collection of effects and their settings used in a particular song) This will let me configure which effects I want to use and their settings and (hopefully) link the expression pedal to the desired effects. Ideally I'll be able to treat Stompz as a single effects unit and it will decide itself which effect to place on which processor. Configure/manage/select "Snapshots" (A group of the settings for all of the effects in a pedal board) Access to all of this via a web interface (Or maybe also a smartphne app) over WiFi. The idea is that I can setup my pedalboards and tune the settings as I desire in advance and save them. During a gig I can use the foot switches to select a particular pedalboard for a song and switch between snapshots as I play, to load the settings for the verse/chorus/bridge/etc. All of this will be run on the Pi which will send the MIDI commands to configure the Zoom processor units. With my EffektLada project (Now put on ice) I had intended to run a MIDI synth and sequencer on the Pi which could be driven by a MIDI keyboard; this will allow for the generation of sophisticed drum tracks as well as being able to produce the occasional "special sounds" that we have used in some of our numbers (Like shakers, cow bells, xylophone ... even some horns or organ snippets). I've a couple of salvaged microcontrollers that can do button/motion sensing and send MIDI over Bluetooth to the Stompz allowing for small handheld battery powered units to produce effects. This will require the addition of an audio output from the Pi so is definately a Version 2 or 3 feature. Other possibilities are to use Pi based effect plugins in the signal chain and even record on the Pi. Now the basic physical assembly is complete I need to wire up the innards and start designing/writing/testing the software to achieve all of this. Hopefully I can make a start on this later today ... I am starting back at work tomorrow and I need to sort out some shoes that will help me survive the 12.5h shift on my feet (I am so looking forward to being back bedside nursing, it feeds my soul) so my time will be constrained. Stompz may not look as elegant as the all in one systems from the likes of Line6, Moddevices or the current gen Zoom units ... but it will get the job done and then some and I will be able to craft it to behave exactly the way I wish, which cannot be said of an off the shel unit which are generally very configurable, but only in the way the manafacturer determines. And the things that makes it all possible is that the cost is mostly effort, the various elements have been donated by the amazing BC family, have been salvaged from the fire or scavanged from castoffs ... no significant financial burden and the time I spend to bring it all together is free! More to come ... S'manth x

It seems a long time ago I tried to make some 'traditional' jazz bass mutes, gave up and so found a set of real ones, courtesy of a basschatter. Recently the Squier jazz I fitted them to has been nearby, and it's reminded me that the sound is not what you'd expect. The sustain is about four seconds, not super long, but not the dull thump a chunk of foam under the strings or a clip on mute would give. The effect is partly losing the highs and partly to emphasisi the initial attack and first stages of decay. Great for a staccato sound (thin Andy Fraser on the Mr Big solo). It really changes how you play by making fast, complex passages really clearly articulated. It also brings the sound closer to a double bass than using flats alone would (I'm using them with roundwounds). I think I'll take it to my next rehearsal and see what happens.

If you want to rumble the bass ,just turn this dub version of Five man army - Dillinger up

Maggot Brain - Funkadelic

Without question its the Ashdown James Lomenzo Hyperdrive pedal. Been through some big money drive pedals but always come back to the J-Lo. Nothing else I've found does quite what it does. Never mind the fact it has a HUGE footprint, Ashdown's entirely useless VU meter and more controls than are strictly necessary - I keep threatening to sit down and build a compacted version for myself - it just sounds SO GOOD!

FTFY

We can't really afford the security escort for one

Rhine On Time - Black Box

Cologne Come Over Jaco

Ah, I'd love to get hold of one of Heiko Hoepfinger's instruments. He's an interesting chap, really dedicated to trying to improve the instrument, even if some of his innovations are too left-field for some. Well done on the acquisition. Bet it's excellent. The L-Bow would be my first choice, too. Not ugly. More like a refined Bauhaus approach. Not as mininalist as the Steinberger nor as reductionist and under-developed as something like a Born2Rock.

New Horace Andy album, Midnight Scorchers, was released today:

Is anyone bringing a Wal? I'd like to know what all the fuss is about. Also, would there be any interest is a sort of "Bass Weigh" station? I was thinking along the lines of bringing a luggage scale and a laptop with a spreadsheet already written. Weigh your bass, add it to the sheet (Make,scale, #strings, wood or other details if known maybe), and then we'll have some stats and charts showing possibly interesting information.

I Shostakovich ～ Marley/ Clapton

Bass Viol?

I have a lot of vintage Fenders myself and had even more through my hands over the years and without doubt the late 60’s early 70’s are my favourites. They just sound and play well, every one of them. Late 70’s aren’t in the same league imo. Pic of my sexy, well gigged 72 for you voyeurs 😂

I have a TC Electronic Corona Mini on my board. While I appreciate that it's slightly above your budget, I can vouch that it is well made and has plenty of tricks up its sleeve. S.P.

Pretty chuffed with this little compact board. It does everything I need...