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I'm 60 on Tuesday, so wifey gave permission: I've already got a metallic blue Charvel PJ4 and its my favourite bass. The neck is just perfect and it looks and sounds great too. I wanted a back up bass that had the same string spacing and nut width, and as I hadn't got any metallic lime green basses in my collection, I thought, why not buy another Charvel. I had to spend two afternoons working on it to get it playable: fret sprout filing, removal of supplied pre amp, shielding, installation of John East pre amp, replacement of strings and then set up. Worth the time spent, it feels great. And I love the colour; this will probably be my first choice over the metallic blue.

Just to let you all know that I have sent all your messages from both threads on the forum over to Sue, and she was very touched by them all. As she replied "These are such beautiful messages. Thank you xxxx" "Simon was a true gent. He loved the Bass Bash. Even last year when we were both caring for his dad I made a point that Simon had to go along to the Bass Bash. The Bass Bash was proper Soul food for Simon .- and he was never one to neglect a buffet. xx" Take care everyone Mrs Scrumpy

Lots to talk about this, but here we are - missing the Capo on its way to me this month I hope…

Or nearer my price range...

How it started vs. how it's going, part II... Bridge fitted and some old strings thrown on just to get it working. Frets polished, fingerboard cleaned but could do with a light oiling. Still needs a proper setup, and a good body polish. I like it already. To my utter astonishment and delight, it is nearly 2lbs lighter than my 2-Tone J. Depending on how well it fits tonally, I think this might be my new ska bass. I know gold hardware is a bit marmite, but I think this looks the absolute feckin business. Oh, and I've found out why these gold tuners were in the spares box... one of them is fecked something inside stripped out as I was tuning it. Into the bin it goes, and off to ebay I go...

We're in Rawtenstall at one of our favourite little venues a week on Saturday - do pop in if you're nearby. https://www.youtube.com/@deadtenant5574 https://deadtenantmusic.bandcamp.com/

The Eventide is going on a separate vocals board so there’s still a couple of spots for pedals here….

Last update: TC Polytune 3-->MXR Studio Compressor-->HX Stomp-->Radial DI and the MXR Poly Blue Octave in the FX loop of the HX Stomp.

A few years back I importedt an old '64 P bass in bits and in quite a sorry state. The previous owner had been able to afford a neck refinish from John Kallas (owner of JohnK Vintage Guitars who's built or restored some crazy amount of instruments over the years!). However, he ran out of money and offered it as a parts bass to get it finished. When he first bought it, the entire neck & body had been stripped back & finished some sort of horrible, slightly sticky to the touch, lacquer: Here's how it arrived to me in it's original, but totally knackered, case: I contacted a few people about refinishing the body but quotes were either really high or they didn't want to take it on given how nasty the existing finish was. Then, one day, I was chatting to my good friend, and local luthier, Julian Mullen. I mentioned that I wasn't sure what to do with this albatross and he took a look at it. He had actually closed the refinishing part of his business because it was too time consuming and a pain in the donkey to try and run a paint shop. He had a good look and confirmed that everything definitely appeared to be original and that the first colour would have been Olympic White as you can see the overspray in the pickup and wiring cutouts. He then said he had just one pack of genuine US nitro paint kicking around in his workshop and it just happened to be Olympic White - it then became a bit of a challenge for him and he decided to take it on. One of the first things he discovered, having stripped away the lacquer, was that the body was a little thinner than it should be for a '64 but that he could rebuild it up using a few more layers of paint than usual. This was no easy job as it required several coats of primer and nitro with full sanding down between each one. ules is something of a perfectionist and carried this out over a long period, making sure it was completely dry and ready between every coat. He then fitted all the parts that came with it, pickguard & pickups not show in the pic above. After all this work, this is how it looks now, I couldn't be happier: All pics taken on my phone so apologies for the quality. I've tried to show the true colour of the paint and this has darkened the board and guard a little. The guard is a lovely deep red tort and the board has some really nice dark grain running through it that almost looks like ebony (it will be brazilian rosewood). Hopefully you can see that the nitro is already checking nicely and the neck has begun to do this as well (the neck was refinned back in 2011 so it's had a good 10 years to 'catch up' with the body finish). It should now continue to age gracefully

Ooh? Nice?

That size is a Neutrik D-Series - panel has a 24mm hole (also known as Universal Format Connector). M3 countersunk - usually 10mm or 15mm long, plus a plain washer, lock washer and a nut (M3 Nyloc can be used). If doing a lot of them get an M3 nut driver/spinner...

I had the same issue on mine, only a couple of frets mind, and only very minor rough edges, certainly nothing significant. I used some fine grain sand paper and a sanding block, applied it to the neck at a 45 degree angle applying no real pressure, more just making contact with the neck and a couple of passes back and forth, check the rough edges and then a couple more passes. 2 minutes later it was all sorted, no specialist tools required and the neck binding (which I thought might get chewed up by the sand paper) felt silky smooth.

Phone on charge so it'll have to be tomorrow for photos. The body is a figured black/ dark grey like the one in @lemmywinks post featuring some early roadworn-ness - remember this adds value to instruments. Neck is a non-sticky gloss finish which feels tiny since I've been playing 5ers. The standard MM Humbucker has a surprising broad spectrum of tones - far better than I expected TBH. Gunky cheap Chinese (I believe) strings produce, again, surprisingly good tones though these should be changed at the earliest opportunity. If I'd had this earlier in my career I wouldn't be unhappy with it. If I was given it I would be a more than chuffed. Easily worth what I paid for it - even with all the messing about from the numpty seller (who had it tuned in some weird tuning).

That's interesting as it reflects my own experience with the Silverstone, I've stopped worrying about the cab and moved on to worrying about my sound and my playing. The speaker is so honest that turning up the mids boosts the mids rather than just compensating for a lump or dip in the speaker's response. Hearing yourself clearly tightens up your playing, I'm wanting to work harder at damping my strings which I tended to let ring when it was all a bass mush behind me. I've also started to explore my Zoom a bit more as any changes are immediately clear in their effects so it is much more rewarding.

Exactly. Ridiculous demo.

TBH there's so much signal processing going on I can't tell if it's any good. A 70's Woolworth's bass would sound about the same....

Fitted the CS 62 and they are very nice sounding pickups Where I hear an improvement is the clarity of the low end and a less harsh tone It’s got less output than say a Dimarzio PBass which isn’t a problem but I think it’s a noticeable upgrade to Player Series stock pups I like the copper shield base that comes with them too Definitely recommend for all genres

Don't you hate it when your job takes too much time and doesn't allow you to play properly ? I do. I've been able to take the Patchwork for a little drive around the music room, and especially playing it against my TM5 Hardcore Aged. First impressions - that I will corrpborate later with some clips and verified facts : The Patchwork is significantly heavier than the Yellow. Not absurd for a 5er, and still lighter than my Dolphin. The neck feels chunkier. It is not according to rough measurements made. Sound wise they are of course in the same ballpark (especially for me, as I think all bass sound "boom boom" in the end). The Patchwork however has a distinct quality that I have difficulties transcribing into words. The first qualificative that popped in my mind was that it sounded more authoritative. Tighter and punchier comes to mind, too. Of course the electronics makes it easy to find a sweet spot whatever your style is, but the "Classic Passive P-Tone that is easily found on the Yellow selecting only the neck pickup is not found on the Patchwork, that gives it a modern quality. I really believe the very special construction increases the stiffness of the instrument, giving it a very particular, commanding tone. Of course for the ToneWoods afficionado, this concept of bass is a vast piffley gobbledegook, however my beliefs have been reinforced by this bass. I have been proven that two identical instruments made of the same wood from the same tree will sound differently if the wood comes from the top or the bottom of the tree. Same applies here where it's not the essence of the woods that will produce the tone but the overall density and construction. More to come. 🙂

The Monaco is a cab with a premium price, no doubt, but I really loved the low end.…I think a lot of people will like it. Stevie has done a great job with these cabs. I’m glad we have UK talent we can buy from!

Do you use a cable for your bass? If so, one of the best bets (in my opinion anyway) is to get a combined instrument and IEM cable. Ernie Ball make one (I put a link in the thread previously) as do the likes of design-a-cable. You can then use a wired headphone amp, such as the Behringer P2, placing it next to your pedalboard/amp input. Definitely cheaper and more than likely better quality.

Having to chase someone for the money at the end of the night is a bummer, but over here it happens all too often. New methods of payment like Event UK do prevent this. but then involves a wait until the payment is transferred. We do a couple of regular gigs in a pub and café restaurant and they always pay us promptly, often when we arrive. Saves all that hassle when packing down, and is much more civilised. In my old band, wedding gigs were the worst. For some reason, people didn’t seem to like paying the band until the end of the evening, as if they were waiting to see how we went down with the audience before releasing the cash. Really annoying as most folk were usually pretty drunk by this time -once had to go and wake up the best man in a hotel to get paid! (Made even more annoying by the fact that everyone else involved in the wedding - venue, caterers, cake makers etc had been paid months before.) If we do weddings now we insist on payment two weeks prior to the event. Not had anyone question it yet so happy days.

Maude On Words ～ Extreme

Who Are You - The Who. Who? Yes. Oh yes. No, The Who. What? Not what, Who. What? Oh f**k off!

Lol, I actually know what crisps are. Daryl

Funnily enough, when I first took up bass guitar as a teenager, my first actual amp was a Marshall JCM800.

Northants to North Hants eh Pete?

Well, this is what I’ve ended up with. 45kg for the cab and 40kg for the head. Not bad! Sounds monstrous. The Fender NEO 8x10 is surprisingly hifi - different flavour to Ampeg but I like it a lot. Turn the tweeter down and it’s got the Ampeg 8x10 flavour. Just over a month or so until I get to give it a proper gig bashing. (Queue the ‘my back hurts just looking at it…’ comments 🤦🏼‍♂️ )

60 days, I was doing so well 😄 Aria Pro Mosrite thing sat in the BIN basket for a week. The thoughts were many, "under £400", "could do Klarna", "could I build one for that ?" Another 'must-have', weird but cool Italia with 4 lipstick pickups parallel to strings. Fantastic look, bet it plays like a dream and sounds as good as it looks only x 2. The many pros were quashed by a single con: I'll never play the bloody things !! With loins girded by "I'll never play ...." , the rest of 2023 was secure; until yesterday 😐 Yesterday the Heavens conspired against me. Off work and bored ✅ Bored leads to web surfing✅ Web surfing to Gumtree✅ Gumtree opens with preferrences intact ✅ Top of the pile is Telecaster bass 3 miles away ✅ Ad has been up 1 hour ✅ Seller on the ball, calls me within 2 minutes ✅ Yes, he still has the bass and £60 is the asking price ✅He will deliver ✅ I never stood a chance 🤬

Should be ready the middle of next week according to Jon!

With a bit more thought and effort Fender could probably make a half decent BB copy. 😉

Good luck with that.