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This has been on the cards pretty much since I first discovered ACG 11 odd years ago. It was @eude’s Finn 4 which first drew me to @skelf’s basses and very soon after that I saw a Holly-topped Finn. I’ve been hooked since the first bass I bought, and for a long time had a Holly-topped Finn in my wishlist. It almost became a reality about 5 years ago but I never got beyond the “annoying Alan” phase. Fast forward to last year, an ebony Finn which Alan shared on socials made me hatch a cunning plan for a yin/yang pair of basses - one holly, one ebony. Specs were developed, plans were hatched, then I had to be sensible and drop one of the two. Naturally I kept the holly plan as it has been on the list since day one, and the shape changed from Finn to RetroB. Thus this spec was born and a deposit was paid last July. Today the 5 string bass of my dreams was delivered. She sounds as good as she looks, and I’m over the moon 😎 So, the specs: Limba body, bloodwood accent, holly top 3pc Ash neck with ultra slim profile, ebony fingerboard with bloodwood blocks, 30” radius 3+2 headstock with holly facing and limba rear veneer 50mm RFB in bridge, 50mm OPB in neck Passive vol/tone/blend with coil select switch for RFB Black hardware 17mm bridge spacing (Hipshot A) Gotoh resolute tuners Honestly couldn’t be happier at this point, I am looking forward to getting her out in the wild with Katy Hurt next month 🤠 First 3 pics are from my “unboxing”, the rest are Alan’s:

Hi folks Just wanted to share the joy of this exceptional ACG bass handmade by Alan Cringean. I picked this up from Alan yesterday and it’s absolutely stunning. This particular model is a prototype and I’m sure Alan would be more than happy to build another if this is ur thing. From top to bottom the quality of the build is fantastic. The way Alan shapes his necks are always super comfortable to play and this is no exception. It balances perfectly either seated or on a strap. I’m really into filter preamps now and this one is fitted with the ACG EQ 01 by John East. Fine tuning your tone is excellent with the EQ01. Like every ACG I have played ( I have nine!) the quality, the workmanship and the versatility is in abundance. If you’re looking for a custom build at the highest level then speak to Alan. He’s an amazing luthier as well as a thoroughly nice chap. Specs down below. Cheers Stuart Body Olive Top Wood Purpleheart Accent Veneer Alder Body Neck Acrylic Impregnated Birdseye Maple Fingerboard 5 Piece Ash/Purpleheart Neck Luminlay Side Dots Details Set-neck Construction 33″ Scale Length 24 Frets 5 String 45mm Nut Width Satin Lacquer Finish Electronics ACG RFB bridge pickup and ACG FB neck pickup East Uni-Pre 4K Preamp Hardware Hipshot B Type Bridge Gotoh GB350 Resolite Tuners Black Hardware Dunlop Dual Design Straplocks ACG/Newtone Custom Strings

No business being this nice at £150 even at £500, as people have said… well. There we go.

Great white BB414 at ridiculous bargain price = happy me. apparently needs some electrical fettlement…but it looks balls ace.

Well it arrived and I'm pretty happy 😁 In reasonably good shape (I was expecting worse tbh) Much less yellowed than my 78 Oly white P Bass. Pickup sounds good. quite thumpy. The not-so-good bits: Definitely needs a new input jack. Definitely needs a new bridge. Needs a good scrub but pretty great shape for a 50yr old bass, overall

From what I see the age requirements are only to avoid seeing age appropriate things in your 'feed' and checks to ensure no access to adult only content. Basschat has no algorithms to give you any 'feed' - that is obviously based on facebook / twitter style feeds, and we have never had adult only sections, apart from maybe the sections on P basses in sunburst and tort that you have to be at least 70 to have an interest in

We have a 5-8 acoustic gig tomorrow night at The Ziegler Winery. 1 hour commute. Classy place. Daryl

I've bought 2 wenge necks off Ebay. Both only needed minor fret work & that only cost me $25 NZ per neck. Great necks. And I've bought 1 Maple neck off Ali Express. Just needed similar work on the frets. So, all three have been good purchases for me & I'd happily buy again from either place. Here are pictures of all three necks on my made at home parts basses.

Yay - Bass Day Europe refund is now in my account = £47 Purchase cost of the ticket for the Ian Allison & Janek Gwizdala event = £39. I've now got enough left over for the price of a London pint of beer! Hahaha

At The Cricketers in Westcliff on Easter Sunday. Our "long-awaited" debut at this venue. I've wanted to get in here for a while - it's one of the good ones on the local circuit. Someone who used to work at another local pub where we play approached us to play at this venue as "he knew what we can do" and convinced his boss to book us. It turns out we didn't disappoint! It was a little quieter than I had hoped for, but Easter Sunday evening is an odd one. But the people there were up for a proper party and stayed till the end. The chap who booked us told us his boss was very happy. He also said he's looking at putting on a cover band event at their music venue next door that they also run (locals will know this as the former "Club Riga" venue bar - which was quite a popular venue for originals and tribute bands. I even saw Michael Schenker and Blaze Bailey play in there several years ago). Anyway, he said they've just got it up and running again and want to put on a cover bands event with the best bands in the area and has invited us to join the roster... which is nice. A couple of other people involved in local bands told us they really enjoyed our set and performance, too. I was very happy with our performance considering we were a man down (guitarist on holiday), which meant the other guitarist wasn't able to double on keys, which restricted our set choice a little. We also had a dep drummer as our usual drummer was watching West End show with his family and wouldn't have made it back in time to set up. He actually showed up to watch halfway through the evening, so we dragged him up for a song. As such, me and the sole guitarist had to work a little harder and creatively. I got to use my "Eliminate the guitarist" Helix preset for a few songs, which blends in an octave-up driven guitar tone as well as power chords with my standard bass tone. Sounded great to my ears, and filled a hole during a couple of solos.

Pictures say all that needs to be said, it's taken me a while to get here, but I suspect that of all the fretless Precisions I've owned (P, PJ, PP, PM) and all of the board materials I've used with them - rosewood, ebony, maple, graphite - this is by a long way the sweetest. Classic Vibe body, PUP, and circuit (the PUP as I'd been told would be the case, is very very good indeed), paired with a stunning Warmoth neck. First rehearsal tonight

And finally, fully assembled, the slightly briefer briefcase:

Out for a gig last week....

It's getting dangerously close to a tone wood argument I'll admit

+1 I would rather a bit of hardware with a roadmap of updates and long life than reactive bringing out the next big thing every year or so.

I've only ever bought a bass off a Reverb seller once, and it was a complete success. Ergo, there's absolutely nothing wrong with Reverb, you're all crazy, what the hell are you all talking about?

Got this beast on loan:

All going ahead though a 2 year wait, counting down the days already.

Busy day…

I remembered I had some cow print fabric on a shelf in the workshop so I thought I'd try and have a go at doing a fabric top on the hidden pickup bass Just gotta wait till tomorrow so the epoxy is fully cured so I can sand the top back flat.......👍🏻🤟🏻

I’ve always liked the single-cut SM2, and when one became available from Jones Basses, I just couldn’t resist—I had to buy it! 😅 I’m glad I did, because the craftsmanship is top-notch. Surprisingly, the bass balances quite well too. Mind you, even if it didn’t, I’d be fine with it since I mostly play sitting down anyway. Tone-wise, it’s very versatile with a strong midrange presence. The action is perfectly set. Super happy with the bass that I am going to have another one built with the multi-coil configuration. 😑

I've owned a CV-5 and loved it, except for the fact that despite the J-buckers' and coil tap switches' versatility it couldn't sound like a Jazz Bass. I recently pulled the trigger on a J5 and totally love it. Schecter is awesome quality, and their thin C neck profile is just superb 👍

The very business model of PP is to scam out some sizeable pocket change from all parties involved. Google "Honey browser extension scandal", owned by PP... literally everyone involved lost money, except PP. Sorry, I am a very passionate PP hater. 😁

IIRC, Line 6 said they planned for the Helix platform to last around 10 years before being succeeded by the next generation. Since then, they have been great with firmware updates and have added some fantastic features and models. I'm quite grateful for that sort of roadmap, as I don't want to have to replace my hardware every other year to get new features. Quite a brave move for a hardware company. And let's not forget, the prices of new units are the same as they were 10 years ago. That 10-year estimate expires this year, so I expect to see something new from them soon. I suspect they have not been sitting on their laurels and will have a few exciting things for Helix 2.0.

I have been testing different IEMs these last gigs and I think I can comment some thoughts about them: Sennheiser IE100 pro. The most comfortable headphones I ever had. Flat response. Everything is there, but not in a spacial way. Nice bass, mids and highs. I can hear my whole band and myself without any problem. Isolation is nice. KZ ZS10 pro X. They sound terrific. Everything is there, good bass and nice mids. I can hear everything very clearly. My only issue with them is that I am not that comfortable with them. I tried several buds and I cannot feel really comfortable with them. Isolation is nice. All my bandmates use them. KZ Castor (bass enhanced). This set is what KZ recommends for bass players. They include switches to change the eq. They sound good. However, if you have some bass boost, the bass sounds really artificial. There is sub bass, but it is not very defined. I think they are a little bit more comfortable than the ZS10. Isolation is the same than the ZS10. I prefer the ZS10 overall, but they are really nice headphones. KZ ZST. Really good headphones. All the frequencies are heard and you can hear all your bandmates. They sound similar to the ZS10, but the ZS10 sound more spacial IMO. Bass is good and defined. Isolation is the same as the other KZ models. MEE6 pro. Nice and very comfortable. Soundwise are a little bit worse than the Sennheiser or the KZ. I have ordered the Seinnheiser IE400 pro to see if there is much of a difference.

Thanks for the demo. Now I just gotta do my typing exercises every day so I can fill in the form quickly enough on the next round of orders

To be fair, there is a certain amount of micturational extraction by Aliexpress sellers. I have found the sales people are often obsessed with commission at the expense of everything else, including their jobs. In their minds, so long as they are selling something that looks like the photo, any deviation in materials from the agreed specification isn't important to them. Their mindset is opportunistic, irresponsible and at times disingenuine...a bunch of cowboys. I had dealings with a company called Shenzhen Grand which left me out of pocket and with a bitter taste in my mouth at the games they were playing. They were good at making amps but their instruments were less playable than a wishbass. The good luthiers in China (and I have found one that could rival Fodera) don't need to sell on Aliexpress.

Screwing rubber feet onto shiny new Markbass cabs might affect your warranty, and with a lot of lightweight thinner walled cabs, there often isn't a great deal of wood to hold a screw for a decent sized rubber foot. I recently road tested an LFSYS Goodwood cab and it had no feet, but did have hard plastic stackable corners. At under 9kg, there wasn't a lot of weight to 'plant' it on a hard wood floor. The simple solution was to use a 'mighty mat' non slip carpet mat, the type that can be bought cheap at most DIY or convenience stores. Protects the cab, stops it slipping around, also protects the flooring, and no need for rubber feet. Saying that, I will always fit decently large rubber feet on bigger and used cabs and amp heads, even if they have stackable plastic corners like Markbass kit has. For brand new stuff with a warranty, I'd prefer using a mighty mat.

Will they be renaming it to Deluxe Reverb or Twin Reverb now?

Oh hey — Reverb here. 👋 Just to clarify, Reverb is not being purchased by Fender. Two new investors—Creator Partners + Servco—have entered an agreement to purchase Reverb. I think the confusion probably stems from the fact that Servco has a long history with Fender stretching back to the '50s, and is now a majority owner of Fender. Once the deal closes, although we'll share a common investor with Fender, Reverb will be a privately-held, independently operated company. You can read more on our blog. Cheers!

Just got home from rehearsal with my instrumental classic rock band. Used my Fender JMJ Mustang strung with Elixir nickel rounds into the rehearsal rooms Ampeg SVT350 & 810, sounded great. I was very pleased to be using the JMJ again, over the last couple of years I’ve developed arthritis in my left thumb and my playing style was always thumb hooked over the neck, true punk style, so I’ve been working on my playing technique to the classic thumb on the back of the neck, and am pleased that after a 4hr rehearsal no issues with my thumb. I had been using my Fender Japan Mustangs and although they’re great I prefer the sound of the JMJ, more Precisiony. Band wise we’ve now got about 90 mins of material and all sounded really good, overall a great rehearsal.

I'm an avid Zoom tweaker and I love copying sounds, but don't have such a thing as Mike Dirnt's tone figured out. Still I'll try my best to "deconstruct" Mike's tone so, regardless of gear, you get the concept, then can figure out your tone on whatever platform. First thing should be identifying the kinda BASS AND PICKUP COMBINATION used. It's usually P bass or neck pickup (if you have 2) for the P bass songs, and IDK what combos he uses on the Gibson G3 (i.e. "Longview"), but still a wide open 2 pickup bass can sorta' fake most of that. P bass is middier by nature. OTOH, more then one pickup in parallel (as wired on most basses with more than 1 pickup) is more scooped, and so does it sound on GD's tunes, not that P bass mids are tamed or they're reinforced on the G3 to compensate, they sound rather "natural", as they are, to me. The other thing is THE WAY HE PLAYS. Be conscious about it, there's no sounding like Mike Dirnt (and many other punk bass players) without a firm and rhythmic motion, hard picking in general. I can't recommend thin picks enough. I mostly use .60mm Tortex Triangles, and occasionally .73mm Tortex Flex Triangles. I prefer the fluidity and also the non-choking punch of thin picks (there's a limited amount of force you can apply to a thin pick before it starts "compressing" you by bending, great for consistency). Look, there's still people asking for holy grial gear to sound like Geddy, while some have been forever able to do that on just any random Jazz Bass. You gotta mean it from the start, from your hands and your bass. Most important part to get a sound you like. Next is some OVERDRIVE. For this I'd start with a SansAmp emulation (what I use the most in my Zooms). Start with EQ flat and gain/blend at 50/50. You might have to do 2 or 3 patches at various gain and blend levels, you'll find quite some gain variety from song to song. The blend control in SansAmps (and most emulations) does a great job making you lo-fi while keeping good (non-cardboard'ish) lowend. The kinda' distortion you want is grainy, but not hissy. Use the SansAmp EQ for correcting that, and overall shaping to the bass tone you aim at. Probably boost a little bass, give yourself some nice punching foundation. Then I'd use COMPRESSION (some more, as rhe SansAmp already compresses some). Nothing shy here. There's MANY compressors in your Zoom. I mostly use the 160comp emulation. Does the work for me. I do a lot of HC/punk with a variety of bass guitars and for that my compression is sorta' "binary", in that I'm either sounding full blast or I'm just not playing 🤣 Hope you get it, just use a high ratio and lower the threshold down to a point where pick attacks stop hurting and overall tone gets fattened a little (re-adjust to such side effect on the SansAmp EQ as needed). Finally, I'd add noise reduction to any overdrive gain patch, also pretty aggressive, as punk is, so you don't sound like a frying pan when not playing. Zoom's own ZNR noise reduction model works great, just set it to monitor instrument input, not all the chain. That (and the time spent tweaking) should be about it. Overdrive could be anything, I've heard anything from a Tube Screamer to a Metal Zone work with the adequate gain for the task and enough EQ and compression. Try different overdrives, theres LOTS of different characters you fan have from the emulations in that pedal. I'm exemplifying based on SansAmp because I'm sure it's in your B1 four, and also because it's one of the easiest to use and get a good basic tone from. Feel free to inquire further if needed. Hope I helped.

Bought one too, just arrived

Same for me, a bass bought from this very parish, before Shitbreaks, that came totally unprotected in a too big hardcase without anything inside preventing it to move and, which is the most "delicious" part, with the shipping label sticked on the case itself that wasn't even locked by any means. Thankfully, when the driver presented it to me, he agreed with me that this wasn't secured at all, so he opened it before me and the ACG bass inside was there and intact. I was a bit upset, but the bass was fine. That said, I still love this place. 😉

It should say "Paul's letter to the Epiphanies", the lesser-known one after Paul's letter to the Corinthians.

I noticed there weren't any videos online yet documenting the changes to the Octabvre design, so i made a quick and dirty video to show the sounds.

Where carpeted cabs only have stacking corners, I'd always fit rubber feet to avoid them soaking up the usual cocktail of beer, fruit juice and other less wholesome substances that ends up all over most venue floors and car parks by the end of a night. I totally get the warranty concerns about driving screws into the bottom of a new cab, but I consider the alternative a much worse situation so I've attached rubber feet to all my Markbass cabs and combos before taking them out. Never had any problems with either the feet or the carpet covering, so my vote is definitely to feet. My CMD 121p for example - still nice and clean:

I have been thinking about getting this pedal for about two months. I must say now, that it is the best bass overdrive I have ever tried. I love the sounds I can get from it

Given the weight of some of the basses, I struggle to pick up my Jazz at times

OK, thank you for your suggestion. I will look for like-minded friends to start this bass journey together. hope I can really devote myself to it.

Updates to the Reverb app will be exactly the same as the previous version, just with different colours.

Drip drip drop, little April shower, dropping a tune as you fall all around... Jah UD sits at his laptop staring at the swirling, whirling, wobbling colours draining downwards into his keyboard and decides it's probably time to kick the hallucinogenics into touch, but not before laying down this pop reggae curiosity. P-bass copy, HB Tele, Yamaha keys and bits and bobs of loops from Looperman. Recorded and mashed-up with Wavepad and Audacity.

Still want. It's funny, after all these years of not playing a Tobias shaped bass, I really need one in my life again. This one.

Two more pictures: The back of the cab, with the amp connectors in the recess and the power connectors besides the battery compartment access. Amp and battery options - Top left: 90w per speaker Kenwood car amplifier Top right: 7AHr battery with fuse and one way only plug Middle right: Meanwell 12v 5A mains power supply. Bottom left: 15w per speaker ebay amplifier for home practice or 'jamming with a friend' - work in progress. Bottom right: 2.3AHr battery to power the smaller amp, giving a reduced weight rig for travelling - also a work in progress. David

I’m sure we’d all like to hear some audio, if it’s at all possible. When I say we, I really mean me, but I’m guessing there might be others too.

I own 2 x J5s from Overwater. Both 35 scale's and an absolute dream to play.

Leave it like it is cosmetically is my vote pups maybe change if needed