Lozz196

Yep, when the budget instruments are plenty good enough to learn well on, and gig with, there`s less of a need to get the more expensive versions. I`m a die-hard US Fender guy, but in reality my Mex Precisions are more than enough for my needs. Yes, the US are better, but completely stock the MIMs are fine for gigging - in fact many pros that I see use MIMs. And with a few quid spent on better electrics and maybe tuners/bridge, well you have a very good bass for about half the price of the main US version. Our guitarist plays the Gibson LPJs - a studio version of the Les Paul. Great sounding guitars, new were about £600/£700, second hand picked up for £400ish. He prefers them to the Les Paul Standards and Customs. Now when the big companies are making such good "budget" instruments, well you can see why they might start to see the hits on their top-end instruments & profits.

Yep, I read that when CJ joined the Ramones he continued to play with his fingers, whereas before with Dee Dee it was all down-stroke pick playing. Given that all their success happened with down-stroke pick playing, I`d say to anyone, learn that pick technique, or you may well bring down The Ramones.

I think they`ll re-emerge. Music is currently a factory of nice pop songs, made by identically looking and sounding teenagers. Sooner or later there will be a rebellion against this and guitars will be back in. It goes round in circles, we just have to endure the non-guitar years much like bears go without grub during hibernation.

With the music quoted, and the fact he already has a Marshall 412 and is veering towards Marshall, for me it would have to be a JCM 900. They are imo Marshalls last great amp, and they don`t have to be daft-loud to sound good either. Our guitarist uses one and we only play to the volume of the drums, yet out front that amp sings. Valve amps do come with volume controls, yes they can go stoopidly loud, but they don`t have to. And you can pick them up for £300 - £400 used.

Yep I`ve been using the triangular Dunlop 1.14mm ones, but have 073, .88 & 1.0 so am gonna try them all. I`m hoping that this will work as, in conjunction with another thread, I want to stop playing so hard all the time, just bring it in for when the guitar is soloing maybe, whereas at present I`m flat out all the time. Sounds great but these hands ain`t getting any younger.

Pretty much that for me too - I look back now and think of all of the things which I could have, and should have done, but didn`t due to my primary mission of getting hammered at the weekends (and at other indiscriminate times as well).

Good point Chris, I used my old Aguilar TH350/Barefaced Super 12T with two different bands, one (my actual band)had the master volume on 3, the other (I was standing in for) on 7. And this was just in the rehearsal room. Some bands are ridiculously loud, often, as was in the case of this one, due to the drummer.

Looks great Dave, I`m still umming & aahhing over a Jazz. I`m unlikely to ever play one in my band so am pretty sure that a MIM will be more than enough for my needs. Just trying to convince myself that having a bass for home-use only isn`t a waste of money. @Gottastopbuyinggear - the Ashdown ABM600 is a great amp. It`s what I use, though I do have to agree with @FinnDave, the Rootmaster amps are great. The ABM has more depth to it at big-stage volumes, the size where you`d use an SVT stack, but if I were in a pub covers band I`d use the Rootmasters, great amps, def the weightiest sounding Class D amp that I`ve had - and mine was the 500 version.

I`ve found that picks really make a difference. I`m trying to go lighter as I have a tendency to dig in a lot, and hopefully this will reduce this a bit. Plus the thicker the pick the bassier the sound, so I`m also hoping to be able to add some lows in on my pre-amp and start letting my equipment generate the sound, rather than my hard-hitting, and let the thinner pick generate the top-end that I need.

I used one a couple of weeks ago. I do agree, there is something special about the sound, however I`m still wondering if it`s more to do with the 810 and the height of the speakers, as in instead of just getting the bass alone your ears get all of the highs and high-mids so you hear a truer representation of your playing. That said I know I`m in safe territory with an SVT/810 stack - Precision into Para Driver into amp, everything at midday, master volume at 3, that`s me sorted.

That`s a good point, no matter what the price is many seem to try and get a few quid off, so maybe some are inflating the initial price in order to get what they actually want, anticipating said haggles.

Well as a result of this thread I`ve decided to have slightly lighter strings, and a lighter pick, and to add in more bass & volume from the amp. Whether or not it will work who knows but it was only when reading this that I realised that often I do tend to set the amp so I have to hit hard to hear myself, and that on gigs where I get a lot of bass through the monitors, I do back off a bit and the performance hasn`t suffered as a result. So I`m gonna give it a go, never too old to learn, and it might just make things easier as I do find at the end of an hour-long set that my pick-hand aches somewhat.

Well a lot can depend on make, if you get an old Trace Elliot or Peavey 1x15 or 2x10 combo then 150/200 watts will be easily enough. I usually go for having 300 watts available and not needing them all, rather than pushing an amp to its limit. That said in my youth when I couldn`t afford the bigger amps I pushed my 100/150 watt amps to their limits all the time and I never had a problem with any of them.

I can understand why the Road Worns are priced near to the US, very good basses indeed. The Classics are good, not as good as the RWs imo but still a darn fine bass and better than the Mex Standard, although not by that much - again imo. I think the quality of Mex Standard Fenders has upped significantly, 2012 models onwards, and whilst the US Standard is king for me, the Mex are gaining ground. I`ve two Mex Standard Precisions at present - one going to be sold soon - and for the £400 or so you get them for 2nd hand there is a great deal of bass there. Similar to Dave I`m looking for a Jazz at present, and am going Mex, will be plenty for my needs.

Yep when I had my Barefaced cabs I found that the bass on the amp was set higher as they were far flatter/neutral in voicing, whereas many other manufacturers seem to voice their cabs with a bias towards the lows.

That was pretty much it for me too - I bought a Precision, played it at home and was pretty underwhelmed with it considering how many of my fave bassists played them. Then took it to band practice and it all made sense. I`ve found that basses I like the sound of played on their own, such as Jazzes & Stingrays just don`t work for me in a band setting, but the Precision that has a fairly ordinary sound on its own is the master in the mix.

I`m the same, but opposite, one tone knob, on full all the time. My ideal tone was on an Ampeg PF500 a few years ago, all eq set at midday, both Low & High presets selected, a tad of on-board compression. Was P-Bass heaven, imo.

Yeah, when I had the Two10 & Four10 I`m pretty sure I`d have got the tone I was after if all speakers had been full range, but then I need a lot of treble/twang and the low-only cones made this almost impossible. Great sounding cabs for anything else though, am pretty sure in later life if I have a change of music genre I`ll be back to a couple of the Two10s.

Undoubtably

That would be gibbon-tastic

I`d love for it to work for me but I have tried and the aggressiveness and attack are lost. Being in a 3 piece street punk band, where my sound is somewhere between JJ Burnell, Duff McKagan & Lemmy the "strength of hit" is where it`s at. The only time I ever really found playing lighter to work was one band practice where it was so hot in the rehearsal room I couldn`t be fussed to play with my usual attack, so turned up louder/hit softer and admit that I really enjoyed it, but that was in a different band where it fitted far better. In all honesty I thought the tone was better too as a result, but again, different band, different needs.

Not UK, but I played in Greece last weekend and of the 6 bands on the bill 2 of the bassists were female. I never think of it as a gender thing, it`s an instrument, they`re not gender specific, though have read on here that one of the female bassists on here has mentioned that people think it strange that ladies play bass. Don`t know why, maybe it`s to do with the size of the instrument and that in general ladies are smaller than men, so people questioning the reach element maybe?

And don`t forget the on-board eq on that `Ray, Pete,

Another "amp I use" recommendation, the Ashdown ABM600. It has valve pre-amp so can be set thick/warm etc, but if wanting the solid-state quick response just leave this off - that`s what I do. My two fave set-ups to play through are Ashdown ABMs & Ampeg SVTs, so when buying my amp went for the one I could lift out of the two