bassbiscuits

I bought an Ashdown Mag300 head about 10 years ago as a spare to cover a load of gigs when my old Peavey began packing up. The Mag was incredible and became my main amp straightaway. Very loud for its rating, lots of bass and quite valvey-sounding even tho a transistor amp. I thrashed it and it always sounded cool. It led me to explore the rest of the higher spec ABM range at the time, tho none of which I got on with as well as the Mag, strangely. Good amps tho. I moved to a Markbass head in the end cos it was smaller and louder than the Mag, and I still use it.

The nearest to all-round perfect I had was a 1995 USA P, which sounded great, even across the neck, good action and strung thru the body. (its the one on the left in my avatar) However, it weighed a lot and had a really big thick neck - it benefited the sound, but made it hard work to play for long periods. I now only have one P - the sunburst/tort/rosewood 1970 with a B width neck which i bought over 20 years ago. (on the right of my avatar) It's not quite as consistent as the more modern one, and a bit gentler sounding, but it makes up for it by being lightweight and full of mojo.

Hmm yeah. I have a 1970. The tuners didn't have that little circled letter after the Fender word until about 1973 i don't think, the decal doesn't look right and certainly shouldn't have the "original contour body" wording at all. Fingerboard veneer looks kosher tho at first glance. Should have a thumbrest below the strings, but evidence of that lost with the scratchplate swap by the look of it. Dunno. Needs a closer look. As Creeper says, pickup and pot codes should help.

I should say so. Saved me from another day of deadly headlines about Brexit and Trump.

Cheers Hobbayne I was more really leading up to using my "show me Kevin" line, which turned out to be less funny that i'd expected. Sorry.

I'm confused - does this Kevin guy actually exist then or is it just a funny thread? I need some proof. Show me Kevin.

Over £3,500 for a secondhand Epiphone Jack Casady? Er, I love mine, don't get me wrong, but that's an awful lot of money....

Ha ha! Sometimes yeah. And my flask of tea....

Fair play to you Andy - that's a good decision I'd say. I left my band of 12 years this summer, as we've got two young kids (the littlest is 16 months) and the whole juggling act was proving too much. The gigs were increasingly playing covers I wasn't keen on to indifferent audiences and it got to the point that I just felt like screaming every time more gigs came in. Sorry to hear your little girl is going to have a poorly start - i think you're doing the right thing taking the pressure off yourself musically and focusing on the important stuff. I still love playing, and have been doing the occasional solo gig and some original stuff with two friends, but it's for fun, support slots and little local festivals, with no one putting the pressure on. Good decision Andy, and I hope every thing works out well with the little one.

Lots of vocals A big bag of spares/tools etc A Volvo estate

Why just man? What about women too?

When I was a kid there was a motorbike cop show called CHIPS which had a funky theme tune. I also loved the music from the Fall Guy with Lee Majors.

Good shout with Go Jetters - that's on in my house all the time and I can't believe i didn't think of it. I'm not sure it counts as 'grooving' but the daddy of all TV theme tunes for me has to be Ski Sunday - I've attempted to play it a few times but it ain't easy...

At a packed pub on St Paddy's Night a few years back, my keyboard player pulled on a lead that was snagged on something on a windowsill at the back of the stage, and it tightened, flipping a full pint of water into the back of my Markbass head. I snapped it up, desperately shaking it to get the worst out as my keyboard player looked on, mortified. Miraculously it seemed fine, and worked for the entire gig (and still does). Happy I wasn't drinking anything stickier. I think that was the same night we got about 200 drunk people to sing Slade's "Merry Xmas Everybody" on St Patricks Day. At that same venue (but different gigs) the keyboard player's x-frame stand gave up mid-song and collapsed in a pile while he looked on, crestfallen, and the guitarist's valve amp fell down a flight of stairs when the rubber dogbone handle split. Someone, neither personnel nor gear came off seriously damaged.

I've normally got about £150-£200 a person for NYE gigs in the past. This year is the first one in a long time when I'm not going to be playing (unless something dramatic comes up in next couple of weeks!) and I'm quite looking forward to being with my family for a change, tho I'll miss the money!

Good shout ezbass! Yep Leslie West had a great sound. And yes you're right about a single pickup focusing the mind. As a lifelong P bass player I'm not really one for pointless fiddling - get a good sound, and then get on with playing.

Anyone here tried a Gibson SG Junior? I've borrowed a 2004 one off my brother who isn't using it, and i fear i can see how this GAS will all end... I normally play strats, and this definitely isn't one of them - a single P90, a wrapover bridge, late 60s batwing-style pickguard, fat 50s-style neck, dark red woodstain. But oh, the sound! Real snarl and bite from the P90 cranked to full, but rolls off nicely on the volume, and the tone control rolled off takes you into halfway-set wah wah territory and dark woody sounds. Ironically, i can see me having to flog my USA HSS strat to fund this (if it comes to that - steady on!) and while this SG Junior does more or less just one thing, it does it spectacularly! Oh yes, and it looks awesome.

14/15 for me - confused my Kim Deal and my Kim Gordon. And never heard of Thundercat! Good quiz tho.

AC/DC - Live Wire Jain - Makeba Van Halen - Panama I cant work out how to add links to YouTube etc but I'm sure you can find them yourselves!

It came on just as I got home from a gig last night. Exactly what I felt like watching with a cuppa and the rest of the house fast asleep. What a cool band.

What an awesome player and what an ace band they were back in the day. That live version of Highway sounds really really loud too! Cool. He had the best job in the world, writing AC/DC riffs and then standing in front of a stack of Marshalls, next to Phil Rudd, and flooring it. RIP sir. You've done us all proud.

Hello Ajoten, There are a few people on here with various shoulder/back injuries etc, so we might be able to help. 13lbs is an extremely heavy bass in my experience - that's about 5.8kg. The average weight is about 4kg (9lbs) for a long scale, solid body bass like a Precision or a Jazz. There are lots of lighter basses tho, depending on how much you want to spend. At the budget end, SGC Nanyo Basses are Japanese 1980s instruments, which come up for sale here from time to time and are very good value and very lightweight. At the other end of the scale, American-made boutique builders like Mike Lull produce basses which are often sub-4kg but are expensive, very fine instruments. There are a hell of lot of instruments in between the two, so its not too hard to find something that fits the bill. I don't know exactly what tendon problems you have, or what impact a heavy bass in having on them, but try wearing a lighter bass on a strap maybe and see if it feels more comfortable, and take things from there.

My lightly reliced Sandberg California TT4. I couldn't get it to sound like I wanted, and ended up trading it in for a jazz bass which i later sold anyway. But listening back to a few snippets i recorded it sounds lovely, and probably would have just benefited from some different pickups etc. The rest of the bass was lovely. I've kept an eye out for it but it hasn't come back up for sale again. Bummer.