mcnach

I'd disagree with that assessment. They compared positively to Squier Affinities and the like in my experience (had three examples in my hands). I do think that too many people who didn't need another Precision bought one, and eventually they let them go. That was certainly my case I bought three! I know I know. The first one was to see what it was about and because I fancied a cheap substrate for modification. It was white/rosewood. I liked it. I was very impressed. It actually was the first time I enjoyed playing a Precision style bass. I put a Wizard Thumper on it and used it as it was for a while. I bought a blue and another white one. The blue one had a maple fingerboard, so I swapped necks and turned the white/maple into the fretless I posted above. The blue one was stripped and became a project to turn it into a MM/P type bass. I only have the fretless now. I sold the white fretted one because at one point I had something like 5 Precisions (Squier CV, Fender Classic 50s, and a few others) so I only kept the Fender because I loved the wide fretboard on that one and it was maple. I never finished the project one and sold it as parts. The fretless remains.

For a £60 bass it was pretty decent, although I found the pickup a bit microphonic which is a shame as it sounded good. I still have one. I turned it to fretless and put a Model P pickup on it. I sold three other fretless basses and kept this one. It just works and makes all the right noises, so I'm pretty happy with it.

Nothing here yet, and not many places have big rooms which will be very much on demand. I play in a couple of 8+ member bands. It's not going to be easy.

I have no idea, and I find it uncomfortable to think in terms of 'tolerable' death rates, especially when you have a few people in your family that would be at high risk of severe illness or death if they catch it. A lot of it will be down to us, as individuals. We do not need to be 100% effective at avoiding being infected, but if we're mindful enough we may just reduce the transmission of Covid and other common viruses enough that things don't get out of hand. Hopefully there will be noticeably fewer people coughing and sneezing openly in the (near?) future. I once kicked someone out of our shared office at work because he kept coming to sit and ask people questions while constantly sneezing and often not even attempting to cover his mouth. I was the 'bad guy' for a day but I don't care even if it was 'just a cold'... and this is in a biology laboratory that works with viruses so it wasn't a simple matter of lack of knowledge. I can't imagine that situation will arise anytime soon at work again because now it's very much not accepted, socially, which is not a bad thing.

My first non-cancelled gig is on the first weekend in September, with an 8-piece band. I'm not entirely sure it'll happen.

I think that approach is just another way of saying "I give up, I don't have a solution". It may actually come down to that, largely, at least for this first winter. 😕

I don't think there's evidence of any long term immunity, so I'm pretty certain all those early speeches about herd immunity are irrelevant right now. It looks like Covid-19 is here to stay. Vaccines, when available, may have only limited effects and would need to be renewed. So much uncertainly. This winter is going to be interesting... will we have a massive surge? or maybe just a minor increase of deaths over the usual winter levels?

wow, that sounds nasty, very painful! 😲 I heard about some people having a reaction to nickel in strings but I always assumed it was a much milder effect.

So sad. He made really nice cabs It's not looking good with regards the survival of the company, is it? @Contrebasse I hope you get this sorted soon, it's a very poor show.

A Nordstrand MM4.2 by any chance?

No, they don't. The EQ is part of the preamp and it's bypassed entirely. The bypass switch (pull on the volume knob) is only really there as an emergency button in case I forget to replace the battery or something. There is no room to add a passive tone control without reorganising the whole preamp, otherwise I'd have added one. If I was going to remove the whole preamp, then I'd put a passive tone control for sure. In fact, maybe I'd try a Tonestyler control with an additional pot to control the 'depth' of the Tonestyler. They're really cool alternatives to standard passive tone controls.

It's a common misconception that the MM pickup is low output. It isn't. The preamp, when set flattish, does not really increase the output level in any significant form. Of course, you *can* boost it... a lot! But not everyone wants or needs that. Anyway, yeah, that passive pickup is comparable in output to any other passive pickups. The built-in EQ on that preamp just allows you get get to a number of 'classic' Stingray tones easily, while on passive form you get access to a different set of sounds. I wish the Stingray came by default with a passive tone control in addition to the active EQ.

I can't listen to the clip right now, but as a fellow bypass-switch-installed Stingray owner, I agree that a passive Stingray sounds pretty damn good. In my case, it sounds much like the active one... it seems that I normally set the controls to pretty much flat normally, perhaps cutting down treble a bit. That onboard EQ sees very little action on my bass

🤣

I was only joking. What I meant is that since you built them, you had to fit the bridge/saddles and in doing so the intonation was set right for your strings/action... that's all

well, if you built them, then technically you adjusted it

and I found it sounds better if I turn the amplifier up a few notches 😛

... and it gets better the more you play it I forgot how cool Telecasters are! I still go for the whammy bar at times but I'm getting used to it. I brought the neck pickup up a bit and that improved the sound. I may still get something better there, but not in a hurry. Frets feeling much better too as they get used. The Classic Vibe my friend has is nicer. It's hard to describe, it just feels like a really good guitar... but he is very good setting up his instruments so his CV Tele is perfect. Once it's been given a little attention, I can't imagine this one being much different, except for the pickups. The CV Squier pickups are very nice. The SX neck pickup is just adequate. Don't get me wrong, it's fine as it is, which for the money is crazy. I just know it can get a little bit better. Thank you all for indulging me

I have used a couple of different stands to tilt combos/single cabs. My favourite is the appropriately named Stagg GAS 4.2: STAGG GAS 4.2 It's simple, adjustable, folds nearly flat, and less than £15. I used mine a lot and it's still in good condition. I also had the 3.2 previously, which folds completely flat and takes next to no space at all which is nice, but it's not adjustable and I found my CMD121P combo would wobble a little on it although it was stable enough:

A bit busy just now but I managed a good half an hour of guitar noises... The guitar is beautiful, flawless finish, I tried hard to look for cosmetic issues but found none. The closest was perhaps the fret slots, viewed from the side, the filler is a bit paler than the surrounding wood. That. And then I remembered how much I paid. It was in tune when I took it out (nearly, I did retune it, but I've heard bands play live with guitars that were more out of tune than this one straight from the box), which suggests someone tested it before postage, or maybe it was the display model (it was the last red one they had). Frets are pretty good. The action is set low enough (I'd like it a bit lower) and plays nicely everywhere until you get to around the 14th-15th fret where the strings choke a bit: it's usable as it is, but it needs a little adjustment so that it plays smoothly all over. The frets are not shiny, they look like the guitar has been out for a while, which again makes me think it was probably a display model, but if it was they really cleaned it up (or not many people ever tried it :D) , except for the frets. As such they feel a little 'scratchy' when bending strings, but I'm sure after a couple of weeks of regular use (which it'll get) they'll be just fine. Fret ends are smooth as... Neck is pleasantly wide and chunky. Not baseball bat style, just... the right amount of girth, for my liking. If you are a fan of the Ibanez RG series necks, you'll find this a bit too deep, but I think it's the right size. Oh and lacquered, beautiful 'vintage' tint. I love lacquered necks. I'll probably cut the nut slots a TINY bit lower. I was thinking it would need a new nut, as a lot of budget guitars come with pretty horribly cut soft plastic nuts, but I'm not in a hurry with this one. As it is, it plays well enough, a little harder than ideal, which is very clear when I switch to the PRS, but... £139! I am surprised I get something that looks as good and is perfectly usable out of the box. I haven't mentioned sound yet. It sounds... like a Telecaster. It's very good, especially the bridge pickup, it's got that edge that Tele bridge pickups have and it's lovely with high gain, which is what separates the meh from the yeah pickups. The neck pickup is a little polite and lacks a bit of 'sparkle' compared to my ideal Tele sound. It sounds good enough, but I'm looking for negative points and I can't find anything else. Ideally I'd have something a bit better there. I have a black pickguard for it... however it doesn't fit. It's what happens sometimes when you go for non-Fender derived clones. On the SX the neck pickup is mounted on the pickguard rather than straight into the wood underneath, which suggests a wide pickup cavity underneath (they often do that so that they can produce different models with different size pickups... humbuckers etc using a single body design). The bottom of the neck is also a couple of mm longer than a Fender-derived version, so the only way I can fit this pickguard is moving the pickup 2mm down, which may be easily done if the pickup cavity is large as I suspect. No biggie, 'though. One day I'll adapt it. If not... I can use the black pickguard on the purple Tele that I'm getting for my birthday in September Seriously... £139? Add a decent setup and this can be a seriously decent guitar. @madshadows you were right, it's a very pretty metallic red. Hard to make it justice on a phone picture.

ooooh... what did the very nice courier brought me today?

That's really cool, thank you!

Doh, I should have read the whole thread first. SPB-1 it was indeed I had that one on my old Maruszczyk Jake and it was nice but a bit polite for my liking. The EMG GZR may be more to your liking (it was for mine).

My SPB-1 looked just like that P pickup. There are other models that may look like those, but the SPB-1 is 'popular' enough, so I'd say there's a good chance that that's what it is.

Not necessarily *more* mids than your favourite roundwound, but their frequency profile is stronger on the mids, lower mids in particular. However, there's also different flats that sound very different from each other. Thomastik Infeld Jazz Flats are pretty bright with very strong mids, while Labella Flats are more about their 'thump', and Status ones are very dull (not in a bad way necessarily) but then you get Ernie Ball Cobalt Flats which are as bright as their nickel roundwounds that have been used for a while... It's a jungle out there!