neepheid

Ahem - https://www.epiphone.com/en-US/Collection/original-bass Relax, their website is poorly laid out. They've got a Sheraton in the bass section FFS! Your beloved Tbird is safe, but the EB basses seem to have bit the dust. Oh well.

Completely understandable point of view to take if you own a Serek As a neutral who owns neither and has no desire to do so, I'll go with historical precedent.

If I had to guess - it's an inexpensive bass, so they'll reuse the wiring harness (and knobs) from the Embassy to save money. The modern Gibson SG has been VVT for some time now, so there's also some precedent for this kind of simplification.

I think it's a bit cheeky to call this a budget Serek, considering the Newport was Epiphone's idea in the first place. Surely a Serek is an expensive/boutique Epiphone?

Get both, obviously

Spooky that Epiphone should issue one with a very similar colour to yours!

Completely different target market and price bracket - they should be able to coexist happily.

All the skinny on the OG Newport Deluxe courtesy of Fly Guitars - https://www.flyguitars.com/epiphone/bass/1962EpiphoneNewportDeluxe.php

I hope they're not the same garbage tuners as found on the Embassy, but I suspect they will be, so even if you like the small buttons you'll want to change 'em. Very vague and too much play in them.

After they put out the Embassy, I wondered how long it would take them to do the Newport. Well, now they have, short scale lovers. Around £350 gets you a pretty decent modern reinterpretation of the pre '63 Newport. Nice colours too. There's not even a sniff of them on the Epiphone website yet, but they're in retailers now (picture nicked from Peach Guitars, Guitar Guitar have 'em too, probably others)

If I may be pedantic, it does have the treble boost option, so the preamp does do one tone altering thing...

That photo is a good start

Aren't all basses just another wheeze to relieve us of our hard-earned?

Priced up all the misc bits and bobs - everything except pickups and bridge, just a smidge under £100. Keen to get going but I must wait to see if the car passes its MOT at the end of the month. Adulting sucks

Can get them in brass, might be a close enough match to gold hardware...

I was thinking about multiple M8 washers but these would look better, if I could either get them in gold or get them electroplated.

Right, phase one complete - complete hardware and electronics removal, truss rod slackened off (god knows how long it'll be unstrung) and fingerboard cleaned and oiled. Mmm, grotty. The rat's nest Empty! Bye bye EMG

I've gone away and done some scheming. I've decided to go full hardware swap to gold for those Lotus/JPS vibes. Controls will be VVTT with push pulls for series/parallel, then regular three way pickup selector switch. Pickups - I would ideally like a pair of DiMarzio X2N-B (DP125) - they're not listed as a regular item but can be ordered from the DiMarzio Custom Shop. I have heard some pleasing footage of these pickups in GIbson-esque basses in a few YouTube vids. Going to get them in black with gold rails, I think that will suit the whole black and gold theme nicely... Probably going to be expensive and difficult to get a hold of though. I've already made some enquiries directly to DiMarzio and they're not geared up for direct international sales, so I'm either going to have to throw myself at the mercy of the UK distributor (or whichever retailer they paw me off to) or find a willing US based co-conspirator to act as go-between. Gold bridge is also going to be an issue - Gibson/Epiphone turned down my offer to buy a gold three pointer from them as it's not an officially listed spare part (BOO - God knows what you do if your Rumblekat has an issue then). Can't find a gold one for love nor money, only chrome or black. Currently there's a chancer in Australia wanting a ridiculous amount for the quite used looking bridge/tuners/knobs from a Rumblekat - I'll pass thanks. It'll either be a case of getting lucky on eBay, or resigning myself to buying a Babicz or Hipshot then have to deal with mounting that on a curved surface (where the curve is a lot more pronounced front to back than say a Jack Casady). Anyway, while parts acquisition may take a while, I can get busy with gutting the existing gubbins and giving the fretboard a good clean.

Nah, there's always something that can change - most of all yourself. A bass I was 100% satisfied with 10 years ago will probably not suit me quite so well now because tastes change, and hopefully I've developed a little as a bass player in that time also!

14 years, 11 months and 30 days later, is that a BC record for thread resurrection?

I will be honest with you - as long as I'm loud enough and bassy enough, I couldn't give a damn. The minutae of bass tone is lost completely on me when the rest of the band kick in and I'm too busy not effing songs up to give a monkey's about my tone beyond that basic ballpark mentioned in the previous sentence. I doubt I'll ever get good enough to have the spare capacity to care

Lightweight gear is the way forward. When I think of the Ashdown ABM410 I used to lug around when I started, my back pseudospasms.

Welcome, and as a resident of NE Scotland, I appreciate your qualification of which NE you're talking about

I expect my obbm cables will outlive me.