Edenburgh

Geoff - fair point...here we both are (the bass has clearly had an easier life than its new owner):

What a weekend! Friday evening sitting at home surfing with a beer and I found out about this London bass show. Easyjet flight for first thing Saturday was booked 30 minutes later. This trip certainly made for easy comparison of all models. Heart : Tried out the Fender '58 and '63 vintage reissue models. From the secondhand stalls, tried out '69, '73 & '77 P-Basses. Head : Tried out a Yammy 2024 Wallet : The 'special show prices' for the yammy and the 70's P's were comparable - the wallet no longer had a casting vote! First off, the new Fender RI models are truly ace. Great build, great sound and the '63 had a significantly hotter output than the '58. Next the Yammy - all that you say about this bass is true. It is awesome. Even the controls have a confidence inspiring quality feel, just turning the tone dial you felt like someone had spent time making sure it had the right amount of resistance (not too slack, not too tight, just right). The guys at the Yammy stall also offered to supply me with any colour (either 2024 or 2024x) and ship it to me at the 'special show price'. The Head (and the wallet) couldn't fault that. Nevertheless, I went on to try.... '73 P-Bass (we're getting into heart territory) - my birthday year bass. Ash body, Maple neck, looked the part, played great, sounded great. But. 1970's patchy Fender build quality made me have a long hard think about it. You see there was an overhang on the heel where the neck was just very badly aligned. About 3-4mm out. Didn't appear to impact the playability, but it was a niggle nevertheless.....so I walked on.... '77 P-Bass (staying in heart territory) - ash body, rosewood neck, black pickguard. A heavy bass compared to the '73. Great condition, thick sound. Played better than the '73. I'll be honest, it probably isn't quite as well set up as the Fender Vintage Re-issues - but I can fix that - because I bought it! Heart - wins Head - trying to argue that head still won because I didn't do something really silly like sell my SSII to fund a 60's P-Bass purchase! Wallet - empty. Great weekend, great show. And spoke to the nice lady from Basschat in the queue while we were waiting to get in.

Thanks all for the warmth and enthusiasm in your responses. Food for thought. I will update this in due course for anyone who is interested...

I'm in the market for a special bass for one of those landmark birthdays (it's a 'happy birthday to me' present if you catch my drift) I was pretty much in the Fender P-Bass frame of mind - either mid 70's (a '73 to match my birthday would be rather nice) or VR or CS - that's the heart bit. The head bit is causing a distraction by saying 'Yamaha BB2024x' So - heart says P-Bass. Head says 2024-X (I saw Marco Mendoza playing one with Thin Lizzy in Glasgow recently and it sounded ace). Any thoughts or insights appreciated. (I know, I know, this is not a great hardship of a dilemma to have but some of the 2024 reviews suggest it is like a super duper p-bass which got me wondering)