BigRedX

N.Hayashi who designed all the iconic Aria Pro II guitars and basses in the late 70s and early 80s now runs Atlansia.

There is no "flat".

Has there been any further information about what MIDI control is available beyond this meaningless statement: "The midi input allow you to control the channels of the amp via a midi standard controller."

Helix Floor, and AFAIK all the rack mounted Line6 devices.

I wouldn't get anything custom built before trying as many other examples of the luthiers work as can. When I first discovered bass forums on the internet Jon Shuker was very much the "in fashion" UK custom luthier, and I do have to say that the photos on his web site of the basses he had made looked very tasty indeed. I exchanged several emails with him and was pretty much ready to have him build me a fretless, when I actually got to play some his basses at one of the Manchester Bass Day events. Nice as they looked I simply couldn't get on with any of the instruments he had on display when it came to actually playing them. I saved myself from a very costly mistake.

Do you play any Polysics songs?

Bass Pod Rack to Shortboard. For The Terrortones I would normally have a variation on each sound with a bit more drive on it just to fill out the sound during the solos, so loosing the connection between the pedals and the Bass Pod wasn't the end of the world. However for one of the bands I am playing with at the moment each song has it's own patch with anywhere between 2 and 4 snapshots per patch for switch between a verse, chorus and "solo" sounds. Without the ability the change sound mid-song they just wouldn't sound right, which was instrumental in my deciding to get the floor version of the Helix rather than the rack and separate foot pedals. IMO CAT5 cables belong in an office environment only where they connect the computers and other equipment to the closest wall network socket, and are completely out of the way. The only time they should be touched is if some equipment they are attached to is being replaced or if you have an office layout reorganisation, in which case I've usually taken the opportunity to chuck all the old cables away and replace them with brand new ones.

I can't say that "networking" has ever really worked for me in over 40 years of playing in bands. Nearly every band that I have formed or joined has been done through adverts, either on the walls of musical instrument or record shops or more recently on-line. Once I get to the audition having been in a reasonably well-known local band or two in the past might have helped prove to the others that I was serious about playing and my commitment to being in a band, but it has never got me into the door at the audition in the first place. That has always been done by carefully wording my ad or only seeking out other ads that looked as though they were written by musicians that were serious about their band. Of course what works for one person does not by any means work for everyone (or indeed any one else).

In that case I'd trawl through the more interesting selections in the Basses For Sale section on here buying and selling until you find something you really like. I suspect that might not even have to spend all of your £3000.

The Hondo Alien is essentially a Kramer Duke with less good hardware. If you go this route I'd get a Kramer, as the "aluminium" used in the Hondo neck didn't seem particularly robust - the threads for the string clamp at the "nut" end of the neck had worn out on mine and the clamp had to be superglued back into place every time I changed the strings. I wouldn't want risk the same happening to those attaching the neck to the body

And in this respect the Thunderbird is the bass that most lends itself to a 5-string version, since the design is already a long scale multi-laminate through neck.

In the Terrortones I used to go through a standard CAT5 cable every 6-8 weeks (which approximately 20 gigs and rehearsals). The main problem I found was that they wouldn't coil properly or lie flat on stage due to the nature of the wire(s) inside them, and the retaining clips on the plugs would eventually snap off rendering them useless, since the plugs only fit in the socket securely due to the clip. Eventually I got Van Damme to make me up some very expensive replacements (about £100 for two 5m cables IIRC) with supposedly coilable CAT5 cable and heavy duty shrouded plugs. These have proved to be more durable, although the first still failed after about 18 months of gigging and rehearsing twice a week - eventually the coilable cable stopped being coilable and shortly after that the lead stopped working reliably. The second cable that has has considerably less use is still working OK. When you consider that I have jack and XLR cables I made almost 30 years ago that have suffered to same level of use and are still going strong, you can appreciate why I am reluctant to recommend any solution that uses computer components in a situation where they are unplugged and moved on a regular basis.

No more or less ugly than any other Fender.

I'm surprised that no-one here remembers that Basschat's @Mr. Foxen was involved with the building of a Modern Octobass for Linder Sterling which was documented in this thread. Unfortunately it was some time ago and many of the links in the thread no longer work. However if you Google "Linder" and "Octobass" you will be able to find out all about it.

TBH if I had that kind of money I'd be looking at booking my band into a decent studio with a proper producer to make a really good recording that will last for ever, rather than buying another piece of musical equipment that I might be selling a few years down the line.

Having previously used The Line 6 Bass Pod with their Shortboard controller I remain to be convinced of the robustness of a CAT5 cable to connect the rack Helix and it's foot controller in a gigging environment. I'd go for mounting the wireless system along with the Helix in a pedal board flight case (which is what I am about to do).

IME the most important thing to do with the Helix is to ignore what the various modules are supposed to be copies of and just use your ears to decide whether a particular module sounds any good for your needs. Of my 30 or so patches I have only 2 with a bass amp (and no cab) and those are used entirely for the overdrive sound of the amp so in effect I am using it as a distortion module. The rest of my patches use either guitar amps (with and without cab sims), or no amp or cab sims at all and simply one of the EQ modules and a distortion module if required.

IME you don't actually need any bass-dedicated models or effects. On my Helix only 2 of my 30 or so patches use a bass amp model (and those are used for the drive/distortion effect). The rest either use "guitar" amps or no amp model at all and just EQ and distortion modules. And as I've said before I'm not keen on multi-effects that don't have a built-in PSU. They are not professional pieces of equipment IMO.

What do you like in a bass? What don't you like about the bass(es) you currently have?

The Epiphone 5-string Thunderbird, was a Thunderbird in approximate body shape only. Nothing else - construction, woods, electronics had anything in common with the original 60s Gibson Thunderbird. Gibson themselves made a 5-string Thunderbird in the 90s. It wasn't very good (although it was more of a traditional Thunderbird than the Epiphone). What Gibson need to do is to make a 5-string Thunderbird that looks and sounds like an original 60s version but with a usable low B string. They have yet to do that.

Typo

The thing is, there are covers bands and there are bands that play covers. I've played in bands where everyone has gone away and learnt note for note what is on the record, and it still sounds wrong because the band can't reproduce every overdubbed part from the studio recording when they only have one or two guitarists plus bass and drums. A lot of the time (mostly on songs from the 60s and 70s) I find that what is perceived as the "bass part" is actually the keyboard players left hand and on the original, the bass guitar tends to be noodling away in the rhythm guitar range rather than holding down the bottom end. I found on these songs learning the bass guitar part was a waste of time and they would sound much better if I played the left hand of the keyboard part with any prominent bass guitar runs (usually those where there was no singing) thrown in. Even on those songs where the original bands instrumentation was the same as ours you still can't reproduce every overdub from the record, and playing every single complex fill and run on the bass, would detract from the main job of the rhythm section - getting the song to drive along. In the end I found it far more effective to learn and simplified version of the bass part and then add the more complex stuff back in if it was noticeably missing when we rehearsed the song with the whole band. I aslo discovered that the previous bass player from the covers band that was most particular about getting the arrangement right from the recording, had produced bass parts that had only a passing resemblance to what was on the original. A fact that I had never spotted, until I started learning the songs myself, despite seeing the band with him play on many occasions before I joined. I've also played in bands whose covers only used the lyrics and vocal melody from the original and the rest of the arrangement was new. Quite a lot of the time I have only had a passing knowledge of the original song and sometimes I completely unfamiliar with it, so in these situations I have tended to approach the song as though it was any other new original song and play what I felt was right for the arrangement as it developed. If I knew the song well enough to know that there was something missing at the bottom end, I would add it in but otherwise I did my own thing. TBH I enjoyed this approach far more, and IME the audiences were no less enthusiastic in their reception than if we had learnt the song note for note from the best known recording.

If you are a functions band then essentially you are staff.

Well after nearly 40 years of gigging and never having been subjected to any requests let alone ridiculous ones from the audience I finally get my first this weekend. First thing to bear in mind is that the band are playing post-punk influenced originals with an unconventional line-up (Drums, Bass VI, Synthesiser and Vocals). So having just played our one and only cover song of the set (a disco'd up bass heavy version of "A Forest" by The Cure), a young lady strides up into the "stage" area and leans over to ask me if we can do something by Placebo! I have to smile nicely and say that our previous song is our only cover and besides the next one is our last before giving the synth player the nod to start the opening bass drone for the song... We appear to get away with it as the lay in question and her friend seem very keen on coming to see our next gig.

From my personal experience, I’d very much agree with this.