BigRedX

Very much so. I wouldn't even think about picking up any instrument to try if I didn't like the way it looks. Looks come first, playability second and I'll worry about the sound if it looks good and feels comfortable to play.

You'd also have to test first whether simply taking the neck off the bass and replacing it made any difference to the sound.

You can find the current Grassroots range here. As NancyJohnson says, they are budget brand of ESP Japan.

I've got one. It's fine so long as you can cope with the very narrow yet chunky 70s Fender Stratocaster style neck on an instrument fitted with strings designed to be tuned an octave lower than a guitar. The problem I have is that the neck is even narrower than my standard 6-string guitars, and consequently is far too narrow for me. I've seen another band whose bassist used one exclusively and if I hadn't seen that he was playing a BassVI I certainly wouldn't have guessed it from the sound.

All basses sound different when played on their own. And they all sound like bass guitars in the band mix.

Interesting, but the on-line store either doesn't work or all the products have been discontinued.

Are there any still working? Back then in order to hit the appropriate price point the build quality was seriously cheap and nasty. They might have sounded good, but they looked and felt cheap. The examples I've encountered had a substantial amount of flexibility to the front panel. That can't have been doing the circuitry inside any good.

Completely and utterly subjective. And when does an instrument become vintage? My main basses - a pair of Gus G3s - are very much "modern" instruments, but the newest one is already 15 years old and the other one almost 20. When I started playing in the early 70s even a 15 year old electric bass was already a potentially desirable vintage instrument.

Are you losing money though? How much would those instruments cost to rent for the time that you have owned them? I'm sure the rental cost would far offset the price difference between what you paid new for those instruments and what you would get for them if you sold them today. Just because an instrument is old shouldn't automatically make it worth more money. IMO it is getting to the point where many vintage instruments are seriously overpriced when considered from any point of view that isn't a collector's.

I'm glad you appreciated it! ;-) But as someone else has said in this thread, the instrument in the top photograph is more desirable to you because you have some knowledge of the history of each instrument even if it is only down to the source of each photograph. On the other hand if someone were to post up photos of two Fender style instruments - one a modern relic'd reproduction, and the other a pristine early 60s original without you knowing which was which would you prefer - the one that is actually old or the one that looks old?

Tone wood is irrelevant as far as solid electric instruments are concerned. So long as it has sufficient structural integrity to withstand the forces exerted upon it form the strings and the player wearing it on a strap pretty much anything will do.

And IMO both of them look equally dull. It's all subjective.

Which means that in 50 years time an intact and functioning Ikea table will probably be more valuable since the Victorian one is unlikely to significantly deteriorate any further. The shrewd invested would be identifying which Ikea flat packs are going to be regarded as design classics in the future and buying them to keep unassembled.

The thing is it's not the courier service that is good or bad but the performance of the individual depots - hence the horror stories for pretty much every single courier service. Therefore such a sticky is only relevant if you can identify the actual depot giving the good or bad service and also know the area that they service.

Sorry didn’t make it in time, far too busy over the weekend... :-((

But a solid electric instrument comprises great big chunks of wood slathered in glue and stuck together in the most ad-hoc manner imaginable. The most important qualities in a piece of "tone wood" in this situation are that it looks nice and it will be structurally sufficient for the loads put on it by the strings and the strap without making the instrument too heavy. The overall shape of the instrument is a combination of eye-catching looks and player comfort. It's not like an acoustic instrument where the type and position of every join is critically important to the overall sound of the finished instrument, and the shape greatly contributes towards the type of tone the instrument produces.

That's certainly been the case for me when I've voted for the composition competition - overall enjoyment of the piece is always above the technical aspects of the recording or performance unless either is particularly sub par (although I don't recall that having happened). I'd like to submit the piece we are going to be recording/broadcasting tomorrow as it's the less obvious choice given the musical style of the band, but considering that we've only been working on it for a week and we played it together as a band for the first time at last night's rehearsal, I'm a little worried that the performance won't be up the standard that I would like. The alternative is submit the track we recorded earlier this year. However it is available to buy on iTunes etc. - does that make it exempt from the competition? Also I won't be able to put it up on Soundcloud, I'll be submitting a link to the Promo Video on YouTube that we made to go with the track - is that OK?

DAWs that have their roots in the days of computer-based MIDI sequencers tend to have a lot of esoteric functions designed to get the best out of the manipulation of MIDI data. A lot of this stemmed from the days when apart from the vocals, you would hope to do everything else using the synths and hardware samplers available at the time. To get a convincing performance out of these devices required a lot of fiddling about with the data of each individual MIDI event, and anything that could help simplify and speed up the process was invaluable. These days when It is just as easy to record a real instrument or use a sample playback plug-in accessing a sound library composed of gigabytes of data (as opposed to what would fit on a handful of floppy disks) that kind of microscopic control is far less important. For those of us who still use a lot of complex MIDI commands (especially when controlling external hardware) this kind of MIDI editing and control is essential. TBH if you haven't missed it so far then you probably don't need it.

Out of interest what is being judged? The standard of the recording or the interpretation of the song? I ask because I have two possible entries - one is a proper studio recording and actually already available to purchase as a download from the usual outlets (would that exclude it from the competition?) The other is going to performed live on the radio tomorrow, and while it's possibly a more ambitious choice might not be as well recorded as the first.

For pretty much everyone, most of the time, the use or not of open strings will always be a trade off between how you want the notes to sound and your technical ability. Of course there are times when in order to get the right sound and feel, open strings will always be the right choice.

IIRC the Bas Extravaganza bass is off-the-shelf plywood bought from his local DIY warehouse.

There's plenty of basses made out of plywood - and not all of them are cheap MiJ 70s copies. Here's one from Bas Extravaganza: And another from high-end luthier Jens Ritter: And TBH there's a fine line between multi-laminate which appears to be a perfectly acceptable construction technique and "plywood".

If you are starting from scratch, it doesn't really matter which DAW you pick, there will be a big learning curve but once you have got to grips with your DAW that will be the one that you'll probably stick with as learning another way of working will just be too much hassle. I terms of standard features AFAICS all modern DAWs are on a fairly even footing. However if you intend to do a lot of work with MIDI instruments (either external or plug-ins), rather than simply treating it as multi-track tape recorder, then I would go with a DAW that has its roots in sequencing such as Cubase, Logic, or Digital Performer, and steer clear of Reaper or ProTools. I would also steer clear of anything that uses hardware copy protection especially iLok. IME these devices fail at the most inappropriate time and as many iLok users discovered the zero downtime option doesn't always work.

Intersting insomuch as I was surprised by how few of the musicians interviewed hadn't been "screwed over" by their employers. Maybe there were plenty with less charitable things to say about the "stars" they played with that could not be included for legal reasons? However I though it was much too long. Under an hour would have made a much tighter documentary and nothing important to the main narrative would have to have been left out. Ultimately it re-enforces my opinion that the musicians who do well out of the music business are the ones who also write and/or produce the popular songs. Not the guitarists who play the killer solos.

Has just been discontinued by Gibson (not the first time they have done this with music software they have acquired) so your lifetime updates are now worthless.