Budgetneil

I bought a 220 Touring 115 about a month a go and I'm really pleased with it. I couldn't find any opinions either way on the 220 here on BC so went and tried both the 112 and 115 at PMT in Manchester (same prices as Andertons despite what their web site said at the time). In short, I loved the tone and it was the only amp with anything like that power in the price range. I was tempted by the EB-180 too but, as well as the lovely tone, the 220 had that little bit more power and the bargain hunter in me was swayed by the £450+ amp reduced vs paying full price for a cheaper amp. Things to note are: You dont get full power through the 8ohm internal speaker, you need an extra 8ohm cab for that. Tone-wise look a up BC's own Walbassist's YouTube review of the 550 on t'interweb - same pre-amp and very similar tones I'd recommend trying the 115 and 112 together - for the extra £30 I felt the 115 just sounded 'bigger'. Hope that helps! (but don't blame me if you get one and hate it!!! ;-))

Wotcha, An open mic night has just started near me so I thought I'd use it as the kick up the proverbial to practice and learn some new songs. I've previously sung and played bass in bands but never at the same time so fancy doing it now which brings me on to my question... What suggestions do you have for songs that would work with only bass + vocals? As a starter, here's a few thoughts: Fever - Elvis Moon Over Bourbon Street - Sting Big Bottom - Spinal Tap... (no genre barriers here!) Lemme know your thoughts :-) Neil

+1 Never heard them before but loved their "Later..." slot. The singer had an awesome voice. I noticed the precision mute too - looked like one of those car windscreen demisting pads jammed under the strings.

Blimey - it's worse than I thought! They must've sold at least one surely?!

Evening, Does anyone out there have any experience of the Ashdown Touring 220 combos? I've seen the hefty discounts floating about so tried to do some digging for reviews but can't find anything. Someone must have tried one?!

Ta for the review - my interest bad been pricked by the description on the G4M website but real world feedback is useful to calm "too good to be true" fears. I've got a couple of questions: How many speaker sockets are on the head? If more than one, is it possible to connect up an extension cab with the head still in the combo and connected to it? Cheers in advance.

D'oh! Cheers for the tip though Paul. I'd seen these but was wary based on the bargain price. Glad to hear it's a good bit of kit though - certainly the most bang vs buck for a new amp in the price range. Neil

Cheers. They're a small, low volume builder of bespoke basses based in Lancashire. He has some standard designs but in my case that was just the starting point to come up with something unique. Very helpful chap.

I couldn't see any other Everson threads so I thought I'd kick things off... Here is my Everson Cocobolo Through-Neck, custom made by Paul Everson and collected at Bass Day in Manchester last year. Spec: Body - Ash wings with Cocobolo top Neck - 5 piece Maple/Wenge laminate thru-neck with Maple fingerboard (+ cocobolo binding, fret markers & headstock facing) Pickups - Wizard custom "Jazzbuckers" Controls - Volume per pickup, Kent Armstrong 3 band active circuit, active/passive switch with passive tone control, single coil/humbucker switch per pickup and finally a series/parallel switch Harware - Badass bridge with thru-body stringing, Gotoh machine heads It plays like a dream and sounds great. To say I'm chuffed with the results would be something of an understatement! With all the switch options it is ridiculously versatile as you'd expect. The design of the bass was born out of discussions with Paul up at his workshop and based on features found on his standard styles but resulted in a new body design, longer than his standard bodies (I'm a big-ish bloke, I'd look daft with a tiny-bodied bass!) but keeping the Everson styling cues. I first came across Everson Guitars in Bass Guitar Magazine's "Woodshed" feature and then met the man himself at Bass Day a few years ago. Collecting the finished bass from last year's Bass Day was the proverbial icing on the cake (although trying the bass for the first time surrounded by that many bass players was, erm, uncomfortable!). Cheers Paul, from a very happy customer! Any other proud Everson owners out there?

Thanks guys. Loads of great ideas, point taken re. separate headphone amp Matt, in fact thinking about it now I've got a little Zoom PS-4 buried somewhere which would probably do the job. Bring on pay-day then I'll be hitting the classifieds I think! Neil

The manual from Ashdown site says it's got 2 speaker sockets so looks promising for an extension cab. From memory, they only give you the full wattage with an extra cab to take the load down to 4ohms, 220w with an extension, ~150ish with internal speaker only I guess.

Blimey - propper price crash. The new NAMM range must be on the way... Perfect Weekend Warrior stuff but why do Ashdown not put headphones on anything but their bargain practice range? Are real bass players not supposed to want to practice quietly? Or is it a scam to make you buy 2 amps?

Mudpup - pm'd back.

I hadn't even considered the Ampegs - based on this I'll be giving them a spin. They also have the benefit of being relatively easy to track down to try unlike the EBS. Spec wise they look comparable to the Ashdown Five Fifteen combo and mini stack but Ashdown seem keen to market them purely as pokey practice amps - is this just marketing fluff or are they genuinely less able than, say, the Ampeg?

Hi guys, I'm looking for a combo (assuming head/cab are out of reach) in the region of £250 (could stretch a bit more if it would get me a lot more amp). Main use in the short term would be home practice but with aspirations towards weekend-warriordom in the not too distant. Headphones definitely (wife/kids to keep happy), mp3 in would be nice. EBS Session 60 looks good but lower power than some for the money, I've seen a Hiwatt B100 on the money advertised locally - any experiences? Style-wise: pop/rock(not metal)/jazz Thanks in anticipation! Neil

Thanks Pete. The nearest one from the Sound Tech site is a shop down in Stoke but their site shows no EBS gear unfortunately. Looks like I'll have to buy blind (deaf?) - not too much of a risk by the sounds of it though, lot of love for the Session 60 from reviews and BC'ers. Cheers, Neil

I'm interested in getting an EBS Session 60 but want to have a go on one first. No joy trawling the web so far, does anyone know of a music shop in the North West stocking them?

Cheers Telebass. Just noticed a typo in my post - should say a Steinberger guitar/bass double neck!

Greetings all. My name's Neil from near Blackpool. I've been playing bass off and on for a scary 24 years, but have more recently drifted into other musical areas (mainly singing). My passion, however, remains with all things bass! Gear wise I've got an Epi T-bird, a rather odd Steinberger guitar/double neck but my absolute pride'n'joy is a recently acquired custom bass from Everson Guitars (I'll be posting piccies in the Gear Porn section soon). Player wise, whilst I love the usual virtuoso crowd (Jaco et al), I'm fascinated by the more 'zen' side of playing - less is more but shaping the whole sound of a song with a single well placed note... Anyhoo, that's me! Neil