peteb

I will just leave this here:

But are they really getting £1.5k for most gigs? As you say, musicians have a tendency to exaggerate. They may earn that for some gigs, but the chances are they are doing plenty of $500 gigs. You have to be realistic if you want to work regularly. It has to be financially worthwhile for the the venue / bar / promoter otherwise they won't put the gig on. They won't be paying big fees for bands that obliterates any additional profit that they can potentially make over the bar.

You could always do what we do at those type of gigs if you don't fancy the late night drive home - pitch a tent, stay the night, have a few beers and drive home about noon the next day...

I used to have one of them in bright red (I got it in the early 90s). Really nice bass...

To be fair, in my world anyone who is any good is likely to have more than one project on the go. You just have to learn to manage everyone's' diaries and dep gigs out when necessary! Of course, everyone has to be upfront about what gigs they have taken on. A bit ago, we had to lose a keys player because he was so busy and just couldn't commit to the gigs we had coming in. It worked out well, as we got a new guy in who is excellent and who's availability is better these days. We're still mates with the other guy and use him for deps for other related projects when he is around.

That's because you eat your porridge oats every morning...!

That's a great photo! You couldn't get any more American than that - from the cut-off flannel shirt to the hat, not to mention the Fender bass / Mesa rig! But it does look cool...!

Jon Shuker is just over the border in Derbyshire (not far from Sheffield).

The room is a bit beyond your, or the luthier's control. Remember that in Roger Sadowsky's case, he made his name by modding Fenders for top NYC bass players. When the particular type of Fenders he recommended started getting in short supply / too expensive, he started making what were meant to be superior quality Fender type basses, with the improvements that he had installed in the instruments for his clients. It was the very opposite of 'exotic', just a basic 'Fender on steroids'. He didn't have to make up anything about the woods he used, he could have just said it was because of his electronics, fretwork, etc. I'm quite happy to accept that he believes that the quality of the 'non exotic' woods he uses is important. Bits of wood can just be different. I've owned a number Fender America Standard Jazz basses. The one that I have on a stand beside my desk is one that I played when I was picking up a couple of secondhand cabs from Bass Direct. As soon as I picked it up I thought that it was just more resonant and lively than the other Fender jazzes I had owned. I had no intention of buying a bass that day, but I was thinking about it on the drive home and when I got back home, I rang Mark and bought the bass that I had been playing earlier. As I say, all the components on that bass are the same as the other Am Std jazzes I had owned, so I can only put it down to the wood!

I don't doubt that pickups make a bigger difference than wood, and to be honest, I can't really tell the difference between alder and ash (but I can with maple). Everything in your signal has an effect, either big or small. It all starts with your fingers and how you strike / fret the strings. Obviously that is the main factor, but everything else has an effect as well - wood, pickups, strings, amp, speakers, etc. Even the lead makes a tiny difference. Getting a bass to sound good is down to a decent technique and whatever marginal gains you get from each component in your chain, from fingers to speaker.

I don't understand that at all. I've had a bass with a maple body that sounded completely different to my other basses made from alder / ash. The difference between rosewood and maple fingerboards is pretty clear as well. I'm not saying that one is better than the other, but there is a clear difference, even played unplugged.

I'm sure that Joe has one somewhere in the house...

Interesting take on the vintage market from Joe Bonamassa https://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/gear/unlimited_money_and_ego_make_for_a_dangerous_combination_joe_bonamassa_on_how_perception_of_scarcity_drives_vintage_guitar_prices_up.html?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR1DpB4xJVOw_3SXldFaLAYVPjO6K_pOavr29u99yuBRFkvYHgyJLHebXqU_aem_7cL5Vq-pC0VNnLaq8SflTw#Echobox=1719357522

Exactly what I thought when I saw the photo! All round, it's a very cool looking bass...

Another pretty nice looking 72 P bass at Bass Direct for £3,250 https://www.bassdirect.co.uk/product/fender-precision-bass-3-tone-sunburst-1972-pre-owned/

I've bought a Fender Am Std Jazz from Bass Bros and part-ex'd a 5 string Spector . Will was great, very helpful and did a reasonable deal. He used to work at Bass Direct down the road and they still seem to be mates.

It's a good job that I didn't buy that one from the Bass Centre then! It wouldn't have lasted half a dozen gigs with me...

Yes, you always put a higher price on Reverb, which makes it slower to sell stuff. What tends to happen, and I have seen this myself, is that people put something on Reverb at an inflated price to cover the fees, then advertise it for a lower price on Facebook marketplace groups. If you see something that you fancy on Reverb, you then search through the various FB groups until you find it and then contact the seller through there. I would only use use retailers that I trust for commission sales. These days I tend to use Bass Direct, although I have used others successfully in the past. BD are completely upfront about the 20% they charge, then advertise at the agreed price on their website. To be fair, they will generally get a higher price than I would and I don't have to bother about postage & packing, etc with the bonus that I don't have gear that I need to get rid of taking up room in the house! It seems a reasonable deal for the commission charge...

I once got the train down to London, fully intending to buy an Alembic from the Bass Centre. It was one of the lower priced models (maybe an Epic??), up at £995 in the mid 90s. I picked it up and played it, but didn't like the neck. I didn't even plug it in! It would have been nice to own an Alembic for a bit, but that bass just didn't feel right for me. I ended up buying a red Warwick Streamer LX from a shop in Leeds a couple of weeks later, which I gigged for many years!

I must admit, I haven't been keen on Reverb - fees make it too expensive to buy from and too much of a hassle / takes a long time to sell. Also, too many idiotic low-ball bids from chancers! I suppose that it does depend on what you're selling. These days, I end to use commission sales by Bass Direct - less hassle, things move quickly and you tend to get a reasonable price (even after the 20% commission).

I'm not sure that a number of musical instruments would be seen as personal effects by HMRC. If you take musical gear into the EU from the UK, you have to declare each item on a carnet and pay VAT on the value of each one if you sell them. I'm not sure about paying duty, but would be interested to find out. Something the OP would definitely need to confirm if he was actually going to go ahead with this idea!

Indeed - I thought that Denmark was supposed to be one of the best places in the world to live...!

I'm not sure that's a great idea. You will have to pay VAT and import duty on every instrument and the UK market isn't great at the moment. Have you thought about selling them throughout the rest of the EU, especially Germany? There must be a German (or French, or Italian) equivalent of the Bass Gallery or Bass Direct that could sell your gear on commission.