molan

[quote name='Conan' timestamp='1376847994' post='2179916'] Please enlighten us as to the reasons (if there are any) for your "problem"... Admittedly, I own a BF Compact - but I am no "fanboi" of any brands. Just interested to hear. [/quote] Mostly I think that they look cheap and nasty. Both on stage and up close. Don't look, or feel, to have the build quality of lots of other brands. Also a lot of people whose opinions I respect have had real issues with them tonally. I realise I shouldn't just rely on third party comments but sometimes you just hear things from people who seem to really know their stuff and have to have to give them some credence. When you don't like the look of something and you hear they it doesn't sound great it tends to colour your opinions a fair bit

[quote name='scoobystig' timestamp='1376843107' post='2179821'] Yep there where I tried out the mark bass rig Lm3 head and traveller 115 and 210 cabs, seriously nice rig and smaller and lighter in total size to what I am using now But they didn't have a lot in their to compare against, would of been nice to stack it up against TC! Hartke and gk offerings [/quote] They wouldn't stock two of those three brands I'm afraid - too many bad customer reports about reliability and/or tone quality

[quote name='JTUK' timestamp='1376838042' post='2179728'] Bass Gear is great but you sxhould ring any shop you intend to visit to see what they currently stock. If you are looking for high end stock they have some great stuff. They say they are getting a big Berg delivery soon.... but check with the shops. Top end gear can goes out the door pretty quickly [/quote] Berg gear is in transit: CN212 CN112 HD112 NV15 HD210 Aguilar also on the ocean:) SL112 DB410 DB210 DB112 DB115 Maybe more but I can't remember offhand exactly what!

[quote name='EBS_freak' timestamp='1376785767' post='2179207'] Barrie - surely you arent telling me that the purchaser of this bass routed the horn like that.. then went to the trouble of refinishing it? The superglue would have cleaned up easy. Whether it was put there or not be JC, I cant believe it would have left the JC workshop without the glue being removed. All very odd. [/quote] I'm not suggesting anything - I just wondered whether people would think a builder would be in the wrong if something was damaged after it had left his workshop. By complete chance this has actually happened to me personally. Something was sent out in perfect condition, a buyer tinkered with it and caused some problems. He then said it was faulty when it arrived and asked for his money back. What made it worse was that he said it was faulty when I sent it and that I had deliberately misrepresented it when I put it up for sale. I took it back without getting involved in a protracted wrangle because it seemed easier and then had to pay to have the damage rectified. With hindsight I guess I could have publicly 'outed' the person but he was quite belligerent and we could have got into a 'he said / she said' type argument which seemed pretty pointless.

Hypothetically speaking. . . If I buy a bass that's been used and shows obvious wear marks that the builder tells me about, then I fiddle around with it and make it significantly worse, does that mean the guy who sold it to me is completely in the wrong and shouldn't have sold it to me in the first place?

[quote name='Lord Sausage' timestamp='1376736477' post='2178505'] The simple answer is they don't just make money on a friday and saturday. If the pub is not doing so well on those times they will spend money in the hope of making money! [/quote] That's very much my experience as well. I used to know a landlord who put on bands on a Saturday and he never really made much additional income on the Saturday. However a lot of his everyday locals really liked the fact that the pub had live music and often cited this as a reason for making it their local - the bizarre thing was that many of them didn't come in on a Saturday, lol

Had a chat with Jimmy about all of this last night. Some 'interesting' stuff going on behind the scenes that didn't hit the public domain on TB. He's decided, wisely I think, to keep it, mostly, to himself. Needless to say it was some of this stuff that made him so angry and, I'm sure, lead to his public response. I'm not sure there's anything to be gained from stoking the fires any further either. One thing appears certain though, his dealers around the world haven't picked up any negative feedback from people with orders in the pipeline and there's been no reduction in demand. Could be early days of course. . .

Wow, that's £900 more than one I was offered a couple of years ago!

[quote name='Lozz196' timestamp='1376730454' post='2178417'] Agree Stan, but when I watched that programme I also was amazed at how many Ricks were used in comparison to Precisions. [/quote] There were a few noticeable exceptions (and even one Jazz bass) but it seemed like the 'everyday' players all had Rickies! As it happens I shared a flat with a P bass owning punk player for a while and I remember him buying a brand new Ricky. He was a ticket collector on the underground so no record company cash for him. I bought his 76 P bass and sold it for something like £150 a year or so later

Gosh, that Mark King bloke is a truly incredible player. I bet he never has an off night. Such an entertaining guy and full of originality as a musician as well. Just can't get enough of his incredible, and faultless, technique . . .

Watching Punk Britannia on Beeb 4 and Ricky basses must outnumber Fenders by about 5:1. Every band seems to have a Ricky toting player with his bass slung low on his hip

[quote name='funkle' timestamp='1376686018' post='2178131'] Molan, how much for a Dove Cage Monique? Or the Rack Mount Monique? [/quote] Don't have final pricing yet but approx estimates are £900 on the Dove Cage and £825 on the Rack. It'll depend on shipping from the West coast and $ exchange rates. Should have it all sorted by Monday.

[quote name='risingson' timestamp='1376609157' post='2176941'] Ahh well, a clash of egos I guess. The clip doesn't do it for me, although slap playing rarely ever does. [/quote] From what I heard it wasn't an ego thing - MK was basically rubbish and unprofessional in he middle of LG's gig and LG clearly wasn't happy

[quote name='walbassist' timestamp='1376677782' post='2178007'] Forgive the thread hijack, but are BG going to stock Demeter as well Barrie? [/quote] Absolutely Will be placing the first order next week with delivery in about 6-7 weeks time. Zap me a message if there's anything you fancy and we can add it to the order list

[quote name='EBS_freak' timestamp='1376609607' post='2176945'] Is the Minnie 800D available with a rack mount kit? I think there would be a lot of call if this was 1u height 1/2u width and rackmountable. There's loads of guys interested in a lightweight pre and poweramp setup (me included). There just doesn't seem to be a good solution at the moment! In other words, something like the Amplite - but less anaemic! [/quote] Yep - literally just spoken to James and there is a Minnie Rackmount option Don't have final prices but I think Minnie is looking like £975 in the UK with the rack at about £50 more. Final pricing will depend on how many we can order up front and shipping costs plus whatever the prevailing £ vs $ rate is. There's also the monster 1600w D which is just 12lbs: http://demeteramps.us/index.php?route=product/product&path=61&product_id=94

As far as I know the Minnie isn't currently available in a single rackmount format. You can buy a Jule Monique as a rackmount with a Minnie inside it and you can also get some of James Demeter's racked pre-amps with the Minnie power amp inside. However - I do have a price list that shows a rackmounted Minnie and, possibly a Minnie Twin with two of the little buggers together! I'm due to speak to James Demeter later so I'll ask

I keep buying sunburst basses and then selling them again I don't know what it is but it really doesn't do much for me. As someone with a pair of vintage Fenders (Olympic White P & Seafoam Green J) I must be one of the few who doesn't look at an old sunburst J or P & start drooling.

[quote name='Musicman20' timestamp='1376664777' post='2177680'] I would be shocked if someone didn't buy Modulus...but it shows how bad the economy is. SWR is apparently no more, and Genz are (apparently) going through changes....I predict that as they are part of Fender, we are going to see new Fender micro amps from the Genz chaps. In fact, I want a Modulus, so they best carry on. Flea Bass PLZ. [/quote] Try selling a high end graphite necked bass at the moment - they are really out of fashion. I wasn't at all surprised they had problems

Yep - all imported instruments have risen sharply over the past couple of years. To be fair some manufacturers put of hiking prices because of the weakness of the £ for quite a while but I think they've all buckled now. One thing I'm pretty sure on is that the recent prices aren't retailers trying to hike their margins up. If anything the retail trade is seeing margins squeezed ever tighter. There's certainly some who absorbed some of the early price price rises from manufacturers but these are now being passed on. Let's face it - when did you ever meet a well off musical instrument retailer In fact margins on some of the brands mentioned here really aren't that great at all. I've checked a few and I'm not sure how some shops keep going at the prices they are offering! One little thing I've definitely noticed is that the big online boys have been edging their prices up ever since DV247 went belly up. Check some Thomann prices now on things they are importing from the US and you'll see that a surprising amount are now higher than UK ones.

Lots of mutterings about a 'mystery' investor for Modulus. As it happens one of my least favourite customer service stories (far, far worse than the Jimmy Coppolo one) was regarding a Modulus It wasn't direct from Modulus themselves though, just someone involved in the sales chain. And no, I'm not going to publicise it here - might make a few people's blood boil and it's really quite a sad turn of events. . .

How about the black Celinder that used to be the main image on the site home page?

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' timestamp='1376650486' post='2177296'] I'd agree with that, sometimes being in the middle like me is tricky, I'm Mr average gear wise and ability wise I'd say, if I was worse I'd know my place, if I was better I'd be the nuts, I see musicman fitting neatly with that my classic is like a snobs Ray anyway [/quote] I've seen this a lot as well - you can get 'snobs' within tiny niches. I've heard a confirmed MM player saying that anything post Ernie Ball isn't a 'proper' Ray (he also explained to me, in great detail, about 'transition era' basses which I'd never heard about before) meanwhile I've also hear people say the Classic & Ltd Edition runs are over-priced and just a way for MM to make some easy money. Personally I try to approach everything with an open mind - there's very few basses that make me shun away from them. In fact some of our shop favourites have been relatively 'ordinary' and not expensive. There was a killer Fender Jazz Standard in for a while. Completely 'off the peg' US model and it played like a dream and sounded great. We priced it pretty highly thinking it might hang around so we could play it a bit longer but it got snapped up really quickly (by someone who came in to try it in person). Equally we've had some high end stuff that's left me completely cold but other people have loved - I think that's all part of the fun really

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' timestamp='1376646407' post='2177204'] Yep I'd go with that too, you can see from lots of peoples gear lists here that they have chosen not to buy an expensive bass but rather a few or more at lower prices but you do get a wiff of snobbery with these so called high end basses. I had around 7 grands worth of rays not that long ago, I just like them! I have played almost every brand going other than dingwall and Ritter so far, none were any better built than my classic5. [/quote] I find there's lots of snobbery both ways here on BC. You get it from high end owners who wouldn't touch a 'cheap' bass and then the reverse from people who would never pay over xxxx for a bass and think the people who buy the expensive ones are mad. Both camps like to take a pop at each other now and then and both get equally defensive. Not sure it's particularly 'positive' but it's pretty basic human nature to have some sort of attachment to things and a set of beliefs you want to defend. Working, albeit only a day or so a week, in a bass shop means I've seen a lot of instruments come through in all sorts of states of repair. There are some that are almost totally faultless and others that are often a bit wonky. Musicman is definitely somewhere in the middle. I've seen some real beauts but also some complete dogs. Two of the worst paint finishes I've ever seen have been on Rays and another had a neck like a banana and was near unplayable (truss rod was still working too!). A couple of Classics have been in recently and both were really nice and very well finished

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1376642352' post='2177144'] Tell me honestly, if that particular bass had come into the shop in the condition that it appears to be in from the photos and video posted would you have tried to sell it? Or would it have been send straight back to Jimmy asking WTF he was playing at? I also find it strange in this day and age people still ask about the country of manufacture. I suppose for high volume factory made instruments it's still important, but I believe that for "hand made" luthier basses surely the person who made them is far more important that the country they come from? [/quote] I'll answer the second one first as it's easier Very customers in the shop show much interest in the luthiers that make any of the custom instruments. This is just as true for Ritter, Fodera, F Bass, Zon as it is for Alleva Coppolo. I find the instrument background fascinating and I know lots of history about each of them and what sort of people they are and how they operate etc. However it wouldn't be the first time I've watched someone's eyes glaze over if I'm explaining about the history and the builder. In fact the most common question about all the customs is about why they are so expensive and there's always some sort of view that the luthiers must be very well off (have you ever met a luthier who's well off - just doesn't happen!). Lots of people are really, really picky about country of manufacture. Some won't even look at an instrument that wasn't made in the USA. Made in the UK is often a deterrent as well. Canada also seen as 'not as good as a real American' bass too (someone said this to me just last week). In terms of selling a used show instrument I have to say it's a lot trickier. . . We try to check every single thing on every single bass that comes in but some stuff will always slip through the net. An obvious example is that we always check all electronics are working properly and without crackles etc. We don't routinely take control cavities apart unless we've identified a problem in the controls. To the best of my knowledge we've only ever sent one bass out that had a control cavity issue and we've learnt from that to make sure we assess pre-owned instruments to a higher degree than something new. Standard policy on anything pre-owned, ex-demo or show stock is to explain in as much detail as possible every single thing we can about the instrument. As an example we took in a pre-owned F Bass this week and it shows a lot of player wear. Some of which looked different from what we might expect. We detailed all of this to a prospective buyer in another country and spoke to F Bass. They remembered the bass and said it had a minor flaw in cosmetic build and this was corrected by adding a, very classy, pinstripe. There was nothing wrong sturcturally with the bass and it sounds great. They'd told the original purchaser, and reduced price accordingly, but it's been through a few hands and this information had slowly been lost from the bass' history. The wear marks we'd identified are simply where the pinstriping has been worn away in places. We explained all this to the customer and there are pictures showing the wear marks. Just to be 100% sure we also paid a local pro luthier to go over it with a fine tooth-comb to check everything as well. We will happily sell this bass which has wear marks on it now but we will also explain exactly what those marks are and how we understand they got there. We've actually sold one of Jimmy's ex-show basses in the past and explained the history behind it. Price was significantly reduced from a new one and the owner was happy about this. N.B. At a later date this bass re-surfaced at another retailer but no mention was made of the cosmetic flaws. If we took a flawed bass in from Jimmy, or anyone else, we'd expect to know about every single flaw in advance and would aim to calculate a price reduction based on this. If the instrument turned up in a much worse state we'd either ask for an additional discount or send it back (or sometime we might try to make good using our local luthier who's an absolute wizard!). We'd then list it for sale and detail every flaw and give an opinion on each of these. Any potential customer would then know in advance the exact state of the instrument. Ideally we'd ask them to come in and physically see it because people's views of 'flaws' differ tremendously. E.G. One person's 'damaged' finish is another's 'mojo' or someone's 'unplayably heavy' is someone else's 'good solid' weight etc. Of course this isn't always possible - hence the detailed description on a show or ex-demo and with backup pictures supplied. I can't genuinely say whether we'd have tried to sell the bass in question or not without knowing all the background. If we'd been told the condition and it arrived exactly like that and was still a solid playable instrument then I think we would have offered it for sale with a clear explanation. If it was unplayable and really nasty then we wouldn't (or we'd have tried to make it better if that was an option). the main thing we wouldn't have done would have been to hide any flaws that we could have found. In all of my direct experience with Jimmy he's been incredibly honest and open about cosmetic flaws and has offered to immediately repair, or take back, anything that may have been faulty. In fact he did take back something with a truss rod issue without a question and offered a brand new instrument in exchange. He also offered to replace some things for free on one bass that had been modified by a second owner and that were not remotely covered by any sort of manufacturer's warranty. I guess it's this usual 'can do' attitude of his that makes me want to 'defend' him a little when people (on TalkBass) call him a cheat and a liar etc. This is simply not the guy I've dealt with on many occasions. Something obviously went badly wrong on all fronts in this particular set of circumstances and it seems to be a real one-off situation. Of course a lot of people find that very hard to accept and I can totally understand where they're coming from. PS - The bass in question has not been offered up for sale to the dealer network as far as I know. It's certainly not been on offer to the few European dealers. Two instruments were recently offered to European dealers and both sold in minutes but they weren't anything like this one.