molan

I must admit that I've had far more problems shipping to people in the UK than overseas - maybe I've just been lucky

[quote name='GreeneKing' post='1069461' date='Dec 26 2010, 08:40 AM']Thanks for your replies. Are all the short bodied basses like the Stanley Clarke and the Mark King headstock heavy? I suspect they are, unless perhaps they are the short scale models Peter[/quote] Loz is definitely your man for short scale Alembics. I'm sure he'll be along soon

I have a Mark King which really shows off the amazing build quality and tonal flexibility of Alembic basses. Although they tend to have a core 'hi-fi' sound the electronics allow you to dial in all sorts of tonal options, I love it for playing at home but not sure it's really a gigging bass. Mine isn't desperately heavy but I'm not sure quite how much it weighs. As kiwi has said, they are a bit 'marmite' - I know a few people over on the Alembic forum and some of them are near-fanatical about the quality of them. Prices are all over the show on the used market. I've seen some sell at what I'd consider crazy prices but you can find the odd one now and then at the kind of price that means you could try one out and if it doesn't work out then you'd easily re-coup the investment

[quote name='Shaggy' post='1069084' date='Dec 24 2010, 10:56 PM']Using that great leveller of the human race - ebay - as a measure, I've generally found US buyers more courteous and helpful than Brit ones, who frequently won't even ship within the UK.[/quote] I reckon an a percentage based calculation there's more Brits who won't ship to Europe than there are Americans who won't ship outside of the USA. . .

I'm loving this little number by Prince's girlfriend - the bass just seems to propel the song along. . . She's not bad looking either. . .

[quote name='dafonky' post='1068685' date='Dec 24 2010, 12:53 PM']thanks... heard of this preamp they were standard in the old celinder basses ? but can't find them on google[/quote] Damn - looks like their site has disappeared so maybe they've either gone out of business or don't sell direct to the public any more

What about the Greengrove pre that's fitted as standard in a lot of Celinders? That's bass cut and boost and a lovely passive treble roll off. I hink Greengrove will sell these direct.

I owned an 11.5lb bass for a while and it just killed my shoulder and left arm after any length of time spent playing standing up. It sounded wonderful but I just couldn't live with it as a gigging bass This particular one was built using a very heavy core wood and the only way around the weight issue would have been to cut chambers into the body. Conversely I've also had a couple of sub 8lb basses and found the body neck balance didn't work for me. I regularly found myself having to use my left hand to support the neck a lot more than I'd really like. I have experimented with Hipshot ultra-lite tuners and these cured the worst of the neck balance problems though - not sure why more people don't fit these as standard, they can make a huge difference to both balance and total weight. Overall I reckon the 9lb to 9.5lb mark works best for me these days

[quote name='CHRISDABASS' post='1066842' date='Dec 22 2010, 02:52 PM']Looks great ey!! cant wait to get my hands on it!! Just the shipping to worry about now![/quote] And watch out for those import duties! I've used both USPS & FedEx for shipping from the USA recently, both worked fine with advantages / disadvantages to each

I reckon you need another Sadowsky NYC but a P instead of a J - I hear there's a nice dakota red one with matching headstock and a custom neck profile coming up for sale soon. . . In all seriousness though - if you're happy with what you've got then I'd just stick with it for a while & see how you get on with just one bass. The big thing, as others have said, is not to splash the money on stuff you don't need whilst you're thinking about the next possible purchase

I'm really loving my '86 Monarch as an all round bass at the moment, playability, tone, feel, balance etc. but it has a zebrano top wood and matching headstock which isn't my favourite. If I ever spot something similar with a different top wood I may be reaching rather rapidly for the cheque book. . .

I've seen SB playing live recently both as solo and a 'house band' member - felt like he could get pretty much any sound he wanted from it. When he was laying back to let others solo over the top of him he really had a great groove going and held the bottom down really well

Actually it's even cheaper - only 59p! I just downloaded it and it works perfectly - simple single string tuning and then a super fast double check across all strings simultaneously

[quote name='AttitudeCastle' post='1058907' date='Dec 14 2010, 07:56 PM']Is it the long awaited new Yamaha Attitude LTD III? Back in the colour from the LTD I series? which i named "excalibur blue" as i played one and knew nothing would match the tone! (and nothing has!) If ANYONE hears ANYTHING, even rumours, about the Attitude, PLEASE PM with everything you know [/quote] He definitely announced it as a new version of the bass and said it would be released in the spring I think. I couldn't really place the exact colour, I think he referred to it as a 'new' blue colour but again I could be wrong!

Here's the kind of thing I was talking about:

[quote name='fender73' post='1058567' date='Dec 14 2010, 02:29 PM']Tell me more...please....![/quote] Billy S casually pulled it out of a case at Bass Player Live in LA a few weeks back. He said he wasn't supposed to show anyone but felt he was among friends - could have been a stunt but it did seem like he was just excited to show it off. I can't really remember that much other than it was light blue and had really heavily angled neck retaining bolts to make the neck/body joint even stronger. I think he may have mentioned playing slightly with pickup positions but not 100% sure about that bit Loads of people took pics and were filming on small cameras so may be some footage out there on YT.

I saw Juan Alderete at Bass Player live this year as a late replacement for Andrew Gouche and thought hebplayed some really interesting stuff. Didn't go down a storm with an audience of mostly jazz and funk people. He got OK applause but there was a real atmosphere that he was just filling the support slot. I finally got round to downloading some Big Sir and was amazed to hear how many of his bass lines I remembered really clearly - bear in mind that this was close to 2 months ago and at an entire weekend of non-stop bass noise, lol. Worth checking out if you fancy some interesting / hypnotic fretless bass playing electronica kinda stuff I'm on the train so can't easily post any links

No surprise that I'm voting for the Fodera Victor Wooten basses I've owned a string of Sig basses but the only one I've ever bought because of the player association was my Bootsy Star bass - just had to have one but it really was too impractical and it's residing back in the USA now. I guess all you Yamaha Attitude guys will be Gassing for the new Sheehan model that's coming out next year - I've seen the prototype, looks cool