uk_lefty

Must be the Fender sticker and Squier neck plate adding £160 over the value of a new one then. GLWTS etc. 🤠

Let me know how you get on! Since my original post my board has grown to include a Boss Synth and expression pedal and a Smooth Hound wireless. I am tending to stick to one amp SIM effect in my Helix with a couple of effects I switch in and out but it's great to know if I need a flanger I can program it in, rather than having to keep buying flangers until I find one that I like.

If that wasn't local collection I'd have probably bought it instead of the Sire V9 I acquired a few weeks back. I need to give Warwick one more chance someday.

Nice body, shame about the headstock! Also that fingerboard looks like it needs a thorough clean.

Let's just call it what it is: a Fender sticker on a Harley Benton

I emailed the seller and told them that a few days back. They said they were told it was a squier and it has a squier neck plate. Squier or not, and it's not, that price is ridiculous.

These are fantastic and cost peanuts secondhand. I have changed my basses a lot in the last five years and this amp works with all of them, it's very versatile.

For me the Sire pre amp is the big selling point, it's what stopped me getting a V5 recently because although the passive sound of Sire basses is fantastic the pre amp takes it to another level. The control layout is annoying, I thought I'd turned the tone down at a wedding gig last week... Nope, master volume, no bass for the first second or two of a song. But surely it's just a case of getting used to it and embracing the quirks of each bass you play? Otherwise you could mod and mod and mod and end up with however many identical bitsas. Sorry, this is BC.... Buy an Alembic preamp and vintage 70s Ibanez pickups 😉

I'm doing a gig abroad soon and will only take my Helix, I don't want to take my whole board out with me, travel as light as possible. This means I will need to ditch: Tuner, replace with a clip on. Wireless receiver, will go wired for this gig. Expression pedal and Boss Synth... I use this on two or three songs, can easily just do a Helix patch for the sake of one gig. Boost pedal, I'm using this less and less. I've changed some Helix settings to give me boost with some effects so this may be redundant anyways. Amp footswitch... I use my Ashdown onboard sub for one song because for what I'm trying to do that sounds better than anything I have managed on the Helix. I can do this without the footswitch if I want to. Really I should just get a Stomp XL and spend more time learning how to use it.

Agree completely, rehearsal rooms kit is often thrashed to death by kids playing as loud, distorted and detuned as possible. I also think it depends what other gear you're using. For example, using my Stingray I thought Orange amps were terrible. But then I ran a passive p bass through an Orange amp and thought it was a superb pairing.

There was me nervously opening this thread expecting to be looking for secondhand Barefaced bargains.... Anything that says "Peavey" on it, particularly the 80s jagged logo and bluey-green trim stuff will kick like a Bronco. It's indestructible. I used to be very wary of Ashdown having only used horribly abused MAG series stuff on rehearsal spaces but since joining this forum I'm a full Ashdown convert. I played a wedding at a hotel this weekend with an RM500 on about 30% master volume and two ABM Neo 15" cabs, no PA support for the bass. Absolutely wonderful sound. There could be marginal gains from upgrading the head and the cabs but to be honest I know what I like and I like what I know. Best not interfere with the formula.... Until summer festivals when no doubt I'll plug into a Mesa or something and immediately be hitting the for sale section 😂

The Desert Penguins will play a set of high energy rock covers in a free entry gig at the Horn! A venue we love to play, always a great crowd, always a high energy performance. Any BC'ers please say Hi! I'll be the one playing bass.

Played a wedding on Saturday night... I was almost dreading it. I was a bit exhausted with the busy schedule this new band has and wasn't looking forward to the gigs. We had a minor disaster in that three of us drove one hour east to Chelmsford to find the wedding venue locked and not set up for a wedding. The singer was setting up for the gig in Hemel Hempstead when he realised he hadn't updated the rest of us on a change in venue. Cue an hour and a half driving west and the fastest set up EVER. No hard feelings, these things happen, on the bright side we realised if we don't faff about the set up can be done lightning quick. The gig itself was really good fun. We played in a small space and at a low volume. We had a good set for a wedding too, some party songs mixed in with the usual rock covers, and a different ending to what we usually do. A few new songs tried out. We had a blast. It restored some enthusiasm and I am buzzing for Friday's rock gig in a proper rock venue!

Well two and a bit years later I've regretted moving on the BEAM and bought a Positive Grid Spark... From Basskitcase once more!!! Only realised when coming to do the feedback. Top notch transaction once more!

Yup. They all sounded good too though, it wasn't purely a looks thing... Hohner B2A was bought mainly for looks but the passive tone with EMGs was excellent. Only moved it because I found the string spacing a bit too tight and I was acquiring more basses than I felt I should have had. Washburn Status for a proper 80s style bass to front an 80s band with... Actually canned the project six months ago and the look didn't fit with the new band. Epiphone Jack Casady. Love the look, it's a stunner. But also I wanted to try a semi hollow for ages and it gets great reviews. My band also wants to do acoustic sets and I don't really want an acoustic bass. I've used the JC at a few "electric" gigs anyway, it's a great bass. It complements the other basses I have too giving me a really good range of tones available across four basses.

Sounds like my last gig. Booked on for someone's birthday at a family friendly do in the afternoon. Kids running around everywhere. We got asked to announce could parents please get kids off the dancefloor so the adults can dance. It didn't really work, it just emptied the dancefloor for ten minutes. Birthday boy showed up for the last two songs and for us to sing happy birthday to him.

It's not quite that problem in this band. The singer has kids same age as mine and the drummer has an older teenager so they get it. It's just the pressures of all other stuff like work and family that go on around gigging.

I'm coming round to the "I hate gigging" part now! I joined a new band at the end of last year and had to get up to speed on their setlist quickly. They have over twenty gigs booked this year. In January we were turning away gigs, my old band did ten gigs in a good year and some of those were for free. Having got to mid March and played mostly the same material for all the gigs from December to early March I almost dread seeing new gigs come into the diary. I've got a busy day job, two small children, and I like playing music. However, getting all the gigs and earning through it (though half the earnings go towards band funds) I am feeling a bit "meh" about the whole thing. The setlist is good, great for a party, but not challenging for me as a bass player. It's ok, sometimes the simple ones are the best, but it's not exciting me to learn new stuff. I need a big meaty, present, bass tone, nothing nuanced or intricate, so that makes me feel a bit like it's all "Wham, bam" etc. I'll get through this summer and see how it goes. I like my bandmates, we don't travel very far, but the pressure it puts on the rest of life without the fulfillment is starting to weigh on me already. I recently went through a patch of cutting stuff out of my life that was causing me stress and/ or not making me happy, hence leaving the old band and binning a project I'd started. I'm now thinking I might have to leave this. It's fun, but it's hard work! Part of me wants to be creating something of my own rather than smashing out four chord covers. But then I don't want to be just sat on my own writing naval gazing rubbish...

I chose to buy a Sire V9 instead of any other jazz bass this month. I could have had a US Fender jazz, I love the dark night colour, but just couldn't do it. The Sire offers so much more and I less than 1/3 of the cost.

In the Bass Guitars section of you search for vinyl wrapping you'll see some interesting stuff that will do what you want and probably have a better result.

You mean add a Mr Lozz P bass to the design, surely?! 😂👍

I had a set of Fender tapes that got used across a few different basses for years. They sound fantastic on a P bass. From a little vigorous pick playing I did slightly scuff one of the strings. Absolutely nothing to worry about though, those strings were still going strong on my Jack Casady until recently.

I've changed tuners before for both aesthetic and functional reasons. But I won't buy a brand new bass and add tuners etc to the shopping cart. Like with all things you could get some with dud components but I never got the whole "Sire tuners are rubbish" in their 1st generation of basses, they were fine for me. But I am not bothered about neck dive, I just don't get it and how this would affect playing when you've got your hand on the actual neck so it can't dive anywhere, but for people who are bothered by that then lighter tuners are probably helping them a little.

Hofner all the way. The tone is limited but it's a great tone. And the coolest female bass player, Tina Weymouth, used one for a while.

My tuppence worth... Go second hand and see what you like the sound and usability of. Boss multis are great IMO (GT versions, not ME versions though they could work for you), I used Zoom for years when they were dreadful by modern standards but they've come on leaps and bounds. The pre-Helix line 6 stuff is good... You've got loads of choice. It's about what sound you like and what is the easiest for you to use. When you settle on what you like you could look to upgrade from there with a better idea of what you want.