Dingus

[quote name='drTStingray' timestamp='1387543612' post='2313149'] Thank The Lord it's not a 4 or I would have had a serious problem with this bass [/quote] It is a 4 string. It is one of the nicest ones I have ever seen . You are in serious trouble.

[quote name='drTStingray' timestamp='1387416409' post='2311830'] Dingus you were making serious money to have a Wal custom at 21! [quote name='White Cloud' timestamp='1387457399' post='2312145'] Well, I'm going to black cat Dingus...I had a new MK1 in 1986 when I was 18! I was a low earner and was literally dirt poor...because I had bought a Wal on the never never. I called it dedication at the time, but in hindsight it was probably madness. Nowadays I earn good money, own 2 nice cars and a gorgeous house in an affluent area...but can't afford a Wal. Life is strange! [/quote][/quote] Life is indeed strange, and few have been stranger than my own. I started saving for a Wal bass when I was still in the Sixth Form at school , and my goals for the rest of my life when I left a school consisted of buying a Wal , establishing a physical relationship with the the girl who worked in the delicatessen and saving up a thousand quid. It is that kind of career-mindedness and emotional depth that have enabled me to become the success I am today. ( I only achieved two of those ambitions, by the way.) I could actually have bought a Wal a long time before I was 21, but I was spending a lot of time away from home and going through my vintage Fender phase. Also bear in mind that when I left school a Wal bass cost £790 full retail price, if I remember correctly. Even allowing for inflation , that was not the equivalent of the £3650+ they cost today.

[quote name='CamdenRob' timestamp='1387378260' post='2311286'] Ever since I've been going through every type of bass possible thinking that I would find something as good and in truth I never have. So this morning I placed my order... Summer 2015 I'll have what I should have ordered 15 years ago... [/quote] That's really exciting news, Rob. Good for you. It might seem like a long wait now , but it will give you plenty to think about and look forward to in the meantime, so try and enjoy the anticipation as well as actually getting the bass.

[quote name='drTStingray' timestamp='1387334682' post='2310890'] I now want a Mk 1 quite badly - I always loved the sound Alan Spenner and Percy Jones got from theirs. But the Wal is in different league and is most definitely on my GAS radar now........bloody expensive though - but fantastic basses. [/quote] Nice to hear someone namechecking Alan Spenner, dr T. I have always loved the sound he got on those late'70's / early '80's Roxy Music tracks , too. He was a brilliant bass player who gets criminally overlooked nowadays . A Wal would be a great addition to your collection , not least of all because of the contrast between that and your Stingray, ect, like chalk and cheese. Looking back , when I was 21 years old I had a Wal Custom and a pre -EBMM Stingray (and a 30 inch waistline) . And I still used to complain that life wasn't fair . That will probably be because of the mullet hairstyle , though.

[quote name='leftyhook' timestamp='1387377161' post='2311261'] 'Tin Drum' is his best work/tone. [/quote] Big+1 on that . Mick's style really matured on that album , and that is when he really came into his own and started sounding like something special , which he was.

As I seem to have mentioned quite a few times on this site, I played Wal basses for ten years, and I have a great affection for them , but I have little desire to go back to playing them now, or at least if I did it would have to be a very specific custom order to satisfy my requirements. They are truly great -sounding basses and an enthralling design overall, but I couldn't say that overall I enjoy the more straightforward basses I play nowadays any less or that the end results are any less impressive. Wals were and still are great basses, but they do have their foibles as well as a lot of variation from one example to the other, so , especially at the prices they are now, you need to make sure you want one, and then get the [i]right[/i] one. for you. Overall I would say that Wals are basses with many virtues but with a few problems, too, Wal basses have been given an upgrade in recent years , but that upgrade isn't in terms of hardware or construction . What has been added to them is an element of[u] mystique[/u], and that is very valuable commodity. To make it you need a lack of availability , coupled with desirability and prestigious endorsements . Wal basses have all these things , as well as being great basses besides, and as a result their legend has grown .

I've got a Musicman Reflex with a humbucker in exactly the same position as a Stingray that can be switched into passive mode. To my ears , it doesn't really sound noticeably different to the same pickup in active with the EQ set flat. It certainly wouldn't be worth embarking on a major project to butcher the electronics on some kind of a Stingray if by doing so you are in search of a profound and pleasing tonal difference , because the chances are, there won't be one. You stand much more chance of making a perfectly good bass sound worse.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1387317421' post='2310736'] Why should the Enfield sound like a Wal? It wasn't designed that way at all. I think maybe the difference of opinion comes from our experience of the instruments. Mine comes from actually having played the basses, and is that the electronics are remarkable, but I didn't much like the look or feel of the instrument. Yours appears to have come from looking at some photos of the bass and noting that the shape is reminiscent of the Wal, and therefore you are disappointed that the concept of the sound is so completely different that it isn't a complete clone. If you want something that sounds like a Wal, then buy a Wal. The Enfield basses are equally remarkable in their electronics but are designed to do something completely different. To get hung up on their similar shapes is to miss the point entirely. [/quote] I am indeed basing my opinion entirely on appearances and implied associations, you are absolutely right, but that is an opinion which these Enfield basses are very deliberately inviting. The similarities to a Wal are not coincidental . Purely from a marketing point of view, if you are going to evoke another make and model of bass , it makes sense to go the whole way and imitate to some extent the functional appeal of that product i.e its' sound, A quasi-Wal clone would have garnered more interest, that's for sure.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1387310266' post='2310607'] Nothing at all like a Wal in either concept or execution. [/quote] Enfield basses do indeed indeed sound nothing like a Wal , but if it did they might actually have sold a few more. It is undeniable, however, that the Enfields are derivative of the Wal in terms of overall aesthetics. Everything about Enfield basses , on a superficial level at least, is contrived to be reminiscent of or evocative of Wal basses in some way or to conjure up some association with that esteemed brand.

[quote name='Bigwan' timestamp='1387297600' post='2310422'] Actually that's an exaggeration - every 5 string musicman. Both my '98 Stingray 5 and my Bongo 5 had the issue, but it may have been me being cack handed... [/quote] Sorry , I had , for some reason , automatically presumed you meant four strings. Yes , you are absolutely right in that case. Every five string Musicman bass I have ever played does indeed suffer from this problem , and it drives me crazy, too. The problem with EBMM five strings is that, though they have many great qualities, the neck profile and related string spacing are a neccesarry but not completely satisfactory compromise. The neck shape feels great and not too broad or cumbersome if you are used to a four string , but the trade-off is that the string spacing is fairly tight, and even with that tight spacing , there is still not enough room at the edge of the fingerboard to prevent the strings slipping off. That is enough to ruin these otherwise generally y excellent basses for me, I'm sorry to say.

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1387294267' post='2310373'] Fair comment, though the pre-amp is so flexible that you can make a Wal do most of the sounds you'll ever need. They're heavy mind, my Mk.II fiver weighs exactly 5Kg which is nothing to some people, but too much for me! I'd certainly back Dingus on this though, don't go placing an 18-month order for a bass if you haven't already played one fairly extensively and know that it will really suit you. This is no P-bass ... [/quote] I personally think Wal basses sound so good that they should satisfy just about anybody, with the addendum that if you want to sound like a Fender or a Music Man ect then look elsewhere at a very different kind of bass. Wals sound unique, but are incredibly flexible within that distinct character. They just sound" right" to me. I honestly think that people who don't like the sound of Wal basses are a bit weird . I would buy a Wal over a Fodera, any day . They are indeed usually pretty heavy, but they can build you a lighter one on request and it will pretty much sound the same . The standard neck shape is pretty chunky by most standards, too. Despite being superbly well-made , I would also have to say that a Wal is a bass that is pretty finicky and slightly temperamental and needs periodic servicing to work at peak performance. However , the same can be said for a lot of top-flight basses.

[quote name='Bigwan' timestamp='1387295177' post='2310385'] Every musicman I've ever played had the g string problem you mention. [/quote] Really ? I am particularly aware of this phenomena, and I have never come across any Musicman that suffered from it. In fact, they are one of the basses with the most generous excess at the edge of the fingerboard in my experience .

[quote name='artisan' timestamp='1387290644' post='2310297'] I watched Spandau Ballet on Sky Arts 1 last night & fell in love with Martin Kemp's Mk2 Wal bass,it is gorgeous to look at & sounded amazing. I want one so bad it hurts can't bloody well affort one though I was never a fan of the band but thought they were pretty good & he is a pretty decent bass player too. I am sure he would really like to give me his bass for Christmas [/quote] A Wal is a bass that is worth really, really wanting . They are one of the few very expensive basses that are actually worth the money However,despite the revered status they hold nowadays, they are pretty esoteric and individualistic instruments and definitely not for everybody, so don't necessarily assume that a Wal would be your Holy Grail. But it probably would be .

Even the pre-84 ones tend to be a bit wobbly in the neck department, but not as chronic as the mid-80's era ones, maybe. Your best bet is a post -1990 one , but they are relatively rare because JD had gone back to building on a much smaller scale and far fewer of those basses are in circulation . I had a custom bass built in 1990 that was amazingly good and the neck on that was completely stable and never needed adjusting , but it was a unique profile with a little more meat to it than a regular JayDee and it also had the new truss rod design and carbon graphite reinforcement. It was a fabulous bass and I should never have sold it, but someone with a big record company advance to spend made me an offer I couldn't refuse. I have it on good authority that bass now belongs to a well-known record producer and can be heard on quite a few of his tracks in recent years .

[quote name='chris_b' timestamp='1387290893' post='2310302'] My verdict is that they are far too expensive and nothing I've seen makes me want to find out whether I like them or not, [/quote] Yes, exactly.

[quote name='NJE' timestamp='1387285667' post='2310200'] I remember playing one of the Wal look-a-likes at a guitar show, lovely bass, but two things stuck me immediately. First was the G string, no-matter how I played I kept pulling it off the edge of the board, I dont know if it was a misaligned bridge or just the way they build them but I have never had that problem wth any other bass. The pickup was superb but I think in a real life situation it would drive me absolutely insane fiddling and selecting the confusing array of combinations. other than that, beautifully made and a pleasure to play (as long as I stayed off the G string). if it was me, i would get a Wal for that money and I would say that it would probably hold its value better than a Sims. [/quote] The problem with the G string slipping off is a common problem on a lot of basses ( and a pet hate of mine) , and it's caused by how the nut has been cut. t is fairly easy to remedy by getting a new nut cut and installed with slightly different allocation of the string spacing. I've never played these basses myself , but they do not appeal to me in the slightest . They might look like a Wal but they sound nothing like one, and their design philosophy is any many ways the opposite of what Wal were about. the electronics in Wal basses were brilliant because they sounded unique , were infinitely flexible , but were also, critically, simple, practical and easy to use. These Enfields are unneccessarily elaborate , with unremarkable results in terms of the sounds available. Lots of modern hi-tech basses can sound like that , but nothing else sounds like a Wal. I know these are an attempt at a new design , but the invitation to compare these with Wal basses is irresistible, and entirely of Enfield's own making. Given a choice between one of these and a Wal ,I would be on Paul Herman's waiting list quicker than you could say " Percy Jones".

I'm not a huge fan of the band,to be honest, but Andrew Levy is a wickedly good player and always has been . He used to be a regular customer at a clothes shop where my mate worked when we were students and he is apparently a very nice chap, too.

[quote name='Steff' timestamp='1387189529' post='2309049'] I've got 60's custom shop in my '76 jazz (thats how I bought it). It's gonna be different to the Seymors but not necessarily better to your ears. I remember playing a warmoth body - vintage neck jazz with Seymors in and honestly I can't really tell which one I like better. The CS 60s are supposed to sound like the original vintage 60s pups but they aren't made the same way, also there's always the wood-pups-player combination that affect the sound greatly. I've heard my musicman stingray5 played by a few different people and they all sounded different ... I am buying a set of original 70's for my bass now, I know there won't be much of a difference (or would it?) but as Bass Doc said to me - you will feel better So good luck and I hope you'll like them, if you don't , there's always the 30 days return policy Steff [/quote] Just to clarify, the O.P is thinking about changing the Duncan-designed pickups that came as standard on his Squier VM Jazz ,rather than a set of USA-made Seymour Duncan Jazz Bass pickups, which would be, as you quite rightly point out, a bit of a sideways move in terms of upgrading. On the subject of your 70's Jazz, a set of genuine original '70's Jazz pickups should actually sound very different to the Fender CS60's you have now for a whole host of reasons, not least of all that the CS60's are overwound for more output and a more meaty tone, whereas as during the 1970's Fender began to progressively underwind their pickups as a way of making them cheaper to manufacture, as well as swtiching to ceramic wire for a while at a certain point in the mid '70's. Inadvertently, the result was a very different sounding pickup that helped give the 1970's basses their characteristic sound.

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1387153953' post='2308902'] Is that why far more people are voting in the Barefaced poll than the Composition Competition? [/quote] Yeah, but when I say actually playing the bass ,[i] I don't actually mean to the extent that you would play proper music and songs on it and stuff like that.[/i] That would be bordering on , well, something or other, and not what this hobby is all about. If I wanted to[i] play[/i] music I would be out doing it. I'm here to[i] talk [/i]about playing the bass, not to actually play it. That would make no sense at all. I might ( might) go see my G.P about my erectile dysfunction, but I'm not[i] necessarily[/i] going to give her a demonstration and ask for marks out of ten . Do you see what I mean? That is essentially how I see Basschat.

Do you mean the Jazz Bass set? If so , they are indeed great -sounding pickups. One of the best I have ever heard.

The problem with Talkbass is that it is far too materialistic. The emphasis is on what equipment people have got or are going to get and not enough on more broad concepts to do with actually playing the bass or appreciating other players . That is where Basschat scores over Talkbass... for now. If Basschat went down the Hondo Club route ect, then it is only a matter of time before that would erode what makes Basschat good, or at least what makes it better than Talkbass. What's more, it is also only a matter of time before the Musicman club would be embroiled in a civil war between the pre Ernie Ball faction and the post Ernie Ball crew. A heated discussion over whether the preamp in the new Stingrays sounds the same as the old ones ( it doesn't) would boil over and lead to the Basschat equivalent of what happened in the former Yugoslavia., And then we would all be sorry.

[quote name='BetaFunk' timestamp='1387145730' post='2308795'] It's a very serious place on here sometimes that's for sure. [/quote] Oh , how right you are ...

[quote name='owen' timestamp='1387150507' post='2308870'] Not wanting to hijack the thread, but could you link me to where I might buy a set of J Chi Sonics? [/quote] Hi Owen I can't post a link right now, but if you go to www.hansonpickups.com and then get the contact information and send an email the Bo Pirrucello will get right back to you with up-to-date information and prices and shipping info ect. . The website is a bit lacking in information in certain respects , but there is also a Facebook page dedicated to with the latest info on though Chi Sonic pickups, so it is worth having a look at that, too. Bo is a very nice chap and responds very quickly in my experience. The newest version of the J Sonics in Jazz Bass -sized cases have got black covers and look identical from the outside to the Jazz Bass pickups on the 44-02 and 44-94 basses. I know they had a couple of sets with very slight blemishes on that they were selling off cheap recently, if you are interested.