Maude

About 20 years ago

I used a BBG5s exclusively for years. It was my only bass, bought from new from Mansons in Plymouth, and I didn't feel I needed anything else. Loved it. I'm back on four strings again now and it's been in its case for years but I can't bring myself to sell it. Mad really.

Oh maybe then. I have the wood one and it's a vinyl wrap.

There is an earlier version with a different input/output side panel. The different coloured fronts are just vinyl covered MDF.

Although you have a hole in the cone, the displaced cone material will still be attached, just pushed out the back, rather than an actual piece punched out, if you see what I mean. Push these pieces back into place with a finger on either side of the cone, hopefully the hole will virtually dissappear. You can then reinforce with the above method.

Whizz all the lacquer off, give it a good rub down with beeswax and mineral oil, stick some little rubber pads on front and chop yer cheese uo on the back. Works best with a slab body.

Have to agree, the band are always great. Slightly OT, but on one episode a couple of weeks ago, between singers the camera slowly panned up a bass guitar on a stand to reveal a Gear4Music logo. Very sly advertising, or was the bassist using it? You decide

One of his 4005's is still for sale at Reverb. At last look they'd knocked four grand off the price and it was down to eight grand. Maybe worth a punt to see if it helps with the tone

My feeling re hanging a bass by the neck is that the force acting on a neck is string tension. If a bass is stood on a stand then the string tension is trying to pull the head towards the body as the body is supported, gravity will also be helping the neck move towards the body, only fractionally but still helping. If the bass is hung then the string tension is trying to pull the body towards the head as the head is supported, gravity will be trying to prevent the heavy body being pulled towards the head, only fractionally again, but still resisting. So with that in mind, surely it's better to hang a bass by the neck, no?

I'm not wasting my time with a shrink when I could be running through the streets with ten mini capes flowing in the breeze behind me.

I've just ordered ten. With a five pound saving on each one I've just saved fifty quid in a matter of minutes. I can now get a 'free' set of flats with the money I've saved, and still have some left over.

I use a Variax and while the 8 and 12 strings are decent approximations, and will do the job in their own way rather than take another bass to a gig, that is all they are, approximations. As is that pedal above. None of these will ever have the sound of real multiple courses, that slight delay between courses, the characteristics you get from actually striking more than one string. This can't be replicated by modulating the sound of a single string.

I'm with The Greek. Although I do rather like the wooden ones on my Bex4. I absolutely can't stand the Gibson/Epiphone speed knobs, the black ones on my Dot (yeah yeah, I needed to slice some cheese) look like cheap toy ones.

Shop - Need any help? Me - Yes, what flatwounds do you stock? Shop - No one uses flatwounds. (Then shows me all the rounds) Me - I wanted flats to see what they'd sound like on my Precision. Shop - They'll sound like stinky poo. I'm more than happy to do all my dealings via the Internet. The Internet always has what I need in stock and is usually delivered before I get the chance to drive the 150 mile round trip to the nearest decent shop. Re missing the shops when they're gone. You don't miss what you haven't got.

Guitar, the player just looks like a c0ck

It looks like a giant steampunk phallus.

'In words' come and go pretty quickly, give it a few months and there'll be a new 'in word' for the kids to latch on to.

I'm more concerned with the dubious town planning going on in his neck of the woods.

How permanent/well done do you need it? If just for a bit of a giggle and the back doesn't matter the get on ebay and buy some gold vinyl wrap. Should get a 500x1500mm sheet for about a tenner. Read a 'how to' and crack on. Put it on the front, stretch and shrink it around the sides and trim the back off neatly. It'll look like C3PO

I read this little snippet last night and it made me smile Fall’s contract to appear on Later … with Jools Holland included a clause stipulating that under no circumstances was the former Squeeze ivory tinkler to play “boogie-woogie piano anywhere near the Fall” Like some others, I was never a fan but the people like MES don't seem to be being replaced in today's music scene.

It was a few years ago but I remember them being lighter tension than Chromes, more like a roundwound tension.

I had a set on my main bass for a while. Feel lovely and smooth and I'd say sound similar to old Chromes regarding brightness. In the end I changed to D'Addario half rounds as I wanted something a little brighter sounding and the LaBella's were to low tension for me, but I'd happily play a tune on suspension bridge cables.

Maybe we're all spoilt with the Internet nowadays if there's folks complaining about seeing a bass for sale 500 miles away and the seller not wanting to post it. Perhaps go back to pre internet days bass hunting techniques, when all this gear was still for sale around the country but you just didn't see the adverts, so you didn't want it. You had to scan local papers or the stock a local shop carried, if you were lucky enough to have an instrument shop that carried basses local. Down here in Cornwall there was/still is very little. Personally I prefer it the way it is now. Even if 50% of sellers didn't want to post I've still got the opportunity to purchase a vast amount of instruments from around the country/world that just wasn't readily available 20 years ago. Nobody used to post basses because nobody outside of say a 30 mile radius would see the advert. We all coped back then and I think things are slightly better now

None of my basses play like butter thankfully. I play in a mod band and often sport a tonic suit. The mixture of heat a dairy based spreads would be a disaster.

The only 'Bodies' song I know is the Sex Pistols one. I thought it was a pretty nasty song to be playing anywhere.