mangotango

OK, I lied about the price. It's actually £395 for the basic model with the vintage bridge - the extra £100 is for a Babicz. http://www.basscentre.com/british-bass-masters/the-bass-centre-lizzy-bass.html For that, I just don't see how you can go wrong.

At the same show, I tried out their Phil Lynott Power Bass - black P with mirror scratchplate. Nice neck, lightweight bass, lovely growl to it. Full sound, lively feel. £499 I believe. Had I been I somewhat more flush, the Power Bass (though probably not the Lynott!) would have been the bass that I'd have bought.

If available on the date, I could bring a couple of Spectors, Genz Benz Amplification, maybe even the Aria EUB. I might also bring @Stingray5 if he's not too busy!!

That's exactly what I did! I have one for bass, one for (whisper it) guitar....that way I didn't have to listen to guitarists going WHEEEEWIDDLYWIDDLYWIDDLYWHEEEE!! at top volume, or other bassists going SLAP SLAPPITY TAPPY SLAPPY TAP all day. I thought the show was OK. I thought that there were too few exhibitors, I didn't think much of the idea of sticking the luthier's talks over in one corner of the main exhibition area rather than in a room of their own. The bass I would like to have walked out with was the blue Willcock Mullarkey n the picture. The one that I nearly did walk out with was the Phil Lynott-stylee Bass Collection Power Bass. To be honest, despite a pleasant chat with the bloke at the Spector stand, Shergold's guy passing on the welcome news that they will return to selling basses next Spring, and bumping into @Jean-Luc Pickguard, it was for a long while more than a little ho-hum. But, after having my brain bashed by Nik Preston with Music Theory at a workshop on improvisation, then meeting up with @Silvia Bluejay at a presentation by Alex Claber of Barefaced, things were looking up. And then I went to the Patitucci performance. When I sat down, I noticed on the stage a Nord keyboard as well as that 6-string bass of his, so at least it wasn't going to be like Gary Willis last year, playing along with tracks off his laptop. I was remarkably pleased when JP came on and brought with him Gwilym Simcock, one of Britain's best jazz pianists IMHO. They played a set for which I would happily have paid ten times the price of my £5 entrance fee to the Auditorium, had it been at Ronnie Scott's, Pizza Express Soho, or the like. It was definitely one of the best performances that I have EVER seen at one of these kind of shows. Once that was over, I tried to hang around for a little while to talk to Gwilym, whom I know a bit from Impossible Gentlemen gigs; however, the organisers were moving people out. Just as well really, because as a result, I was able to sneak into the back stalls at @Steve Lawson's workshop on Fretlessness - sadly on at the same time as Mr. Patitucci's performance, but I managed to catch the overlap. Best bit was yet to come, though - as I went down to the main exhibition hall again, out past me walked Messrs. Simcock & Patitucci, so I said hello to Gwilym as he walked by, and then got introduced to JP, and then Shez Raja turned up and talked to me, and all of a sudden I was surrounded by top class musicians, me in the middle, chatting away like I belonged....... old age fanboy or what? Anyway, it turned a reasonable but relatively ordinary show into something worth remembering for me. If the organisers could arrange a similar experience for next year, I'd buy my ticket now! 🤣🤣 .DS_Store

That's it you blokes, don't sell me anything, or it'll cost you in the long run!!😁 Nice to know it's my fault again that you've ended up with a particularly choice bass. 😕 For both of us, mate.....😖

Yeh, they do tend to "re-cycle" stuff......however, second time I went, there was enough different material to make it worthwhile.

Ain't gonna talk with you no more!

Entwhistle PBX. http://www.entwistlepickups.com/pickup.php?puid=PBX Good, inexpensive...what's not to like?

You're right - from there it's but a short step to 5 -string banj….no, don't make me say it

I have been to see the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain not once but twice, and each time it was a good fun night out. I think however that was more to do with the people in the band and less so with the instruments played. Sometimes, if you're English, playing a uke seems like an excuse to be "Wacky", in a twee, self-conscious, cringe-inducing, middle-class kind of way....maybe that's just my perception.

Judging by your avatar - I can see why you'd go for the red bass. But....presumably you also want the black with mint version for away gigs? https://store.liverpoolfc.com/kit/third-kit/?limit=all YNWA

THIS is a joke, right? I could buy a whole bunch of decent kit for that price...… https://www.ebay.co.uk/i/293130299202

...and having seen that, I want one now!! Watching that, on the day on which I bought my ticket for the Show, mightn't have been the wisest move..!!

Not exactly roughing it with the rest of us, then?😉 😄

An astonishing 7, though of those, 2 are currently up for sale and one is so new that it hasn't been played by me in front of anyone except when I was trying it out. Quartet Gigs call for the two 5-string Spectors (fretted & fretless), though I would out of preference take the Aria EUB as well if the material demands it. Workshop Big Band gigs require the 4-string Bass Collection and the Aria EUB.

OK, Serious Nostalgia Time, peeps. I said in the "Best Beginner's Bass?" thread that, since many of us had a real moan about the first bass that we had, back in the day, it might be interesting to see on exactly what kinds of junk we began our bass-playing odysseys and I would start a thread to that effect....so here we go. Please post details, preferably accompanied by pictures (library pictures will do, though vintage photo's of you with your not-so-prize possession will be welcome) of:- Your First Bass Your First Amplification set-up - from back in the days before we called them "rigs" and the date when you had these beasts in your possession. Happy to start the ball rolling. I played my first gig on an Eko violin bass through an Impact 60 amp and two unbranded 2x12" bass cabs (could have been Simms-Watts??) Would have been early to mid-1976 that these came into my possession. As @Scoop would confirm....the worst bass sound ever known to humankind. Putting it through the very cheapest of fuzzboxes probably didn't help any, if I'm honest.

I recently acquired a Squier Bass VI from the estimable @Al Krow and found that I get the best results when playing it with a plectrum, partly due to the narrow string spacing but also largely because I'm (whisper it!!) a guitarist as well as a bass player and so using a pick is pretty much second nature. Anyway, getting into playing a few tunes with that bass, and then catching the recent SBL course with Bobby Vega and yes, you guessed it, I suddenly found myself thinking about maybe trying out lots more stuff with a pick. Now you should know that I don't play that rawk'n'roll stuff, I play jazz of both funky and straight-ahead types, and the like. Playing with a pick wouldn't particularly be my first thought when it comes to playing technique, especially the sound of a plectrum with flatwound strings. I know that people will come up with lots of examples of how that might sound good in rock and pop and stuff, but the sheer horror of my parents' records by the Bert Kaempfert Orchestra - bass with the treble right up, pick, flats, horrendous clicky noise with a dead note sound - still makes me wince even now. (Swinging Safari, anyone?) So I tried it with care at Saturday's Jazz Workshop - lo and behold, reasonable results were achieved!! Sufficient to make me want to give it a proper try on all of my basses, even the fretless. After all, Steve Swallow uses a copper pick on his Harvey Citron semi-acoustic 5-string in jazz music, achieving a very nice tone; so no reason not to give it a go.

I have 2 Spectors, Korean-built (Legend Custom 5 fretted and Spectorcore 5 Fretless) both of which have the EMG SSD pickups. They're fine instruments and I'm actually very pleased with them; I play in a funk-jazz band and so I like the clarity that I get from them. I find that they provide a wide range of tones for the music I play, be it funk slapping, warm plummy latin sounds or clear fusion oomph, and I certainly wouldn't use the expression "one-dimensional" to describe them. But, unlike many Spector users I don't play rock or metal, so my expectations are very different from someone playing in either of those genres. Hope that helps.

No Sir! As I said, I noted a whole bunch of replies from people bemoaning the rubbish basses on which we started all those years ago, so I thought it might be of interest to start, as a separate entity from this thread (which IMHO has much worth), a separate thread on that subject. Per previous, I will get to that when I have chance, but there's an awful lot going on out here in Mango-land at the moment by way of non-musical stuff.....

Phew, that's a relief - thought it was just me....

Yep. Hence my "I might just kick off a "What was your first Bass/Amp?" thread" comment above. I'll get to it soon....non-bass stuff going on at the mo', I'm afraid.

There's been quite a few "Well I started out on a XYZ bass..." posts involved with this thread. It's quite interesting, I am sad enough to believe, especially if accompanied by the usual mix of nostalgia and misery - "now that WAS a piece of ****, action about a mile high, and don't get me started on the amp...." So I think I might just kick off a "What was your first Bass/Amp?" thread on here. Might be a bit of fun. See what people have to say. Pictures essential, natch, even if they're library pics off the Internet and not of the actual bass, which would probably be lost in the mists of time...and would probably have deserved it too, in most cases....

Leaving the ground vertically? Sudden Bright Lights? You must have been playing "Rapture"....

Got it. Had never even thought of that before, I guess because normally you see it with the guitar being held rather than neck upright.....

YehbuhWHA?