ped

They say ‘actual price is £3500’ in the ad and make it sound like they didn’t put £1 on purpose. We’ve had some classics recently, one guy even said ‘it’s not £50 it’s £750 but it asked me to pay if I put that’

£18 to renew an existing £20 sub. Most people also see the sub as a kind of ‘thank you’ which is nice, and the good people far outweigh the scammers. It annoys me when they get through though because it makes a mockery of those who pay and pierces our safe little ecosystem which we’ve developed over the years!

Strangely enough they never reply to the PM I usually send! Everyone who does it gets a warning which stays on record and after two goes their content gets moderated before it appears on the site. Some own up and apologise, others scuttle back off to gumtree or Facebook 😝 good riddance.

Hi folks As you know, items priced at £50 and under are free to post here. Recently we introduced some code that means anything listed under the threshold has to be approved first, because in the past we’ve seen scammers listing basses worth thousands for £1 just so they can avoid paying the fee. The fee protects you as customers - if a seller is dishonest enough to defraud our system we don’t expect them to be great people to deal with. Currently there’s a gap in the code where items posted at exactly £50 are free and may pass by the filter, too. Today I’ve had to stop three idiots trying to evade payment this way. Often people have commented on the thread before I’ve been able to take it down. Could you help out by clicking ‘report post’ instead, so I can get rid? I’ve asked for the gap to be plugged ASAP so hopefully this won’t be for long. Lets try and keep the marketplace free of these types of people please! Cheers ped

That’s a good read and I agree with everything you said. Especially how much ‘weight’ there is behind the notes. Plucking an open string in this feels like it vibrates your whole body, yet it’s smooth and high fidelity. I always played it passive to be honest - sometimes engaging the pre if I wanted something extra or to tone down. I think the mark of an excellent bass is that it sounds perfect flat or bypassed. Take good care of the bass and enjoy it

I suppose a good analogy would be to say it’s like writing - you can write without your hand touching the page at all but you have more fine control when you rest the side of your hand on the page. Kind of feels like that.

All it does is raise the surface of the bass closer to the strings. It’s all about feel. If you’ve played neck thru basses all your life going to a bolt on you can feel like the strings are miles away from the body, for example. For most of us we already use the pickups as a kind of ramp - and thumbrest. It doesn’t interfere with pooping as you’ll probably pop near the neck and the ramp tends to be further back between the pickups although some fret less basses have them at the neck too to give you more of a double bass feel. The benefit will vary from player to player - it might help you play more quickly or it could have the opposite effect depending on the player.

Yep that’s the one. I used one with a 410 and 210 for years and I’m not convinced my subsequent amps sounded much better on stage than that Hartke did 👍🏼

If you’re borrowing a Hartke can then I’d recommend the Hartke 3500 head, it’s a classic and sounds great with those aluminium speakers.

Yes that’s a cool one, wonder how it sounds with the pickups further apart like that

Indeed. It’s interesting to read about the history of the company too, I know the first 200 or so we’re built in the original NY workshop by Ken and Vinnie in part and finished by Ken in his apartment and after that, Ken moved to Philadelphia where he continued making the BT shape but introduced the BSR shortly after that. Despite going through various sub contractors to make parts of the basses (most recently Brubaker) the design language and the sound Have remainder constant. I read an interesting story about how the pickup placement was ‘discovered’, basically a customer requested it early on, when the pickups had bezels around them. They were touching. With the newer design the pickups didn’t touch but the sound was great so the placement was kept. No measurements involved, just ‘two fingers apart’ (although I’m sure they measure it now!) Looking forward to your review @Mastodon2

How are you getting on with yours? It’s interesting to hear how similar this sounds to yours - the basic recipe has stayed the same I suppose.

Thanks folks I’m over the moon with it

I do that on all my basses for some reason!! A bass only earns its ‘puppets’ once it passes my strict setup and quality tests 😂

New bass day for me - and quite a special one for me personally. I've always loved the 'Smith Sound' and grew up listening to John Patitucci playing his early six string Smith. I recently realised my dreams of owning one when I bought a beautiful BT5 from Basschat last year. However I'm not really a five string player, but I can adapt. Smith basses tend to be 5 or 6 string so there wasn't much choice. But then I saw this. Not only is it a 4 string, but it's a very early one built just two months after I was. It was finished in January 1984. The serial number is 151. Early Smith basses have a few differences from today's models - first of all the brass fittings on the headstock, especially the 'S' logo in a brass disk which I remember seeing on those early Chick Corea vids, whilst my brother watched and analysed every move Dave Weckl made. I got some info from Ken about the bass who said the neck joint is a hidden mortise which I believe was inspired by a damaged double bass from a car accident in the 70s. The preamp is made by Haz Labs; it has volume, balance, treble, bass (not sure of frequencies but the treble control always feels very musical) plus a phase switch which Ken said they subsequently removed because it's not very useful. It's quite unusual to see Smith basses without an exposed centre block like my 5 string - I think some of the Hadrien Feraud models have a solid top like this one. It has a walnut top and maple back with an ebony fingerboard. The whole bass has a very light satin finish which feels great and shows minimal wear except usual playing in. It's been well looked after! I wasn't able to play the bass first so I was kind of nervous but Smith basses are so consistent I needn't have worried - the neck is dead straight and the action was pretty bang on right away. I've got the G string a little higher than my 'strings painted on' Vigier because I find it makes double stops on the G string more pronounced. As usual have the neck with almost zero relief and the other strings very low. Someone described the sound of their Warwick Thumb as 'digital' here the other day; that's quite a good way to describe this. I'll do some sound clips asap to show you. So yeah I'm really pleased. I think that's my bass buying escapades over for a while. Some pics!

Hi guys Popped into Kings Cross Station today to pick up something I’ve been after for a long time. I went straight to a pub and gave it a thorough looking at plus a new set of strings. A guy sitting nearby was on the phone for a while but when he finished and got up to leave he said he was a fellow bass player. I think everyone else thought it was weird me sitting there with my tools, pack of strings, Polish and rags. Full NBD coming soon!

The best option IMO is to file down the string saddle - go further than you need to then raise it to taste. You can get special files for that.

People say a credit card thickness but I like it literally a hairs width above 👍🏼 Go by feel, not numbers.

Here's one I had made (not the same brief as yours) https://www.basschat.co.uk/topic/343694-nsd-custom-leather-strap/