Painy

That's rather a lot of money for something that looks like it was moulded out of old Mini Babybel wax.

Sell it to me for five pounds! Oh alright, I can throw in a Hiwatt 'Hurricane' 10W combo to sweeten the deal as long as you pay for postage. No?..... Maybe just keep it and get it fixed then

Kasim Sulton anyone?

You could also try plucking a small fraction closer to the neck than usual so there's less string 'tension' (actually more compliance before anyone says anything - I know!). Glad it's getting there though.

[quote name='Bassman68' timestamp='1469018945' post='3095107'] A healthy dose of compression & 'digging in' with a low action, to my ears? [/quote] Yup, this. It's basically subtle fret rattle with compression keeping it all tight and punchy. Edit: Bright new strings too - no 'gunk'!

This video explains a lot of the differences. However my Squier vintage modified precision 5 string is my first choice gigging bass. Not because I'm worried about damage/loss/theft of my more expensive basses but because it's the one I find nicest and most comfortable to play. I'd say my Squier is a very playable and usable instrument as standard but is even better as a platform for upgrades and modification to make it into an excellent instrument. If Fender made a Mexican precision 5 string it might have saved me the effort of the upgrades that I'm in the process of carrying out but as its only available as an American Standard (costing around 6 times as much as the Squier) I'll happily put in the work. http://youtu.be/qaUOaaOyhHE

I've got a photo somewhere on an old phone of a Nissan Pickup with the plate B16 NOB that I saw in a Sainsbury's car park. My favorite though was a wealthy dentist who lived on the same road as me a few years back. He bought his wife a shiny new red 911 Carrera but then bought an old banger from an auction (seem to remember it was an old Cortina but could be wrong) just so he could get the registration transferred over to the Porsche. It was BOL 10X.

Could you not stick a patch over it and tell everyone it's a Donald Trump themed speaker cabinet?

Ha, just kidding... my number one gigging bass right now is a Squier

Just picked up this little beauty for a cool £189000. Do I win?

For those not familiar and as bonzodog says, the modern player jazz has dual humbuckers already. On the later models these were coil tap-able by means of a 4 way rotary selector switch (I have one in a 5 string) which gives the options of HH/HS/SH/SS, plus the standard VVT controls. I find the neck pickup solo'd in humbucker mode gets much closer to a precision sound than a standard jazz single coil. In fact whilst it's not exact played on its own, it's probably still close enough to pass for a P fairly convincingly when it's in the mix.

In the past I've used a volume swell pedal where you can set the amount of volume cut when the pedal is tilted fully back. That way when I plugged in the hotter bass I just pushed the pedal back fully for fixed amount of volume cut to keep it level with the other bass.

[quote name='charic' timestamp='1468397079' post='3090595'] Like ashdown? [/quote]

[quote name='Barking Spiders' timestamp='1468337378' post='3090254'] what about F# Bflat 9 at the 8th fret? [/quote] I was about to say it's lucky for him that there are only those 5 chords that it's set up to play in the whole of music but I forgot about that one. Drat!

In case anyone missed this elsewhere.

You could always use the extra hole to install a dummy toggle switch like Lee Sklar's 'producer switch'.

http://youtu.be/ZxW5KFZ-9CM

The low B is actually fairly decent on mine. Tension is as good as most of the far more expensive fivers I've owned to be honest so playability-wise it's very good. If I'm being hyper-critical then it doesn't have perhaps quite as much punch and definition tonally as the other strings but to be fair it's nothing you'd hear in the mix anyway. I just move my plucking position a tiny fraction towards the bridge on the B and it evens right out. Mine has actually become my number one despite the German built Warwick now living under my bed!

[quote name='JPJ' timestamp='1467831873' post='3086633'] Not British and no longer in production but the Aguilar AG500SC takes some beating in the simple but devastatingly beautiful sound stakes. [/quote] I have the AG500 - which has a second channel compared to the SC (single channel) version so mine is not quite the simple amp you're describing - but I do concur that they sound fantastic. I'd add another +1 for the SC version.

[quote name='peteb' timestamp='1467756690' post='3086047'] Right then, a number of points the first being this a skill you develop. Break the songb down into small manageable sections, say 2 or 4 bars at a time. Then before you pick up your bass sing the baseline out loud. Basically if you can sing it you can work out how to play it. It helps if you know your scales or have a very basic understanding of modes or chord tones as it will help you to recognise patterns more easily. These are the building blocks of al music and remember that there is a maximum of only 12 notes, so there are lots of patterns that you will find cropping up in all sorts of songs. Hope that this helps. Good luck. [/quote] I'm really lucky that learning by ear has always come pretty easily to me but whenever I do get stuck this is exactly the technique I use and it always works really well for me. I'd just add that literally singing just 3 or 4 notes at a time then piercing it all together once you know what those notes are on your bass can make it easier.

Aguilar padded covers for head and cabs, Thomann own brand hard bass cases, Stagg pedal board and then cables/mic/other bits and pieces in the silver aluminium tool case. The folding steps are to raise my amp up a bit closer to ear level. Not pictured are a Hercules dual guitar stand and mic stand which travel loose.

[quote name='E sharp' timestamp='1467657567' post='3085208'] Small world - years ago , I used a plug in Armstrong Red Ranger for a Precision . I think they used to do a little range of plug in units [/quote] Apparently so. I know the guitar version of the Yellow Humper was called the Purple Peaker

[quote name='gjones' timestamp='1467581772' post='3084709'] What would we do without Mr KiOgon? [/quote] If it was me then this :-

Having spent around 17 of my 21 playing years using active basses exclusively, I decided a couple of years ago to go passive and got myself a Fender Jazz and a Squier Precision (both 5 strings). I particularly fell in love with my precision for its playability and I do love the precision tone but for some reason I just hadn't quite been able to get it to sound like me. Anyway, a couple of weeks ago I found a small cardboard box containing the remains of an old Dan Armstrong 'Yellow Humper' pre-amp which I'd stupidly dismantled about 20 years ago while I was still at school. After posting on here to ask for help getting it working again it went off to KiOgan who worked his magic and, genius that he is, as well as repairing it also modified it to be fitted directly into the control cavity of my bass with the addition of a bypass toggle switch in case of battery failure. It's a very simple pre-amp in that the controls are just a 3 way toggle switch with either 'off' (actually a flat boost) 'lo' (bass boost) or 'lo + high (bass and treble boost. So, after a tiny bit of routing under the pickguard to make room for the battery and drilling a couple of holes in the guard for the switches, I fitted it Saturday morning, gave it a quick test to make sure it was working and took it to my gig Saturday night. At first I was a bit disappointed as switching the circuit on gave a nasty buzzy distorted sound and turning down the input gain on my amp didn't stop it either. Fortunately I then remembered the pad switch on my compressor, pushed it in and there it was. Sounded like me again but still like a precision. Really happy with the result. Obviously time will tell how it sounds at different venues etc. But I'm looking forward to finding out!

Personally I think relic'd is clearer.