NancyJohnson

Expect this post to be edited several times! We're going to hold the next SE Bass Basheroonie on 11th October 2026. Same venue as the 2025, St Sebastian's Memorial Hall, Crowthorne, Berkshire. Similar timings - 11.00am to 5.00pm, although we didn't seem to have any issue getting in a bit earlier. Again, we'll hire the whole site. And, once again to confirm, the site has decent parking, good connections with M3/M4. Closest rail connection is Crowthorne (which is on the Guildford > Reading branch line) or Wokingham (Waterloo > Reading). Hopefully, no engineering works scheduled this time around! Main entry to the site is off Nine Mile Ride, the exit is off Honey Hill to the rear of the hall. On the subject of parking, please be sensible - no double space malarkey just because you have a big Mercedes. This is the place: Map below. ++++++++++++++ BASIC POOP: ENTRY/RE-ENTRY We're proposing the usual £10.00 entry per person. CASH PLEASE. No cards, Paypal, body parts or sexual favours. You'll get a sticker. Write your name on it and wear it. RAFFLE We're hoping to do a raffle of some sort if we have enough donations. SELLING Of course, you'll be able to use the event for selling your unwanted stuff; please just make sure whatever you're selling works and is labelled and priced. ATTENDANCE Please note (as usual), this is a private event open to Basschat members and their guest(s), and we will categorically not be letting any local oiks in. It goes without saying, please be vigilant. VOLUME This is a two room village hall. PLEASE respect your volume and be considerate of other members around you. Yes, we all know you're proud of your earth-shaking SVT and 8x10 fridge, but this is a small hall and 300w of valve-powered bass tone is going to melt the face off the guy next to you, so please try to restrain your rig. When the talks are going on in the main room. please refrain from cranking it in the side room because, as proven in 2025, the sound travels. HMMM, POWER SOCKETS The 2025 event seemed to be fine, but there did seem to be the possibility of a lack of electric sockets if more people attended, so please bring a multi-plug extension cable. WHAT'S THAT BASS? Sadly the blind bass shoot-out didn't happen in 2025, so I'm hoping it'll happen in 2026. More information on this to follow. OTHER SHIZZ Be respectful of other member's equipment...no unplugging anything if it's not yours. Also, it transpired that the hall seems to be in an mobile dead-zone area colloquially referred to as a not-spot; mobile coverage is frankly terrible. You would think the location was In Guezzam Province, Algeria, rather than a few miles east of Reading. That said, In Guezzam Province probably has a larger population than Crowthorne. If you want to pay people for purchases by Paypal, you may struggle. In closing, we're obviously looking to break even on the outlay and make a profit from this. @prowla and I agreed in 2025 that any proceeds over our costs will go to COATs (Crowthorne Old Age & Teens) of Crowthorne, where I volunteer weekly. COATs have a well run shop, a lovely day centre on the edge of the village and they run a couple of mini-buses to get the oldsters to hospital and for day trips. The whole place is volunteer run, even the top line people. It's a great cause. There's no need to form an orderly queue or anything at this juncture. Cheers Paul @NancyJohnson Paul @prowla Gary @cetera

Just been trying to shoot a PM to @prowla and @cetera and I'm getting a response about the recipients not being able to accept messages? Thanks PAul

"Wanna buy a Spector?"

It transpired that the singer in my old project knew J Willgoose's father and offered his son some sage advice when he was starting out. I popped Willgoose a message and he was kind enough to respond and confirm: ...don't get too moist here, but there was also a bunch of other stuff on the thread discussing the possibility of exploring Atmos/5.1 mixes of the albums.

Had the same thing when I was a kid, some televised concert thing, mid-70s, maybe The Carpenters; bass player was using an already well beaten-up Jazz or Precision and my mum was going, 'Look at that old thing. Why wouldn't he have a nice new one?'

Maybe sadness was the wrong word here. Disconsolate, maybe. Dunno. No synonym springs to mind. And yes, I get the 5% analogy. Umm. I recall a story about a multi-millionaire Japanese businessman that was obsessed with vintage and rare Rickenbacker guitars/basses and bought them like any normal Joe might buy a CD ir book. He didn't even play guitar or bass, it was just about ownership and - fair enough - that was his thing. This little yarn springs to mind every time I see something aligned to expensive/rare guitars. Someone with deep enough pockets will buy it and - using Geddy Lee as an example - it'll just sit in his house/lockup and likely never see daylight again. Probably digging myself into a big hole here.

Personally, I wouldn't do anything beyond giving it a deep clean (while retaining the patina as much as possible) and a basic set up. Things worth considering that despite it being rareish, this is more down to it being left-handed, a niche 90s bass, with a Star Wars graphic. You have three fairly big boxes to tick here when considering a buyer; [you] could throw a sizeable wedge restoring this back to pristine condition and not realistically see a return on that outlay. In the same situation, I'd just source a buyer and let them take on any mods.

Little desire for ownership of anything like this but there's thousands of (pro/minted) players out there with burgeoning collections that would consider a £20k-odd price tag as small change. We've no real idea of the provenance here, whether it's been used regularly or if it's spent 60 years under someone's bed. That said, rest assured there's Precision bass fanboys on this very site RIGHT NOW who are doing the sums to work out whether they could afford this. The real sadness is that if it went to someone like Geddy Lee or Sting or <insert name here>, it would just become just another bass in an already huge collection and likely never see any real action.

It's genuine. Don't you people remember when Peavey had their open day for the partially sighted event?

Just stunning.

Email from COATs:

Here's me (and the lovely Di) when I paid the swag over this morning! Thanks to everyone!

I stopped for a while around 2001/2002, not really much going on musically, tired of chasing. It was quite cathartic to just clear out more or less everything; I kept a bass - a '70s Precision bass - in its/it's case and let it sleep for a bit. Genuinely felt good to free myself from playing for a bit.

A few years back I bought a Hamer Cruisebass; it was a series 1 model and didn't have a scratchplate (others did). After a bit if jiggery-pokery, a member of the Hamer Discussion Group scanned his plate, I sent the schematic to Gig Ink, they made up the plate (without holes) and I attached it to the body with some strategically placed strips of 3M double sided tape.

If we're happy with the venue - it seemed to work well enough - I think we'd be more than happy to arrange one for next year. Obviously, there's going to be some minor logistical issues, but all in all if we just set out a handful of ground rules at the start and stick to timings, we should be good. Personally, thanks to Paul and Gary and to everyone that turned up!

Evening kids! Just a quick note to say thank you to everyone who attended. @prowla and I sorted out the fundamentals and after settling out our expenses for hall hire/food, we made a £75.00 profit, which I'll pay into COATs charity when I'm there on Tuesday. Disappointingly, we overran on the presentations, so round two of 'What's That Bass?' was shelved. Next year maybe. As there was a low amount of donations for the raffle, this was parked too. We did see a Behringer pedal got left behind (this was a raffle donation), so if it's OK Paul (@prowla) will pop that up in the classifieds here. All in all, a fun day. Home now. Glass of red incoming! Until 2026, best to all! Paul

Let's Goooooooo! Wife has got a bit of a cold, so is staying home. I'll be doing the door etc. See you all later.

Public Service Broadcasting (with The London Contemporary Orchestra) at The Barbican. 1st November, evening show. 3rd row. Just splendid. The current tour is supporting their Last Flight album, with a few older crowd pleasers side loaded in. I've seen this band evolve from a two piece to a five (which expanded at various times when a three-piece horn section came out), and now again - albeit for a limited time - with the orchestra. I'd love to sit down with J Willgoose Esg (the chap in the courdroy and bowtie) and try to understand how his stage set-up actually works.

Unless there's anyone on the list, then nobody specific. Basic setups are a breeze to do (intonation etc.) but I'd be reluctant to break out the soldering iron or do fret levelling.

PLEASE READ THIS! There'll be a few people coming who may be using public transport. Please check National Rail as there's engineering works in the area. If there's any Basschat members that can pick up anyone enroute, please post here and arrange pickups. Thanks

I tend to do most of my small jobs off an ironing board and for the bigger stuff I have something fashioned that attached to a Workmate. The only downside to the latter is that it's a little too low.

Best? Necks from China and an XB Driver. There's not been any bad.

Can you imagine the egos at work here? Gouldman with his pre-10cc writing credits and Stewart with Strawberry Studios, The Mindbenders and his session work. Godley and Creme both seemed quite obstinate and difficult.

I remember seeing Lol Creme on Blue Peter demonstrating the Gizmo thing; it seemed (to me) at the time that the reason behind the breakup was solely to benefit this unit/thing. My early teen mind couldn't grasp why they would walk away from 10cc for that.