NancyJohnson

Uncle Henry has gone?

XTC. Everything on shuffle. Makes my day go fast.

I believe Gibson are supposed to be $600m in debt. The brand has been mismanaged for years; they've been passed from one holding company to another since the late 1960s, they've misguidedly acquired too many businesses and closed them down indiscriminately, too much litigation against other brands for copyright infringement, the recent issue with the illegality of ebony and mahogany imports led to a huge fine and loss of most of the wood as well. They also have one of their manufacturing plants up for sale. But what do Gibson do? Rather than buck the trend and shift some manufacturing overseas to take advantage of cheaper labour costs, they stick with USA production and hike prices annually. Little innovation and what they have bought out recently has admittedly been awful. Look at their 2018 range...I mean honestly, who is going to pay £7,000 for a Les Paul because it's got a 'collectors edition' mark on the headstock and a number, when they can pick up a 2017 model for a third of that? It's a nonsense. They're not a bijou maker turning out small numbers (like Gabriel Currie or Frank Diemel), so they need to stop thinking they are; Andertons list nearly 200 [edt] Gibson guitars on their site with a retail of over £1,000; nearly half these retail for over £2,000.

Hamer were bought by Fender. Crying shame, but at least my FBIV will appreciate.

I saw what you did there.

I bought a couple of sets of the 5-string Nickels. I've used them before...and at £18 a set, it was too good a price not to turn down. Christ, if Spector are putting their name on them you'd hope that they weren't terrible.

Yes, sorry, GT1000FX. It's 'just' a powerstage; to be honest, to my ears it sounds fine, whether or not it's supposed to be for guitar or bass. I had a day up in the Midlands with the Matrix guys about a year ago and their attitude ultimately came down to the unit being fine for whatever you needed to push through it...bass, guitar, keys, PA. It's reasonably priced and weighs very little...I have it housed in a Gator 4U rack with a Korg tuner. Easy!

If I could submit a two part scenario, I use a Matrix GT100FX-2U power amp and have previosuly fed this with a Tech 21 Sansamp/RBI pre-stage and now a Geddy Lee Sansamp pre-stage. Until I went this route, I went through a ridiculous amount of gear...from lowly entry level Carlsboro combos, H/H, Orange, Trace Eliot, Ashdown etc etc. The only all in one unit that was equally good was a Tech 21 Landmark 300, but it just wasn't loud enough. The current rig does everything I could ever want. Loud/quiet. Clean/dirty. Phat/thin. An pretty much everything in between.

I've run one amp for probably 95% of the time I've been playing, but the old swing-o-meter for basses has gone from 1 to a perhaps a dozen or more at any given time over the years. Thing is, I find that gear in shops distinctly underwhelming. Doesn't matter where either, the small/large standalones (GAK/Andertons), the chains (GuitarGuitar, and obviously the bit US ones, Guitar Center/Sam Ash), it's all a bit meh. It was like shopping for clothes at Gap. I just took a look at the Bass Gallery in stocks. There wasn't one thing that I'd buy (but the Normandy Archtop looked quite nice...). The big brands tend to bore me stupid now, hence I'm going with someone who can make what I want that doesn't resemble a coffee table. Anti-gas is good.

I believe you just have a bout of anti-gas. It'll pass soon enough, once you see what's new at NAMM in a couple of months.

Sadly the thread doesn't have any real closure. Neeph, get on it, eh?

Didn't we have a headless Thunderbird in these pages a while back?

I know I have considerable monetary investment in Lulls, but cost aside, the JAXT4 is the best bass I've ever played, bar none. I'm hoping the new one is equally as good, or better.

Great isn't it? Honestly, don't see what the issue is though. In a blind test, no touchy, could you tell the difference between a bolt-on, set neck or neck-through tonally?

Delano make two pickups that look like this...one is wound/intended for use in a P/J set, another as a standalone Precision pickup. This one is the latter.

I've got an age-old version of Photoshop CS3...now, I know people will say it's only for this and that, but ultimately isn't it about using your own creativity and squeezing as much out of your software as possible? Everything I've done with images, from logos, CD covers and labels, flyers, posters, banners etc. it's all been with this package. I understand everyone has their preferences and I think if I was coming into this game from scratch, I'd be asking questions as well, BUT for the odd one-off, get someone else to do it for you as Adobe's pricing structure is mental.

Roomwise it's one of the conference/wedding rooms at Cirencester FC. It's not going to have to be huge. He's a bit vague. I suppose if you think of what a club band or DJ might use. I guess they'll only mic up the bass drum and snare. It's a punky gig. If you can help, I'll happily pass over his contact details.

Oooh. Wouldn't that be a thing?

There a few pics peppered about. Try this thread: https://www.basschat.co.uk/topic/311768-hipshot-kickass-bridge/?tab=comments#comment-3370200 When I got it, it needed everything looking at, it did have a set of Schaller machines on it, but everything else was shot . I have, to date done: New bridges, BBoT now a KickAss Fret Levelling Full set up Delano pickups, new pot and knobs New black scratchplate Dunlop straploks ...must remove that sticker.

I know the thread is about the one particular bass...my old Aria Primary was like this, fundamentally solid, but requiring TLC. The tiniest of tweaks can make so much difference. I'm not really a Precision fan as such and I know the Aria is a copy of one, but I love it dearly...granted, it's turning into this test-bed of different hardware, but it's a beautiful thing and plays dreamily.

In answer to your first question, they're using the dep who they pulled in without my consent earlier in the year. This is/was the root cause of me leaving; the whole insensitivity surrounding that furore was just another issue that ultimately broke the camel's back. Gigwise, I use the colloquial 'we' here as yes, we were doing Reading on the 25th, the Yellow Bus gig on 2/12, a radio thing on the 3rd. He booked two toilet gigs mid-December (Maidenhead/Southampton) on dates he knew full well I was unavailable...these places are shitholes, especially the Southampton one, but well, he booked them anyway and didn't even bother asking whether I was OK with a dep. 'We' also had a load of gigs in for 2018. You know, on the subject of deps, one thing that the singer said as well over WhatsApp was this (this is a direct copy and paste): "Also, it's not like there is a finite number of gigs. If we turn down six and play six with you, we've played six gigs. If we say yes to 12 and play six with you, you've still played six gigs." There are loads of quite irrational comments like this peppered through our final exchanges and even reading this now, I'm shaking my head trying to understand the logic behind it. So much for putting in the hours writing, rehearsing every week. I'd still have played six gigs. That's all that matters, eh?

I'm not there either as I left my band a couple of days back. I'm handling his artwork until someone better than me offers their services! *I'm doing the Sounds Of The Cotswolds posters this weekend!

Isn't it generally like this though? Bands I've played in have folded and it's simple to keep it civil and friendly, but here it's just different; there is no way I wanted to commit to doing the rest of the gigs, especially as it's so easy to find a dep The singer was overbearing, controlling, brutish and thought everything he said was right. Even at rehearsals he used to go on about where we all stood, because he, 'wasn't interested in what the bass was doing.' There was no denying he was a decent frontman or that he helped to lift the band to the level it's at now, but he didn't care who he trod on to achieve that and the total lack of empathy towards my half of the rhythm section over the last few months was just appalling. He just broke my spirit, so much so that I just walked away.