NancyJohnson

I worked for a huge global business and I can assure you that Amazon are buying from manufacturers; sure there's probably are traders operating out of their back bedroom, but for us (and many other businesses) it was a no-brainer considering the crap that we had to deal with in the name of customer service dealing with High Street chains and family run shops. It was a pretty good deal for us; they ordered, we supplied product by the pallet-load, they paid on time and handled everything from a logistical perspective.

There does seem to be people taking this (frankly pointless) moral stance against Amazon, based off taxation, work conditions, dealing with suppliers etc. To be brutally honest, customer is king. Why should I pay £55 for a set of Elixir Nanowebs from Strings Direct when I can get the same product for £15.00 cheaper from Amazon? Same thing applies pretty much everything that comes in through my front door and they'll always be the first point of call for pretty much everything we buy. I honestly couldn't care less if Jeff Bezos doesn't want to contact me about my choice of lawnmower or water filter, it's all about how much you pay and how fast you can get it. If employees are disgruntled at the working conditions, then leave. That's their prerogative. Look, I used to by an awful lot of books from a two independent booksellers and was frequently told that once the independents shut down the book market would crumble. What actually closed their businesses was the council hiking fees rates and the collapse of the net book agreement (which kept books at an artificially high price). The book market hasn't crumbled, far from it, and in part Amazon is keeping many publishers in business. Elixir don't care if they sell into Strings Direct or Amazon, sure they'll make less money selling to Amazon, but they're selling way more that they would through Strings Direct. As a society we're conditioned to sneer at success; it doesn't matter whether it's Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Jobs/Wozniak or any number of entrepreneurs. These people got to where they are because they either had an idea or the tenacity and drive to make their business succeed while others didn't diversify and fell aside. Sure they ruffled a lot of feathers, but as my mate's dad used to say, "that's business, you won't get anywhere just sitting there with your thumb up your a$$." Nobody is getting all tetchy about the people who own and run Samsung or Sony or Walmart or Vitol or Cigna Health, because they're not in everyone's faces or trying to put rockets into space. I know this all sounds cold and harsh, but if you want to spend 30% more for the same product, then knock yourself out.

With apologies to my neighbours, I've had what could be classified as a good ol' noodle this morning; I've been inside the control cavity, rolled the Tonepump right down and done a few 1/8th turns on the trim pot and have hit paydirt. It works brilliantly with the AO900, the DI-2112, dUg and the BDDI. I'm asking myself why I haven't been in there and done this previously. It just seems to be a fine line between nothing, sweet spot and unusable mush. It was kind of odd, I know different cabs have different characteristics, but with all the three I have, there was this somewhat unpleasant thing that sounded like something was loose/rattling. That's disappeared now, thank god.

😃 I have no idea how anyone would get usable tone with it at 100%>

Loaded question on the Tonepump. Anyone adjusted theirs down? Odd one, maybe my ears are changing, but I've been happy with the Euro-X for the last year or so, just put some new strings on (Elixir Nanowebs) and it sounds quite harsh. Never really experienced such a tone change. Took a look in the control cavity, rolled the Tonepump right back and reintroduced it a little. All good. Was really surprised at how hot it was when ramped up to full. Just nasty.

This. Wonderful stuff. Arrived today. It was a RSD release a few years ago, CD came out in Japan.

I'd not really given the TC Electronic BAM200 a single thought until earlier. Understandably, I really don't want to keep chucking money at these things; I just want something titchy.

Just an update on the Harley Benton. Spent a bit of time on it yesterday, I have some studio stuff upcoming and give my recent bout of sickness (see elsewhere), I've not played much. Used it for about an hour, fairly loud, plugging in various devices, started to get some farty overtones/weird distortion; wondered whether it might be the cabs (nope)...it just doesn't seem to like a hot input. Went back to the Darkglass and it was fine. I realise the AO900 is undoubtedly going to be more robust, but in conclusion, I guess it's fine for short-term playing, but not for longer sessions.

We went with 3m x 2m. I'd have gone bigger, or more to the point wider, different aspect ratio, maybe 4m x 2m. It was a very thin nylon material, ring-holes in the corners. It folds up to something about the size of a box of muesli.

The idea of putting a capo on the first and going to whatever fret is simply just a way of having a straight bit of something to see which what the neck is bowing. If you watch some of Ted's stuff, you'll see a similar measurement, but he'll also measure string height/action at the 12th fret; he'll adjust the truss rod and then remeasure, tweaking individual bridge saddles.. Ultimately set ups are a very personal thing; I favour a low/rattly action - this just adds a certain characteristic to what the pickups output. (Big Crewdson fan here. Happy to report we've got the entire published works. If you get the chance, watch the Brief Encounters documentary on how he captured the shot.)

What you're trying to do is determine the neck relief, straightness, front/back bow. These factors alone are just part of the overall setup process (along with fret levelling/bridge adjustment etc.). I would honestly take any recommendations from Fender's site with generous pinch of salt; even in these days of CAD design and machine production, there's still way too many variables in woods/hardware. If I can offer a bit of sage advice, delve into a couple of You Tube channels; https://youtube.com/@davesworldoffunstuff?si=RAgkdoZcedKyvx08 https://youtube.com/@twoodfrd?si=chpdAfMoK1FhUKXi Dave's World of Fun Stuff and Ted Woodford Instruments offer a lot of advice, albeit their delivery couldn't be any more different. You'll find a wealth of information about setups/repairs on both.

Just on the OP, if I were on the market for another bass/guitar, going somewhere like Andertons or guitarguitar would just offer a) some surety that the product is genuinely what it purports to be, and b) if you're going for something with a highly figured top/finish, you may have the option to select the instrument you actually want. If I was buying production line stuff, backline/stomps, I generally do my diligence and would just find the cheapest price online (ultimately Thomann).

Read through the post. This seems to be the main point. i) You quit. ii) As a consequence, while they claim 'no hard feelings', they don't want you there. So it's over. iii) You won't let them bring in a replacement and allow him to use gear you've contributed to monetarily. The key point is #3. You won't let them bring a replacement in and use gear you part own. Hmm. Well, good luck with that. Realistically, what are you going to do? Jump on the stage where they're playing with a placard saying you own <insert percentage here> of their live gear and the show needs to be stopped? Quitting a band hurts, I know it does, you've worked hard and someone else is now going to reap glory from your work. To resolve this, from the outset, work out what you've spent and depreciate it accordingly, agree on a figure (go in high, which will allow you to take a drop in return) and give them your bank details in the initial contact email/text. Leave it to them to continue gigging and let the old guys pay you back.

My wife snoring. It's a thing of joy.

Stupidchief. Acoustic Couch, The Bracknell 12/7/24 These guys are mental.

Paul Rutherford (vocals), Mark Toole (bass) and Ped Gill (drums) were 60% of the original line up. Holly Johnson and Brian Nash (guitar) declined the invite. The guitarist who stepped in was Jed O'Toole who was the band's original guitarist. Fair play. I was suprised to read they did a few dates through 2005 with RM, there doesn't seem to be anything online - footage/audio. Shame.

This is quite superb. Ryan Molloy genuinely heir apparent to Holly Johnson; pity they couldn't get it together to do an album.

I didn't mind the overall look of the Dimension bass, although there was too much scratchplate going on. I'm not saying this thing is beautiful, but take the scratchplate off (in truth, it's unnecessary) and we're in Lakland/MusicMan territory here. Granted the bridge is slightly too big, but it's got a nice deep sunburst, two pickups (winner, winner), rosewood/whatever board. Even though I'd never consider buying one, it's way more attractive than a J or P:

Just thinking about this one and the TZ model earlier in the thread. Fender could have gone out on a limb a produced something genuinely radical here; there's certainly no reason why they couldn't have tweaked the body shape away from the Jazz shape and done a 3-aside headstock, but like Gibson, they're inherently lazy and it's probably simpler to just make the neck pocket and headstock bigger in CAD than to design something different. Likelihood being this'll be in production for 12-18 months and (like everything else different) be quietly withdrawn due to poor sales.

The fundamental issue with Fender is that they're too headstrong and they're stuck with a headstock design that doesn't look pretty with the incorporation of additional tuners. Other manufacturers don't seem to be too hindered/constricted by sticking to the same shape headstock across their ranges; off the top of my head, Ibanez. I love the Spector headstock. You could (possibly) put that on anything.

Headstock is a munter.

Cheque in the post, sir. I just remember after that one I had this intense pain behind my ears, only for one of the girls in the crowd asking for her Alice band with kitten-ears back. Oh, and then there was the sound guy going off and doing lines while we were playing. Jikes!

I've had this for a long time. It's in incredible shape for a 40 year old instrument. There's hardly any left globally (they didn't even have a model to photograph to include in the Hamer coffee-table book) and it's worth a small fortune (which is why it doesn't see much action). Tonally it's lovely - I've not had the pickups out (not want to/see any reason to), so I don't know what they are, but considering it was 100% original when I got it, I'm assuming they're early-80s DiMarzio units. Original hardware was chrome, have swapped out to the same units in black and have recently swapped the jack socket for a flat one made by a young chap locally. (Kept the originals.) Gigged it once - @Wolverinebass was at that one - I rehearsed with it a couple of times and it's been to a couple of SE Bass Bashes, but in general it spends most of its time in a case.

Cheap Trick (see what I did there?)

Watched about 20 minutes of coverage at around 7.00pm last night on BBC2 (I may wander onto iPlayer at some point today). It's like a three-day version of Later... with Jools Holland supplanted by hip young things (or as my mum would say, 'Boys in shorts'), making gravy by standing on a hill reading an autocue and waxing lyrical about how great past festivals were - it would be like me saying how great the Steve Hillage set was in 1979 - then telling us they're going cut back to Mwombi N'Dunga, a folk/apala crossover artist from Mali doing an acoustic set. Ack.