NancyJohnson

If Gary brings the Axe, I'd suggest he also brings along a pair of boots.

A request; I'm curious about quality/build/tone differences between the US and Euro NS-designed models, any chance of at least one of each in comparable specs?

Weeee! Now you'll have the opportunity to hear what an NS Design NRT5 sound like through a dUg pedal. Can I ask a favour? Everyone who attends needs to have a sticker on them so we know who you are!

XTC Nonsuch.

As a teenager (late '70s), a school friend of mine went up to London (probably Denmark Street/Charring Cross Road) and bought a black Fender Precision (it had to be black, although strangely he sanded off the finish later). Where it gets interesting here was that he wanted some combination of body colour/neck material that wasn't off the shelf, so the shop swapped necks from other basses to suit. He decided he didn't like the Precision neck at all and the shop suggested a Jazz neck, which after a but of fettling was fitted to the Precision body on the spot. This is what he left the shop with. I'm always a little in awe that the shop went so far to satisfy a (young) customer's needs. I also wonder whether there's a late 70s Jazz Bass with a Precision neck in circulation anywhere!

Watched this earlier. Interesting if nothing else Didn't like her so much when I was a kid; she just seemed a bit intimidating and just plain odd. Decent clutch of singles but I know little about the album stuff. Might investigate.

Double posty fail.

[Edit] I've never had any issue with all these little things that seem to bother bass players; string tension, neck dive, nut width, weight etc. etc. I'm perfectly happy just picking up anything (so long as it doesn't carry a health warning) with four (or five strings) and playing it. I have a set of Markbass LongEvo strings on one of my Hamers (there was a promotion here a couple of years ago), I like them quite a bit; they have just the right amount of coarseness and they haven't gone off at all in the last year or so. The only reason I haven't used them more extensively is because of their scarcity although I'm aware they're available from BD now. NYXLs just didn't do it for me in the slightest, they dulled very quickly, a bit underwhelming. Back when I was playing every other night and rotating about a dozen (Thunderbird) basses, I'd favour D'Addario EXL or EPS strings as they were cheapish and cheerful, consistent, worked as expected and boiled up nicely for another gig BUT it was still costing me £50-60 a month to change the strings on two or three basses. Ultimately, string of choice is Elixir Nanowebs, I know they're more than twice the price of EXLs (don't get me started on the exorbitant cost of five string sets or where I've needed to buy a set of 14087s and a 15433 taperwound B-string), but I'll be damned if I've ever had a set that's not lasted five or six times longer than than a standard set of any other brand. It's just false economy. God knows what Elixir does during the manufacturing stage, but Nanoweb strings just don't die.

Out of curiosity, if the 1950s/60s Precision and Jazz basses came with high-mass bridges as standard 60 years ago, would the reaction to installing a BBOT unit right now be derisive?

To support content here, until I went the pre/power route, I don't think any one head actually produced what I wanted tonally. For years I used a variety of kit, Hartke (endorsed),Trace, SWR, Ashdown; none of this really gave me the dirty clank grunt I desired. Light-bulb moment here was sticking a Bass POD into the effects return of an Ashdown MAG (cue angels singing). Next thing was to reduce the size and weight of everything, so I filled a short 4U Gator rack with a Sansamp RBI, a Korg Tuner and a Matrix poweramp. Heavenly, That I could just carry one box it was just win/win. (Despite my desire to go more lightweight/smaller, I eventually chopped all this in and went with a Darkglass AO900 head. I like the power it provides, but tonally not so much, so I'm back to running a couple of @Tech21NYC stomps into the effects return. If they'd make a GED head like that VT Bass 500 thing they made a while back, I'd just go with that.)

By definition, if it has a pre-stage or EQ, it's not strictly a poweramp.

I was looking at the Demeter 800D a while back; I bought a Darkglass A/O 900w head which I don't really get along with (it's just a bit too aggressive tonally - still up for sale folks), so I just use the effects return for a GED/Dug DI boxes). The Demeter looked ideal; I had one lines up and honestly thought the DG head would sell in minutes!

I have the live album and an audience recording bootleg from the first night of the residency. I'd honestly say the bootleg edges it from an excitement perspective.

I have a tendency to rotate basses...I haven't gigged for a couple of years, but in that time have done more than enough noodling/ponking at home and in various studios. I suppose I have my favourite/#1 bass, but it's more a case of which one do I want out this week and whatever takes my fancy at the time for non-home work. They're all set up more or less the same.

Just going off on a small tangent, the Aria Pro II SB1000. While having played a SB1000 and a SB900 briefly a long time ago (I didn't own either), I always felt the SB900 was a country mile better (subjective) than the '1000. No idea what the construction was (they were both laminated body/neck-through; end of the day they were both high-gloss natural finishes, so it mattered little what was under the finish), I think the SB1000 had active circuitry whereas the SB900 was passive with dual pickups and some additional switching. The SB900 just edged it for me personally...I always prefer a two pickup bass; more tonal variety at the front end rather than making the active circuit do all the work by trying to boost resonant frequencies that may not be there.

(Matte) black is always the preferred option.

In a continuing series, I'm listening to the new T. Rex collection '1972'. Being brutally honest, Electric Warrior aside, I find the band's output fairly inconsistent and I'm drawn more to the singles rather than the albums. I'm listening to '1972' which is essentially The Slider album, the previously released matinee show from Wembley, the Born To Boogie soundtrack in full and about 40 radio shows, demos and outtakes. It rocks along nicely, however the Wembley show is a new mix and Mickey Finn's bongos are quite prominent in the left channel. You honestly have to question why Bolan didn't just dump him - there's no value added from his contribution; it honestly sounds like a monkey sporadically hitting some coconuts - laughably poor, out of tune, out of time. Proof enough that unless you're 100% on your game, you're adding nothing. Pity the bongos aren't lower in the mix. Otherwise, hugely enjoyable.

Just on the subject of EoN, if you're unfamiliar with them, check out Curve (start with 1992's 'Doppelganger'). Whether it's intentional or not (probably the latter), EoN as a unit sound incredibly similar to them.

Seriously, what's not to like?

Marina (and The Diamonds). Again. God, it's so good.

You need to rip the 5.1, I still need to do that Ronson one for you.

Rush are a weird one for me, I started with All The World's A Stage and went backwards from there, so broadly there was about a year between this and A Farewell To Kings, at which point I was probably more into punk than anything else, although it had to be said that my formulative bass-learning years were in my bedroom playing along with the ATWAS. With every album from Moving Pictures, I lost a little more interest; as I mentioned earlier, I like maybe 60% of Moving Pictures and by the time we hit Signals there were just a couple of tracks (Subdivisions/Countdown), Grace Under Pressure (nothing really of note), Power Windows was just The Big Money and Hold Your Fire was Time Stand Still. I've not listened to a Rush studio album beyond that. All said and done, I do enjoy the live stuff and find all three bandmembers quite engaging/entertaining. The recent documentary was wonderful viewing.

Caress of Steel too? Are you bonkers?

I remember getting Exit...Stage Left for Christmas and dropping the needle on the vinyl and thinking, 'What the hell is this?' It was muddy sounding, just awful.

Haha. In The Camera Eye, don't you hear the similarity in the repeated sequence from about 2"40' to Freewill? As soon as I heard it all those years ago it was, 'Oh, that sounds familiar.'