Dan Dare

Buy a snare drum? Snares against a thin piece of wood are never going to sound the same as snares against a stretched drum skin.

I notice they haven't used a capital F in "fender". Perhaps it's made from an old fender (one meaning of which is the frame around a fire that prevents coals from falling out). That could explain the scorch marks.

Could be a refin'. Looks suspiciously pristine for a MIJ Squier, which are getting on a bit now.

The stickiness could be due to the fact that the factory has put a coating on them to prevent corrosion in the packet. A wipe down with some alcohol will cure that.

This. If you need more volume, add a power amp and extra cab and drive them from the TE preamp. You'll get the same tone but louder. Job done. Don't be daft like us and spend all your hard-earned on gear if what you have does the trick.

That instrument does have pretty hot pickups, even though it's passive. I wouldn't think it's wiring. If it was, the problem wouldn't normally be intermittent. Are the pots or the output socket worn?

If you use wire wool, STICK MASKING TAPE OVER THE PICKUPS BEFORE DOING SO. Apologies for the caps, but if you don't, you will end up with a "fur" of wire wool fragments on them that you will never completely remove. I speak from bitter experience.

If he has a Polytone head, I should think that will be ideal for jazz guitar. That's what they were originally intended for. The head is largely what governs how it will sound. I'd look into the neo driver option. Is the existing cab a 1x12? if so, he should be able to replace the drive unit for much less than £150 - Watford Vales has the Celestion Neos at reasonable prices, for example.

It helps to wipe them down thoroughly with a spot of alcohol. Takes the dead skin, grease and gunk off and less faff than boiling them.

I'm sure you all know this, but the Shuko is not really a two pin (maybe connector would be a more appropriate term) plug. The flat metal plate with the hole in at the top between the pins is the earth. So you will need to earth if you switch to a 3 pin UK plug.

"Rip it apart"? Hardly. Comments above are sensible/reasonable. Yes, it's compact, but there are mini-heads out there with DI outs (TE Elf, for example, which sports an XLR out) that offer giggable output levels already.Are you a Quliter rep?

gjones, I feel your pain. I think the problem is that many don't realise we actually play. They think that, if we stop to talk to them, the music will keep playing (when they shout at each other whilst their music system at home is playing, the music carries on dunnit?). Either that or their weekly diet of Britain's got No Talent means they think it's all karaoke.

It's really a pre/DI with a small power amp for low level practice. Phil Jones does something similar.

It's a Sodoffski...

I've rumbled him. He's Wallace. That's the bike and sidecar from A Close Shave. "Cracking bass, Grommit"

If they're leather, a good application or two of dubbin will soften them.

100% certain scam. Just refund his PayPal payment (if he's paid) and ask the next highest bidder if he'd like it. Or relist.

Blimey. Time to head for the exit, I would suggest. I had a similar situation to contend with recently. Some pals were working up a band with a singer who once (many years ago) had a minor hit (scraper Top 10) with a song she didn't write, arrange or produce. The usual story - she was wheeled in to sing something that was put in front of her because she looked good and could just about hold a tune. They asked me to play bass and as the other musicians, who are friends/colleagues I've worked with a lot over the years, are good players, I agreed, thinking it would be a good musical experience (I'm not worried, at my age, about trying to get famous or make shedloads of money - I'm fortunate in that I'm comfortable in my dotage). However, our heroine thought she was a star. She was musically illiterate and kept changing things, covered her insecurity/incompetence the whole time with b/s and generally behaved like a diva. I walked. The others hung on - even did one gig, which was a shambles - but it crashed and burned.

Spot on. Waste of time to expect mainstream teevee shows - especially daytime ones - to cater for the knowledgeable. It's all about how it looks and people wanting their 15 minutes of fame (even if it costs them money). If you had something you thought was of value, would you get an expert opinion (better still, several) or ring up a TV company and invite them to shaft you?

P, J, PJ and a fretless. You can only play one at a time (and nobody listening cares - we're bass players, remember 😉). .

I find the plain leather 3" wide Levy's straps fine. They are nice and cheap, too. Padding makes little difference imho. Once it compresses, it's as if it isn't there. It's the width that's important.

I assume that by "transposing", you mean you are reading a part in one key and playing it in another. That's a skill you can learn, as you can any other. There's some helpful guidance in the posts above. If you are playing something you know in a different key, being confused about transposing suggests that you do not know the song/piece, but that you have learned a sequence of moves from a particular start point, that point being the first note/chord. As a result, rather than thinking in terms of intervals and the movement/shape of the melody, you are thinking "This song begins in C, moves to F after two bars, then to G, etc, etc. If you know a piece, the key becomes irrelevant. To use a simple example, if I ask you to sing a song that you know and give you the starting note or key, you will be able to do it easily (or you should, at any rate). The principle is the same when playing the bass. If the first change is up a fourth, it will be to F if the piece is in C, A if it is in E and so on. Woodinblack (see above) is right. You must think in patterns, rather than fixed notes. It is helpful that the bass is tuned in fourths - moving to the same fret on the next string up takes you up a fourth, down three frets takes you down a minor third, etc, etc, wherever you start from (and therefore whichever key you find yourself in).

Good idea.

Even that would be a waste. That P bass p/u is in the wrong place (the cut out under the scratchplate was probably done with a cold chisel). He admits the heck is warped. The tuners are sh1te. Even the bits would probably not be worth £20.

The three legged chair is pretty cool, too...