Cato

Are we 100% sure those are the actual pickup covers that come with finished bass and not just some crass over -branding for the website? I just can't see how anyone would think that's a good idea or that anyone would want them on their bass.

That made me smile remembering my HX Stomp arriving from Andertons. The shoebox sized manufacturer's packaging was delivered inside another box that must have been at least a cubic meter in size.

I saw a documentary about The Who a few years back. The way Townshend talked about Daltrey, Moon and Entwistle it's fairly astonishing the band has lasted as long as it has. It came across like he didn't value or actually even like a lot of their musical contributions and if it was up to him The Who of the classic era would almost have been a completely different sounding band.

Sometimes you just know that an instrument is 'wrong' for you. You may not be able work out exactly why that may be, but if it feels wrong it is wrong. Someone else will probably love it though.

With things like fives,sixes and fretless I reckon it's always worth a go just to see how you get on. I'm pretty sure I'll get a six at some point even though I realise it's going to require quite a big step up in the correct technique stakes. I've already got most of the basic skills needed to play these instruments to a reasonably proficient level, theoretically at least the rest is just familiarisation and practice, so why wouldn't I give them a go?

Revelation did a sub £300 bass vi, but after a quick Google it looks like they might have been discontinued. You might find a second hand one somewhere. I was going to also suggest the Fender Pawn Shop Bass VI from a few years back, but it looks like they're selling for more now than they were new.

I've never really tried it on a shortscale bass but the string spacing on a standard 4 string bass guitar can make playing some chords a stretch too far. If you don't want to play chords and you've got the right strings then I can't think of a technical reason why a bass tuned DGBE wouldn't work as a Bass VI substitute, as long as you never needed the E or A.

If I wasn't currently waiting for a fairly large builders invoice to hit the front door mat I'd be all over that 6T. Quite possibly the D400 amp as well.

I bought myself a Squier VM70s bass a few years ago because I fancied a go at modding. It's a great feeling instrument, I changed out the loom, bridge and pickups because that's what I got it for, but there was absolutely nothing wrong with the bass just as stock before that. I've got a couple of more expensive basses but I've never noticed myself thinking that the Squier is in any way inferior to them when I decide to pick it up.

Is it a graphite neck? If so it might be worth emailing an enquiry to Status. They probably know as much about carbon fibre/graphite necks as anyone in the UK. I don't know if they'd be willing to work on a different manufacturer's product, but it can't hurt to ask.

Depends on the bass for me. I'm a big fan of a 70s style natural finish on a Jazz, I also think it suits a Stingray very well. For some reason I find Precisions look better in solid colours with with white + black pickguard leading the pack.

My Sire has lines and the side dots in the position they would be on a fretted. I'm 99% sure that the dots are where they are because Sire probably uses the same basic necks on both their fretted and fretless instruments.

Sometimes I walk into the room where I keep the basses and guitars and just grin.

The clip at the top of the thread is now changing every time I refresh the page. I'm seeing every music related youtube clip ever, apart from Telstar. Edit: I can't stop refreshing the page, it's like a music clip fruit machine. Damn my addictive personality.

I'm confused. The clip in my feed is Davey504 doing his Top 10 easiest basslines. Are we all seeing different things or am I just not getting the joke?

My brother -in-law's got a Harley Benton acoustic bass, I think it's the most basic model. It's a lot of fun, I've been tempted to get one myself for those times when I just spontaneously get the urge to pick up a bass and play. Not too keen on the tone but I'm almost certain that's a phosphor bronze string thing rather than a Harley Benton thing.

There's always the PJ compromise. It's where I've ended up with my Precision Deluxe. Push the pan control all the way on to the P pickup for some classic thump, start blending in the J for more modern/jazz bass tones. I can't quite get a Stingray tone out of it, even with the active preamp but that's mainly because it has the wrong type of pickups in the wrong positions, but it'll cover most other ground pretty well.

I'm fairly sure I read somewhere that Leo Fender originally put them on P basses as a purely aesthetic thing because he thought the pickup looked ugly. I've seen claims that the covers on Rickenbacker basses are supposed to somehow enhance the pickups performance, but most people seem fairly sceptical about the science behind that and there's an alternative theory that it's a hang over from the very early Rick designs back when the 'covers' were actually an integral part of the magnetic pickup system they used on their 'frying pan' guitars.

My fretless Sire V7 came with an ashtray. It's in a drawer somewhere. I might have at least given it a go if the bass had come with the corresponding pre drilled holes required to fit it but it didn't and I'm not going to drill the holes myself or faff around with double sided tape for an aesthetic feature that I'm almost certainly going to decide is just a hindrance to my normal playing style.

I saw the 1975 live when they were touring their first album. Me and a mate decided on a whim to go in to Birmingham to see a band one evening and they happened to be playing at the Institute. I thought they were pretty good, but that first album was pretty upbeat, the 80s influence was there, but they had a lot of other stuff going on as well. From what I've heard of of their later material at some point they went full on 80s and not the good 80s stuff either, a lot of it seems to be soft and slow angsty teenage ballads with generic 80s synths and drum machines. I doubt their current live set is anywhere near as energetic as the one I saw a few years ago. They do seem to be doing quite well for themselves though, so maybe I'm just too old to get it, or maybe because I lived through the 80s I've just heard it all before and I didn't like it that much the first time round.

I think these are up to date. https://dshowmusic.com/line-6-helix-amp-models/ https://dshowmusic.com/line-6-helix-effect-models/

Controversial. On the one hand the new headstock might help widen Jackson's appeal to bring in more non metal oriented customers. On the other we're talking about a Megadeth signature bass so it's target market is probably pro pointy.

Right handed, right leg. I'm at home this week so I just grabbed a bass and tried it on the left leg. Maybe it's closer to where it would be if it was hanging on the strap, but I found twisting round that extra bit really uncomfortable. Not to mention that the first fret suddenly feels miles away.

Sitting in a waiting room, Radio playing over the speakers. Paul Simon's Graceland comes on. That's a hell of a fretless bassline.