lemmywinks

Had a look and you can get reasonably priced Nova hardware on eBay, seller is in Brazil though but he posts on Talkbass and is legit, his stuff appears on some beautiful custom builds: https://www.ebay.co.uk/i/184028293047?var=691720856746 Can choose between 18mm and 19mm string spacing too. Definitely a lot cheaper than the Hipshot and ABM versions! Might be worth seeing if you could get something built or converted using that bridge.

Hot Natural finishes, particularly darker ones Black Hardware Dark fingerboards Warwicks (rounded body shapes in general) Not Glitzy sparkly finishes White scratchplates Gibsons Singlecuts Red basses (just no) Precisions (booooooooring)

Might be worth seeing if anybody has a Prosebass/Funnbass knocking around or just shoot him a message and see if he's still building instruments: https://www.basschat.co.uk/profile/3436-prosebass/Always regretted not ordering one of those, they looked cool and were far too cheap! The problem you have with wanting a headless 5 is that there is no cheap version of the hardware, lots about for 4 strings though.

Usually getting a drummer on in ears can make a big difference in taming their volume. Won't help if they just enjoy playing obnixiously loud but when they can hear themselves clearly it can help immensely.

I don't think sub(s) are OTT for pubs btw, sounds much better with them than without and sounding good is the aim of the game so given the advances in portability and low price I don't see why earning bands would gig without them. Gives you the flexibility to do big venues without hiring anything in too. We use the live soundcheck facility on our desk (record your soundcheck and then play it back while standing out front to fine tune levels) and the difference the subs make means we use them everywhere, it just sounds so much better.

I did exactly that a few weeks ago, space was extremely limited so I put my QSC on a Gramma pad on top of one of our subs pointing back at me, worked great. Can have my own monitor mix without having to rely on other peoples' stage sounds being the correct volume. Seeing as I didn't have to bother about positioning an amp on the floor it effectively gave me double the room on stage so I could move away if the snare got too loud etc.

We use subs at every gig, sounds miles better giving full control to FoH and not compromising your monitoring.

This one looks like it has had minimal effort put into it tbh, I expect a fair few of us have done a not so great defret at some point in our lives (I have!) but if you had a large workshop full of tools then you could easily make it good again. Get rid of that filler, saw out the fret slots, tidy up the chips and fit proper wood inserts would be an option, just using rosewood dust and glue would be another. These things don't take up too much time and aren't particularly difficult if you have the tools and space, even getting one of those furniture touch up pen sets and matching the filler to the fretboard would improve the look of it. My cheapo fretless acoustic bass is originally a filler job and it looks a lot better than that one, in fact the colour is matched so from 1m away you can't tell it's not an unlined board. All done with just rosewood dust, glue, sandpaper, touch up pens and wood stain.

Without having bass through the PA you're stuck regarding monitoring really as you will have to provide the FoH as well as your own on stage sound. I'd probably just go with the traditional bass amp at the back arrangement tbh. Subs don't have to cost the earth, we picked up a pair of RCF subs on eBay for around £500 the pair. They're big and heavy but were cheap and make your bum vibrate when you sit down within 10m of them. A good compromise might be to try a single sub and find the best location for it, half the size/weight of a pair and you will be able to use smaller, more convenient monitoring.

Why would your knuckes impede your ability to tune a Fender style bass with its massive tuning keys? Surely you turn them with your fingers and your knuckles don't get in the way of anything, in fact reducing the size of the tuning keys (paddles?) and making them an awkward un-ergonomic shape would make them more difficult to use would it not? Especially if you position the G string tuner pointing away from the player so the hand is forced into an uncomfortable angle. I don't really get this "for blokes with big hands" nonsense, I'm tall with big mitts and it's just not an issue and never has been. It's not like being a big bloke suddenly means you have no articulation in your digits and have to resort to flailing around like an uncoordinated maniac hitting musical instruments with your knuckles and elbows or whatever.

For the same price you can get a brand new Classic Vibe fretless Jazz: https://www.gak.co.uk/en/squier-classic-vibe-60s-jazz-bass-fretless-laurel-fingerboard-3-colour-sunburst/923634?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI19nYm_H65QIVSbDtCh2nEwXtEAQYASABEgJR7_D_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Two of the tuners have the backplate hacked and all of them have the tuning key bodged into a Mickey Mouse head, his new thing seems to be making the tuning key progressively smaller from E to G which doesn't make any sense. Seems like another solution to a problem that doesn't exist and an excuse to alter a bass for no real reason.

Yeah, about half a tub of it by the looks of things!

Also looking at the string height at the nut and again on the fretboard pic above it looks like that action at the 12th is seriously high whereas it look like it will buzz like hell at the lower frets as it is so low. You can see half his workshop under that E string. The G string is pretty much touching the fretboard: I don't think he knows how to set instruments up despite the bluster.

That defret: The height of those grub screws: The biro! Also it's now PCSGC, the S stands for "special" according to the description. It certainly is pal, it certainly is.....

Would probably be a simple job to add a passive tone rolloff before the bass signal goes to the preamp. All basses with an active/passive switch should have this IMO but it's not something you see too often, mind you an active/passive switch itself seems to be uncommon too.

I've also had them pay for a new driver before, did quite well out of the deal and upgraded to a Deltalite shedding the bulk of the cab's weight in the process!

I appreciate this as a few years ago when I had a lot of basses through the door I used to sneak larger parcels through to save money (yeah I know, I'm part of the problem!), IIRC they had limits which were slightly too small to fit a full size bass with the neck on. Will definitely be checking for any radical differences in the future. UPS charging that amount to handle what is essentially a slightly larger box is nuts though.

I wasn't advising to do it if you read the post.

Ah right, is there no way to just get the monitor mix on an iPad and get faster basic functionality on a bigger screen?

The My Fader app rather than Master Fader? Yeah that's all I'll need rather than the whole desk app, the Ipad Mini 2 is the same spec pretty much as the 5S I think but with a higher resolution display. Apparently the latest supported OS is 12.4.3 for it. Ideally I'd want a small tablet rather than a phone so I can stick it on a mount in a convenient place for quick access. If 5.1 is released then I can run that on my Windows 2in1 hybrid which I already own and flog whatever Apple device I have.

It's literally just for changing the odd slider a handful of times over the course of a gig for my personal monitor mix, the minis seem to be a bit cheaper locally and on eBay for one in decent condition (ie normal wear but hasn't been thrown out of a moving vehicle). I've checked and a regular one would fit in the laptop pocket of my gigbag. Ideally I don't want to spend much on something I don't actually want and was hoping I could get away with being tight and buying a cheaper old tablet. In fact ideally the existing tablets I own would be supported! Besides I'm worried that if I buy a more modern Apple device I'll start wearing skinny jeans and will have to grow a rubbish beard.

I think the 1st gen Mini has worse specs than the 4th gen standard iPad too, would a Gen 2 Mini be bearable?

Yeah looking back at the T&Cs they have a £15 "manual" fee for doing the admin so they're waving that to pay UPS. Seeing as they're emailing you to claim the money and haven't taken it automatically (6.1 in their T&Cs) it would be tempting to just stop replying as they will probably write it off, there's always the chance they could pursue it though which will be more of a ballache and expense than the £116. This will be a drop in the ocean to the amount of unclaimed extra insurance people take out on their parcels every day so it's probably a numbers game to them, hoping most people just pay up when they get the £116 offer. At this stage I'd be getting proper advice if you have any legaly minded friends.

Can you try and phone them? I've had to do that before and once you get past the 1st line of customer services and speak to someone who can make decisions they are/were very good. Surely they'll be able to see how ridiculous the £116 charge is for a parcel which was no more than 20cm out at it's largest dimension. I wonder if they are paying that £116 to UPS or if they get a different surcharge for oversize packages.