Bassassin

Best bit might be the bassist sitting there, determinedly projecting "I'm not with him"!

Found it! As ever it was in the last place I looked. PM me your details and I'll bung it in the post.

Just had a quick look and it's not where I thought it would be. I think a few things got misplaced in a house move a few years back but it should be around somewhere. I'll have a proper root around & let you know if I manage to flush it out!

Good god that's squalid. You'd think they'd at least hose it down before taking pics. 🤢 No idea how I missed @Reggaebass' thread, this sort of thing being of interest to me - and it's a pity I did, because I think I've got a brass Kay trc at the bottom of a spares draw somewhere!

Unusual old basses are always interesting to see, but it's quite incredible the price-tags that get attached to things like this (throwaway catalogue junk, in its day) by rose-tinted glasses & rampant hipsterism. I suspect the recent reissue was more like an actual musical instrument, and fully expect an Eastwood 'tribute' to be incoming, complete with 4-figure price tag!

Cort made literally dozens of variations on the same through-neck, triple brass dot inlay template. There's even a twin-neck guitar!

It's a rebranded Cort, passive, loud, punchy pickups (called 'PowerSound') and no plywood anywhere. These were great quality Korean-made budget instruments from about 1980, easily up to the standard of many similar Japanese basses of the era.

Does remind me that I was in a studio once & smoke started coming from one of the racks - turned out to be a Behringer headphone amp catching fire! Admittedly this was easily 20 years ago and given the track record of all my stuff, QC & reliability may have improved a bit over the years! It may well be that Behringer don't release schematics because they just assume that any users who are dedicated enough to fix something (rather than chuck it in the bin & buy a new one) could just refer to the original manufacturer's documentation... Those with long memories and who have ever tiptoed through the minefield that is TalkBass might remember an interesting thread, again from 20-odd years ago, about the similarities between ther Behringer BX3000 head (like wot I used to have) and an equivalent Ashdown MAG300. After much misplaced flagwaving fury about dirty German cheapskate knockoffs stealing the food off the tables of hardworking blue-collar 'Muricans (yes, it was broadly assumed in the thread that Ashdown was a homegrown American brand) it transpired, coming from someone in the industry, if I remember, that the Behringer & Ashdown amps were both made in the same Chinese factory, using the same components. Jokey anecdotes aside, that's probably broadly true of current Behri products with, erm, close similarities to others.

For me it typically boils down to 'want pretty thing'. Which can lead to no end of problems.

I like that a lot. Very pretty in blue: Don't need one though, do I? ...do I?

Cheap, certainly but in no way nasty. I've been using Behringer stuff for years and have genuinely lost track of how many different bits of kit I've had. My bad experiences are limited to a BX3000 head (Ashdown clone) that developed a random cutting-out issue and some bargain basement headphones that were about as good as you'd expect £10 cans to be. I currently have & regularly use for various purposes: BD121 pedal, V-Amp pod clone, V-Amp Pro bass, micro headphone amp, powered monitors, X-Touch control surface, USB micro-mixer, Virtualizer rack multi-FX, UMC404 interface - and probably a few things I've forgotten. A lot of of it's here: It all does what it says on the label - I could have paid 40% or so more for 'proper' brands that did exactly the same things I suppose - but all I'd have would be less money for pies.

Sorry! It's really getting to the point where I need to preface everything with "stop me if I've said this before"! Must be me age...

Would this be a bad time to tell you Ibanez didn't use DiMarzios? It was their own 'Super P-4' - a very good DiMarzio clone, probably made by Maxon.

DiMarzio Model P with authentic 70s cream coloured covers. Obviously!

Neck-divey symmetrical or near-symmetrical bodies was a bit of a thing with late 70s/early 80s MIJ original design basses, not sure why. Probably just recycling body shapes from guitars, where neck dive's less of an issue.

Looks like a great bass for the money, Fenix have a deservedly excellent reputation and clearly there are still bargains out there. There's a Fenix guitars FB group where you should be able to find answers to any questions about the bass - I'm confident they'll recommend that you buy it anyway! https://www.facebook.com/groups/128212226340 However it does look like the controls are volume, tone & pickup selector. Just a personal thing, but for me I would probably re-wire it with an individual volume for each pickup, & dispense with the selector - I find it useful to be able to blend the pickups, rather than just switch between them.

That price seems surprisingly reasonable, particularly from a dealer. Lots of SBVs available from Japanese sellers but prices are insane, particularly considering shipping & import fees on top. https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=m570.l1313&_nkw=sbv500&_sacat=0

Always had a bit of GAS for Epi's Thunderbird Pro (the through-neck stripey active one), but never wanted a 'proper' T-Bird. I deeply regret missing a Pro for £100 on my local FB ads - just have to keep telling myself it was probably nicked!

That's an HP1216 - very high-end MIJ, despite being a Hondo, possibly a Chushin Gakki build if the bridge is any indication. Matey might think it's unique & worth a grand but this one in It'ly is a bit more realistically priced: https://reverb.com/item/32293146-hondo-professional-bass-hp1216-vintage-year-1981-made-in-japan-matsumoku-factory

That's a stunner, looks like superb craftsmanship. Looks in great condition - component choice (Schaller bridge & tuners) suggest it's not particularly new, possibly 80s. It would be good to have back views so you could see the construction. Style-wise not to my taste, but it's beautifully done.

Dave Brock still plays his (very Hawkwinded) Westone Speccy, as far as I know.

I would definitely refinish the body - it looks like the victim of a dirty protest in the prison music room! Much as I'm not a fan of shonky logos, I'd leave the headstock - a previous owner's put a lot of patience & a degree of artistry into labelling it as something it blatantly isn't, and that's a nice touch of history imo, as is the original dealer sticker on the back. It's originally had a pin badge (the holes are visible if you look closely) and in fairness there's zero chance of finding a replacement, even if you could be sure what it was. I also think I'd reinstate the bridge pickup it's had at some point, maybe using a stack pot to wire it v/v/t.

Looks like you'd get away with slightly wider spacing without risking the strings hanging off the edges of the fretboard up the dusty end. An alternative would be a bridge with adjustable spacing, like a Schaller 3D, if you can find one for a sensible price.

Ibanez & Columbus versions would absolutely not have been the same instruments, despite looking similar. Ibanez was a Fujigen product and Columbus was probably Chushin or the collaborative group I mentioned earlier. Big difference in quality, there are other details but Fujigen never used ply for bodies so this definitely wasn't an Ibanez.

Low to midrange early 70s Japanese shortscale plywood Tele type, manufacturer unclear but none of the 'big' names - possibly a Matsumoto Gakki Seizou Kumiai collaborative build, but no-one really knows with this sort of early copy-era stuff. As far as this example's concerned - ghastly boot-polish refin & a non-original bridge, where somebody has inexplicably replaced a Tele-style two saddle unit with an infinitely more useless EB-0 type. Things like this may have been sold branded Jedson, but Teisco never made anything remotely like it, in fact by the time this was made they were long-gone.