EdwardHimself

Haha my m8 has always wanted a ken lawrence explorer. I'll have to get him this for his 18th!

[quote name='MacDaddy' post='391390' date='Jan 26 2009, 02:22 AM']My last few basses have all been quality mid range USA made (Carvin, Fender J, Musicman Sub, Guild B-301) but for my last gig I used a cheap Asian Mustang bass - not to be confused with the Fender Mustang. Anyway no-one commented on the change of sound, loss of tone, etc or even noticed there was a cheaper bass. There's no doubt the quality of budget basses has increased severely since I were a lad (to be said in wistful Yorkshire accent) and the budget bass feature in BGM got me thinking, are there any budget basses (for the sake of argument no more than £200.00 as per the BGM piece) that can do a pro job? By pro job I mean sounds good enough to do a decent job at a gig for the player, with sufficient build quality to negate any interference issues, plays well with a decent set up, and to an average member of the audience would be no different sound wise to a bass 2 or 3 times it's value. I realise this may be entirely subjective, but we may find some common ground? Waddaya reckon?[/quote] I reckon my peavey Milenium BXP will do the job pretty well cost me just shy of 2 hundred. I do agree with the sentiment however that it's a matter of want not need. But after all, if you have the money and you're alright on the bass why not get something nice? I think the quality of all entry leve instruments in general not just basses has improved exponentially over the years. It's just a case of better mass production techniques and cheap labour. I must say i can't STAND stupid little kids who say "oh i can't play very fast/well because my guitar is too SLOW!" No such thing as a slow guitar, just a slow player.

[quote name='Imanupstart' post='428083' date='Mar 7 2009, 04:25 PM']Well the gun in the photo is a deactivated Norinco Ak. If I was to walk in public with that I have a sneaky suspicion I may be shot [/quote] I think i was quite lucky the worst i got was a grilling from plod. Plus the fact you don't see many 12/13 year olds toting guns round Beverley!

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='428129' date='Mar 7 2009, 05:42 PM']I thought it fit the rant quite well, that's why I used it. Most of my friends work in theatre, if I was scared of gays I'd have nobody to talk to. To me the prices are insane. I can understand people spending five figures on an acoustic instrument (although I don't play upright myself), but when you can get a perfectly servicable bass guitar for a few hundred quid that will play and sound great, I don't see the point in paying much more. Two or three grand for something really special, maybe, if you've just fallen in love with the thing, but ten grand? They're having a laugh.[/quote] Yeah but what maked you think it would. You could have just said it looked crap or terrible. I just don't understand because you don't hear people saying something looks "n******" or "Paki" or "Spazz" so why the hell do you call it Gay? I just really don't get it. Also what makes you think that everyone who works in theatre is gay? I know several people who do drama and are far from homosexual. I'm not gay myself by the way i am just sick to death of hearing every stupid chav in my school who calls me gay because they seem to think it's the worst thing you could ever call someone. They're clearly not having a laugh because people buy them. At the end of the day things are worth what people will pay for them so it can't be that stupid can it? I could see why you might think it was a bit stupid that someone would pay £10 grand on 1/2 a kilo of heroin or a model would pay to have their toes cut off when they could have just got a medical student to do it for free but a bass, it's hardly the worst thing you could spend £10,000 on. [quote name='Golchen' post='428167' date='Mar 7 2009, 07:12 PM']Ho hum, here we go again .............. a perfectly interesting and informative thread and some people choose to drag it down into the gutter. I thought that this was an intriguing question so I posted it at another forum that I go to, three pages so far and no negativity whatsoever.[/quote] What's really funny is that i used to think exactly the same thing coming onto here from UG back in '07!

Yeah i really can't suggest any more than just having a purpose to play really. A band is really good for this. I'm not in a band atm and it really puts a downer on things in terms of bass.

^no chance mate. Full size jazz bass copy brand new, £65. [quote name='Bassassin' post='428051' date='Mar 7 2009, 03:42 PM']This was it after a hose down with Dettol & a set of strings: Plays OK, sounds pretty decent too. Really nice shaped neck on this, when I get a minute or two I'm going to experiment with a bit of fret levelling/crowning & then spray it matt black. RatBass! J.[/quote] That's one cheap ratbass. Unlike mine, which cost hundreds

[quote name='thisnameistaken' post='427808' date='Mar 7 2009, 03:02 AM']So two grand for the pickups? Three? Countless more country tracks feature Fenders, I imagine those records sold better too. Fusion doesn't sell all that well, except to bass anoraks. I should've known you'd be the first one with his head over the parapet! It's unfortunate that you didn't compare it to Warwicks, because I bought my Warwick for dirt cheap and it pisses all over your Alembic and doesn't look as gay. Incidentally I don't pay any tax through PAYE, most of my tax is collected through corp. tax as I'm a company director and take most of my earnings through dividends. I'm glad you got a silly-priced bass though, even if you did justify it to yourself as tax-deductible. You still could've saved yourself thousands and got a bass that sounded and played just as good and looked a lot less stupid, if you hadn't got suckered by the name and the blingy wood on the front. f***ing mug.[/quote] That's ridiculous. For a start it pisses me off so much people who use the word "gay" as an insult it suggests to me that you're homophobic. As has been said, you might like a warwick as much as an amlebic but the warwick is a mass produced bass whereas the amlebic is a custom built bass. It's like saying "How could anyone be so stupid to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds on a car by Chip Foose? It's not as if it drives any better than a NORMAL car!" Well clearly you'd pay that much because it's hand built and therefore the quality is going to be a lot better. Same with this. My bass cost £200.

[quote name='obbm' post='428040' date='Mar 7 2009, 03:15 PM']15.6Kg. Even I can carry it one-handed. As well as the case, UL902 and tuner, that figure includes a 1U 13A power strip along the back and the speaker cables inside[/quote] Haha i was lifting 15kg dumbells today so yeah not too bad!

I personally love playing riffs on the low B string of my 5, such as machine head

Hey mate i think if you're just going on one tour with this bass then there's little point getting a really expensive bass. Think about it this way: You're basically buying a shiny new posh merc for a banger race! It's probably gonna get buggered anyway so you might as well just go with the squier. I bet Sid would have had one had they existed back in his day. Cheap basses don't suck at all, my bass cost £200 and it's great to play. Sounds pretty mint too.

[quote name='jimbartlett' post='426892' date='Mar 6 2009, 08:05 AM']It's a shame you feel you have to make comments like that to someone you have never met. Do you not think that someone could take offence to that? I don't but why should you take the rise out of someone for their choice of Guitar? I have not and will not make any comment about the type of person I think you are judging by what you play.[/quote] Dude he's just making a joke! I'm afraid what type of guitar you play does have more of an impact on how you look than you might think. You've got to admit that it would look very weird if someone in a pop band was playing an ESP F-series bass. Conversely, if you were playing metal it wouldn't do much for you if you strapped on a daisy rock guitar unless you were deliberately going for some ironic statement. Now obviously you don't have to be a frank gallager look-alike to play a bass like that but it's definetly more old-school rock orientated methinks although i'm sure it would hold it's own in heavier more modern styles. Having said that, £600 really is a steal for such a high-calibre instrument. I'd love to see how this bass compares to something like say a peavey USA bass.

Very nice amp. Bet you have all the bases covered with that cab. As for the amp, how much were you thinking for it?

Are those warpig humbuckers? I was thinking of getting some of them once but then i decided not to.

[quote name='BassMunkee' post='423134' date='Mar 2 2009, 01:01 PM']I have 2 - one active, one passive. At a push I would buy a 5 string. Sorry, but I really can't see the point of having more than that...[/quote] that's what you say now but wait till you get your 5 string!

please put a scratchplate back on!

Love it, it's like looking at a brand new american made muscle car or something.

[quote name='Imanupstart' post='422481' date='Mar 1 2009, 05:44 PM']Yeah, girlfriend uses it to ward off the groupies Nah i'm an airsofter/gun nut.[/quote] haha i've got an AK47 bb gun, got done by a copper for walking about with it in public when i was about 13.

[quote name='Rat Blitz' post='422073' date='Feb 28 2009, 11:21 PM'](I know most folks in UK don't have a basement)[/quote] You should go to Sheffield!

JPJ, that's the way to do things, keep her sweet with the odd gift now and again so you can use it as ammo Also you can't say you have more stuff and not post pics! aphook that was very nice of your girlfriend! Mine is 400w as well. wolleydick, very nicely done! I think that is the first ever product SWR ever came out with unless i'm mistaken. [quote name='BTGAndy' post='422282' date='Mar 1 2009, 11:31 AM']SWR SM-1500 through a Goliath III and a Son of Bertha, I plan to extend it with another Goliath and Son of Bertha and run the two stacks stereo. Set up for recording. Just the 4x10 playing with Sylosis.[/quote] Great rig, i'm just listening to your band now it sounds pretty good, i see your singer is called Adam Jackson, that's not the Adam Jackson is it the bass sounds great on the recordings, too.

[quote name='hubrad' post='421455' date='Feb 28 2009, 12:52 AM']Also worth checking - depending which country you shop in, if buying from a business you might get their VAT knocked off at point of purchase, before ours is added at the UK border. That certainly works if folks from abroad shop here.[/quote] That's right. If you go on thomann for instance you'll get charged 15% VAT rather than 19% that it is in Germany. It's not just online orders either. My sister worked in the world famous Christmas shop in Heidelberg Germany and she had to ask people where they came from so she could charge the appropriate tax.

[quote name='AREA' post='421919' date='Feb 28 2009, 07:49 PM']Okay, here it goes... Short Soundexamples.... Please keep in Mind, that there are 20Year old Black Nylon Strings on this Bass... 1. Run = Normal, Both Pickups Tone ca. 50% 2. Run = With Phaser, Ratio about 50% 3. Run = With Distortion, The Full Hell :D:D [url="http://xlupload.de/Download/yh3mj1vbo08us9m5b2ze/"]http://xlupload.de/Download/yh3mj1vbo08us9m5b2ze/[/url] ...you have to wait 10 Seconds, than you can download or open the File...[/quote] The clean is a very nice clear sound, not so much attack very much a softer sounding bass. The Distortion is just pure old school fuzz. Great!

Hmm maybe you could wire it up so that it's got 2 volume controls and a blend pot? If you like tone controls maybe you could make the volume pots concentric volume/tone pots.

[quote name='BassBod' post='421824' date='Feb 28 2009, 05:57 PM']Thanks for the comment....it really is a great set up. I've pretty much gone lightweight (Euphonic Audio) for most of my work, and when I think about it the basic sound of this old SWR gear is pretty similar to the "flat" sound of EA, as long as you don't go mad with the aural enhancer. And there is something about the sound of a heavy 4x10/poweramp that the "digital" stuff doesn't do....even though the power levels are roughly equivalent. One scary thing. I was having a clearout a few days ago, and found an SWR leaflet/pricelist from 10 years ago when Rotosound were the UK distributors - this lot retailed for something over £2K (although the Tone Controls never had an official retail price?). I'm so glad it became unfashionable...and I could afford it used.[/quote] Haha i must admit i just put the thing on full! I just like the extra high end clarity of it, when it's on half though it does have an interesting boost in volume and gives some nice "old school" sort of mids. And yeah i mean when this rig was made in '86 it retailed for $1498, 21 years later i got it for £250.

[quote name='BigRedX' post='419577' date='Feb 25 2009, 08:25 PM']For me it's not enough just to have strange looking basses - they've got to be excellent musical instruments too: [/quote] Interesting, i'm guessing truss rod adjustment isn't such a problem?

sorry if you were going for the record but well done on your effort. Nice basses too.