Paul S

+1 for going secondhand. Doesn't hurt so much when I cock it up and have to do it all again, but I guess that is half the fun. My #1 gigging bass is a Fender Precision Lyte that I bought unseen - when it arrived the electrics were faulty and a previous owner had given it an appalling refinish. My initial reaction was to move it on at a huge loss and get one in better nick but I decided in the end to turn this into a bit of a project. Having cut my teeth on a couple of other cheapies I stripped this down, repainted it (badly, but better than it was), changed the headstock back to clear rather than painted, added a new decal, put in a J. East pre-amp (bought from siddlx) and it is now my go-to bass - lightweight, sounds the business, huge range of tones. Resale value is probably rubbish but I love playing it and bonded with it after all the malarky getting it sorted out.

Bought a pickup from Mark, arrived packaged well enough to withstand a nuclear stike, great comms, dispatched immediately. As smooth a transaction as could be wished for and a gent to deal with. Cheers!! Paul

I won't be but will keep watching it to see how it goes. Good luck!

At the moment I have 8 basses and they are all between 20-28 years old, with a particular liking for mid-late 80s MIJ things. Being a died in the wool meanie I no longer want to lose money buying and selling on new basses so always get them secondhand now.

I have also just discovered that these are 'relatively' lightweight - obeche and just over 8lbs. I'd assumed they were heavy like my old Hayman 4040 was. Be interesting to see how much this makes as it seems a good one. I'm more interested in a do-er-upper.

[quote name='andrewrx7' timestamp='1331561391' post='1574783'] Hehehe...slight confusion here! I'm not aiming to set the EQ the same as the pre-shape and then use it like this, I simply wanted to understand what frequencies were being altered when using the pre-shape, and to achieve that, I was flipping between pre-shape+no EQ and EQ+no-preshape and trying to replicate it. Not being able to, I thought I would simply post on here and see if anyone knows how the pre-shape was...well, shaping! So thanks to Stevie for a nod in the right direction! Just for info, I neither slap or finger, I use a pick. It is all personal taste, but I like the pre-shape sound, through a 4x10 and 1x15 (or sometimes a 2x10) rig. For any EQ, I tend to either balance between the pick ups, and/or use the actives on the bass (which is rare). For what we do, the pre-shape sound in conjunction with my bass works very well, and I and the other members of the band, like the overall sound. [/quote] I did this exact same thing with 2 Trace heads I owned and was *completely* unable to mimick the sound of the pre-shape. I also liked the pre-shape sound, not for slap but also for pick playing. I try to get a similar mid-scoop sound now from my set up as it is my preferred tone, only using a boosted mids for certain things that need it.

I think it all depends what you want to get out of it. I have discovered that I quite like turd polishing as a satisfying exercise in its own right and as a learning aid. When I first did it I knew absolutely nothing about how a bass guitar was put together but having now taken a few apart, put back together, updated electrics and even managing a crap body refin, I feel I have learnt loads - much more than reading could have ever taught me. I am now much more confident about doing my own set-ups etc, whereas before I used to take them to the local luthier. Probably saved myself quite a packet as I seem to be always buying something new! But I think the key is being selective about which old sh*te you buy to polish - not all turds are equal. My example is always the Westone Thunder Jet that I pimped - replaced the pickup, added a generic high mass bridge and a secondhand J. East P-Retro. I think the bass is well made enough and also cheap enough to buy to warrant an upgrade - certainly it sounds and plays well enough to gig, which I have now a few times. But once the thrill has gone I'll change it all back to stock and sell off the components - rather than expecting to sell for the value of the bass + upgrades. I think it owes me around £230 all-in but plays much better than that figure would suggest. I have no hang ups about what I use for gigs - I'm equally happy to play something with 'Westone' on the headstock as 'Fender' (of which I have 2 - one of which I gave a major overhaul to) so I get real pleasure from playing and handling an instrument that I have become 'intimate' with.

I think it is well worth the extra money for the ABM. As I said earlier - I had a MAG 210 300 combo, which never sounded 'right' to me. I added an ABM 115 and it was possble to juggle the speakers by unplugging/plugging the combo cab and the difference using the ABM cab on its own and in combination with the MAG cab was very noticeable. And if you get the ABM cab you may decide to one day upgrade the amp to an ABM one and then you will have a much better rig.

[quote name='mart' timestamp='1331400627' post='1572453'] But you're still overlooking the main fact that in "gui" the u is essentially silent (it is merely there to make the g hard), so just as you don't say "gwitar" or "gweetar", so you don't say "agweelar". If you pronounce the u there you'd be talking some sort of guirigay, I think. If, on the other hand, the u has an umlaut on top, like in "güira", then it becomes a "gwee" sound. [/quote] Yes, I was confused, you are quite right. I was getting muddled with other combinations like 'gua' - wah - and a common one in Mexican 'hua' which is also 'wah'.

[quote name='mcnach' timestamp='1331376346' post='1572003'] should really be agg-gui-larr... gui as in guitar. Same with Cristina Aguilera. I guarantee you she does not pronounce her own surname "agg-wee-lera" [/quote] I have learnt a little Spanish, albeit I speak my Spanish in Mexico or the Canaries more than in Spain. I thought the 'gui' would have been nearer a 'wee' than a 'gwee', so 'ah-wee-larr', with the very slightest of guttoral stops on the g, rather than emphasising it? Then again if I was talking about it I was say Ag-wee-larr as it is common usage to anglicise words. For example we call Paris 'Pah-riss' not 'Pah-ree', Seville we call 'Seh-vill' not 'Sey-Bee-yeh'

Huge fan. What a voice! Don't let me be lonely tonight [url="http://youtu.be/6HsDiu4V8P0"]http://youtu.be/6HsDiu4V8P0[/url] Hope you feel better love - Ernie had another go at that solo in this one. [url="http://youtu.be/03UZeJrM9OU"]http://youtu.be/03UZeJrM9OU[/url]

Also popular with the 60s instrumental groups like the Shadows etc, so my BIL tells me. Shameless plug for his Gretsch baritone/regular 6er double neck for sale here. [url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/150586-gretsch-g5566-jettm-double-neck-price-drop-18th-feb-l375/page__p__1564557__hl__gretsch__fromsearch__1#entry1564557"]http://basschat.co.uk/topic/150586-gretsch-g5566-jettm-double-neck-price-drop-18th-feb-l375/page__p__1564557__hl__gretsch__fromsearch__1#entry1564557[/url]

Warren - Orange or not is going to be fairly subjective - when I tried one I found it wasn't versatile enough for what I wanted being very heavy on the valve gain sound side of things but I know a lot of people love that. Guitarist in one band had the guitar equivalent and after going back 3 times for repair he finally got shot of it - which is sort of backed up by Bass Merchant telling me, when I was shopping for amps, that they didn't stock Orange anymore for similar qc reasons. If you want to try out Barefaced cabs to see what the fuss is about you are more than welcome to borrow mine for a couple of days if I am not using them. I have the Compact and Midget.

'Tis my pleasure to start off a feedback thread for Rich. I bought his Hohner B-Bass in a silky smooth and lightening fast transaction. Good comms, bass arrived beautifully packed. Cheers Rich!

[quote name='Mylkinut' timestamp='1331139757' post='1568365'] My advice would be to go to a shop and try as many basses as you can - find out what you like and what you don't. There's no 'need' to go active or older or newer, that's just personal preference. Secondly, buy second hand. You'll get far more bass that way. [/quote] This. Have no preconceptions, find somewhere with a huge stock, leave a day free and try everything on the wall. Better still, go to a local bass bash. Your Peavey is perfectly ok to play live with, though.

Just current or old? Hayman, Shergold, Ned Callan

[quote name='ezbass' timestamp='1330953978' post='1565214'] That Montrose album was great and supposedly the loudest piece of vinyl Warners had put out up until that point. I certainly remember it being loud back in my youth. I also remember them doing Bad Motorscooter and Space Station #5 on Whistle Test. Great band. [/quote] Brilliant album, laid the foundations for so many sound-a-likes - Rock Candy another awesome track. RIP. I didn't know it until I was chasing links on YouTube but he was in the Edgar Winter band for a period - some recent stuff on there at a local 're-union' gig.

[quote name='spinynorman' timestamp='1330897306' post='1564619'] One mistake I made at first was cranking up the bass on the eq and rolling off the treble. That does make it distort and disappear in the mix. Don't overdo the bass and bring the treble and mid up, then you'll be heard. [/quote] That was the exact same problem I had with my Ashdown MAG 210 combo. I favour a mid-scooped, rather bass-heavy tone and active basses - with everything up on the bass frequency it used to fart like nobodies business. Adding a 115 cab helped but I still found the tone of the MAG was missing a certain clarity.

As far as I can see there are so many variables that it is impossible to diagnose what is going on an internet forum. If it were me I'd take my bass along to the doctors, wear it as I usually do and see what he says. Neck width in particular is a funny thing and seems to defy logic - I have big hands yet find a skinny, shallow neck more comfortable. There are plenty of female bassists - I assume with much smaller hands than mine - who play 5 or 6 string basses which have much wider necks than anything I like.

I think my rig is sorted now - Barefaced Midget + Compact + TC Electronic Classic 450 (which I love!). I moved to lightweight from a classic era Trace Elliot rig and now don't miss it - in fact what I have now is a improvement. Before that I had an Ashdown MAG210-300 with a 115 extension or whichever way around the numbers go but it seemed to lack what I wanted. I did a gig where backline was provided and the Ashdown ABM rig available was a very different beast to the MAG - sounded great - but too heavy for me these days. All goes to prove it is very subjective. Sadly I still have endless curiosity about different basses. My current favourite is a Fender Precision Lyte fitted with a J-Retro, which nudges ahead of a Fender Power Jazz Bass Special only by virtue of its lower weight.