Shaggy

I've probably missed out on a few bargains over the years by being annoyed by listings that end in "£...99" or even worse (as here) £...999. Just call it £3K for chrissakes. . This is why the missus compares me to Victor Meldrew of course......

I'd check out (Google) the violin restorers around your way too - bound to be a few. They'd be used to doing highly skilled work on acoustic instruments, and repairs using antique tonewoods / finishes (I'd assume the Martin would either be oil varnished or French polished)

A few more rare-ish ones in my arsenal.... '58 Gibson EB-2 (so pre-baritone switch, with Kluson banjo tuners and single-coil Bakelite pickup) '77 Ovation Magnum 1 fretless (rare, as the only factory fretless one I've ever seen) Early Travis Bean TB2000 '79 CF Martin EB-18 Late '80's Steve Smith (ex-Goodfellow luthier) long scale "EB-2"

I used to have a 1972 MGB Roadster in just that colour - British Leyland called it "Pageant blue" Nice!

'81 Gibson RD Artist CMT

Yes, that was the point - the original circuit might be perfectly acceptable; but if you're going to fit high grade pickups then something like an East circuit is going to complement the pickups to get the very best tone out of them. As there no rush, you'll get boutique bargainaceous gear here on BC for the price of generic new - I had some Barts on here for peanuts that I put into an MB1 Squier P/J that absolutely transformed it into a bass as good as any big-name equivalent.

Upgrading pickups are almost always the single best way of massively improving tone /response of an electric instrument. With the Clipper being a Warwick "clone" I guess EMG's or MECS's would be appropriate, but my choice would be Bartolini's - they just seem to work great in any bass. A decent active circuit upgrade (pretty cheap these days) would then get the best out of the pickups. They look like nice basses, and anything through that Hiwatt is gonna sound huge!

These...... Also bridge saddles that don't fall out when there's no string tension on them when changing strings, and personally I prefer master vol / balance pan for 2 p/up basses rather than vol / vol. Some of these features go way back - loads of '60's instruments were zero-fret, and my mid-60's Vox teardrop (active) had a built-in tuner in the sense that pulling out the treble control produced a E tone that you could tune to

Seriously cool looking old bass, though I can well beleive mgeek that it's almost certainly fairly horrible to play. A few years ago I bought an old six-string semi in a junk shop for 30 quid purely with the intention of ripping out the pickups for a '60's inspired project build, but didn't have the heart to - so re-finned it instead (it had a botched brush varnish re-fin job covered with punk-era graffiti) and upgraded the crude original bridge & tailpiece. Turns out the pickups are Fenton-Weill units (like in the OP) and guitar is probably a"Broadway" - one of Rosetti's budget bitsa brands of the early '60's. Quite tempted by this thread to use those pickups and circuit for a super-streamline build now though!

Fantastic stuff, and I liked the understated and very funky guitar playing too As ever, I'm entirely baffled how bassists who wear their bass so high up the body manage to do it. I'll have to give it a go, and imagine I've got shorter arms.

Boris Johnson on keyboards? Great stuff

PM'd

Jamie sold me his very lovely Wawick Streamer - definitely one of the good guys on BC; easy deal, great communications, and sent the bass fast and super well packed Thanks fella!

It was, but a bit of zoot suit going on there too, I think DB had his creative roots in '50's & '60's small-town Americana

When I saw it (when it came out) the entire cinema audience got up and danced in the aisles. It's still an unfulfilled ambition of mine to have a suit like David Byrne's...... For me Talking Heads peak period were "Fear of music" and "Remain in light" - I think they went a tad mainstream after that. I loved DB's solo and collaborative work - particularly "The Catherine Wheel" and "My life in the bush of ghosts", and that's more what I still listen to

(See pic) - a bit hard to see, but fret lines & dots to left are reinforced with Tipp-Ex, ones to right aren't (my '77 Ovation Magnum 1 fretless) recently used the missus's sparkly iridescent clear nail varnish - really catches the light!

Tipp-Ex fine correction pen lines sealed with clear nail varnish Nail varnish remover will take it all off without affecting the varnish (assuming it's Poly)

Ramones were always '60's American bubblegum pop with distorted guitar, but instrumental in making Punk happen