Musicman666

3 hours ago, Nail Soup said:

I like the way John Peel says the he could have chosen someone obscure and unlistenable, but chose The Fall instead! 

Lol..yes, so dry …miss the guy.

More a poet than a singer….love this one.

28 minutes ago, SumOne said:

I do feel lucky!

We will see punk!

18 hours ago, SumOne said:

Part of me thinks £195 for a preamp pedal is excessive and surely I can get similar sounds with my Zoom B1-Four and Laney preamp pedal, or get something like a Two Notes Torpedo for loading all sorts of Amp and Cab sims if that's what I need (I don't really need it)......but a bigger less rational part thinks why not give it a go - I like trying out analogue pedals to find 'the one', B-15 is a sound I like and this seems the going rate for Broughton pedals - which must be for a good reason. So I'll go for it (unless someone was quicker than me) PM sent. 

In my mind Clint Eastwood was the narrator of your post…

I like this one

A

8 hours ago, matski said:

Unpopular opinion: I still prefer Mick Karn's Travis Bean over the Wal. 😛

He only made one album with the wal…the rest was this one.

6 hours ago, Cliff Edge said:

It may not be but it happens. 
Personal effects do not attract any duty or taxes but you might be asked for some form of proof of ownership.  Strolling through customs with a Guitar case is going to attract attention. 
If you are going to bring your own gear back from overseas, you’re better off employing a shipping agent who specialises in personal effects to do the whole thing for you. 

I have never heard of any specialist doing that from asia, most shipping agents are geared up to simply pay the tax and not try and avoid it, they are all set up for commercial shipping. Household movers in the uk who may know more don’t have representatives in asia. My guess is if you find someone who can do it all they will probably charge so much that you may as well just do it with commercial shippers and pay the tax. 

1 hour ago, NancyJohnson said:

 

 

 

I do wonder what would happen if you actually went through the red channel dumb and and said, 'I don't really know the circumstances, but look, I've owned this for ages (at this point provide some evidence, photos, receipts etc.) and do I need to pay duty?'  Would they let you through or would they sting you?

 

 

Well there is a huge difference between someone doing a surgical tax avoidance international shopping trip and somebody returning home from living abroad carrying their personal possessions, and I would hope that customs would see it that way also. I have plenty of photos to back up my case but not much else in terms of receipts etc. 

59 minutes ago, BigRedX said:

IME trying to work out the exact amount payable in VAT and duties on something you've imported from another country is a fool's errand. It's far simpler to take the price of the item, the cost of shipping add them together and then put another 25% of that total on top. This should adequately cover you from the complexities of trying to find the correct commodity code and then working out if duty is payable on top of VAT or VAT on top of duty and finally the addition of the courier's clearance fees.

 

TBH if you need to work out the price to the exact £, you probably shouldn't be importing it in the first place. My advice has always been that only items which are impossible to get without having to import yourself them from their country of origin are worth the hassle. Trying to save a few pounds on a new Fender or similar mass produced instrument that already has an official UK importer/distributor will generally end in tears and/or disappointment.

 

As for trying to sneak an instrument through customs at the airport - don't even think about it. While everyone has success stories to tell, you won't be so pleased when customs seize your newly bought bass and hit you with a fine as well as the import taxes before you can get it back.

Ooops ..quoted wrong post.

2 hours ago, Downunderwonder said:

You aren't asking the right questions.

Yes I can see why you might think that …I’m really trying to figure out if anyone here has the knowledge. 

15 hours ago, NancyJohnson said:

 

When you posed the original question, you wrote:

and if you just get on a plane buy it and bring it back as personal luggage ..is it zero tax??

 

The key thing here is the word 'buy', you didn't say anything about bringing in personal effects.

 

As @Downunderwonderposted, check the C&E website or take advice.  Sadly, just because an instrument is old, well travelled or battered doesn't automatically exclude it from being seen duty-exempt.  Border officials couldn't be any less interested in provenance.  Do your diligence.

I thought I was doing my diligence, I get many opinions on this but the one opinion I can’t get is  from uk customs.  If you are buying secondhand and bringing it in I can’t see any difference comparing that to my situation as far as the customs officer is concerned, all he sees is a less than new guitar being brought in as personal luggage. I thought there was an exception for personal household goods being exempt, ie they are not your professional tools. But I’m probably at some stage going to bring a few guitars over as necks, and the next time it will be the bodies just to be sure. It’s a pia but what else can I do, I don’t want to pay tax twice. 

1 hour ago, NancyJohnson said:

 

Anything to declare, sir?  Red channel/green channel. Doesn't matter if you ship it by DHL or carry it in.

Are you saying you have to pay tax? What if it’s an old bass you had in your other international home …I have a stingray bought in the uk in the 90s, it’s been all over Asia, looks really battered and I’m thinking of bringing it back to the uk, would I have to pay tax again on it and how would they value it…this isn’t hypothetical.

and if you just get on a plane buy it and bring it back as personal luggage ..is it zero tax??

Any of Gabriel’s monologues when he was in old genesis.

for unusual i have a six string short scale musicman silhouette bass/baritone tuned e-e with bass vi strings and a chapman stick railboard dual bass reciprocal... 

4 hours ago, lemmywinks said:

Almost forgot Gus basses. Not sure if those are chrome dildos or those hand rails that pensioners use to get in and out of the bath. Either way an odd choice to stick on a bass.

Some things cannot just be unseen….

12 minutes ago, Newfoundfreedom said:

 

Like this? 😁

The main offenders know who they are…

Anything that looks like it might have fallen off an antique Spanish galleon gets a no from me…it’s just wrong.

3 hours ago, Lfalex v1.1 said:

I was referring to coil splitting/switching as I figured that was what you were after.

I can't see musch use in coil taps on any bass, let alone a modern one with an 18v active EQ.

Ah …my bad, I misread the spec, yes it is both switching and tapping. I’m going to have to chat to status about this like you mentioned earlier and see what they say. Thanks. 

Ok …I’m not getting that mod, I was getting coil tapping mixed up with coil splitting, I was after coil splitting which it isn’t.

7 hours ago, Lfalex v1.1 said:

Leaving aside my experiences with my Status, and on a more general note-

 

If you have specific requirements from a build or alterations from the norm to be made in any bass, be very specific, otherwise you'll get the builder's interpretation of what you asked for. Don't just tick a box on an options sheet, discuss how it'll affect the performance of the instrument.

 

In this case, I'd find out from Status how they implement single-coil taps, which coils they use and why, and what effect that has on output and tone. 

If the manufacturer can't answer that sort of question.. Well, decide for yourself how well tried and tested the modification is.

 

I ended up paying extra for something that was useless based on the assumption that it would work like my previous positive experiences of series/parallel/single coil switching.

It worked really well in the aforementioned Stingray5, a Warwick Corvette $$ and (subsequently) an Ibanez ATK derivative (SC with hf roll off and slight mid-scoop, SC, and parallel)

 

* I think I'm going to drop out of this discussion now as I'm concerned that my personal experiences are biasing my views.

 

I hope that your S2 turns out to be awesome, and stays that way.

this will be my second s2 status build so there wont be too many surprises hopefully, but yes literally its a yes or no type deal, anything custom that deviates from the norm is going to cost a lot with these guys. I'm sure they will think its a good mod but forums like this will hopefully give me the real down to earth no bs user point of view... I already think their prices are way too high so I don't want to add to it unnecessarily but on the other hand i don't want to be kicking myself for not getting something that later on I wish I had. I do appreciate the single coils on my jazz with that tight response... 

ps...this is a forum, we are here to hear your honest personal experiences!!!!!!!!!!!!..

3 hours ago, Lfalex v1.1 said:

As long as the pickups have enough (3?) output wires, coil switching for series, parallel and single coil are all possible.

The issue you'd face is knowing which single coil in each pickup you'd want to select.

By definition, one coil of each will be Reverse Wound/Reverse Polarity. You'd ideally want it to be selectable with its opposite number in the other pick-up (Normal wound/Normal Polarity) in order to give some degree of hum-cancelling (life a Fender Jazz)

 

I'd guess that you'd  end up with either inner or outer coils running as pairs to achieve this. 

You could always have that as a switching option- front coil/parallel HB/rear coil for both pickups on two switches.

 

Don't know whether that'd yield worthwhile results. 

Last time I had a "good idea", it was having series / parallel switching on my Streamline...

This is a new build so it’s whatever status would normally do.

2 hours ago, Lfalex v1.1 said:

Does the S2 share electrics with the Streamline?

I ordered mine with series/ parallel switches on both pickups.

Waste of time. 

They sound too thin in series, and the level boost is quite considerable.

 

The best bass I've had for series/parallel/single coil switching was a Stingray5. Musicman implemented it properly; 

 

The series and parallel options are reduced down to match the single coil output, so no volume jumps. Other filtering may also be employed. 

 

The pickup has a dummy coil for the single coil setting, so no hum (not relevant to this question)

 

Unless you can find someone to add some sort of compensation to the switching, it's not worth it. I couldn't even EQ out the shortcomings. 

 

Different pickups might yield different results, but it didn't work at all well with the soapbars in my Streamline. It was a  huge disappointment, and not worth the extra I spent to have it included.

 

 

 

Ok …thanks for the feedback…appreciated. I suspect the s2 and slimline do share a lot of the same tech when it comes to the electronics. I think the upgrade you had is different since the coil tap as far as I understand just turns the humbuckers into single coils.

Is it a useful upgrade worth having?

love everything from these four guys in all their various formats. Having young's fragile voice weaving amongst the harmony is like taking the whole thing up a notch from a solid 10 to a sublime 11.