binky_bass

I went into a large, well know, music store over the weekend to get rid of one of my basses (for a very good price surprisingly!), naturally while I was there I had a play on a few basses, and naturally gravitated towards the more expensive side of things! I played 3 different basses, all between £1400 and £2000 in price, and I was utterly disappointed with all of them! Each one clearly had absolutely no kind of set up whatsoever, the action on all of them was sky high, the fit and finish of two of them was really quite poor and they just felt cheap in hand... The fit and finish isn't the stores fault, but I would really expect the store to look at the 'delivery set up' of these expensive basses and adjust them where necessary, the Ibanez I played (which had a price tag of £1399) was borderline unplayable. I know action is reasonably subjective, but this was silly... In order to sell these basses, surely they need to present them in a manner that befits the price they are asking? As mentioned, the finish was particularly poor too, the rear of the bass looked pitted with noticeably uneven lacquering. The other two basses weren't much better, one being a Dingwall, which I was surprised at. With the Ibanez, if I was blindfolded, given it to play and then asked how much I though it was worth, I would have absolutely said sub £200 at a push. I was considering putting it down to being a bit spoilt in terms of what I'm used to playing, but I don't think that's the case as I have a mid-nineties Tanglewood Baron 6 string bass, and have owned a couple of Cort A6 basses and the build quality and general finish and tone (particularly on the Tanglewood) is remarkably good, better than some well know, eye-wateringly expensive basses I've played and FAR better than the three I played over the weekend by several country miles. Has anyone else experienced this? Playing 'expensive' instruments and being left utterly underwhelmed and somewhat surprised at the general lack of quality? Maybe the three I played were just not great examples, but I suspect that isn't the case.

I've not really had a chance to fire it up properly as we've not had a practice since before Xmas, but just from home use it is definitely a formidable rig. The Mesa is concise and clear and all sorts of ferociously loud and the PJB cabs provide a very articulate outlet for all that Mesa power. Can't fault it as yet!

It is, and it will exterminate you.

Happy to join the 'New Year New Rig' gang...

So I've been after a passive, non powered, volume pedal for a decent price. I paid £25 for a Schaller F-121 volume pedal from the mid/late 1970's. Bit of a punt, though I have been assured it works. Has anyone used/got one of these? Are they decent? Have I bought a lemon, or worse... A lime?

I'll have you know I could easily beat Hafthor in a amp lift-off! 💪

For those who care to know...

Sent them a note in case it's some kind of error they're not aware of. Surely it must be!!

That is literally 5 miles from me... to add salt to the wound I could have easily picked it up and met you somewhere with it!

Very nice! Was tempted by the traditional 8x10, but my spine will not permit it. The PJB 12B is about as much as my cripple hook of a spine can take!

Seen these before, they always looked a bit naff to me... the tuning pegs ruin it. There are other makers of miniature guitars that look far better!

I'd be quite confident in saying 95% of us have gear that FAR exceeds what we actually need. Myself very much included! I like collecting and trying different gear, but I definitely don't 'need' 95% of it! If I stripped down to the minimum I needed to do the job, it'd be two 6 string basses (one as back up) with a circa 200w head and something like a 2x10 cab. But that'll probably never happen!