Skybone

The thing that gets me, when you rip a CD to MP3 for the car, is the change of volume from album to album. Even the ones that claim to be 'remastered'. Minor OT whinge, sorry. Yes, there are quite a few bands albums that I can sit through without skipping a track, but like a lot of other responses, I'm another 40-something who grew up with vinyl and cassettes before CD's became the norm. Can't match the Delberthot's boast of 24 albums without skipping though.

I still regret selling my good old MIJ Tokai Love Rock, it played superbly, looked ace and sounded monstrous with a set of BKP Emerald's in it. It was so good, I sold my Gibson LP Studio because it wasn't getting used. I had quite a few Tokai's, but none of them were quite as good as "Bluey". I also managed to pick up a couple of Gordon Smith Graduate 60's, one in black which I sold on to a mate, and the other with a stunning pommelle nato veneer top (kind of like a birds eye burl type). Superb guitar, unfortunately, it was bought as a back up to the blue Tokai, so didn't get used as much as it should have, and subsequently sold on (to another friend).

After 30-odd years of using a plain, single ply leather strap, thought it might be time to invest in some padding for my shoulder. Ordered a Mono GS1 today. Seen a few that look very promising too. The Kliq one looks good, as does the Ibanez Bass Works one (they also do one with extra padding). The Comfort Strapp one looks pretty good too. Wait for the Mono to arrive & see what I think to that.

You definitely need to include a few "classic line up" Motorhead songs.

RIP Fast Eddie, real shame. Sad day. ☹

You just have to watch some of the performances, especially the live footage, to see that without Noel, everything would have descended into chaos very quickly with the guitar & drums going off in all directions, it was Noel that kept them "on track".

Nothing wrong with 'cheap' strings, and the Fender 7250's & 7350's are pretty good IMO

The other one's the Kestrel (jazz pickups & a scratchplate). They do look great.

Nice catch.

I can see this thread going on for ages...

Was the Squier new or second hand? If it was new, then the strings will have been Fender brand strings. Either 7250m/ml (nickel wound) or 7350m (stainless steel). If you shop around, you can get them for less than £14 a set. I really like the 7350's, and they're reasonably priced, sound good and last well.

RIP

IMO, horses for courses. Some basses & guitars suit gold hardware, some suit black or matt hardware, like others suit chrome hardware. Some suit solid colours, some suit natural finishes, and some even suit uber fancy furniture grade wood finishes. Some spend thousands on an instrument, others spend only hundreds. Variety is the spice of life. Must admit, I'm not a fan of gold hardware & overly fancy timbers (though I do like a nice, understated spalt/burl/flame/etc.).

But not quite as cheap second hand

Some would be nice

Although the Hartke HA3500 is an old amp, it's definitely a good one to go for, as you'll find good ones on the second hand market.

Haven't they been toeing the line for some years now, especially after some of their wood stocks were seized by the Authorities.

At the moment, I'm not ruling anything out! However... after many years of playing only active's of numerous brands, I realised that I was unhappy with the sound of all but 2 of them. Switched back to passive's, and have no intention to return. I did own a G&L L2000 Tribute relatively recently, lovely bass to play, but couldn't get it to sound "right" for me. Never had a hankering for a bass with more than 4 strings either.

Thankfully, I've never had it quite as bad as the Dom, but I certainly noticed my finger tips peeling like mad when I used nickel wound strings. Changed to stainless steel, and never had a problem since.

A couple of the narrow roller banners, either side of the stage would be pretty cool. https://www.rollerbannersuk.com/premium-roller-banner/

One thing I did find with my last band, was that no one wanted to buy demo's, but they bought band merchandise. In fact, we made more from selling merchandise than anything else. Gigs didn't pay well (if at all), even low priced demo CD's didn't sell well (though we did shift quite a few at gigs). It is definitely worthwhile getting a batch of 100 t-shirts printed up to take to gigs, as well as a bunch of demo CD's.