Muzz

This was a Perception with Overwater soapbars and their EQ. Definitely polite, clean and sterile. Probably sophisticated, and certainly a lovely bass - just not for me. Having said that, Barts (and Jazzes, even copies) aren't my thing, either... This was before I got into modding basses, so it didn't really occur to me to start ripping out pups and EQs...I'm still not sure it would have made that much difference...

I think the technical term, given the smoky venues these basses will have been played in, is 'Fagnolia'... 😀

Ermmm...funny you should say that...I've got a John East U-Retro in mine... 😁 It's more to keep consistency with my other gigging basses, all of which have East pres, but it doesn't do any harm... 😊

I put the 'P-Type' pickup in the neck position of my ABZ, and it's no longer polite - actually, I'd have described it more as 'Clean'. When I think of 'polite', I think of the Overwater I owned once (actually twice...long story) and I emailed Chis May about its 'politeness', but there wasn't much to be done about that...

I've had an ABZ for years, and the fanned frets aren't an issue at all: as others have said, 30 seconds the first time you pick one up and they're a natural thing, and I switch between my ABZ and 'normal' Shukers at gigs without even thinking about it. The string tensions are great, and although mine's a 4, I'd imagine the benefits for a 5 are even more pronounced...If you are a 20th fret chorder, then you may have more of an adjustment to make, but that's not me... As Chris says, try and try one first, though: there's more to them than just the fanned frets - they're light, they have compound radius boards, banjo frets, they're tonally very versatile and feel like the hand-finished quality they are. All good things, IMO... 😍

Yep, I've commented before about the appalling quality of a lot of big festival/gig bass; it's invariably mush...or at least it has been at the last few I've been to. The two methods above are a step towards a better sound out front, but then the sound engineer will probably make a balls of it anyway...he'll just have to try a bit harder... 😏

No idea, I'm afraid - he does this a lot, and he has a pro setup...it was a small handheld unit, though (how's that for technical? 😀) I'll try and find a link to him...the sound came straight from the desk.

Ohhhh, I'm putting that in the 'Politely Appalled' phrase list...I can see us using that quite a lot...

So we had a video shot by a friend at one of the series of gigs we did at Xmas in a venue in Cheshire...it came out pretty well...eventually...

Played a regular pub gig this weekend, they have a stage the staff set up in one of the window bays kinda thing. It's usually a late gig anyway (first set about 10:15 start, second set 1:00am finish), but with Russia playing for penalties (and I'm glad they've gone out with that approach), it was gone ten by the time they started setting the stage up, so it was gone eleven before we started, so we went straight through in one set till one. Given the heat in the (packed) pub, it was rowdy, sweaty, hard work. Good fun, though.. 😁

...or a £1.6k starting price for a completely hand-built Shuker...

Although most of us hated it...

Went to the Hollywood Vampires. Dreadful. The Damned were great, I like everything about The Darkness except the songs, but we left after 45 minutes of Johnny Depp's w**kfest - and we only stayed that long because SWMBO had gone to the loo and got lost on the way back. Seven people onstage to remind everybody how much better the originals were done by three or four people. About as subtle as a kick in the knackers...and how can you get the wrong keyboard sound for a Doors track? And as for their 'original tracks'...pfffft... On the upside, it wasn't as ear-bleedingly loud as the last couple of times I've been to the Manchester Arena, and the mix was a lot better. Didn't help Johnny's lot, though...I've seen better covers done down the Dog and Duck...

Ohhhhhhh...I like that: "Here: show me how it goes..." Genius. Stolen with thanks... 😁

Ahhh, you've been to one of our gigs...actually, when I say we 'have half a dozen in the bag' it means we can play them, but the singist regularly forgets the words, and has actually gone through entire songs ad-libbing like the 'Hi di diddle I-aye' bit in Rare Auld Mountain Dew. And no-one has ever noticed... It's not as bad as his Volare, though...he didn't even know it was Italian until I pointed it out after we'd done it at several gigs...

That as well...

Well, the fact that it's still in one piece (and presumably in tune) after all that abuse might be what they're trying to show off...

Anyone else gig with a reading drummer? Our drummer is frankly astonishingly good, and reads all the time. He knows the material, but reads it anyway, and I'm not sure if it's just his talent that makes him that good, or the reading, too. When I dep (or we have a dep) with a non-reading drummer, it's always a bit looser (no bad thing sometimes), but still feels that bit more haphazard. Any encounters with reading drummers? Are they all that rare out there (outside of full Pro/theatre/show setups, natch)...? * And I don't mean the 'I'm on chapter three of Harry Potter' type of reading...

The Rawk Band I'm in haven't rehearsed for months, due to scheduling commitments, and is consequently staggering a bit, and the number of gigs we've done is a one-hand-count, but it's good fun to get together. I wouldn't like it to be my only band, tho... The main gigging band never actually rehearse, other than every blue moon to do a 'technical rehearsal' to get the sounds and patches set right (we're an in-ears, triggered drums, Mainstage and Helix kinda setup) and maybe once every three or four months we might get together at the singer's house with a minimal trigger kit and the in-ears to run through a couple of songs, but that's it - we put new material in by emails (with a YouTube link to the 'definitive' version, just in case), usually in the week before the gig. We've been playing together long enough for that not to be a problem...

We always have half a dozen Oirish songs in the bag, just in case. Six pints in (the punters, not us) and they never fail... 😁

Well, as clickbait it got me onto the Custom Shop page, but the prices have given me a mild panic attack...£10k for a 6-string Streamer? Gott in himmel... 🤔

This. All of it. Haven't really wanted a bass by anyone else for a very long time now...I have a niggling amount of GAS for one of his JJB Precisions, or perhaps I bite the bullet and get him to make me a full-fat Shukerbird (as opposed to the Shukerbird I have, which is a Shuker neck with the rest a combination of Dingwall pickups, Hipshot and John East...oh, and a bit of Epiphone 😁)... Let's put it this way: Once I make my mind up, my Dingwall will be going to provide the funds...he's that good. 😁