Chris2112

Surely the tone of the neck in that instance is almost entirely determined by the wood rather than the 0.1mm thick carbon skin wrap? I'm guessing that the stuff that goes on is a bit like what VAG owners wrap their wing mirrors and dash trim with?

If it's just the wrap over wood like Enfield used then yeah, it looks really cool but doesn't have the typical graphite stiffness or sound. Whether or not that matters to you is another matter entirely. I do recall a white headless Shuker with a proper graphite neck but I can't recall where the neck was made.

You could add Vigier and Zoot to the list of companies than made in-house graphite products. Vigier for certain never made them for anyone else (indeed Patrice moved away from all graphite construction in his necks). Furthermore, Vigier are effectively winding down. I understand that their order book is closed and that remaining orders are being finished off, once they're done, Vigier are done. Interestingly, Mike Walsh of Zoot has talked about getting his graphite production going again. That is pretty exciting as I used to own a Zoot with a graphite neck which was really nicely made. For the rest of your list, well... Zon seem to be in tumult (still). I hear that Joe Son's comms have improved recently but there are still people waiting for builds long since paid for that aren't yet being delivered. Zon continue to take orders for and deliver basses ordered long after these poor customers were hooked. The saga documented time and time again on PH is chronic. I love Zon basses but I'd be extremely wary of ordering a new one if it wasn't money I could afford to lose. They can't service their own needs never mind make aftermarket products. Modulus are back up and running but they're not the same company. Production has slowed and prices have ballooned (seems they're taking a leaf out of the Wal book). Geoff Gould continues to make his own amazing basses. As the understand it, his order book is full enough that he doesn't need to offer aftermarket necks for the P and J basses of the world. Bogart - Stefan He's continued to manufacture his own necks. I'm not sure that Schack offer carbon fibre necks anymore. Clover don't (does the brand even operate anymore? I don't think you can actually buy a new Clover bass). Stefan still maintains his business and makes a good amount of basses, though I was disappointed to read of a Basschatter ordering one and getting a less than perfect bass. Mr Heß has been making basses long enough that they should be going out perfect. I still regularly play my 1994 Classic and love it. That bass is nearly 30 and is great fun, must be one of the good ones. Basslab are an interesting one. They're not graphite but they're in that same sort of sphere, made using a 'tuned composite' that seems to have even more remarkable physical properties than traditional graphite cloth. The builder, Heiko Hoepfinger, is again only concerned with building his own instruments rather than making aftermarket parts. His basses are so light that I can imagine it would be surreal to bolt one of his necks to a body that would usually have a wooden neck. However, I've never even seen one of his basses in person. I should change that.

That Jerzy Drozd fretless four string that they had seemed to have been there since Jesus was a lad and went through a few price drops. They don't seem to keep hold of used stock all that long in general.

Has there been any drop in quality since they were bought out? I remember being quite impressed trying out some of their amps many years ago, round about a similar time as Mark King spent about five minutes using them.

Gibson have been gleefully taking cash from mugs that like awful looking/sounding/playing instruments for years. It seems they're not looking to change that now.

Pardon me, it is an ash body.

They may not list them directly on their website but you can definitely get them, probably for a price comparable to a Blackstone body. There are a number out there, this one with a zebrano body being my favourite:

It depends. You can have a wooden bodied Bogart if you prefer and the basses now come as standard with a rosewood fretboard, though you can still have it in the classic style with a composite fretboard if you prefer. The 'Blackstone' model refers to a composite foam coated in a resin shell. It was designed to be an analogue to alder wood, but unlike wood the bodies should be completely consistent. You know how you could occasionally get two basses of the same type made with the same wood and yet one would sound markedly different to the next because the wood was more 'tuneful' or where one bass might seem to suck up frequencies or simply weigh an absolute tonne more than another of it's kind (70's ash-bodied Fenders, I'm looking at you...). The Blackstone composite was made to get around that, to provide a base for the instrument that was absolutely consistent in terms of weight and tonal character, allowing for the electronics to make the real difference in the tone. It also allowed for some amazing colours and patterns because the builder, Stefan Hess, could layer colours directly into the resin. In truth, I don't know if the Blackstone idea was any better than just selecting good wood to make the basses out of but it was certainly unique and came from that period in the 80's where many bass builders were looking to innovate with materials and construction. I've had my own Bogart Blackstone for a good few years now. In a way it reminds me more of a 34" scale Modulus Quantum than it does the Status, Zoot or Zon graphite necked basses I've owned. It has Bartolini pickups but it is quite bright with an excellent balance across strings and all over the neck. If consistency was the goal when the bass was designed then I think it absolutely achieves that. It sounds absolutely great through a modern amp with a mild scoop on the mids, but it is not anywhere near as bright or aggressive as my Spector NS-5CR. So for anyone who labours under the old misapprehension that graphite/composite instruments sound sterile, I'd invite them to play this and see what they think. This is possibly the most fascinating era of bass design, for me. Kubicki, Status, Vigier, Bogart, Modulus etc were all trying new things. Stefan Hess was a bit like the Rob Green of Germany at the time as his graphite products were sold to a variety of other manufacturers in Germany to go into their own basses (I understand that his necks featured in both Clover and Schack basses at the time). Even a few days later I remain very sad that Status as we know it are done. I really hope they will continue to make new instruments in some form rather than just becoming a parts and spares shop. However, I would not like to see them going down the Wal route of scalping with ballooning prices and a slow, trickling output of builds to keep the bubble inflated.

They still offered the body shape with a graphite neck only now. The preamp wasn't listed as an option but I'm sure for the right price you could have had one...

I've had some really nice Status basses over the years. Some of the best instruments I've owned, I think. I recently got a fairly decent payout from work after it transpires that they hadn't been paying me properly since March last year. I was considering speaking with Status once they opened their order books to order a Kingbass or a Hellborg signature model. I guess that won't be happening now. I do have my eye on something equally eccentric though.

It needs to go to a central point that can take action rather than just collating reports and farming out those with leads. If you have twenty scams in twenty force areas, all for a low value, I can see how it would get lost in the mix. There is so much minor fraud in the UK now that we could dedicate every available hour of police time to it and still not be near cracking it, I'd imagine. Of course, having the money to equip a central task force for fraud is the real issue, it's not forthcoming at the moment. It's not for a lack of desire for nailing crooks either but a case of getting the details on the right desk at the right time. Back when I started (thirteen years ago) we would regularly get reports like this from different force areas. If the offender had been traced to your force area you'd do the business. I don't work 24/7 anymore but when I moved departments, we hadn't done that sort of cross force enquiry in years. There just wasn't time for it. The problem is systemic and structural rather than a lack of desire for your average officer to take a fraudster to task. I could have an offender of this scale before the courts in a matter of weeks. Telephone statements from victims, a few files of digital evidence documenting the sales, arrest and interview. Charge on overwhelming evidence even if no admission, likely a guilty plea bit sadly no realistic chance of anyone getting their money back. It's a simple MO only compounded by the amount of times it has been repeated. Sadly as my current role is now a specialism I can't just ask my boss if I can take the Basschat case and run it!

Pentabuzz or MVP?

A great bass. One of the few fretless basses I GAS for, but don't tell my Pentabuzz that. As far as my number one goes, my 1993 Spector NS-5CR gets the call most days. It's one of those basses that is extremely flattering to play because it's effortless. The tone is supreme but there is no hiding it in a mix, so if you're one of those guys who likes to sound like you have a pillow sat in front of a 15" speaker with strings that went dead twenty years ago, it's won't be for you.

Quite. I like Wal basses but I've never played one that was worth their asking price (to me). I don't decry him at all for trying to sling the nasty pasty, might as well take the cash out of some rich doctor or architect's pocket and enjoy it. Clearly it wasn't 'the one' for him as he's been playing his Status basses for years. Given their light weight, superior ergonomic form and tone, that doesn't surprise me. I may have mentioned earlier here or on Facebook that a friend of mine once sent me an advert for a Nissan Micra being sold by a member of Status Quo. I had mistakenly thought that it was Rhino selling it but a review of my records showed it was actually John Coghlan.

I would expect a discount given that it may have been the bass used to inflict that awful Christmas song on us but even so, the price is steep. I'm wondering if his roof hasn't fallen in.

Between £1200 and £1500 is probably realistic. I've seen a few float around the £1200 mark for a while over the years. I used to have the number for Todd Krause when he was building Stu's basses at the Fender Custom Shop. I used to dream of having a Mel replica but the price would have been extremely high.

My brother has one of the last three Shawn Lane Excalibur models on order now. It will be the last natural alder model out of the shop before they close. He had a heads up from a Vigier dealer about the end of the production and was passed details to buy it. I am really looking forward to hearing it as Shawn got the best cleans tones ever committed to record from his natural finish Excalibur models.

A bit like unboxing videos, I find these to of the sort of utter nonsense that floods YouTube.

Ordered a set of these in Medium gauge to put on my Spector NS-5CR this evening. All went on fine except for the B, which barely tapers at all at the headstock end. It won't fit into the tuner for me to start winding. A shame as the four that fit on the bass actually sound and feel pretty good.