Getting back to the bare essentials.

[bassbiscuits]

I only had one precision from about 1994 till 2005, which i used for everything and took everywhere with me.

It finally needed a refret and i bought another as a back up, since when many others have come, with a few becoming permanent residents.

I could easily live with just one. But i like having a few to choose from.

Saying that, having too much gear does panic me and makes me want to sell things!

So amazingly somewhere between 'too many' and 'not enough' seems to be about right.

[LukeFRC]

Cheers for the replies guys - I was on holiday so not been super quick replying! (and it's something to think about) - I've gone through the whole basschat fueled GAS stage.. .and luckily tried pretty much everything I want to try - so that's good. That's not to say picking up a Fodera in bass direct wasn't a "ooh this is nice" experience - but I've gone through gear enough to know that an expensive bass won't make me a better player.

[quote name='Fionn' timestamp='1467531917' post='3084249']
Aye, I did exactly that. I downsized from 4 basses to 2. Both of my "go to" basses were Warwick's too. A SS1, and a Thumb, I also had an old Aria SB900 fretless, and a bitsa P-Bass.

I decided on keeping two basses that would give me as broad a pallet as was possible, considering the options. The Aria fretless was a no-brainer, and keeping one Warwick was a certainty. That was difficult, as I cherished them both, but seeing as I was consolidating, I went for the most versatile of the two (the Streamer). That was a good decision. Only after the Thumb Bass was gone, did I fully realise how totally perfect the Streamer is for purpose, and how much I'd always naturally favoured it in almost every way. But, you know how it goes, the Thumb had this going for it, and that, etc, etc, blah, blah. Truth is ... I didn't need the Thumb bass, and as great as it was, it was an expensive and unnecessary luxury. Like the bitsa P-Bass, just stuff that I didn't need (Fender-type sound included).

So I now have only two basses. One lively, active, fretted, with round-wounds, and that whole vibe ... the other being mellow, passive, fretless, flatwounds. Very different instruments which offer a lot of vatiety and range (the SB900 is also very versatile in what it does too). I can find whatever sound and feel I want, between the two. Although they are very different, they're both bass guitars at the end of the day, so I've always got a back-up bass.

Why not keep your favourite Warwick, and something else that will give you a totally different sound and feel? If you don't have such a bass, then I'd be thinking about what bass would best fill the space, and I'd sell the other three basses to fund it.

Two works for me. Less clutter and distraction that way.
[/quote]

Useful to have direct experience of the same conundrum with a streamer and a thumb in the mix. Since I've got back from hols he Thumb has been getting the playing time - but that may be cos the strings are dying on the Streamer - so got a new set of DRs to treat her with
[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1467564667' post='3084580']
I have three basses.

One I play.
One that is in a hard case and comes out if my main bass fails. It only failed once, when my backup bass was a home.
One that is in the loft, I'll never sell it. Mainly because it should be thrown in the bin, but it was my first bass.

When I bought my bass I spent a very long time looking for it, close on 7 years of searching. In the mean time I didn't buy something that was nearly right. I've had it for 15 years now.
[/quote] what is it out of interest? (the one you spent 15 looking for)

[Lozz196]

At the moment I`ve got 4 Precisions, 3 amps, and 2 cabs (with another 2 cabs on order).

I only really need 2 Precisions (1 main, 1 backup), the same with amps, and the 2 cabs (and tbh as the cabs on order are a 410 & 210 I could make do with just the 410).

But I like to have a home bass, as well as my gigging basses (so I don`t ruin the string-life on the gigging ones), so that knocks it up to 3. But once my new cabs are here I`ll be having a bit of a clearout, get back to suitable numbers.

[ivansc]

3 basses. Electric upright, P and a weird thing that Gibson gave me that was my main working bass for years. Couldn`t sell any of them, as I use all three.
Now guitars is a different matter. I currently need to sell about four or five of the buggers! I swear they bewwd when kept in dark corners....
Also a few remaining bits of hardware studio gear, but that will have to keep till September. Hard to sell stuff iN France when you dont really know how it all works. Ebay does nothing here and havent found the equivalent of Gumtree.