Vintage Instruments: Quality or Psychosomatics?

[Frank Blank]

Just now, Bridgehouse said:

Do you mean the forum? If so, I'm the same username over there

In that case we are, you were offering me short scale bass recommendations.

[Bridgehouse]

1 minute ago, Frank Blank said:

Brilliant, thank you, just in case I ever drag myself away from modern, somewhere near 1k basses that I now usually go for.

Depending on where it's located, I'm sure some of us vintage owners/collectors would come and look with you as well. I know I would. I may not know everything, but I've learned the obvious stuff to look for

[Grangur]

10 minutes ago, GuyR said:

Nothing controversial,  in a blind test you almost couldn't miss the vintage bass. 

At the Herts Bass Bash about 3 years back @Lozz196 presented a P-Bass head to head, blind test. The results were odd. My Gear4Music LA bass was voted above some USA Fenders.  Was this down to the position in the running order? Was @Lozz196 feeling tired and less "into it" when playing the USA Fenders? Who knows? I'm sure Lozz doesn't!

What we do know is Lozz came away thinking  it's all down to the setup and all number of other things.

[Bridgehouse]

3 minutes ago, Frank Blank said:

In that case we are, you were offering me short scale bass recommendations.

Ha! And I think the Chowny is the best option - don't listen to the Ric naysayers

[Frank Blank]

3 minutes ago, Bridgehouse said:

Depending on where it's located, I'm sure some of us vintage owners/collectors would come and look with you as well. I know I would. I may not know everything, but I've learned the obvious stuff to look for

That's a lovely offer, thank you. *faith in Internet restored*

[Frank Blank]

1 minute ago, Bridgehouse said:

Ha! And I think the Chowny is the best option - don't listen to the Ric naysayers

Man, I'm pretty sold on the Chowny SWB Pro, the looks alone slay me.

[Bridgehouse]

Just now, Frank Blank said:

Man, I'm pretty sold on the Chowny SWB Pro, the looks alone slay me.

Get yourself off to Bass Direct and go play one

Or, as another thought - how about a vintage Mustang bass? (Trying to stay on topic!) A 66 sold on here for under a grand just a few days ago

[Frank Blank]

Just now, Bridgehouse said:

Get yourself off to Bass Direct and go play one

Or, as another thought - how about a vintage Mustang bass? (Trying to stay on topic!) A 66 sold on here for under a grand just a few days ago

I am heading up to Warwick on Saturday to take up a new bass for set up and pick up one that's just been done. I was thinking of dropping in there to do just that.

Oddly there is something about those Jaguars that leaves me cold, purely a look thing.

[GuyR]

41 minutes ago, Frank Blank said:

You can do such a thing? Sorry, not 'you', 'one'.

I am fortunate enough that I have access to that expertise free of charge, but, bearing in mind a set up costs about £40, checking over a vintage bass might be expected to take a similar time. Even if it cost £100, a good investment. 

[Bridgehouse]

1 minute ago, GuyR said:

I am fortunate enough that I have access to that expertise free of charge, but, bearing in mind a set up costs about £40, checking over a vintage bass might be expected to take a similar time. Even if it cost £100, a good investment. 

I agree. Specially at the more eye watering end of the price scale!

[Frank Blank]

9 minutes ago, GuyR said:

I am fortunate enough that I have access to that expertise free of charge, but, bearing in mind a set up costs about £40, checking over a vintage bass might be expected to take a similar time. Even if it cost £100, a good investment. 

 

7 minutes ago, Bridgehouse said:

I agree. Specially at the more eye watering end of the price scale!

I totally agree.

[ambient]

52 minutes ago, BigRedX said:

Very much so.

I wouldn't even think about picking up any instrument to try if I didn't like the way it looks. Looks come first, playability second and I'll worry about the sound if it looks good and feels comfortable to play.

There are a great many instruments that I just look at and think, no. All the time I was playing it I would be conscious of the fact that I didn't like the instrument.

[Frank Blank]

1 minute ago, ambient said:

There are a great many instruments that I just look at and think, no. All the time I was playing it I would be conscious of the fact that I didn't like the instrument.

Me too, I think the vast majority of players would agree (even some who wouldn't admit it) that aesthetics come first. I would also be very conscious of the fact that I was playing a bass I disliked the look of.

[josie]

2 hours ago, Frank Blank said:

I am interested in your choice of words comfortable and genuine. Comfortable I understand within the context of your post but genuine? Genuine in what sense that a modern instrument isn't?

A 50-year-old bass with no signs of age or wear would feel very unnatural - at least to me - not like a real working instrument. A new bass that looks new is perfectly genuine too imho.

3 hours ago, ambient said:

I think a lot of the desire to own a vintage Fender is the mystique surrounding the the company and it's instruments.

 

3 hours ago, White Cloud said:

The simple truth is this; the average listener (receiver) of music could not give a stinky poo what bass is being used by the sender - and would never be able to tell the difference between basses even if they tried.

Once when I took my Aerodyne out to my local om night, an older gentleman came up to me after a while and said admiringly "You know, from across the room that looks like a real Fender." I smiled and said "It is". His mouth literally fell open and he almost pushed his nose into the headstock to be sure he was reading the logo correctly. After a pause he said in a tone of almost religious reverence "I never thought I'd see one of those in my local pub".

[Frank Blank]

4 minutes ago, josie said:

Once when I took my Aerodyne out to my local om night, an older gentleman came up to me after a while and said admiringly "You know, from across the room that looks like a real Fender." I smiled and said "It is". His mouth literally fell open and he almost pushed his nose into the headstock to be sure he was reading the logo correctly. After a pause he said in a tone of almost religious reverence "I never thought I'd see one of those in my local pub".

Ha ha, that's so cool. Oddly I've just bought an Aerodyne, just a week before I realised I should be playing short scale, that will be the quickest I've ever bought and then sold on a bass. They are beautiful basses though.

[Quatschmacher]

On 01/01/2018 at 14:29, Frank Blank said:

I am mindful here of the story about the chap who only discovered his second-hand $35 violin was, in fact, a Stradivarius after it was run over by a bus, only then did he realise it was worth a million dollars, nothing in the playability or the tone led him to think it was anything special before he saw the name.

The one in this story turned out to be a very good fake (as determined by an auctioneer from Christie’s after its owner took it there).

[Frank Blank]

Just now, Quatschmacher said:

The one in this story turned out to be a very good fake (as determined by an auctioneer from Christie’s after its owner took it there).

I wondered why I could only find the one story about it online. Excellent, thanks for letting us know. Whether or not that info was a relief or not to him remains a mystery I suppose. 

[Woodinblack]

2 hours ago, Frank Blank said:

So are we to assume that hand assembly makes the instrument better if, in the final analysis they mostly sound the same? 

I am separating 'a better instrument' from 'mostly sound the same'. They do sound mostly the same but some are a delight to play and some are horrible, while still sounding the same.

And no, the hand assembly makes the instrument less consistent, so some will be miles better, some will be miles worse and most will be in the middle. But as I said, once you lose / break / burn the miles worse, the average moves up.

[Frank Blank]

Just now, Woodinblack said:

I am separating 'a better instrument' from 'mostly sound the same'. They do sound mostly the same but some are a delight to play and some are horrible, while still sounding the same.

And no, the hand assembly makes the instrument less consistent, so some will be miles better, some will be miles worse and most will be in the middle. But as I said, once you lose / break / burn the miles worse, the average moves up.

I agree. I suppose the modern construction techniques even the basses out into a plateau of quality whereas the hand assembly, as you say, turns out dogs, middle ground and gems. Do you really think that the lesser or middling ones really get destroyed or do they make it through history in the hands of less discering players until they are past the line and become vintage and valuable regardless of tone and playability?

[Quatschmacher]

5 minutes ago, Frank Blank said:

I wondered why I could only find the one story about it online. Excellent, thanks for letting us know. Whether or not that info was a relief or not to him remains a mystery I suppose. 

It was very much a click bait story but quite interesting. 

[Quatschmacher]

There’s a similar thing going on in the saxophone world with old Selmer Mark VI and SBA horns going for stupid money. Part of that is that lots of great players played and recorded on them (at the time they were the pinnacle of sax building) and so everyone has that sound in their head from all those golden age recordings. I too fell foul of the hype years ago and bought one for an extortionate amount. (Amazingly I managed to sell it at a big loss.) It did sound lovely but the tuning was ropey compared to newer horns. Undoubtedly there are gems out there from that era that will sound better than a lot of modern stuff. However, Selmers are still hand made (at least the annealing process of the bell section is) and so still vary from example to example. The trick to finding a good one is simply to test lots out side by side. 

Edited January 2, 2018 by Quatschmacher

[Grangur]

33 minutes ago, josie said:

A 50-year-old bass with no signs of age or wear would feel very unnatural - at least to me - not like a real working instrument. A new bass that looks new is perfectly genuine too imho.

Surely s 50 year old bass with no signs of wear has either been under the bed a long time, or someone didn't like it much.

2 hours ago, Frank Blank said:

So are we to assume that hand assembly makes the instrument better if, in the final analysis they mostly sound the same? It is an interesting thought about the quality instruments surviving and the older ones not making it.

There are some differences here. Even the cheapest budget bass may be hand-assembled in China. This carries no craftmanship if all necks fit all bodies.

There are other places where assembly means time is taken to lightly-sand the neck/pocket to carefully match the 2 parts to get the perfect fit for the resonance to pass right down the neck and body as if they are one. Yet in all this there are people for whom this is important and others, it doesn't. If you're playing Punk rock with a Big-Muff on all tracks you're probably not going to be worrying about tonewood, or brass bridges over BBOT.  But, I guess, other things will make you feel good about the instrument that will reflect in how you play.

[White Cloud]

51 minutes ago, josie said:

Once when I took my Aerodyne out to my local om night, an older gentleman came up to me after a while and said admiringly "You know, from across the room that looks like a real Fender." I smiled and said "It is". His mouth literally fell open and he almost pushed his nose into the headstock to be sure he was reading the logo correctly. After a pause he said in a tone of almost religious reverence "I never thought I'd see one of those in my local pub".

Hmmm, that's akin to standing in your local street and walking up to a parked Ford Mondeo and announcing, " I never thought i'd see one of them in my street!!!!" 

...and that's coming from a Fender Precision player (before the Fender rent-a-mob dig out their pitchforks and light their flaming torches) 

[Dan Dare]

20 minutes ago, White Cloud said:

Hmmm, that's akin to standing in your local street and walking up to a parked Ford Mondeo and announcing, " I never thought i'd see one of them in my street!!!!" 

...and that's coming from a Fender Precision player (before the Fender rent-a-mob dig out their pitchforks and light their flaming torches) 

I think the key is the fact that the chap was an "older gentleman". I'm 64 and I can remember when I was in my teens/early twenties, a "real" Fender was a pretty rare beast in Blighty, unless you were a pro'. Now, they're everywhere and you can choose between US, Mexican, Korean, Japanese, etc instruments, all Fender branded, at varying price points. The guitar hero at the school I went to was the only bloke for miles around with a genuine Strat' and the copies hadn't started appearing yet. When I finally got my first "proper" Fender ('72 jazz, which I still have), it cost me several months wages and was a real red letter day.

Edited January 2, 2018 by Dan Dare

[Al Krow]

29 minutes ago, Cuzzie said:

To quote a bass player, who can play a riff or two better than me, those that get bespoke basses are posh rock stars with more money than sense, and the re sale value is no good.