Jus Lukin Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 (edited) - Edited March 1, 2022 by Jus Lukin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leroybass Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 yes upstairs barry was the dude back in 86 when I was there, nearly bought john entwhistles Steinberger the 2nd or 3rd one sold but instead bought an aria that belonged to neil murrey Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chris_b Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 The rehearsal studio was on the ground floor, entrance in the side road and the basses were upstairs. After it all switched around I knew the guy running the drum section of the school upstairs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Linus27 Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 4 hours ago, NancyJohnson said: I'm certain the BC was at street level. Wasn't there the Acoustic Centre upstairs. I remember my first time up there, Wapping High Street. Coming out of the Tube, you're just expecting this bustling street, but it was deserted; it wasn't really gentrified, from memory no real shops...a narrow road and if memory serves me correct, the street was cobbled? Yes, this is correct, the street is/was cobbled. You walked out of the tube and it was just a street with flats and maybe the odd business if that even. I only ever knew the Bass Centre to be downstairs. You walked in through the door which was on the street and straight ahead were some stairs but instead, you would turn right and go through the next door and then you were in the Bass Centre. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lowdown Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 (edited) Loved the place (and the pub around the corner - The White Swan?). Early days all Basses and Amps were downstairs. Mid 80's (when it opened) through to the early 90's I purchased a lot from them. '88, I got my first Wal from them (five string). A Sadowsky five string, and a couple of Fenders. The usual Trace Elliot stuff as well, along with their own brand of strings ? They used to have some great clinics/demo nights there as well with some top players. I used to live just over the other side of the river, near Tower Bridge, so walked over there quite often. It was a good social gathering as well, always lots of players to talk music with. The Bass Centre Wapping Years. http://www.basscentre.com/the-wapping-years.html Edited October 22, 2018 by lowdown Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 Yes, bought a Wal from there in 1989 for the princely sum of £930. Looking at what they go for now, oh how I wish I kept it... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daz39 Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 Basses downstairs when i went early noughties. So much amazing gear, and i’d come from uni in newcastle where we had 7 shops to peruse in the late 90s. just down that quiet cobbled street from the Tube was The Captain Kidd, a quality drinking establishment. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lowdown Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 2 minutes ago, FDC484950 said: Yes, bought a Wal from there in 1989 for the princely sum of £930. Looking at what they go for now, oh how I wish I kept it... I think mine was about that, or maybe a little bit more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chris_b Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 1 minute ago, FDC484950 said: Yes, bought a Wal from there in 1989 for the princely sum of £930. Looking at what they go for now, oh how I wish I kept it... I was chatting to Nick one lunchtime and a guy came in wanting to sell a Wal Pro. He only wanted about £300 but was told they couldn't sell them and they weren't interested!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drax Posted October 22, 2018 Share Posted October 22, 2018 14 minutes ago, lowdown said: The Bass Centre Wapping Years. http://www.basscentre.com/the-wapping-years.html Fantastic set of pics 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave_bass5 Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 (edited) i got my first ever 'real' bass from the Wapping store, when they were upstairs. It was a Squier JV Pass. Still got the receipt although not the bass unfortunately. I got a TE head there a few months after, and had the pleasure of saying hello to John Entwistle while i was in there. Very decent bloke IIR, but made one hell of a racket lol. If anyone remembers Wapping high street from that era, its completely, different now. You really wouldn't recognise it now. We used to rehearse at Jumbo (or was it Elephant) studios there. Good times although bad at the the same time. Edited October 23, 2018 by dave_bass5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Browning Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 On 22/10/2018 at 12:50, Drax said: Fantastic set of pics ............... and mullets. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Captain Bassman Posted October 23, 2018 Share Posted October 23, 2018 My first visit was in mid-95, just for a browse you understand... and I walked out with a gorgeous blue Warwick Fortress... that I didn’t really need but absolutely fell in love with and wish I still had. The basses were defo downstairs then with the Acoustic Centre in the back of the shop. @NancyJohnson I was at the Doug Wimbish clinic too and I remember the other main topic of discussion that eve was the sad news of Bernard Edwards passing, maybe only the day before? My last visit there resulted in me bringing home this beauty... ... not the Tanglewood acoustic but the GB! August of ‘99 and I still have it, still one of my 2 main gigging basses and the gig bag is still going strong too! I visited the Birmingham shop a couple of times too - bought at Stingray there, again completely unplanned - but the Bass Centre just had that effect on you. Wonderful times, wonderful people and a wealth of stars just willing to drop in at any time to play, buy or simply endorse the shop. No disrespect meant towards the likes of Bass Direct and the Bass Gallery who still do our community a fantastic service but sadly for our modern, digital, internet-convenience world something that will not likely be experienced again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave_bass5 Posted October 25, 2018 Share Posted October 25, 2018 This thread is quite a contrast to the other, old thread about how poor CS was at the BC before it closed down. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Browning Posted October 25, 2018 Share Posted October 25, 2018 Nostalgia clearly is what it used to be. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NikNik Posted October 25, 2018 Share Posted October 25, 2018 I remember going down to London for an audition and went to the BC beforehand. They had several basses from John Entwistle's collection, Warwicks, Statii, etc . Still, lovely place dedicated to bass. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Highfox Posted October 25, 2018 Author Share Posted October 25, 2018 1 hour ago, dave_bass5 said: This thread is quite a contrast to the other, old thread about how poor CS was at the BC before it closed down. Actually, I didn't feel I got that great cs when I was in there (just the once) But they did let me try any bass I wanted and left with the Warick and px'ed my passive pro Wal ,so can't of been that bad. I did live in West London so it was a bit of a journey out to Wapping or at least it seemed so at the time. Was Rose Morris for me "the store of dreams" lol. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave_bass5 Posted October 25, 2018 Share Posted October 25, 2018 IIR there was one guy who always seemed miserable and looked like he didn't want to be there. This was at the last shop in the last year or so before it closed. I do remember there being a thread about him but it was a long time ago. There was also another guy there that couldn't do enough for me.Offer to put new strings on any bass i wanted to try out. Personally i had very good service from them right up until the end. I even had a few good chats with Chris the tech there. He was the one that told me about how much Squier JV's were wroth, and that it was the neck that was the big deal. I had taken mine in to get it looked at, when i was getting back in to playing, and i remember he was all over it. To me it was just a cheap bass that i had for years and never got around to selling it because it was a cheap bass. I ended up trading it for £300 towards my first real Fender. In case anyone was wondering why so low, only the wooden body and neck were original, all hardware had been changed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FatFingers Posted October 26, 2018 Share Posted October 26, 2018 I think it was back in 82 when I first trekked from Scunthorpe to Wapping returning with a ‘66 EBO which I only recently parted with. It was a toss up between that and an EB2 and part of me wishes I taken the EB2 home instead. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lozz196 Posted October 26, 2018 Share Posted October 26, 2018 I bought my first ever Sansamp BDDI from there. An added extra thrown in was being taught how to play Down In The Tube Station, by The Jam when the sales-guy was demoing said BDDI. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mingsta Posted October 28, 2018 Share Posted October 28, 2018 Great shop and many fond memories like the rest of you. I was just a snotty 17yr old when I first went and too innocent at that age to feel in the slight bit intimidated by all the high end kit and pro players around me. Nick was a star and always happy to talk shop and let me try out gear despite my tender years. I paid back the generosity by purchasing a '93 Stringray 2EQ and a Trace 1215smx combo with the proceeds of my first summer job (doing the night shift packing food in a refrigerated warehouse)! The trace is long gone (sounded ace, but weighed a ton!) but the' Ray is still with me and I'll keep it till I get shipped off to the old folks home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikeswals Posted October 31, 2018 Share Posted October 31, 2018 On 22/10/2018 at 04:37, FDC484950 said: Yes, bought a Wal from there in 1989 for the princely sum of £930. Looking at what they go for now, oh how I wish I kept it... The Bass Centre they had here in the States in Hollywood, I started shopping there when I was 17-18 and could take the car for the 3hr drive each way; in '91/'92 the prices for a Wal were already nearly $3 grand for a 4 string, and almost $3500 for a 5 string. The black Mk1's I was looking at (because I hated the natural wood look with visible core) was $3200. So Wals were always expensive 'over here'. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Happy Jack Posted October 31, 2018 Share Posted October 31, 2018 On 26/10/2018 at 20:55, Lozz196 said: I bought my first ever Sansamp BDDI from there. An added extra thrown in was being taught how to play Down In The Tube Station, by The Jam when the sales-guy was demoing said BDDI. Bastard! When I bought my BDDI from them, nobody offered to teach me anything! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dood Posted October 31, 2018 Share Posted October 31, 2018 I once spent the best part of 7 hours in The Bass Centre on Wapping High Street. I bought so much gear from there including my first set of Hartke 4.5XL cabinets, a six string fretless Status bass, one of my Tobias 6 stringers and tons of hardware including EMG pickups. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Funkfingers Posted November 1, 2018 Share Posted November 1, 2018 Visited once, Spring of 1989. Made one purchase - an EMG-P pickup. Still got it. The pickup spent over twenty years in my fretless Fender Precision Bass. It now resides in a ratty old Charvel CX492 ... where it absolutely rocks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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