Your most expensive gear mistakes?

[Al Krow]

A bit of light-hearted (or more serious if you prefer!) banter for a Sunday afternoon. So what are your most expensive gear related mistakes?

My top three have been:

1.      Buying new

2.      Complete schoolboy error: I got a 7 bass rack to replace my 5 bass rack. Ok so no biggie you may think? But, and here's the thing, I didn't try very hard to shift my 5 bass rack.. So I now have storage capacity for up to 12 basses – doh! I've since discovered there's a not-well-publicised law of music that:

The number of basses owned by a dyed-in-the-wool bass player inevitably expands to fill the rack space available.

3.      Speaking to @ped et al about Ken Smith basses…Ok, that's not technically been a 'mistake' just expensive 😂

[jrixn1]

Joining basschat.

[ped]

Launching Basschat

[Beedster]

3 minutes ago, jrixn1 said:

Joining basschat.

Ha ha, fair point, although if I hadn't, I would still be playing a crap MIJ Jazz through a Peavey TNT combo, which would have been a far greater mistake. 

 

[Beedster]

7 minutes ago, ped said:

Launching Basschat

But we love you for it mate

[Al Krow]

42 minutes ago, Beedster said:

Ha ha, fair point, although if I hadn't, I would still be playing a crap MIJ Jazz through a Peavey TNT combo, which would have been a far greater mistake. 

Yup exactly!  

[Burns-bass]

52 minutes ago, Beedster said:

Ha ha, fair point, although if I hadn't, I would still be playing a crap MIJ Jazz through a Peavey TNT combo, which would have been a far greater mistake. 

 

That was exactly my set up too... TNT130

[TheGreek]

1: Believing that I could get a better tone from a Class D head - you can't, get a Class A/B and strong friends.
2: Looking for "The One" - doesn't exist that's why I/you need more than one bass
3: Thinking that you can get the same Tonal Palette from cheap gear. - you get what you pay for so buy quality gear in the first place.

[Len_derby]

I bought a Boss BR-80 micro recorder that I found totally exasperating. My dumbo brain found it far too fiddly. I've since then made myself a little rule - beware something that has a user manual bigger than the item itself.

I gave the thing away to a young chap who'd got the patience but no money to buy one himself and got a Zoom H2 to replace it. Much better.

[ahpook]

A 1995 Fender Bass VI...

 

[Heathy]

I could say everything in the past 15 years, as my tastes have come full circle. It has been a useful learning experience though, and I have owned some great basses along the way.

[Paul S]

I wouldn't say mine were mistakes, per se - more collateral damage from multiple 'epiphany moments'    Like changing from roundwound strings to flats, back to rounds and now back to flats again.  Going from 4 strings to 5 strings and now having both.  Going from long scale to short scale to medium scale to long scale and now all of them.  All incredibly good experience.  And fun. But I really don't want to think in terms of money spent.

[Lozz196]

1 hour ago, TheGreek said:

1: Believing that I could get a better tone from a Class D head - you can't, get a Class A/B and strong friends.
2: Looking for "The One" - doesn't exist that's why I/you need more than one bass
3: Thinking that you can get the same Tonal Palette from cheap gear. - you get what you pay for so buy quality gear in the first place.

Yup, certainly agree with those Mick. 

[mep]

In the early 90's I bought a new 5 string fretless Stingray. I thought I needed a 5 string, which I didn't, and for some inexplicable reason got a fretless instead. I never really got the best out of it and had to sell it quickly for a huge loss to fund a move abroad. I still haven't bought a 5 string and have done ok with a Hipshot D Tuner instead.

[bassfan]

Buying various signature basses believing they would magically make me sound like Flea!! 😂 

[Steve Browning]

An ex John Entwistle 1961 Precision. The E string was completely dead no matter what I did and with any number of different strings on it.

[Al Krow]

2 minutes ago, bassfan said:

Buying various signature basses believing they would magically make me sound like Flea!! 😂 

But they do! They do! No really they do!! 😁

[Al Krow]

Just now, Steve Browning said:

An ex John Entwistle 1961 Precision. The E string was completely dead no matter what I did and with any number of different strings on it.

Aww - that would have been totally gutting! 

[ahpook]

1 hour ago, ahpook said:

A 1995 Fender Bass VI...

 

Thinking about it, my 2nd expensive mistake is that I still have it

[Hellzero]

Buying fretted basses as I (almost) never play them, being a fretless guy.

But the worse was getting into (truckloads of) vintage instruments as these are not better ones, but certainly way more expensive, for sure. Thankfully, I always got my money back, and learned so much about vintage gear that, now, I know that most of them are fake ones... Sad but true.

Edited September 29, 2019 by Hellzero

[phil.c60]

16 minutes ago, Steve Browning said:

An ex John Entwistle 1961 Precision. The E string was completely dead no matter what I did and with any number of different strings on it.

Hopefully you won't get fooled again.

[Burns-bass]

51 minutes ago, Hellzero said:

Buying fretted basses as I (almost) never play them, being a fretless guy.

But the worse was getting into (truckloads of) vintage instruments as these are not better ones, but certainly way more expensive, for sure. Thankfully, I always got my money back, and learned so much about vintage gear that, now, I know that most of them are fake ones... Sad but true.

I had the same. 

People will laugh me out of the forum when I say that the Mexican standard jazz I picked up earlier this year sounds and plays better than every other vintage bass I’ve ever owned aside from a totally original 64 I sold on here (which was incredible on every way) and the 66 I still own.

I’ve never lost money on any bass to date, but the time I spent messing around with dusty old Fenders could have been much better spent!

[bassbiscuits]

1. Believing that buying stupidly expensive gear would make me play better. 

2. Buying amps/cabs that sound great but are too big to carry. 

3. Taking over 20 years to figure out 1&2....

[lurksalot]

Monetarily , spending too much on guitars I hadn’t tried before I pulled the trigger.

time wise, persevering with trying workarounds with old kit , it’s great when it pans out , but now I just buy new kit that works 

 

[machinehead]

One of my expensive mistakes was buying a very expensive Avalon acoustic guitar.  I didn't need it, already had a good acoustic (bought new in 1979), didn't play it and ended up giving it to my brother who was looking to upgrade his acoustic guitar.

So 100% loss there then. 😀

Frank.