NBD - La Reunion

[p4ul]

My 1st propper serious purchase for a good long while and so, Let me tell you a potted histooooooooooory.

It's the 70's and we are all punks, just plug and play!

 I hated being the bass player for a long while, but being the youngest, all the cool instruments were taken by the big kids.

I hated that effing Columbus.. but the selmer bass amp in Croc skin I would like back now please. thank you.

I had to sneak into our 1st gig round the back door and played behind the drummer... I was 11 years old.

The other guys told the promoter I had dwarfism.. I feces you not.

The 70's ended and I could actually play a bit better, and had Larry graham and Boosty fever, then Mark King came along and the Bass Centre in Wapping... what could go wrong!

The 80's were a weird time, I wore chinos, braces and a tie to rehearsals..5 years before that it was leathers and a red mohawk.

It was the summer of 82, and brought my 1st real 4 string.. A Red Vigier Arpege serial 002.

SH from Coda music for about £500 iirc [deal of the decade] Slapped the actual feces out of the 80's..... and then...

The 90's happened, and things went from baggy to grunge and i swapped, yes swapped the Beautiful Vigier for........

A beat up Hofner a SH Gibson LP mk1 and a 1975 Orange super bass with matching 4x12 [deal of the decade 2]

P-Funk, Nirvana and Ledzep ahoy!

Start your own recording studio Ahoy!

Bands and music! ROCK AND ROLL! and right on cue - I lost my mind.

Then after some r and rehabilitation

Some real  life feces happened and I ended up on skid row playing percussion on a 1999 Hammerlin wheel barrow for money...

Its now 4 kids and 30 odd  years later I still have the 92 Gibson and the 63 Hof, and I decided that playing the bass was way better than not.

So I got match fit and began to play in bands with drums again last year.

All the time thinking of the beautiful Vigier.....The gibbo is good, but she is no lady.

Joined Bass chat 2018 spent a ton of money on pedals...

All the time thinking of the beautiful Vigier... some real beauties came up, all too pricey, all too graphity or new and none red enough... 😞

Then miracle of miracles! 

 

needless to say, i was skint... but as luck would have it my very great friend who is richer than I [and wearing the hat in picture 2] became my saviour.

And now after driving for hours in the wind and rain, braving the plague-19..

I am the very proud and smiley owner of Red Vigier Arpege 126...and original case, one owner from new a Mr Theo Scipio [google him]

Gaze upon her! ..................... Gaaaaaaaaaaaze! ♥️♥️

Simply Glorious..

 

TLDR?

 

After looking for 2 years, I brought an epic bass from an epic dude.

 

Edited December 23, 2022 by p4ul
dyslexia

[Drax]

Funny how finding these lumps of wood, metal and plastic can mean so much to us. Your back story and pics do one of the best jobs I’ve seen on here for a long time in bringing this journey to life.
 

Some people think buying basses is a matter of life and death, I assure you it’s much more serious than that  
 

[Mastodon2]

Going from a Vigier to a Höfner and a Gibson must have been a massive come down. Glad you found your way back to a Vigier in the end though!

[grayn]

Great story, great bass.

Congrats.

[ped]

Congratulations I'm glad it went to such a great home! So tell me, did you try other wheelbarrows before settling on the classic '99 Haemmerlin?

[White Cloud]

Fantastic tale... Loved it! 

Also love your new Vigier Arpege. Congratulations. Can't believe you owned no 2 back in the day. Incredible basses.

[p4ul]

6 hours ago, ped said:

Congratulations I'm glad it went to such a great home! So tell me, did you try other wheelbarrows before settling on the classic '99 Haemmerlin?

quite a few... however, if you really need that tone... its got to be a mid to late 90's Haemmerlin..

 

[p4ul]

5 hours ago, White Cloud said:

Fantastic tale... Loved it! 

Also love your new Vigier Arpege. Congratulations. Can't believe you owned no 2 back in the day. Incredible basses.

Thanks, and what is even weirder, is why was it PX'd in Coda Music in Stevenage? how on earth did it end up there.....

[p4ul]

"I hated that effing Columbus.. but the selmer bass twin in Croc skin I would like back now please. thank you"

And in an incredible twist of fate, my original Crocbeast has been found!!

Brought by my dad in ~1976 at a school auction in Knebworth for £5 earth pounds and allegedly donated by Henry Cobbold of Knebworth Festival fame, and moreover, left behind after their stint at Kfest with a bunch of other stinky poo by none other than The Pink Floyd in 1975... The Amp was rediscovered buried in a mates loft this year..

How it got there, why it was there, no one can remember.  It is at the menders right now, as my mate rightly said when I went all teary eyed, "nope; you will just plug it in and kill yourself, I am going to get it checked out 1st"

Now I am looking for a suitable cab to plop under her as the massive chipboard 1x18 blobjob my dad made me having been long turned to weetabix... will post pics when I have my grubby mitts on her again.

[p4ul]

And I still cant quite believe I still own this little crocstar.. having lost basses and amps and tons of other shite over the 43 years i have been playing.. played my mates 73 jazz through it last night, 1st time I lit it up since at least 2002, and before that I think the last person to use it was guitar legend Link Wray when we were recording his “Shadow Man” album. Life is weird, no doubt.