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We have Summerfest here in Milwaukee, world's largest music festival. The music industry has changed a lot since 1985. Summerfest is not the festival it used to be. How has Glastonbury changed since it started. Daryl

TL;DR - it works but needs some extra bits to work with certain basses with recessed sockets, eg Ibanez SR series.

New gadget day. Mentioned recently in a topic about changing batteries, it didn't seem ridiculously expensive and I thought I'd get one and give it a try. It seems it's only available from Thomann at the moment, so I felt obliged to buy something else (an sE V7 microphone, as it happens) to slightly reduce the pain of the £10 shipping. I've very recently bought an OLP Tony Levin, and the battery in it was a non-name brand of indeterminate age which was still able to make the preamp work. I left that battery in so I'd have a reasonable test subject, along with the other basses I have knocking about. First thigs first, I put in a new Procell 9V battery and checked the self-test, which was fine. The first volunteer for testing was an Antoniotsai dragon bass which showed a healthy 9.06V and 404 hours of playing left. Then I went for the Tony Levin, and that was 6.6V and showed LO. The Sei Jazz BC bike was a little under 9V with 240 hours remaining, the Sei Flamboyant 5 was rather lower and only 36 hours remaining. I wanted to try it on a Variax but either the socket is recessed a tiny bit too far or the switching is done by means other than shorting ring and sleeve. That did make me wonder about recessed sockets, so I tried an Ibanez SRF705 which I think has the same recessed socket as all the SR range, and that also didn't work. I need to make up a short stereo jack extension lead to test recessed socket basses, or get a stereo coupler and use a stereo jack-jack lead with at least one straight jack. My one and only 18V bass showed 10.2V, as expected. So it's an effective measuring device but with a minor design flaw. And I've got two basses (at least) to replace batteries on.

Come Tomorrow - Manfred Mann

Sold a strap to Tom recently, nice and straightforward, another excellent basschatter. Deal with confidence.

I've never heard of Turnstile but, considering the last two "future of metal" bands I was told about were Linkin Park and Sleep Token, I reckon I'll give them a miss 😆

I’ve had pretty much the full range from Squier Affinity up to Fender US Deluxe/Ultra. All were perfectly good, and imo ascended up to the US made ones. The Deluxe/Ultra, great basses they were, were imo Deluxe/Ultra due to the added active circuitry which I didn’t really use, so the peak for me was the US Standards. So if I had £1000/£1500 available to spend on a Fender I’d put the money to a US Standard, my fave range of those being the 2013-16 ones with Custom Shop pickups. Sure I could get a Mex Player or Vintera and change pickups and have a great bass, but for me the US Standards are the best. I’ve briefly played Custom Shop Fenders - a Precision and a Strat - and they were easily the best instruments I’ve ever played, though I don’t think I’d ever shell out that amount on an instrument.

It's extremely rude. Daryl

I was hoping you'd tell me what it was 😂 Dave

Not seen much from you recent months @martthebass All well i hope. Is your singer also a leftie guitarist. Must be a Glam thing. Ours too. Dave

Yesterday - Beetlez

You really have to treat the various mass produced Fenders the same way per model/series, in that you really need to try before you buy. You can usually find one diamond in a batch of 10-20. I've owned a lot over the years, and currently have a 2018 American Original Jazz, 2012 FSR Limited Edition Hand Stained Jazz & a 2016 American Elite Jazz, with a couple of Mex/USA Mustangs as well. Generally speaking, the current higher end Mexican ranges (Vintera II & Player II Modified) are very good. They really seem to have bumped up quality a lot at the Enchilada plant. The American Standard/Professional series seems to go in two steps per series - the 2008s were great, whereas the updated 2012s with the custom shop pickups were a bit meh. The 2016 American Pros were great and the later Pro II less so. They seem to have a habit of making something great that appeals to the pros and then dumbing it down a bit to appeal to more players. (Obviously they're there to sell as many instruments as possible!) In my own personal opinion, the peak for the 'Deluxe/Elite/Ultra' line was between the 2010 Deluxe (with N3 pickups) and the 2016 Elite. The Ultra models produced since are showing signs of production cost cutting, with a return to the cheaper neck construction with the skunk stripe at the back and top loaded truss rod. You'll have to ask someone else about the Custom Shop offerings. I have no experience. So yes, I do believe that you do benefit from the higher up ranges, but they are getting very expensive now and musicians' earnings aren't keeping up.

I have locking Neutrik jack sockets on my basses - I found a rubber lined pipe clamp of just the right size that holds the socket nice and firm. Happy to send you a clamp in the post in you like?