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Both are preamp replica, the builder(a friend from oriental, he is now working on noble which will included the input transformer)..made some changes based on the original design and switch to high end components. On the left is based on inner bamboo b-ii And the right .. yea the bp1c.

Recently purchased this: Its ostensibly designed for guitar, but with the dry blend it works great on bass. Its a subtle, textural drive, which is exactly what I want.

Bloodhound Gang... Saw them live YEARS ago, Evil Jared (bassist) threw up into Jimmy Pop's (singer) mouth after drinking a whole bottle of Jagermister through a funnel.

I'm sure your right Trevor. The only thing that elevates the value of this bass is the idea that because it's been played on an important hit records that makes it worth more money. That "specialness" is a bit of an unstable commodity, as you quite rightly point out. All I can say is that, despite loving that song and my respect for Horace Panter as a musician, to me all that adds absolutely zero to the amount I would pay for this bass, if in fact I liked it, which I don't. I have never subscribed to the idea that an instrument is more worth owning because a famous pro player has owned it previously. Exactly the opposite, in fact. I'd rather have a nice new bass that only I have played.

@kuetsum - what is it?! who's made it?

100%.

Very happy with my pool man bp1c and b-ii Wonder if anyone near Buckinghamshire have the real unit. so we can do a a-b comparison.

Much appreciated @Bassassin and interestingly I live about 7 miles from Glasgow and purchased it in Glasgow lol. I'll clean her up and give it a good setup and see how it plays and how it sounds as I haven't even plugged her in yet.

If it was the bass he used to record Ghost Town then its worth a lot of money to a lot of Gen X bassplayers who will now be in their prime of purchasing power. But I'd say in the next 10 years it won't be. Probably the top of the market right now.

GH I’d full of quirky stuff. If you’re considering bidding I’d encourage you to get a full condition report or (even better) to go and visit. The chap their (Luke) is really nice and you get a lot of opportunities to see the items, unless they’re super expensive stuff like the 50s or 60s Strats that are locked away. Sometimes the descriptions aren’t always incredibly accurate. I bought one bass there described as in excellent condition with lots of corrosion. I’d been to see it so I knew what I was buying. When you’re dealing with thousands of items (which they do) it’s understandable and it’s not a criticism.

There is nothing new about retail therapy , it’s just got a whole lot sophisticated in the last 10 ish years . Even in post war Britain , people would get a certain glow from buying new goods , new appliances , new clothes . I am just as guilty of buying stuff to get that warm fuzzy hit of new stuff arriving on the doorstep . it was particularly bad during the photography phase when film was king , big bucks on big lenses / bodies / motor drives . Thank goodness digital killed that off . If the equipment that is bought is used and appreciated ,all well and good . I generally use most of the gear I buy , so your not chucking money down the drain . Buying is just too easy . back in the pre internet days , you trawled the classifieds in NME / MM papers and made the journey to London to buy the instrument in question , now we just press the buy button from the comfort of your sofa . Eventually you hit the point when you realise buying one more guitar does not make you a better player , it just means you have one more guitar .

I’m spoiled with the Wombtone Billy Strings: it’s silent.

Well - this is interesting. Firstly, 'Custom' was a Netherlands importer brand, I think for a specific retailer - somebody on one of the Facebook MIJ guitars groups found the name but it's slipped my mind, annoyingly. They sourced from a number of different manufacturers including Moridaira, Matsumoku & Chushin - so they probably just bought in whatever their supplier had, rather than contracting to specific manufacturers. Customs turn up in the UK pretty regularly, very often in Scotland, which has led to some speculation a Scottish retailer was bringing excess stock over from the Netherlands - no evidence as yet but no-one would be surprised if it turned out to be the very entrepreneurial Jimmy Grant, who had Glasgow & Edinburgh Grant Music shops, his own range of Grant guitars (with UK distribution) & was also UK importer/distributor for Canadian hand-made Odyssey guitars & basses in the 70s & 80s. As for the bass itself - that's really interesting - and this is why: Had this back in 2011, and I could never pin down what it was. This had a plain, oddly home-made looking neckplate & the body was a not-quite right P shape. Came with no hardware, and I pretty much concluded it was likely European, not MIJ, based on the Eko-esque inlay patterns. I have never seen the same neck before today. I think the finish had been stripped under the rattlecan black & it had no hardware or electronics to help ID it - but seeing @Shabbs's pics I'm confident it's the same bass. No logo on mine, the head having been stripped & re-finished, probably with Ronseal! I'll speculate & say this might have come from an organisation called Matsumoto Gakki Seizou Kumiai, the Matsumoto City instrument manufacturers' co-operative. They bought in bodies, necks, electronics & parts from various small manufacturers & assembled instruments from an order-book system, where a customer would choose necks, bodies & parts, and instruments would be built up & branded to their specifications.

A light snack this evening, the Ben Wolfe part to the Billy Strayhorn tune 'Midnight In Paris' from the 1999 Wynton Marsalis seven-CD box set. 'Live At The Village Vanguard'. Not a massively long chart and not a fast tempo but some nice triplets to think about. https://bilbosbassbites.co.uk/midnight-in-paris-wynton-marsalis-septet/

Well, it's not the bass I thought it was, ie the sunburst/rosewood early '70's Precision he used in the early days of The Specials. Obviously a refinish ect. What would this bass be worth in a private sale? I would say about five grand, maybe six to a fan of the band. What would it be worth without the provenance? About four grand, may a bit less. If this bass sells for the estimate or anything near it I really don't see it as a good investment. Ghost Town was a great record, but that isn't enough to turn this bass into a holy relic worth twenty grand. As a general rule of thumb, whenever the phrase "Your chance to own a piece of history" gets bandied about, that is your cue to put your wallet away and let the rational bit of your brain take control for a while. In reality sales like these are actually your chance to subside someone else's retirement by indulging in spurious nostalgia about things that are no longer important and definitely not worth paying for.