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After much trying out and research, I’ve finally sorted out my small rig. It’s unbelievable that this little lot ( Aguilar AG 700 and a Barefaced One 10) can produce the sounds that it does in such a lightweight package. Rehearsal tomorrow night should be fun!

My Maruszczyk Jake was based on the specs of a Duck Dunn I had blocked and bound neck matching headstock I decided against a jazz pickup at the bass , this comes in at around 7.5 lbs , I've had several laklands Dj , Bob Glaub , and loved them however I now have 2 Jakes and they are at least the equal if not better than the laklands , i had the bass pictured below up for sale I have since come to my senses and removed it

I'm glad he's managed it saw the announcement today. Although, as dingwalls are already quirkily shaped seeing it in lefty REALLY sent my head spinning

No but I got him to stop gigging with a Les Paul which is almost as good!!

If you just want 30w in a bedroom, a Fender Rumble is brilliant and good value. the Roland series of Bass Cubes are awesome too.

I wouldn't be too happy if I had to spend a whole gig with my foot gaffer taped to a cymbal stand!

Update o'clock: Posted the pics on my fave MIJ FB group and after lots of (occasionally heated & fractious) discussion, it's been established that the serial number & neckplate style is a dead-on match for Tokai. This is from a 1980 JB-65N: This seems to be the standard format Tokai used on their replica-level Fender copies & it's interesting to find that they were presumably building slightly more modestly-specced off-brand instruments simultaneously. There aren't any other 100% match components as far as I can see, although the tuners (which I'd say have distinctively large backplates) are quite similar. Here's the link to the full listing: https://reverb.com/item/3703632-1980-tokai-jazz-sound-bass-very-rare-natural-finish-birdseye-maple-neck-custom-shop-quality so @steviedee, looks like you got a vintage Tokai for £75. Not jealous or anything...

Team work folks!! Following correspondence with Andy and the seller I managed to pick this up at the £525 price. Andy's agreed to pick it up tomorrow once he's agreed a time with the seller. Bit of a steal? So much for downsizing, eh..

Just sold Phil a Fender cab. Really nice guy, super easy to deal with. Instant payment, great comms throughout. Even met up in the luxurious surroundings of a Sainsbury's car park to seal the deal! Thanks again Phil, hope to catch your band sometime!

If you have an audio interface, then you should be able to write a simple beat - or set up a loop - and record some bass to it within your first hour with any DAW (certainly using YouTube tutorials). If not, then you’re probably not using the right DAW for you. And you won’t discover that unless you demo a few and try. But yeah, it’s a cyclical discussion that comes back to Reaper because it’s the cheapest DAW for people to ‘dip their toes with’. I suppose I’m just more of a tart ‘cos I enjoyed playing the field before finding my sweetheart

Just to clarify, I’m not the horse referred to in the OP’s title....👍

Well I've just taken advantage of the 20% - thanks to the BC community for that! Ticket booked for Saturday 3rd - see you all there...

So what do Slipknot use? A Johnson?

This one actually looks pretty good, but generally I think they're tasteless, tacky and a right pain in the bum. There, I've said it. An insert for the kick drum works OK though, there's nothing worse than pics of your band playing with some other band's name on the kick. That is, if you're on a multi-bill and there's just the one kit.

Phil bought a cab from me. All as it should be. Recommended

According to info in another thread, no.

we use a couple of pull up banners for quick get in gigs and a proper printed fire certificated one, which is great for more established venues that require the proper paperwork the pull ups were £23 each and the full cert one was about £220 i think, the print quality on that one is superb, its just set up at our rehearsal place in the pic. overall i think they were both good purchases.

there is a new thread elsewhere on this site about the new Sire Marcus Miller V3 - the 4 string is priced at £238. That would be a stunning first bass for any player.

Cheers McNach that explains it and i get what you mean. Had a wee listen to some of your bands there. Nice rounded tone with URANG MATANG. Bands sound tight and looks like all having fun. Dave

To me the semiparametric mids on the D800+ is a nice touch but I didn't need it. I found the D800 nice, but a little 'dark'. The D800+ has a 'bright' switch which stays on permanently in mine and gives it a character that I like a lot, before I touch the EQ. Turning up treble on the D800 just wasn't doing it. Now, the D800+ has a built-in adjustable High Pass Filter, which is its secret weapon, to me. The thing I love the most about the D800+ is that I can get fat, well defined lows without being boomy/overpowering. Playing a little with the voicing and HPF controls, and adjusting the bass EQ gets me a really nice sound easily. I cannot describe it better than that... The D800 was ok for me but didn't give me GAS. I am very happy with the D800+, however.

One thing I did find with my last band, was that no one wanted to buy demo's, but they bought band merchandise. In fact, we made more from selling merchandise than anything else. Gigs didn't pay well (if at all), even low priced demo CD's didn't sell well (though we did shift quite a few at gigs). It is definitely worthwhile getting a batch of 100 t-shirts printed up to take to gigs, as well as a bunch of demo CD's.

Reaper is extremely capable as long as you get on with the workflow you'll be just fine. At these levels we're talking about a preference in how you work rather than quality IMHO (unless you move into ProTools HD territory which is a whole different realm)

Yes, definitely. When I was talking to him, 18 months ago, I banged on (and whined!) about the non-existence of lefty Dingwalls, and he said that he wanted to produce some, but that would imply getting entirely new tools for most tasks, so he would start production once the company's finances allowed it. I take it as a good sign, then, that he's done it. I'm seriously thinking of killing my GAS forever by buying one!

A Stagg sounds perfect to me for what you want, I still think the Stagg is good if you want to move onto an acoustic upright later as the neck is fairly deep and the finger board arched, a fretless bass on it's end it ain't!

Another warning about Lakkie weights; I've owned a few Lakland Skylines (JO BG DJ) and NONE have been 9lb (never mind less), most have clocked in closer/beyond 10lb. I've heard multiple people say they've had uberlight Lakkies (particularly DJ models) but not one has been able to put them on digital scales and post a pic! Oh and tread very warily of the seller who says that it is 'the lightest P bass they've ever played' (they've only played 1) or that the bathroom scales read less than 9lb... I've got the T shirt for those replies!

I used some cheap short to medium bungee cords to hook ours with. The fact they stretch a little takes up any slack in the banner too.

8.5lbs is pretty light, and Skyline's aren't renowned for their light weight. *WARNING: WoT'S PREDICTABLE STANDARD RESPONSE ALERT* For the thick end of a grand you could pick up a nice light Maruszczyk Jake. Like this one: https://www.public-peace.de/bass-guitars/maruszczyk/jake/4-string/515-jake-4p-heavy-aged-classic140400

On a serious note, I do think it`s down to the specific instrument, not the year it was made. I had three 70s Precisions, a 77 in white/rosewood, and two 78s in black/maple. One of the 78s weighed 10+ lbs and sounded amazing, the most aggressive Precision I've ever played, I nicknamed it Ian Paisley as it barked at you (so it did). The other 78 weighed about 8lbs, sounded fine, as did the 77 which was about 10.5lbs. Major different weights of supposedly the same build-materials, and radically different sound from one of them. And a mate has a white/rosewood 77 that weighs 13lbs! Just like in The Life of Brian, they are all individuals.

please bring the 'Axe'!

Who'd have thought the first Barefaced cab I'd see without the obligatory amp overhang either side would be the smallest cab they make!

But I can assure you I was smiling when I typed it.

Thanks for the welcome! I am indeed - an underrated classic!

Loving the simplicity and the body colour with the maple board is just great.

Agree with the thoughts on trying out as many as possible in music shops, but also check out as many bands as possible to see which instruments you like the sound of in a live mix. Yes, many of those may be over budget, but if every time you see someone playing a Jazz bass you like the sound of it more than any others that`s also giving you a lead to which instruments to pay more attention to.

I can tell you for sure, that the Subway 15s are awesome cabs. They perform just as well as my old Diesel 2x15 and I don't say that lightly. I have used them with all 3 of my Mesa amps and they have got all the presence without the weight. I confess I was very pleasantly surprised. Unhappily they are about 250 quid more now than when I got mine. I know it's a trek but you're welcome to give them a go if you want to try before you buy.

Hey Roger - have you A/B'd the Mesa cabs with some of the more modern high end gear e.g. BF or Vanderkley? As you say Mesa was mega 'many years back' but I think these newer kids on the block have more than caught up with Mesa, Aguilar etc on the cab front and are definitely worth checking out, particularly as they are both less expensive and way less heavy. All three will be a step up from the Markbass traveller cabs (I have a LM3 + 121H cab housed in a AC 121 Lite combo package) but you would hope that would be the case if you are paying two to three times as much for a cab, right?! In terms of your rig set up, well that's going to be very much down to your personal taste methinks. I would pair a 1x15 (or even a 1x12) with a 2x10 over two 1x15s simply because I prefer the punchiness of 12s and 10s over 15s (and I do disagree with the 'experts' who say that a properly set up 1x15 is no different to a 1x10 with comparable drivers, other than the surface area of air shifted...if that argument was taken to its logical conclusion you'd end up trying to argue that a 1x20 was the same 1x5 speaker, which is patently nonsense).

Will do, timing was never a strong point, despite playing bass!

yes my thoughts exactly

Saxondale - you just cannot go far wrong with either of the Ibanez's at this price point. Great basses for the money. I'm sure you'll get loads of other great advice here, including Squier's etc. It is actually not easy to buy a dud at any price nowadays...which great for first time buyers!

I had a Vintage V900 which the neck is very similar to an Ibanez and I just couldn’t get on with so I got a P bass instead and it felt so much more comfortable to me But I’m sure you’ll have loads of other recommendations of other people

Listen to this (two minutes in, but there's plenty of good bass during that time) and then say that!

GAK and Andertons also got the Sunburst VP. (They got 'em in yesterday.) Andertons probably the best place to drop the £499 if you don't want to wait for the White and Ebony models. The "free" accessory pack includes a Roksak TB gig bag, worth 30 or so squid.... Epiphone Thunderbird Vintage Pro Bass in Vintage Sunburst @ Andertons

I brought this beauty last year, it is a 2016 CS 62 Precision, it is, for me, the perfect Precision bass, I couldn't really afford to shell out for a genuine 62 Precision and even if I did I would be reluctant to take it out and gig it so this whilst still pricey is the best of both worlds for me, that said I also own a sunburst Road worn Precision and whilst the colours are less vibrant on the Road worn playability, weight and sound wise there is definitely not a couple of thousand pounds difference between the two

Something I'll never need again is a comb. Does that count?

There seems to be a strain of nostalgia (especially among the English) that there was once a golden age when things were better. Luckily we don't apply that to medicine! 😄

My latest attempt In progress

No? Really? Awww... buzzkill. I agree with the post above: compression threads have a tendency to get weird, which is weird in itself. Visit a studio engineers’ forum and you’ll find pages and pages of discussion about “which compressor is best for bass?” (ad nauseum). In that arena, bass and compression go together like beer and crisps. But talk to bass players themselves and it’s as though compression is some kind of dark art, a taboo. I’ve never understood this and just feel that many of you guys are missing out on a great tool that every bass player should understand and have in their ‘toolbox’. It’s really nothing to be afraid of

I went short scale 18 months ago because of neck and arm problems. I have 3 short scale (30") basses, and they have noticeably different playing characteristics. This is mainly because of the position of the neck relative to the body. See Photos. In photo 1, left to right, Lakland hollowbody short scale, Fender MIJ Mustang, Harley Benton Shorty. Notice the different bridge positions relative to the end of the body for each bass. The Lakland's neck projects quite a lot further to my left when I'm playing. It feels much more like a 34" scale bass as a result. The Mustang has a thin, skinny neck which brings my left hand closer in. The HBS brings my left hand even closer in, plus it has a small body, making it feel quite dinky relative to the other two. Howeber, it has the widest neck. See relative nut positions in side-on photos, and see how much "longer" the Lakland neck is. Kev - don't know where you're based, but you're welcome to pop round anytime to try these basses out for size.

Phil bought a stupidly big bass amp from me. An absolute pleasure to deal with; sorry about the mad house when you came to collect!

Remove its four screws and slide the head out of the rack. A sticker with the exact manufacture date and signature of the QC worker should be on the main circuit board. Cheers