Leaderboard

Meet the new range, same as the old range...

Adrian Maruszczyk must laugh his socks off whenever Fender come out with an updated range & price list...

F**k Rock, F**k Roll

So... skimming through today's threads we learn that you're probably best off with an old Peavey TNT combo and a used Fender bass. Hooray! Ten years of membership to find the best gear was totally worth It!

Boring.

Okay, okay so plenty of head shaking from the experts and the knowledgeable, but I just discovered Chuck Rainey. I'm learning Rock Steady by Aretha for an audition and have steadily fallen in love with the extraordinarily splendid bass line. So I do a little research and discover that I probably haven't just discovered him as he has played on so much. I have actually been listening to him for quite some time, notably with King Curtis. I just didn't know who he was. The riff to the song is a joyous thing, rhythmically perfect, and perfectly repetitive with some little unexpected flashes. He then breaks into a few bars of pure inspiration before settling back onto the groove. Yum. It's beautiful. A little more research and I find he played with Steely Dan who were of course one of Bruce Thomas favourite bands and Bruce has always been my biggest influence. So there we go. Anyone familiar with Chuck's work who'd care to point me at other of his gems would render me eternally grateful.

As a bass player, I don't give anyone playing solo bass a second thought, either.

Fender really need to start looking at what other builders are doing. The likes of Maruszczyk, Sandberg, Lull, Sadowsky, Moolon...the list of builders who seem to make better Fenders than Fender themselves at competitive price points is as long as my arm. There’s little incentive for many of us to buy a brand new Fender and the sale of used models obviously brings no new revenue in for the company. Out of interest, anyone know how Fender are doing, financially?

Today's word is 'grandmotherable'. You win the internet.

If the title wasn't "new range" you could be forgiven for not realising

Lake Placid Blue! Yay! ..and tort. Wut?

Judging by the video I don't think he is!

-

You could look at it another way... I'm assuming that you and the guitarist don't sing. Find a singer or maybe a singer songwriter and be their backing. Get some gigs doing acoustic sets. If you do sing, don't look for a singer, but do the acoustic sets! Then get a drummer. Then do bigger gigs. Open mic nights can be good to polish things and inject some momentum and urgency to rehearsal, if there's something to aim for people pull their socks up. Did it myself where there was a singer and guitarist who were flatmates, I played bass for them and we did some open mics while looking for a drummer. A good drummer will want to know you're moving in some direction and not being yet another load of dreamers, so it helps.

I understand your smugness. I was getting remarks along the same lines after a bee-sting to the scrote at a naturist campsite years ago.

That's the Spirit. Oh teehee back at you.

Hi all, done a few transcriptions over the last couple of years so thought I'd start sharing them with you all here, before I get my own website up and running. I'll be doing some playalongs of some of these tracks in the not too distant future also. Hope they are of some use to you. Countdown to Ecstasy and Pretzel Logic are also done, just proof-reading and layout to do, so expect them soon! Cheers https://drive.google.com/open?id=17WeLSNw4fCnT6vLav75e0Nr0f0iXx6IB

I was playing in a club in Banbury last Saturday. We played Mustang Sally. and yes, I was playing a Fender Precision.

He’s an incredible player. Deep, rich and with a tone to die for. And an absolute monster when he needs to be too, but it’s all about the groove. Anyone who was booked by Steely Dan must have been a fantastic technician and a superlative sightreader. Oh, and he’s the author of one of the best instructional books for bass.

Have a listen to Reverend Lee by Roberta Flack. Lovely playing.

I'm far too polite to say that your talking out of your derrière 😆 but..... Boutique bass builders by their very nature are low volume & aren't chasing mass sales. I bet a boutique builders profit margins would make Fenders accountants weep though... I don't know how you can measure or even estimate the equating 'the' bass guitar to Fender. I've been a player for 30 years & all I know is that I've never done that. It's a brand, one of many, full stop. If your bass tone is good or what's required in a 'real world' situation, then no matter what you play no-ones going to complain. There are many basses that can do that comfortably as well as & sometimes better than Fender. Wouldn't all basses costing as much as these sound as good? Is there really a duff bass brand at the £1500 - £2000 mark these days? Brand an Industry standard? Once perhaps, but not these days. Again there's too many others to choose from. The standard might well be (or not in fact!) a P or a J, but there's a other brands to choose from with more aesthetic originality or better price vs quality. And there's many a player that would rather play say Warwick, Yamaha, Musicman or a G&L instead. I (& many others I'm sure) would not see a Fender bass as an essential tool to be taken seriously as a player. There's many a factor, both instrument & otherwise, that make up you as a good bass playing candidate. If someone was judging you highly by the presence of a Fender or not, I'd be walking away from them at very high speed! Fender's better at keeping value? - no chance! Market forces of supply & demand & the same old, same old models are factors here. Yes, plenty of new Fenders have sold over the years, which also means there is plenty of used instruments to choose from. Plentiful supply however equals lower prices on anything, & there's not much to differentiate many a P or a J is there so buyers have plenty of choice (proper vintage instruments excepted). My own recent experience? A 2014 Jazz Deluxe (top production model of it's time mind) with a new price of circa £1600, I picked up last year in excellent condition for £950. Then sold I'd for £900 a few months later. Pretty typical & poor asset value retention - certainly not better than other brands. Please don't change your mind - it's good to have an opinion you believe in. But a flip side if you like, for contemplation!

And better than me too. Which is why I'm going to be making a pilgrimage to SE London...

The LPB 60s P bass has me going all weak at the knees.... a few months of wear on that and I'll be in heaven...

To keep a level head

FRFR= Full Range Flat Response

Full Range, Flat Response

Think there's one on there from some minger though........

That's Paul Turner's Alleva Coppolo. Olympic white, so just the lighting giving the impression it's yellow... and boy can he play it!

One band I play with does a cover of Days by the Kinks, and I always end it with a two note root-third chord. I'm so proud of myself. My one and only chord!! I've been playing 7 years now and I'm really getting flashy

Didn't know Russell Bland was a bass player.

I await the sound samples of your 12 string emulation. If only any of us had known that the rich, textural properties of a niche instrument could be replicated with 3 stompboxes...

Now i'm gonna laugh. Always thought motorbikes were dangerous. Should i reinforce that you should always cover your head while riding a bike. Dave

I think my Ashton 410 had these - part of the lower end Tru-vox / TF series and they worked great in that too. They haven't got an exceptional spec but there's something pretty sweet sounding about them.

Good call, me too. It’s sat up my mates barn, still going strong despite many winters and not being looked after. Bomb proof too!

This one?

So many people DESTROYING ROCK AND ROLL. You BARSTEWARDS.

Looks a bit like the Sue Ryder basses that were going around a few years ago!

Not the usual sort of thing that I post, but as it's January I've been thinking a lot about how to get the most out of practising and realised that there's not much point putting in the hours if you can't focus in the first place: There's a more detailed rundown of all the books, apps and strategies mentioned in the video HERE The site has had a facelift and been transferred to a new server, so things should be looking better and running more smoothly than before. New transcriptions on the way next week...

A used sealed abm go for nice low prices....i found it had that nice sealed cab mid punch

I had one made up for mine by OBBM...

https://ritter-instruments.com/blog/

TI flats. They just seem to improve with age and I love the floppy feeling that many others hate. Frank.

No probs Nance. We'll do tea / coffee / chinwag etc

7:29am... maybe I was getting ready to catch the train...

Hmmm, that makes sense of something I’ve been pondering. Way way back, I recall being off work with a virus and veg-Ing in front of daytime telly. I remember seeing a Wal bass on (probably) Lorraine. Gareth Gates was trying to make a comeback and was doing his latest single backed by a “himbo” backing band who barely knew which end of their instruments they were holding. Except that “bass player” was “playing” a banana yellow Mk 1 Wal bass. I often wondered whether it really WAS and actual a real bass player or just a male model and, if the latter, where the yellow Wal had come from/gone to. I suspect we now know the answer. What’s the betting Gates’ management/stylists popped down to the West End and Camden and rented some telegenic instruments for the hired totty to “play”. If they’d gone into The Gallery and seen that bass hanging on the wall it would have screamed TV bass”! Never have managed to find a YouTube clip of that performance. Back to the bass itself, I love that the yellow uses a white undercoat to enhance its brightness. Garish but in a lovely way!

I'm sure that bass was in the Gallery once, many years ago. I'm sure I remember playing it, unless there's more than one that colour, which I would've thought unlikely.

Made simple video last night with the PRO and man does that bass play nice! incredible low action without buzz......