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Finally managed to get round to posting this. So happy to have one of these again.

A very early (judging by the serial number) Roland Cube bass 60. Made in Japan. Think this is from first production year as the serial is only 4 digits long out of eight. All works, and I can't believe how great it sounds. Even handles the low B on my EUB 5 string. It's not light and it's been seriously gigged but the original tolex is in fabulous condition for what must be 45 years old. Not sure , but I assume it's the original 12" in there. Sounds incredible.

3leaf Trifecta complete! Doom2 in Aurora Pink just arrived. My synth dream is satisfied.

Became the owner of this beautiful Harley Benton mp4-eb in Creme colour today. Changed the strings to my preference of Rotosound Roundwounds and lowered the pickups slightly as they were to hot for my liking but apart from that she turned up in great form. Very easy to play and glide around the fretboard.

Here's my 'triplets'

Honestly, I wouldn't even report a cable to this thread. Having spares is just good practice. Frankly, they're such humdrum, sundry items that I'm surprised it has generated this much chat. Is a cable even "gear"? What next, a plectrum? Also, if you have a cable fetish, or some other compulsion to buy them, then frankly I think you need more help than this little support group can possibly offer

Been away yesterday, so sorry for the late reply @Burns-bass. The body is period correct, some details confirming everything including an extra hole at a certain place and the black painted neck pocket, which was the norm back then for sunburst, but it has been oversprayed. The pickguard has absolutely not shrunken and is not glossy on the back, so is not from that era, but a later one. The controls must be concentric in 1961 and furthermore only the tone control is period correct being a Stackpole from 1961, but it doesn't belong to this bass, so the whole control plate has been changed certainly due to the Jaco syndrome. Solders on the neck pickup are brand new. The neck has also received an overspray and the logo is not original as it should be darker and positioned a bit closer to the nut. Not a fake at all, but there are some non correct elements and an overspray, worth asking for a lower price.

A couple of years ago I bought a Hamer Cruisebass; it was a second year run and came without a scratchplate...always wanted a scratchplated one. Had a short dialogue with Tim at Gig.Ink, got a scan if a plate from a chap in the USA and got one cut. Arrived today. Before and after vanity shots below. I am so happy.

Biased opinion here potentially, being as we sell these AND we are big fans of Hadrien's playing. Massive fans of these basses, they are beautifully made with some of the best setups I have ever played. The necks are thinner in dimensions in terms of the back to front measurement, pretty lightweight and versatile enough tonally

We're not saying that you didn't witness what you witnessed. We're saying the cause of what you witnessed isn't what you think it was. And why would you? Without technical training one cannot be expected to make a diagnosis of why a driver failed. The value of threads like this one is it allows those without technical training to learn from those who do. But one can only lead a horse to water. From there on what happens is up to the horse.

But the list of reasons why one person's experience of gear failing doesn't generalise is huge. If we all bought all of our gear from new, looked after it (no drops, spilled beer, lends to a mate for a gig etc....), didn't modify it, had it routinely checked and maintained by a professional, and stored it in optimal environments, then perhaps there's a case. But many of us buy used gear so have no idea whether any of the above criteria have been breached, and even when bought new we often don't take very good care (at least not as good as we assume we do), adopt routine maintenance etc. So stuff fails, and when it does we tend to draw an ad -hoc hypothesis along the lines "too much power/distortion" etc. The number of amps I've bought used that when taken to a tech - or even when checked over b y me and I'm very far from expert - turn out to have been damaged, modded, poorly repaired, or simply allowed to fall into poor repair, is probably testament to all of the above So when your WEM Dominator (nice unit BTW) went, it could have been the results of so many things other than the volume 👍

We're back out this weekend at The Twisted Pair. 2:00-5:00. Usually I like Sunday afternoon gigs but more in the Summer time and playing outside. Daryl

Some ogle-worthy pics of the bass I just let go - Graft J Type with vintage burst oil finish. Only weighed 3.8kg or thereabouts. Superb bass I got from vmaxblues who bought it new.

Too high - you can get wireless bugs and many effects pedals for that. I would not support a blanket limit of any amount. Better to adjudicate by item type. Or, you know, just stay the f out of shops and online retailers...

Don’t forget that sone of us have designed these products commercially for decades and have a much larger view of the results of “player versus speaker” interactions.

I wonder how much a violin bow costs?

Totally get it. What's fascinating – and reassuring – is the way that the group here can provide insights, experience and opinions that I'd hope any buyer would find useful if they were interested in buying the bass. I've hd ots of help from people on here about basses, double basses, amps and powered speakers that have really helped me.

Nice pink theme there!

NOLA is about the history of the metal music scene in Louisianna. It's mostly around bands including Down, Corrosion Of Conformity, Crowbar, Eyehategod and Acid Bath. An interesting history of where the music comes from, the people and the events. Some of it gets pretty dark

Envelope filter. Lots of two-handed slap (ie, using the fretting hand to make percussive ghost notes in between the thumb slaps, a la Mark King). Mark (TalkingBass) tells you all about it here:

Maybe it’s because my evening plans were ruined by car failure but I am shocked that you would encourage each other into buying cables that aren’t replacing broken cables or removing liability where a salesman encourages a purchase! No wonder you’re all in this group 😂

A very rare shot of us all smiling. Had a good gig last Friday. Might be the last (for a while) with our dep singer, who has such a similar voice to our normal singer that it's like we dont have a dep. As REM say, that's me in the corner (not on bass).

I thought it was forbidden to smile as a bassist, let alone laugh. I’m told I look like I just heard my Mum died when I am playing but I feel quite the opposite inside. I think I need to work on my bass face!

Our first gig this year at The Lookout on the Pier in Scarborough harbour. The weather had improved so apart from some patchy fog the journey was fine. Usual full house of diners with plenty of requests, some of which I’d not played for ages. These included ‘Waterloo’, ‘Moonlight in Vermont’, ‘Losing you’, ‘Starman’ and ‘Ever fallen in love’. ( We couldn’t manage ’Peaches’ but swapped it for ‘Golden Brown’ !!). We are there again at the end of the month and it’s always a pleasure to do.

You make some interesting points here. I tried it for ten minutes and found it a fabulous player, There weren’t pictures online at that point and, not having £18k spare, I was just casually enjoying comparing how it played in comparison to my own various examples, not scrutinising it as a serious prospect, particularly having just bought the more attractively-priced ‘70 fretless from the same consignment seller. Under the guard the paint finish does look more textured than would be expected, so maybe there is overspray, although the screw holes are free of paint or lacquer. Of course any refinishing could have been done with screws in place. I don’t see it as having belonged to the type of owner who would go to any level of effort to deceive. It was just a tool, hence the Badass. Looking closely at the back of the neck when I had it in hand, most of the back of the neck is down to bare wood, it would still greatly surprise me if that was anything other than the authentic finish. I can see now the decal looks to be in a more ‘1965’ position- is the decal not of the right 4 number type for the period? I wasn’t aware there was a different colour variant for 1962, I haven’t seen that in any of the reference books - I’d love to know the source of the information re the decals as, like anyone posting here I’m sure, I am always interested to know about any new authoritative sources of information of which I was previously unaware. Re the pickguard, I’m familiar with the correct pre-64 tort guards. You don’t think the guard is right? It certainly looks exactly the same as on my ‘62 and 64 examples, the wear is the same, the sunken tug-bar impression. Are all celluloid guards glossy on the back? Again it would be great to know the source of your knowledge to share the resource. Where I respectfully disagree with you, is that the controls must be concentric in 1961. Andy Baxter has recently sold two 61 Jazzes on his site, both VVT. One has a neck date of 8/61 and pots 20th week/61. The other has a neck date 9/61 and two original pots 20th week/61. Our own @Ricksfine52 has a 1961 VVT. The example currently for sale has one correctly dated 1961 pot and two replaced. It defies reason to go to the trouble of sourcing a sixty year old component to fake a configuration that never existed. Particularly when the concentric pot version is the more valuable. If you were going VVT to make a Jaco-alike example, you would just add a new VVT with new pots and put the stackers in the case pocket. The Bass Gallery example is being sold on behalf of executors, relatives of a session player who died. They know nothing about vintage basses and are relying entirely on the advice of the shop. The shop have no significant incentive to jeopardise their reputation in return for 15% (commission) of the uplift in value of an optimistic misdescription. Of course, all of us have the potential to make a mistake.

Most models of WEM Dominator were open backed combos, I suspect there's a reason why almost nobody has made an open backed combo for bass since then.

I've just expanded my Zoom armoury.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/hire-a-court-venue Turns out you can hire a courtroom!

If I had a pound for every time a piece of digital audio studio hardware stopped working or wasn't fully functional as the result of a software issue - usually but not always an OS update - I'd be rich. If Mooer are anything like other tech business in audio, they'll be frantically working on a fix. I hope that's the case, as I can see all sides of the problem here 👍

Royal Blues https://ticketool.co.uk/order/9da4cc4f-63e6-4b38-936b-149fca947bb9

I get all my plectrums for free from our guitarist. Once he's worn the points off his Dunlop .73s, he can't use them. However, they're perfect for me, so I just hoover them up when he's dumped them! #winning 🤪👍

I will be honest that my training did not include valves and I am ready to be shot down by @agedhorse or any real expert. As I understand is, Sag in power supplies adds to the natural compression of valve amps that may or may not continue in the pre-amp stages and is certainly true of the output stages.HiFi would demand that an amplifier is not used in its non-linear region to maintain adequate distortion figures (THD or THD+n). Any type of compression, overdrive or fuzz increases the distortion. Of course sag occurs at higher power levels and also happens to some degree on solid state amps using an unregulated power supply. Sag is a form of current/voltage limiting.

For 32nd note percussive phrases, I like to incorporate second and third fingers on my right hand too. For example, Thumb, LH, Pop Index, Pop Middle. Played slowly, to practice, each can be played on the beats 1, E & A in a sixteenth note phrase. Up to tempo its sounds really cool. Aside from the Left Hand percussive slap, Dirk Lance (ex-Incubus) replaced it with a palm slap from his right hand. Coincidentally, this was covered in a Scott's Bass Lessons Instagram post recently, though I remember getting exicted about that sound when the album SCIENCE came out in, I guess, the late 90's. Turning triplets in to straight 16ths and incorporating the 4 note groupings above, it's possible to create some really crazy 'odd timings' without even thinking about it. (Thumb, LH, Pop) + (Thumb LH Pop1 Pop2) would give me a fun 7 beat phrase for example. Very tech metal / prog!

Basically yes. They are single wood, I think ash and painted. Rather than multiple woods with figured top. Both Burners are made by Sleek elite in Japan. Other Ken Smith's US made as the other posts detail. The e-series also have OEM tuners not Gotoh from what I've seen. I thought the bridge had a different spacing but that seems to be just on a few other ones out there as these say they are also the 17.5 ones.

One of my favorites is Chick Corea: In the Mind of a Master. This documentary rekindled my love for jazz. You feel good after watching it! Another one from the same series is coming out on Stanley Clarke which also looks great. UPDATE: The documentary is out now and it's fantastic!! You can watch it here: https://www.scientology.tv/series/signature-performances/stanley-clarke-forever/

I bought some FretFx side Leds for my vintage bass. Works fine and much easier to see than the original dots on a dark stage.

I use dark chocolate leather dye, then lemon oil. The end result is a lovely, rich, dark colour.

May I join in the fun? (Or lack of fun depending on how you look at it?) Should be good for a larf at the very least....... I think I'm in nett negative territory tbh as I sold a bass today and still haven't bought owt in 2025, fourteen whole days in....

Hi Dan I’ve had Evah Weichs on my main bass for a good few years now. Switched from Thomastik Weichs as I started doing a lot more bowed work and needed more of a hybrid string. I’ve always found it tricky to decide exactly when to change them, and for me it usually comes down to how they feel rather than how they sound. After a point you’ll find you have to work a lot harder to get the same results; both pizz and with the bow. It was always much easier to tell when the Thomastiks were dead as they sounded dead; whereas old Evahs don’t really sound that different as long as you’re willing to put more physical effort into playing them. Changed mine about three months ago and the bass sounded almost exactly the same but marginally louder. Much easier to play now though! I play that bass a lot and usually change the Evahs every 2.5-3 years. Hope that helps! Simon

We end up doing a lot of laughing at our gigs, and usually the audience are laughing with us rather than at us ( I think anyway…). We do have our serious moments too of course, and the best gigs are when the balance of the two are just right. We like to think our audiences leave the gig with a smile on their faces. Thinking about this, looking back to gigs I’ve seen over the last 50 years, the best ones are those which made me smile too - usually those when you can tell the band are really enjoying it. I don’t have much time generally for overly serious stuff, happy upbeat music is what mostly floats my boat. 😄

I find this comes in handy:

I realised I hadn't shared pics of the Salace E Type 4 string which arrived last year. Will need to get an updated family shot sorted!

Just added the Bass Rig and had to sacrifice the Darkglass Duality. The Bass Rig is my favourite pedal ever, perfect always on pedal.