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I got this at the weekend that I absolutely love to bits, and just wanted to share. A huge thank you to @walshy for his patience and good nature over the past weeks, as I’ve bombarded him with various questions, requests for excruciatingly detailed dimensions and pics galore. “Walshy, if the neck was an 80s pop act, who would it be? Which discontinued item of confectionery is the bass most like?” Prefab Sprout, and a Texan Bar, since you ask! I’ve been after a ‘68 to ‘73 period P Bass for a while now. I tried some lovely basses, but they weren’t quite for me, as I was after a specific neck profile. As soon as I picked this up I knew it was what I was after. Virginia Plain, Metal Guru, In a Broken Dream, All The Young Dudes, Ernie (the fastest milkman in the west), and this bass: 1972 was a good year…

Well folks, that's me bowing out. I have just taken delivery of a bass which has been living rent-free in my head for about 12 years. A Greco LGB-700, three pickup. More pics later, but it needs a bloody good clean, new strings and a setup. There will be mucho bass fettling tonight. And in case you're wondering about how I know about the 12 year thing...

I placed this order quite some time ago, so long ago in fact that I don’t even have the original email chain with all of the details on it. I did ask Jon to ping the spec back to me so I can share it with everyone, but this beauty arrived today. It’s not the first lavish spec Shuker I’ve owned, so I know how good his work is, but this is quite something. The preamp/pickup combo is fierce, a really biting tone. Soon as I get Jon to send the spec back to me I’ll share!

We always try our best for customers, drop us an email/give us a call anytime to discuss anything. We are always happy to help where we can, we are just 3 guys running the business rather than a big organisation

Well, that's me crashed out of gear abstinence for this year and it's time for my full confession (although I'm 1 in, 1 out for the year so far, so could be worse). But I have a good excuse - this bass has been living rent-free in my head for nearly 12 years* and I finally snagged one in the finish I wanted. Black and silver ones pop up more often but I've only seen the purpleburst available two or three times in all these dozen years, so seeing as I'm not getting any younger, I decided a bit of carpe diem was in order. It's a three pickup, Les Paul shaped bass. It has three Greco T-bird-a-like pickups and three volume controls. That's it. Hardware is good quality - a Hipshot B style bridge and Gotoh tuners. It's had a life, there are some dings and scuffs in it but it's taken a polish well, the pickups have buffed up nicely and the fretboard enjoyed a drink of lemon oil very much. Lovely, dark rosewood board, yum. S'pose you'll be wanting some pics... It sounds great - I had a blast through my TC Electronic BH250 into headphones and it's got a lot of mid poke about it - might have to boost my mids a bit less when I'm playing this guy! Using the different pickups in different combinations makes noticeable changes to the tone, but it's not quite the same as having a tone knob - I might mod it but I'm not in a hurry. * TWELVE BLOODY YEARS - https://www.basschat.co.uk/topic/210350-sorted-greco-3-pickup-les-paul-bass/

Because I clearly needed another Jazz Bass.. 😬 This lovely thing arrived from the folks over in Leamington Spa, BassBros this morning - it's an '04 and is is near perfect condition. They'd done a lovely job setting it up although I've done a few minor tweaks to get it just where I want it. It feels great, it sounds great and looks fantastic. ❤️

I didn’t touch his staff…oh, ok…right, well…

In the house for testing.

Then buy what you want at Andertons... oh wait, you can't It costs me more than £5 to send someone an FX pedal I sell in the marketplace 🤷‍♀️

Would you feel better if what you bought added up to £705 with free delivery? My point is: there's no free anything.

£5 sounds a bargain for £700 worth of goods to be shipped to you, risk free

This has found a home. Bloody dangerous helping @walshy, cost me £1500 😂😂😂

An article in the BBC about 'super rare' 5 neck guitars from Hutchins being sold at auction... oh yeah, well I had a SIX neck version so 😝 If it has loads of strings, I've probably owned it!! Appreciate this is a completely pointless post... feel free to move along! https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cjevveglx88o.amp

Picked up a "used condition" p bass body on eBay for the hefty sum of £20, combined with a jazz neck I had in the garage, hardware from my junk box and some emg gzr used off Amazon - presenting the bullseye bass because yes, they are air gun wounds, including a souvenir pellet still wedged in?! That's one way to relic I guess!

I love my Electra. A real cut above the average bass

Mark sent another update - lots of progress. All the chambering has been done - the top has been glued on and the neck blank has been glued up. Awesome to see the progress!

Here's both my 71s, which gives an idea of the variation. The darker one looks almost black in some light. Note the lack of sharp detail - it's more about molten, swirly depth.

Probably better to compare against other independents and stores that have comparable shipping volume? Bassbros, for instance? Vintage Bass Room?

2 quality abstinence fails, right there. Well played 👏👏👏.

Bugger, forgot about this. New DI = me out

Ah, hope. One of the cruelest of all expectations.

It’s been a busy evening

Brought out the big rig for the gig last Friday… SVT-CL and SVT410H

Short Facebook video from yesterday: Bendricks march 2025.mp4

2025 board updates Big board got the Shure wireless, custom CMC Proto Type, Origin TX-LP and Stomp XL and also now mounted to a Temple Audio Duo24. Small/Fly board is now mainly based on the Stomp plus some pedals I can’t live without.

Hi Martyn, Ash here from Bass Direct. We appreciate your comments and honesty about your experience. We’re really sorry to hear you felt that way—it’s never our intention to send out an instrument in less-than-great shape, and we definitely wouldn’t set something up badly on purpose. We don’t remember hearing from you directly, but we’ll check first thing tomorrow to see if there’s anything in our system. If you ever have any concerns, reaching out to us directly is the best way to get things sorted quickly—we’re always happy to help! Regarding the Dingwall, we provided the info we had at the time. Based on our stock flow, we’d assume it’s a 2024 model, but we can double-check if that’s important to you. Dingwalls are great for low action thanks to their even string tension. As for returns, we don’t see many, and we don’t recall ever having this model come back, but we can check if needed. We understand that the £15 delivery charge might seem a bit off on a high-ticket item, but it’s there to ensure safe and secure shipping, and it’s only what it costs us to ship the item to you. We’ll check the emails in the morning, but if there’s anything else we can help with in the meantime, just let us know! Best, Ash

Last year I ordered an Ibanez that turned up virtually unplayable , like 4.5 - 5mm action and intonation out, only slightly but enough to bug me. I don't expect a 1 1/2 hour set up or plek or whatever on a thousand quid bass, but I'd at least fancy not having to wrestle with it. I got the feeling they were having a laugh and wound out the saddles to max height as a FU gesture for asking do they check the set up. Turns out I got it sorted after a while setting up and the bass was otherwise immaculate. Ok, Sorted moved on. So back to this week; I've been thinking for a while let's see what all this Dingwall fuss is about so asked a few questions on a NG3 5 string in black (that appeared to have been in a while). I asked what year it was, does it have a nice low action and is it definitely new and not a return. The answers were: not sure what year it is, possibly a 2024, yes Dingwalls can achieve a low action and no mention of the new/return. I sort of got the impression they aren't that bothered about selling Dingwalls. I thought mmm, OK we'll let things ride and go with the flow. Hit checkout then up pops the £15 delivery charge. On a 2300 quid item, really??? All the little snags I'd forgotten about suddenly came rushing back to me and I thought I'm out. Don't know if I'm being a little too arsy or whether music shop staff are right and the customer is always wrong...

^ This

He played a Fender MIJ/CIJ Marcus Miller Jazz Bass back then, but it obviously wasn't his signature bass. It was just my first time seeing one, and without knowing about Marcus Miller, I associated it with Mendez. And I guess I always will There's some slapping from 9:04 on, so I guess still a little bit in Marcus' vein?

Threads like this remind me how much I need a P bass with old flats on it...argh gas

We've found that Facebook works as long as people follow you. To that end I created an A4 sheet with our band logo and a massive QR code to take people to our page. I then laminated it and it goes in front of the band at every gig. I make sure I create events a month or so in advance, and the guitarist does an amusing "call to action" post with photo a day or two before. It seems to work. The photo is a must, because text-only posts just disappear into the ether I don't use Facebook on a personal level because I hate it, nor any other socials

CRABCORE!

Lots of great bass and string recommendations. I'd come at it from a different angle as I have the same general issues (I'm 65 and have been playing for 52 years). I have arthritis in my left hand (more than my right) and have found two things that really helped manage my situation (beyond what's already been suggested). 1) I've cut way back on my sugar intake - and have been amazed at how much that appears to help reduce the inflammation and 2) I wear fingerless compression gloves (even when I play) that provide subtle compression of my hands and really seem to help. I think part of what they help with is better circulation in my hands. I use gloves from a company called OneCompress - although I'm sure there are lots of others out there. Good luck - it can be very frustrating!

I'm going to out myself as a BC anorak! I think the redder more 'authentic' period pickguard is the way to go. I don't know the brands as other people have mentioned but for comparison here is an reverb listing for an original (ended): https://reverb.com/item/29201598-vintage-1973-75-fender-precision-bass-pickguard-tort-1974-1975-73-74-75-1970s-70s-p and you can see it's much redder. For what it's worth - I don't hate the one you've selected!

I would agree with the Spitfire suggestion. Either that or one of the alternatives like Lava Pickguards or Reptile guards. The modern stuff just doesn't look right. Alternatively, as the bass is a '74 you can always save some pennies and just put a black pickguard on it. 1974 was the very last year of Fender using tort and most '74 basses do in fact have a black guard rather than tort, so it would be historically accurate if you went that way.

And not necessarily in the right order

and 'Available at somewhere other than Amazon' means a lot to some of the rest of us.

"£10 cheaper than Amazon" means a lot to all of us! 😁

Was hoping for a good gig today, my and the singer's home town and a fair few people had said they were coming. A 5:15 sunday gig. We used the venue pa but the desk does auto setup with white noise so we had a good sound (4 vocals plus drums) restof us backline only. Had a decent soundcheck. Hadn't played a gig since start of December, just two rehearsals with just four of us. Place was rammed, which was great considering we've only played Barry once before. We made a handful of cock ups but recovered well. Went down a storm, the bucket added over 50% to our fee. Plenty of dancing(!) Lots of compliments especially for the sound and our singer's voice, also loads of great feedback on our setlist. Playing songs we love seems to work. Screenshot from a facebook live...

This weekend's rig of choice was based around some old school Ashdown kit. A big mag and a wee mag. The wee mag 200 is tried and tested, and was brought along as a back up to the big mag 600. Reason being, the big mag was bought as a parts only unit a few days ago. Both are UK built, and the big mag 600 only needed some minor repairs to get it going again ( new input and output volume pots, a new sub harmonic pot, and lastly a new VU meter bulb). Serviced and fully cleaned. Did its first gig in alledgedly years, sounded brilliant and performed brilliantly. I've owned a few mag 600 evoII before, but never bonded with them. This old UK built one sounds so much better than any other MAG i've used. The only real difference is that the UK ones came with very high quality and high output Demeter transformers instead of the generic PRC ones. Bass and pedals - same as it ever was. Cab is my 4 ohm Laney R210.