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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.

I knew this would be nice to play and would look lovely, but I wasn't prepared for the monstrous sound to come out of it! I have various instruments, each of which has some good qualities but also some failings. This is just huge. Everything's there. I'm lost for words. It's a DiMarzio Billy Sheehan pickup. A Relentless, I think. I went to see The Raven of this parish, hoping to buy his Shuker PJ. I played it, liked it (though I was really looking for a passive P but of course it also works passive and it's not obligatory to use the J pickup) and was about to hand over the cash when, being a nosey sod, I said -what's in that other case? -oh, that's another Shuker, here, have a look. -I'll take it. -Done. Pleasure doing business with you. Might still have to go back for the PJ, mind.

Jeesh. Arguing over a 5er on big ticket items.

^ 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?

Oh yes , very nice indeed, congrats

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

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!

Run away!

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

A long, long time ago (early 2000s?) I made a slightly similar thing but with a different purpose: to generate a range of the worst, most cliched and generic names for pub rock bands. The sole aim was to make people snigger, groan, and roll their eyes. And purely for the displeasure of Basschat, I present it here: http://greenwax.co.uk/pubrock_bandname_generator I find that you can easily check it for authenticity by imagining a slightly overenthusiastic front-man bellowing "Hello Tiverton, we are... " If you hit the refresh button a few times, you're sure to find the name of a grotty pub band you've actually seen. And if you find the name of your own band, I apologise. You should probably change your band name. 😄

Had a mostly good gig on saturday. Haven't had a gig since last month and no practices either, so my fingers weren't match fit! Not too many mistakes from my part, although a few in general. It was a pub that has just reopened, but a short way out of town, the last few gigs we have done there have been as a dead as a dead thing, but they did say that last week, their opening night they were really full, but there were a lot of things going on in town, so I was surprised it wasn't dead, there were quite a few people there, but it is a big place so it seems not too busy. Anyway, we had quite a few dancers, and it seemed to go alright, so was quite happy with it. After loading up and getting the car ready, was talking to the guitarist while the singer and drummer went to get them money. Turns out the drummer decided that the fee that we had agreed with the pub was too high and he would just say to take £70 less, so that went down badly, especially with the guitarist who relies on his gigging money. I am not really that bothered about the money but feel like decisions like that should be a band agreement. Hopefully we can get some practiced done as we have some songs almost ready

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

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.