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And there we have it. It feels really nice. It does the flats thing nicely. It stinks of fags. I had forgotten that people smoke. I guess it will have to sit in the garage for a couple of weeks. Eugh. I guess I will have to price up a metal flake finish now. That will sort out the smell!

"Boredom is the mother of invention" I have been bored. very very bored. So i started thinking about the next Bass build, and thinking turned to planning and planning turned into scheming. Ive had a couple of bass playing friends reach out to me and ask in the past if id ever build a bass for them, and ive always said no. essentially i just never felt qualified to build something to a standard that i would want to charge someone for it, and ive always liked my bass builds to be suitably "home made", plus i never have enough free time to get it finished in a reasonable timescale. Plus, the workshop id normally use to do all of the work, with all the big power tools (Bandsaw, Router table, Table saw etc) has been closed all the way through lockdown, which makes the whole thing even more of a pain. but this is where i came up with an idea. i decided that what i'd do, is take the time and build a prototype, a pattern bass if you will, in order to try out all of the ideas ive had, get the design correct, work out any kinks and complications, and if anyone likes it and it turns out good, then i can use it to show people what theyd be paying for. And if i can do it in a garage on a workbench with fairly basic power tools, ill feel confident in being able to repeat the feat once the proper workshop is back open. Im certainly never going to go full time luthier, but id love to be able to do this as a hobby where i can recover the costs! So.... The design. This is one i spent most of the first lockdown (in march) planning and thinking about. i had a few basic parameters that i wanted to stick to: 1.Not crazy over the top - my last bass turned out great, and i love it, but its design is a pretty aquired taste. this one needs to be a little more universal in its appeal 2. Lighweight - whatever happens i dont want a bass i make to stay hung on a wall for all its life because it breaks its owner's back every time he/she plays it. this means making sure the aesthetic design is fairly compact, but also that the material choices and construction are considered from day one 3. comfortable - this kind of ties into the lightweight aspect, this needs to be comfortable to play standing up and sitting down, with easy to use controls and fairly normal dimensions. i dont want it to have crazy narrow string spacing or a mile long scale length 4. Unique. this is my big focus for this project. i want this to be something special. ive got a few ideas for it, that i will share as we go through the build and see what people think. in the end this is what this prototype is for, to see which experiments work and which don't! With those in mind, heres a quick rundown of the specs (although these are subject to change depending on the aforementioned experiments) Neck through construction - (experiment number one, the neck through blank will have carbon fibre laminated directly into it to save material, reduce weight and improve stability) 33" scale length, 26 frets Body - laminated from walnut, maple, Padauk with a curly redwood top (experiment number two, as opposed to a book match top, this will have a "swan matched top", i will explain below) slotted headstock - similar to Bolin Steinberger bass macassar ebony fretboard with tree/leaf inlays tune-o-matic style bridge with custom graphite saddles - paired with customised bigsby with bass guitar string and tension bar electrics: 2 Multi coil custom pickups (experiment number three) - similar in construction to sims super quads (switchable coil combinations) but with 8 individual coils (a la Wal pickups). there are reasons for this which i will explain in due course stereo filter based preamps (experiment number four) - active filters with variable frequency, resonance and independent mono and stereo outputs (these have a few interesting qualities whih again, i will explain in due course) internal, replaceable lithium ion battery pack, and integrated 24V phantom power connection and accompanying pedal (experiment number five) that will allow for extremely high power draw, hi fidelity op amps to be used in the preamps Im taking some interesting inspiration for the body design, little bit of CT, little bit of Wal, little bit of some of ther other boutique scroll basses out there: The flamed redwood will be divided along the S-shaped curve, and have a sandwich of veneers in between them. the white areas in the upper horn and left hand side will leave the wood below (black walnut) to show through. this is to show off the lines of the bass, but the cutaway on the left will act almost like a thumb rest just at the upper edge of the pickups. this is obviously a pretty rough representation, as the edges will be carved and rounded to expose the various coloured laminates underneath. this build isnt going to be happening in real time, ive been sitting on this for a while so that i could get some of the more time consuming and boring bits out of the way first, so im hoping that updates will be fairly regular moving forward. im super excited, and have at least 3 full notebooks of sketches and drawings and notes and diagrams for all of my crazy hair-brained ideas! and on a final note, there will be experiment number 6... which is i think the most ambitious and least likely to work of all of them... but i will play that one fairly close to the chest. for now ill say this: if it works the back of this bass is going to be more impressive to look at than the front Look forward to sharing this one with you guys!

I got this lovely bass a couple of weeks ago, and changed to EMG pickup and preamp last weekend. What can I say, the bass is super light, and extremely comfortable to play on. Well balanced, and the workmanship is easily on par with way more expensive basses. It also have this je ne sais quoi feeling that I really enjoy, it booms from the bottom so to speak. I know that doesn't make sense, but it is how I feel it. It also sounds like an EMG equipped Stingray, as in this video. If you are in market for a Sterling-esque bass, I (and doggo) will totally recommend this one!

Has anyone else seen this? I saw the trailer yesterday, and my old man has just sent me a link to the first episode raving about it: Sonny T in the house band!

There are many tasks in guitar and bass building where I still haven't found the 'perfect' way to get things right or accurate. One of those is the short area of body wood that the fretboard sits on in the way that I do through-necks. If you remember, I cut a notch in the neck blank that the top slots into. The top face of this area is at an angle to the top face of the main length of the neck - and that's what will give me my neck angle to the body: But, because the fretboard extends over the body for a short distance - and is an an angle to the body - I have to take steps to make sure that the end of the fretboard doesn't end up with a gap. And so I set the body a couple of mm proud of the neck top face. And so I then need to cut an angle in the body wood to make sure that the fretboard is flat against wood all the way from neck to heel to fretboard end. And the challenge is cutting that angle. In the earlier days, I used to think just a levelling beam would do it. But two things tend to happen - the beam does quickly remove the edge of the body wood - but then tends to ride high over the body and leave a lump but also starts to sand the neck (which I don't want - as that is already flat). My present method is to take the bulk off masking the neck and pulling a fine microplane blade down gently across the body wood parallel to the neck top face, and then use the longest, sharpest chisel I have to go the other way - using the neck upper face as the datum for the chisel and slice away the excess, lumps and bumps in a sweeping movement up the body wood: It seemed to work. And why do I outline this in so much detail? Well, how else am I going to remember next time that this is how I did it this time??? The full length was checked with a straight edge, truss rod put in, back stop glued and it was ready to have the fretboard glued on: And it's clamped up and glue drying as I type: And that means that I can start carving the neck over the weekend. And all guitar and bass builders will tell you that neck carving is the most satisfying part of the whole process. Happy days

My artist model 😛

Sofa’s mine!

The video that made me spend a fair chunk of change.

The Firm - someone to love. Tony Franklin on fretless duty Japan - Halloween. You know who on fretless Japan again. Visions of China

No, not at all. I've had a few cheaper basses over the years (usually as a spare), but I always moved them on for something better after a few months. Like Chris, I bought my first Fender Precision as soon as I got my first job (working backstage at a theatre as an 18 year old). It was a really nice mocha brown P bass with a maple neck. This travelled up and down the country with me for 6 or 7 years (acquiring a pretty crappy 77 Precision as a spare along the way), before I sold it when I first discovered the joys of active basses back in the mid 80s. Bizarrely, my old brown P bass came up for sale a few months ago and I ended up buying it back for five times what I sold it for 24 years ago! It has seen a bit of life since we have been apart, belonging to a couple of session musicians, doing loads of soul gigs, living in a recording studio and apparently even being used to settle a drug debt several years ago! But now it's back with me, been cleaned up and wearing an old badass bridge that I've had in my spares box for years as wellas a bart pickup and still sounding as great as ever. Sounds and feels like a proper Fender (to me at least). So my oldest bass is one I bought a couple of months ago, which was the first really good bass that I owned...!

I've bought and sold a fair few basses over the past 5 years and find myself really happy with the shape and balance of my herd. I'm fortunate to have some lovely basses including a Ken Smith and a Yamaha BB NE2. However... I was taken aback recently when the penny dropped that the three basses I have owned the longest are actually my three least expensive ones! Here's a pic of my second oldest, a Yamaha BB1025, bought end of line from the Yamaha store in London for a very decent price, to get the ball rolling. It's seen off several other PJs and I suspect I'll never move this one on: Any of you got a similar story about your budget basses being the ones that have best weathered the test of time? And of course, it doesn't have to be just basses that can inspire loyalty! I bet there are some wonderful amps out there too that you've held on to 'cos they sounded great but didn't cost the earth?

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I'm more impressed that I've managed to successfully post on a Topic without getting it locked.

I just wanted to say a HUGE thanks you to @Shepster8316 for sending me a box of stuff that was beyond my wildest expectations. Words just can’t describe how grateful I am. Jon

well it's not quite the car crash i was expecting but it's not great either, I had to guess some of the dimensions and the loading was assuming a 5kg instrument hanging straight down. i took 1mm as the internal bend radius as it wasn't that clear on the picture, and i used a couple of 8mm circular patches on the back to anchor it (the actual holes weren't modelled so these are a guesstimate using some assumptions that i use in my day job) the expected high stress point is right along the bend as predicted, there is a nasty stress where the screws go through as well, I certainly wouldn't trust these hangers with any of my instruments. and that's before you get to the sharp edges digging into the headstock. as an interesting aside the "guitar" shown in the pictures is computer generated not real, so we don't even know if these have been made and tested, they might have designed them and will make them as they are ordered (not a hugely time consuming thing to make with a laser cutter and a bending rig.) Matt

I suppose it just saves swapping basses for a couple of songs. Personally I prefer fretless when it's not as noticeable that's it's fretless, if that makes any sense. Although I love Pino's fretless, a lot of his early 80s stuff (Numan, Young) was very 'mwah heavy'. Music For Chameleons is epic but it's almost a cliché of fretless playing. I quite like when you can barely tell it's fretless but for the subtle little slides here and there. Such as.

Black headstock gang

A lot of people don't realise that this is a fretless bass

Oh, I'm off and running now. Danny Thompson sounding ace on Victoria (she's fretless ). I would have added New York Minute, but Don Henley (or his henchmen) block videos . Where there's a will, there's a compromise... https://open.spotify.com/track/2jxqu3v4AZAhUNvdAbDGet

Loads of stuff you could do with trace nowadays that just didnt exist when they were around. Lightweight cabs. Pre amp pedals. Larger class d amps with classic pre amp built in. Their current range just doesnt interest me at all. I had an elf which was surprisingly good, but was max on its limits in a gig situation, so not great in the real world. The pre amp transit pedal is expensive and their 8" and 10" cabs just dont do it for me. Whack together a classic pre amp, the large band eq, the UV light and an 800w class d power stage and it's a winner. Couple that with a lightweight 4x10 or 2x12 all in the black and green and its sounding good already.

If you wanted to dip your toe, an Epic or Orion might be a reasonably priced place to start. They're the budget models (yes, I know 😂), generally set neck, no back facings and have a bass and treble cut/boost rather than filters. I got my one via the forum here a few years ago. It's a 2004 Orion with a walnut top, maple and purpleheart stringers on a mahogany body. The neck is five-piece maple and purpleheart with the standard ebony fretboard. The Epics and Orions have MXY pickups, which are humbuckers and don't need the phantom coil you see on basses with the single coil AXY pickups. The neck pickup is pretty much where a P pickup is, relative to the 12th fret, though the bridge pickup is slightly closer to the bridge, even compared to the 70's J position. I play with fingers 95% of the time and didn't have a problem adjusting to it or finding places to anchor my thumb. The string spacing is 18mm, slightly narrower than standard but easy to get used to. The electronics are very high quality. The blend is particularly useful. Minuscule changes on the knob position result in big changes tonally. I have no other bass which responds like that. As a result, the blend is fundamental to getting different sounds, moreso than the EQ, even. I find I rarely play one pickup solo. I usually use the blend to get what I'm looking for and then the EQ for fine tuning. The nut is 40mm, narrower than a P, wider than a J. The nut height is adjustable and can be locked in position. I like this a lot because I like a very low nut, basically I like the height of a zero fret. I prefer J necks, generally, but this is very comfortable to play for extended periods. One caveat, I did find the neck edges quite abrupt so I rolled the edges. That is a personal preference, though, not everyone cares about that kind of thing. It's built immaculately, as you can imagine, and the action can go as low as you need. I like low action, no complaints from me. When I got it, I put my preferred strings on it, adjusted the truss rods for very slight relief and haven't needed to touch them since. They're not cheap, let's be very clear, and I would never buy a new one. I couldn't afford to. You'll pick up an Epic or Orion for much less than a late 70's P, though, which just makes no sense at all in my head. If you buy second hand you're never going to lose money either, if you choose to sell it on. I can't see myself parting with this one, though.

i think a really good place to also check out to get the lowdown on your questions would be the alembic web site forum. www.alembic.com as that is a more focussed group, and many also use non alembic basses too so you would find more views relating to the different alembic models in their range, both vintage and current. There are many members from that forum who participate in BC too. I hope you find one.

Posted this before but I’ll just throw it back up to keep the thread going. Series 2, 3/4 point body and crown headstock, burl maple front and back, chrome metalwork. Fire & Ice.

Threads have been merged, in case anyone is coming to this wondering what's going on. I'll hide the merge request comments.

My Orion. It's one of the "cheap" models but it's still something which is a joy to play every time. You can see where the money goes in them.

I thought I’d posted a couple of pics of my ‘bic ages ago, but looks like I haven’t. 1976 long scale S1 with birdseye maple facings; imported from the US (in the days before customs charges became crippling). I tend to gig with my Warwick (LX Streamer Jazzman) these days*, but the S1 is a lovely old beastie....... *Edit: when we actually were gigging, of course.......

You've already ordered it. What if everyone says it a load of old rubbish? It's too late now is what it is.

That's not how it works. How it does work is that by adding the second cab identical cab stacked on top of the first, with no changes to any of the amp settings, the output will go up by 6dB. That gives the same result as would quadrupling the power into the one cab, if it could take it.

I think you have put in words what I am feeling.

How ironic that people can now go and try them out in a shop.......only they cant lol.

Oh yeah, that’s so nice , excellent purchase ☝️

Hello Mark All good here thanks. I hope that the same goes for you

Some more Bathiki Kumalo

The track posted in this thread is from his 'Jaco Pastorius' album. Just found this: https://reverb.com/news/jaco-pastorius-on-how-he-learned-bass-and-composition-bacons-archive I interviewed Jaco Pastorius at a London hotel in summer 1976. I wanted to talk mainly about his first solo album, Jaco Pastorius, which had just been released. "On my record, I play fretless on everything but "Come On, Come Over" and "Portrait Of Tracy," I played fretted on those two."

You said neck carving was satisfying out loud! *cringes as a large sack of potatoes is lobbed down the basement stairs by MrsAndyjr1515 with instructions to get that lot done by teatime*

It hasn't been mentioned yet, and it's kind of a fretless standard More Japan

It's a Gregory Isaacs kind of day today. First discovered him in the early 80s when a mate put Night Nurse on a mix tape for me. What a voice!

I bought my 4H from @Sparky Mark as a birthday present to myself more than a year ago and I absolutely love it. It's light, comfortably sculpted for the player and has that MusicMan sound in spades. I haven't had the too-hot preamp problem, but then I haven't been out into the world with it yet! As for the design, I think Patrick Hunter on YouTube had it in his first "Ugly Basses" video (he made the "flush" comparison too!), but in a world carpeted with Ps, Js and PJs, it's both distinctive and - depending on the finish - classy IMHO.

I enjoyed the feel and extensive tonal choices on tap on the one I tried...... it was really nice! Sadly the design is too out there for me. No way I could ever feel truly comfortable playing 'that' shape *flush*'.... 'sorry'. YMMV...

Here is another talkbass project:

There it is. My dream.

The 435 I had was unusually good, I’d tried quite a few and this one was special. I also paid a fair bit to have the fingerboard rolled, and had the frets levelled and dressed by my favourite techs at Feline Guitars, so it is a bass in as-new condition that plays way better than a new one. I got an early 90s mk1 TRB-5P with John East electronics on this very forum, the bass I dreamed about as a teenager after falling in love with a Abraham Laboriel’s playing. We couldn’t afford it at the time, but my dad managed to negotiate a crazy good price on a floor-model TRB6 that was my first bass and that I still have (and have upgraded with a Glockenklang pre).

Hopefully Trace have been sold. It's probably one of the top 3 most famous Bass brands of all time (IMO of course) The name still carries a lot of weight, (pun fully intended!) and I've always found it strange how such a internationally renown brand was mothballed (bar the Elf series) for no apparent reason. Imagine if they came out with a range of lightweight class D heads, using the SMX pre-amp, with some form of UV type lighting as a nod to their heritage. Coupled with modern, lightweight cabs with high performance design/drivers etc. They'd make an absolute killing.