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Hi guys, I have a second Jaydee on order... will confirm the model but it will be fully binded & sea foam green pearl colour. A few thoughts on my first Jaydee that i received in January: Being a Mark King fan since the first time i saw Level 42 on Top Of The Pops in the 80s, I always desired that distinctive Jaydee look & sound through out the nearly 30 years i have been playing bass now. So 3 years ago i put in an order for a blue series 3 Jaydee.. yep 3 years! When the bass arrived the first thing i notice was the beautiful craftsmanship & attention to detail, the construction was flawless. The neck was solid and super stable, so much so that i could get the most ridiculously low action. The paintwork was gorgeous, it actually changes colour depending how the light hits it, I would definitely recommend a pearl style colour if you like this effect. The negatives: Picking up the bass i did notice at first that it seemed a little heavier than my other basses which are all chosen for their lightness. This did bug me a bit (more on this later). On playing the bass for the first time sitting down, I found it a bit weird to balance on my knee as the shape of the contour pushes the bass backwards compared to say a Fender sitting position. Also, generally playing the bass after playing Fender Jazz basses for years, felt a bit strange, I couldn't get used to the tone controls, and the tone wasn't like my Jazz bass ...... 3 months later, negatives turn into positives: I soon got use to the slight weight increase, since lock down i had done virtually no exercise, after a few barbell curls I stopped to even noticing the slight weight difference. I soon got used to the shape of the bass in a sitting position, i experimented positioning the bass in between my legs (it actually helps your right hand finger style technique in the position) but also in my normal - resting just on my right leg position. One thing that has surprised me is how amazing these basses play and sound but - it didn't happen out of the base case, it took a few months to get use to the Jaydee sound and playability. Now, I can't even play as fast or articulate on my Jazz bass! Also, Jaydee basses are meant to be played mostly with the back pickup on, yep even for slap! But if you select both pickups you can get that Marcus Miller smooth slap sound as well. Also, It can handle an amazing Jaco style growling mid tone, perfect for staccato funk or reeling off bebop licks. By far this is my favourite bass I have owned, and iv'e owned quite a few. To conclude, my experience with Jaydee basses is that they are really professional basses for pro bass players. You have to make a few adjustments if you're coming from a Fender style instrument & probably need to play it in for a few weeks / months but once you do there's no looking back! I'd love to hear your similar stories & thoughts on your Jaydee bass experiences.

Al Dente was a Jazz musician who played the double bass, although he was never involved in any particularly famous recordings he was notable for being one of the first players to boil his strings. He was also known for his intricate macramé portraits of the Jazz greats and his detailed knowledge of the baroque harpsichord.

I learned to play bass in the early 1980s when I was a teenager. In those days, the only good bass (to me) was active with multiple pickups and preferably headless. My right hand would always have been close to the bridge, and I was chasing "the honk" as much as possible. I've returned to the bass in recent years, and through GAS ended up with a Jazz, a P, and a PJ. The P, in particular, has encouraged me to rest my thumb on the single pickup, further from the bridge than I was used to. What a revelation! I really feel the feedback I get from the less rigid string at this position makes me enjoy playing more. Much more. And the tone seems better there too. I can't imagine heading back to the bridge now, except on the Jazz, and that makes me want to play the Jazz less. I think I've been seduced by the P. Teenage me would have turned his nose up at a single pickup passive bass. Anyone else been through this?

This guy is very talented (which will probably put some people on here off) - but it’s very witty and the observations are hilarious in some cases - Pop Producer is a classic!! (PS forum software seems to have stopped detecting video links……correction - now doing it!! 👍)

Nope. 'Don't look back in anger'. Lagered lads singing "So-oooo Sally can wait, she sumfink or other, mutter mutter [cue: gap while waiting for the bit they know], but don't look back in anger, I 'eard you say'. While waving a can

Just thought I should share my great fortune/ honour in becoming the only the second custodian of an unmarked 73 jazz bass. Before I share the story, I know that the bass has the black scratch normally found from 74, but I've seen the original receipt from Carlsbro Sound in Mansfield clearly marked Sept 1973. So the bass is 100% original down to the case, original paperwork, inspection tag, owners manual and spare set of flatwounds ! Having saved his hard earned cash for years, the original owner, John B sadly passed away suddenly and his wife couldn't bring herself to part with the her husband's pride and joy, which has been sat under the bed until now. His wife decided to pass the bass on to someone else and I was recently invited to the family home to hear the story for myself. I have several photos of the John playing the bass in his band. I can't share them on here as they aren't mine to share but I can assure you the bass is visible clear as day, including John's initials on the lower horn, as was the trend in the 70's apparently and which are still on the bass now . . . . I promised I wouldn't remove them. Of course when I 1st saw the bass, apart from being floored by the stunning condition, I assumed JB stood for Jazz Bass! So an incredible, virtually show room condition beautiful jazz bass, preserved in time.

Play only songs that you have written yourself. If you end up writing an anthem taken up by stupid drunken punters, then at least you can take comfort in the amount of royalties pouring in!

Same here Chris. When we first got married in the 80's I had a day job and also gigged 2 or 3 evenings every week. Without that income it would have been much harder for us, and doing so meant my wife could look after my daughter at home for the first five years before she started school. When I went pro my goal was to gig until I paid off the mortgage. Didn't see me getting divorced though, so stuck with gigging to pay off the next one! ( Still playing as my only source of income, and eventually paid off the 2nd mortgage ). Things change in life all the time, and I've just rolled with the punches. I was never a big fan of the 9 to 5 / corporate thing, and not a day goes by when I don't think how fortunate I've been in having a job which I still love.

And so to the part that probably need the most care - gluing the fretboard back. First step, clearly, was to ensure that all traces of the original glue was removed from both faces. Then a couple of dry runs to make sure that when I started clamping, I knew where everything I was going to need was and where it would go. The board tends to float around on the glue layer and so positive location of its position is needed. One useful thing is that the original heel screw drill holes actually go into the fretboard a small amount - I will be able to use that with a drill shank as a locator! Note also the plywood strip running along the neck spline which will act as the clamping caul: The next way of locating checked in the dry run was a few spool clamps to clamp the side of the fretboard in line with the side of the neck. The main clamp cauls on this side is a variety of fretboard radius sanding blocks to give maximum pressure across the board and to the sides: And then, just before gluing, low-tack masking tape - I don't want to be having to scrape wood glue off the neck or fretboard any more than I have to! And, finally, glue, check all of the alignments, clamp, re-check: And it will stay clamped until tomorrow morning when I will see how much edge reparation will be needed.

If I wash my hands before I play, I can wave bye bye to my callouses very quickly indeed. I recall reading an anecdote from John Giblin of a session he did, where the artist made him change his strings after every second take.

Exactly what I said to Jabba last night but having slept on it I think I share his concerns about how the square top will look on such an otherwise curvaceous body. I think I've settled on knob A. with an aluminium marker line like C. but no veneer line. But he more I look at D., again, the more I like it but I am really not sure about the square top. Gah, why does he have to do such an excellent job? Because they are all lovely it's difficult to decide!

People often tell me covers bands dont earn money. We would have struggled badly with 4 kids without it.

Coil them, place them in a large plastic container and wait for the bin men to empty it. Then fit some new strings to your bass.

Blur were the most overrated Britpop band. I saw them at Glastonbury on their big comeback show. They were just boring, especially after Nick Cave

Rather than boiling, my solution now to keeping strings in top playing condition is to keep the bass in the corner of the room just as a piece of furniture. They now never get gunked up.

Wulfpeck are... oh, it's unpopular opinions that are wanted.

Dance and trance music from the 90's was to a large part instrumental

I've been trying to make some knobs for this bass - it's taken a little while to work out how to do it when I don't own a lathe. I've also made quite a few as I've been trying different things: I will post some picture of the process later but for now here's some different designs. I'm thinking of the one on the right with the marker but without the veneers as I think they are a bit fussy. I'm also waiting for my planer blades to come back from the sharpeners so I can get on with the second body. Cheers

D fits better with the "fret" markers and the rest of the instrument so perfect knob IMHO, but C would be 'kin hilarious with the line right across the top like a John Thomas.....

Sandblasted blue American Special Precision Bass

Is it this one? Pinterest is your friend! The Princess Isabella Blue Dragon.

It might be an unpopular opinion, but I'm unimpressed by how many of the other opinions expressed here are far from unpopular.

The (Ford) Zephyr Song - RHCP

Jump. Vah Halen

Wonderwall? Played it last Saturday. It's not a song I'd play at home, but it went down a storm, which was the point. The only songs I would suggest a band didn't consider for the set are the ones that don't get a positive reaction from the audience.

It's very precarious, which is why I only lasted 6 years the first time around. I managed 10 years the second time around, but now the pension is making things a little less precarious. We'll see where the energy prices take us!! Not long after we bought our first house, in the 80's, when we were most financially stretched, the interest rate was in the high teens. Much later, the wife, who is the money expert in this house, told me that if it wasn't for the money I earned gigging, regularly 3 nights a week, we'd have gone under.

@funkle I'd agree, the narrow band boost (Pick attack) is a very useful feature. the one sound generally lacking from these filter based preamps is a "mid scoop", which the pick attack effectively remedies in terms of frequency sweep not going below 150-200hz, (I mis read my own doc- these preamps do go down to 150), so early on i whipped up this little bit of kit: This was my test bed, which let me test frequency ranges down to 50hz all the way up to 7khz by switching all the dip switches in different combinations. the thing to remember is when we're talking about sweeping down and removing frequencies above the cutoff frequency. with the resonance turned down and the frequency backed all the way off to 200hz (or just below) you are actually starting to pull the Mids out a fair bit, leaving you with some low-mids and all of the bass. to my ear, sweeping down below this started to reduce the overall volume a little too much and left a very boomy bass sound with very little in the way of harmonics. I will admit however, it's totally a matter of personal preference, and with the addition of a pick attack going down to (and even below) 100hz would allow for a more pronounced mid-scooped sound. totally a matter of what kind of sounds you find useful. as i mentioned before, the upper and lower limits of the multi filter can be modified fairly easily (2 components to change) @MoonBassAlpha i did look into doing an SMT version, with some through hole components, but i never actually got the PCB's made up. i may well look into it once i get back into this, i did my best to keep the whole thing extremely compact, but its very tightly packed components on both sides of those boards.

Yes - a tonetech standard modern two-way I had a ponder and discussion with @evan47 and we agreed that this would be preferable. Yes - it's a bit weird that the Maurszczyk is reverse. If the adjuster was fitted in manufacture to the other side, it would work 'normally' (one end has a reverse thread, the other has a standard thread. The adjuster here was attached to the reverse thread end but could just as easily been fitted to the other end without any difference to how it works other than it would then adjust normally. It's bizarre). But my main concern was that even if it was turning the wrong way, it shouldn't have snapped with the small adjustments that @evan47 was making and the relatively small bow that he had created in the process! And being reverse is just stacking up the odds. I could understand it if they offered a ready and lucrative truss rod replacement service but, clearly, they don't And it's not unknown, of course, for the modern rods to fail (although I've never personally suffered or seen that). But if you scour the 'Repairs and Technical' here and on other bass and guitar forums, it seems to me to be almost always the case that truss rod difficulties - other than related to folks using the wrong allen key sizes - are with the older-style bent-rod systems.

Four knobs? That's making me feel anxious just thinking about it... When I had a board with individual stomp boxes, I had a dedicated compression pedal (an Aphex Punch Factory.) It sounded fine. As did my bass without the compression pedal turned on, so it went in the Great Rushbo FX Purge of 2015. The only time I use compression now (as part of a patch on my elderly but amazing Zoom B3) is on the one tune of the set which I slap. I think it makes a difference in smoothing out my less-than-amazing slappage. Or maybe its just a placebo... In short, try one and see if it works for you. As a wise man once said, "ask 100 bassists for advice and you'll get 150 opinions."

Not my choice as not my bass, but I really like the one above on the left.

I despise the Blues Brothers' 'Everybody wants somebody'. Not so much because of the song but due to its amazing power to cause a headlong rush to the dance floor from lagered-up lads (who normally prefer to booze rather than dance), knocking everyone aside, leaving a trail of death and destruction and lots of bro-hugging. (PS, Mr Brightside is the modern day equivalent)

Paul mcCartney is an average bass player and the beatles were garbage..........

Why not put an aluminium disc in your knob to reference the fret markers ? so a silver line is seen just below the knob “head” ? A silver ring amongst the wood, a knob ring, if you will It would have to be the right girth though heh heh

Dear Bass friends, attached a few pictures showing my actual Headless Bass on my workshop 😎

I have to say that no one has ever emailed me knob pictures before and then, like busses, three at once! It was like Knob Xmas 🎅

Why don't you forfeit the element of surprise and home print her off a 'Bank of Mum and Dad Bass Voucher' for £XXX, give it to her for her 18th and then get her to do the leg work, and in that way she'll maybe appreciate it more as it will be her choice? I bought both my daughters their cars and they both got Fiat 500's....only because I like Fiat 500's, not because they were necessarily the right cars for them!

I suspect some of this (i.e. awareness of tuning) is down to musical background and context. If you're playing in a band with wailing guitars with a lot of overdrive etc. then tuning is not going to be that obvious. If you're playing in a set-up where the sounds are much cleaner and purer, then tuning/intonation are going to be more obvious. The other factor is the harmony and the function the note you are playing in that harmony. If you are just playing roots and fifths, tuning issues will be less apparent than if you're playing the major third.