Leaderboard

This is my 1980 Wal Pro 2E, it had been sat in its case for the last god knows how many years in need of a good going over. The pots were knackered, the jack socket was shot to bits, it was basically unusable but I had other working basses and so it wasn't a priority. Eventually I came to my senses and gave it to Paul at Electric Wood to do his magic. I was expecting it to take ages, which I was fine with, but he turned it around in only a couple of months and then apologised for taking so long . He ended up doing a whole list of other stuff that I hadn't realised needed doing, but to his credit he stuck to his original quote. And oh my god, it sounds incredible -- I'd forgotten just how good. It'll be coming with me to the various Bashes this year, so you can see for yourself. And it'll be getting its first gig for at least 20 years at the end of this month, at a dementia research benefit with the ska band.

If was after something to double on gigs with my upright bass. In order to quickly put down the upright and pick up the electric bass it needed to be lightweight and shortscale. The band is all acoustic (through PA) so I wanted it to look right as well. I saw Eastwood selling Rivolta guitars on their website and they were making twelve of these Duocata basses and it ticked all the boxes. I do like the look of Rickenbackers and love a florentine cut. These basses have checkerboard binding and more than a hint of Rickenbacker about them, the soundclips were good so I ordered one. It was a gamble as I'd never heard of Rivolta before but it paid off, this little bass is fantastic. So well made, so playable and sounds great. Simple, single PU, volume and tone but there's so much variation in tone with playing position. I'm really fussy but I really can't fault this bass, well I can but it's three really minor things that most people would never notice, or let bother them. The volume control is a touch on the on/off side, there is a tiny bit of plastic swarf on the inner lower edge of the 'f' hole binding, and the biggest bug is that the scratchplate isn't perfectly aligned to the strings. Told you I was fussy. All easily sorted though. The woods, the grain and the colour is lovely. The neck is a three piece with two more strips on the headstock, like a Rickenbacker albeit they're all the same wood. I don't know what tuners they are but they feel solid and stable. Nor do I know what pickup it is but it sounds great. The binding everywhere is perfect, you cannot feel any edges, the frets are nicely finished, paint is perfect, just a really well made bass. They're made in Indonesia then sent to Rivolta in Nashville where they set them up and QC them, it arrive still in tune really nicely set up. Anyway, enough waffle, pictures 😁.

Playing ten miles out of Bournemouth in Ringwood. We (Otis Jay BluesBand) are beginning to hit our stride now with our new girl, and the social media reviews have been kind. Played my Sandberg VM4 through Galien Krueger MB200 and Barefaced One10. Perfectly adequate for the acoustics, though I did need active bass boost for a couple of numbers. Notable milestone - played our first band original last night, which was happily video’d by an audience member. Slight gripe - 34 paying punters is probably our lowest attendance at the venue (we split ticket money 50-50). Are people finding the new year hangover is now lasting through February? Three gigs in March, so here’s hoping things pick up a bit. The band are now ignoring my request to wear dark colours (like proper blues people) so I’m retaliating with the b/w pic!

Great venue for us last night with BLOCKBUSTARZ at The Ferry in Glasgow. Our first time there. The original band that was booked had to cancel and asked if we could fill in for them. Initially said no as they get paid half off what we normally charge. Venue got in touch and we settled on a compromise of a decent fee plus free food and first drink. Venue set aside a table for 6 just off the bar area which was the highlight for me. It was good sitting down for a meal and a blether with my bandmates. All very civilised. Food was excellent too. Anyways back to the gig. Load in 3pm sound check to be completed for 5pm to allow the support band time to do theirs. We set up and finished sound check by 4:30pm. Have to say the SE Stewart from Greenroom Studios in Glasgow was exceptionally good and even told the drummer to retune his snare and how to set the snare for optimum effect as drums sit in an alcove type thing below the upper deck of what was the old Renfrew Ferry. He really was top notch and sound both on stage and off was probably the best i've ever had. I could hear everything clearly across the stage and thru monitors. A perfect balance. Support band was GlasQuo who were all good guys too and easy to work with. Nice listening to a bit of Quo. Bass player was using my rig altho the bass was DI'd to desk and split to my amp as a stage monitor only. Normally i wouldn't do that but the guy replicated my on stage sound to FOH so all good. We don't normally play with support acts because of our costumes and getting ready for the show takes 30mins. Again SE sorted out the full stage when they finished. Two drum kits on stage so that meant dismantle one and pull our drummers kit forward to the front. Fair bit of work but he did a fantastic seemless change-over for us. This guy really knows what he's doing. He literally made our life so easy on the night. Huge respect where deserved. Gig went exceptionally well only a few mistooks (not by me of course 😉) Originally asked to do 2x45min sets or extend it if we need to depending on how change-over went. We opted to play right thru rather than take a break for a costume change from 10:15pm to 11:45pm but we had to cut a few songs out to fit it all in. SE told us we were first class and that the owners were very impressed by us and expect to ask us back. He said even the staff thought it was a great night and apparently they mentioned that the band were all very nice, pleasant and helpful with them. Fun taking the gear out at night as tide was out a bit and ramp was quite steep. Big downside was the parking in Glasgow. We could park on the esplanade area at The Ferry only to unload for approx 20-30 mins however on street parking only allows for max 2hrs stay then you need to move outside that zone so we stretched the venue parking to 4pm and then parked across from the venue on a side street. On street parking was £1:80 /15mins so we found a car park that was only £3/hr so £6 for 2hrs then free street parking after 6pm. Its only £10/day in the private car park so that's not too bad and that's what i'll do next time. Come April this year on street parking restriction will change from 6pm to 10pm so street parking won't be an option if we return as we would need to move the cars every 2 hrs until 10pm. Its a bit of a joke and not good for the staff that work there. The council are also planning to double the fee for parking. This could kill off the many city centre venues that host live music. Nice we 1hr drive home with clear motorways and very little traffic. Usual gear :- Sandberg VM4 with MarloweDK back up. Shure wireless, Keeley Bassist comp, Handbox WB-100, BF 212 cab, Platform boots being the footwear for the night. SE sent me some pics he took. Dave

What a sequence of events, but to cut it all short played Three Compasses in Clydach with just one, dep, guitarist. He'd done a lot of prep so only two big cockups... used a capo on the wrong song (I eventually figured out my bass hadn't gone flat and played up a semitone), and left out the key changes in one song where we play a different version. Great pub venue with playable(apparently!) Instruments on the walls, nice stage area, lights and excellent house pa so ours stayed in the van. My rig boomed a lot (near a corner plus hollow wooden stage) until I cut bass and boosted top and middle. Appreciative audience with some dancing, all a bit chaotic but great fun.

It was our first time at the 1912 in Sileby and what a great sounding room, with a nice vibe too. They had a low stage in the corner with plenty of room to fit a band on, and more importantly plenty of power sockets in good working order (which makes a change!). The venue also put some effort into advertising the event. We had a room full, but probably 90% were our regular followers. I'd have hoped for a few more locals. With the room sounding so good it probably lifted our performance a little more than normal too. We started off with a bit of rock and prog, but for the last set got much more dancy and filled the floor. We had a great night and lots of compliments. Oh, I nearly forgot to mention. The guitarist brought along his old 70s strat which was his sole guitar when we were all poor in the 80s and only had one guitar each. We played together for about 10 years, him on his strat and me on my Aria SB-1000. Well tonight, after much anticipation, he said it left him cold. He struggled to get it to sing and ended up playing the Vintage (brand) thinline tele he'd brought as a spare. He thinks maybe he's just no longer a strat guy, although I did mention he hadn't got the old Marshall combo he used to lug around. At least he still loves the guitar I built for him - a super-lightweight LP Junior double cut copy with twin P90s 😁 And look, the lights change colour 😂

I did my first gig with the covers band last night at The Whitmore Tap, Clifton/Redland, Bristol. It was quite stressful overall especially being the first time with a very established band. The footprint was so small and the layout so weird, we didn't have space for monitors, lights or my mic stand. I had my pedalboard on my amp and had to stand still to not hit walls, drummer and 2nd guitarist with the headstock. The pub has waist-high wooden screens that form booths and the sound was muffled everywhere. The load in/out was horrible too. No parking, yellow lines everywhere. The radiator behind us was red hot and didn't seem to respond to the valve adjustments we made. I was sweating and my fingers were slipping, more than you'd expect for a February pub gig. I told Guitarist 1 that he'd have EQ issues with his cab in a corner and guess what? No one seemed to know what time we were supposed to start, we had conflicting info from the agent/promoter and the pub and we went on in the end at 19:30. Finished up about 22:10 with a short break. 33 songs in total. That's as many as I've ever played I reckon. The punters were annoyingly all over us and wanted a go on the drums, guitar, they wanted selfies with the band, they thought it ridiculous that we don't do random requests. And of course they all stood in our way when we were packing up and unloading to the cars. It was like a greatest hits of pub gig niggles rolled into one! There were some tyre-kicking wedding enquiries that might or might not lead to decent function money but who knows? One bloke told me that my bass was the nicest Warwick he'd ever seen. Second time that's happened in the last 6 months. If you know, you know 😉. I kept my cool, did my job and went home only to find the road for last 3 miles of it was closed and I had to make a 9 mile diversion up the M5 to get home. Considering everything, I think we did well. If you can deliver the goods under those conditions, you're doing alright.

A new venue for us last night, Ruskins Bar in Kendal. A nice music bar in the heart of town, eerily quite at 9pm, but we waited until 9.30pm to start and the place filled up nicely, with lots of people dancing by the end. We used the house PA, which apparently isn't considered to be all that great, but we made it work pretty well for us. They want us back later in the year, and the fee will go up too! I really could have used the 3x10 last night, but I was travelling with the drummer and compromised because of space in the car. It was nice to meet Ian ( @Pirellithecat ) who travelled an hour down from Ulpha to see us. Cheers! Rob

Last night, played with Nine Lives at the Balaclava in Fraserburgh. Quite an odd night of two halves. First half was pretty busy and we had some dancers up. Second half got a bit quieter, and everyone seemed more reserved, although I did note some head nodding and singing along. So we got finished, and then, to my surprise given the relative tumbleweed which was the second half, got 4 different folk say to me how much they enjoyed the gig, we were amazing etc. One fellow bass player too praising my performance - always nice to have one's ego fluffed a little! Gear was Ibanez ATK200 then G&L L-1000 into the usual cubular black and yellow trouser flappers.

Quite a show on Saturday night, I played with a symphony orchestra! A local symphony had a "Swingin' With The Symphony" concert at a lovely theatre in North Bay and our band was part of it. The first half was just the symphony playing arrangements of some swing tunes and jazz medleys and then the stage was rearranged and set up for a big band in front of the symphony musicians. The seven members of our band formed the core of the big band and it was filled out by symphony players and some community musicians so we had 4 trumpets, 4 trombones, 5 saxes and a 3 piece rhythm section. We played 9 songs and what made it different was that the orchestra director actually took 7 of the big band charts and wrote complete orchestrations so on most of the songs we were a BIG band with the full orchestra backing us...fantastic sound but for us it was odd hearing bassoons and tympani parts in swing tunes. The audience of about 600 loved it and although I had one senior moment I managed to get most of it right, no room for mistakes when you are reading orchestra charts. The conductor occasionally sings with our band and that is how this whole thing started, he put in an enormous amount of work writing all those orchestra parts but they all worked well. I used my Shen SB100, NuX wireless to a Schatten Design preamp with volume control and my Traynor SB112 amp and because of the excellent acoustic qualities of the hall I didn't need anything else, I had plenty of volume even at the loudest orchestra parts. Good music, good players, good hall added up to a memorable night, I'll remember that one for a long time.👍😃 Edit: The first photo was just prior to actually playing and it looks like I play lefty but I was just standing in an odd position.

Birthday, plus massive work promotion haul. The Asheville Music Tools stuff are basically Moogerfoogers on crack… and OMG they are phenomenal.

You know it's going to be a good gig when you can walk up to the bar with your bass and order a beer... The Plough, Newport Pagnell, last Friday night. Pub reopening! Went with the stingray. Cozy setup.... <squeeeze>

Played the Sterling Castle in Bridlington on Saturday. A good gig overall with our new drummer- second gig and hes match fit! the sound guy James was superb, great not to lug any pa in to the venue as RCF stuff already set up. IEMs working great. Such a small stage but its amazing how much room you have with no bass amp taking up the space!

Back at The Crew rock bar in Nuneaton. It has a great atmosphere and I love the framed photos, posters and guitars everywhere. It does make for quite a lively sound though. The stage is under a staircase (leading to Queen's Hall) so the sound reflections can be interesting. Using pretty much the same settings as last night, which sounded great, the guitar had a lot more bite and the snare was like a gun shot where I was standing. I couldn't hear myself that well though as I was right on top of my cab. Anyway we were assured by some of our regular followers that although it was louder than usual it sounded great. This is one venue where I could probably do with some ear plugs. (Moby Dick drum solo) The guitarist had bought his strat along again, and this time it sounded great with the extra volume, etc. I used my usual kit - the Stingish bass into GT-6B into Fender Rumble v3 500. It's not really a dancing venue, but it was great to have the whole place singing their heads off to War Pigs!

Bit of a bitter sweet one for Glam Viva last night at a very nice local private club. We’d played this venue back last November and one of the audience requested we play the same venue for her birthday in February. This was booked, sadly she died over Christmas from a massive stroke. The family asked if we would go ahead with it as a tribute to her memory. We were unsure but it turned into a massive party with lots of happy revellers and even a nice fund raiser for a local animal shelter. The buffet was top notch too which pleased our drummer no end. Thats it for a couple of weeks as next weeks gig has been cancelled through lack of ticket sales….we’ve all agreed we won’t take anymore gigs where the organisers are relying on ticket sales to fund.

Full house at a relatively local club for us. Shotton Comrades last night, easy load in, great crowd too 👌🏼 Zoom B2 four is working well with my simple two settings - basically it's an uncoloured Vigier tone with compressor only, and identical compressor and chorus for any widdly bits 😆 my Cliff Bordwell fretless just goes straight into the desk.

I'm not sure if people have seen this before but I revisited this from 5 years ago and HS and his fabulous band put in a great performance and do the song justice. Along with Pino on 'Tear your playhouse down', this is my favourite bassline and I do like an octaver. The bassist gets a great bass octave sound and I believe he's Adam Prendergast - EDIT: From what I've found on this bassist, his board has a Micro POG on it and I wonder if that's what's in use - I've been chasing the right Octave pedal for ages and have a separate thread on that but the EHX was never on my list...mmmm

I was away immediately afterwards and so didn't get chance to post at the time, but there was a Mingus Tree gig in The Shed in Charlbury on the 14th. This style of music always seems to go down well with the local audience. There's one tune where the guitarist changed the intro, and I keep missing my cue. I paid particular attention this time and was bang on with the intro, then cocked up in the second bar once the tune got going. Oh, well. There was also a request from the band for bass guitar for a particular song, played in a particular way. Normally, if I noodled away on an altered scale throughout a tune it might be considered a bit dodgy, but this was exactly what they wanted. We even got a star turn from the BL's ventriloquist's dummy for one song...

Sunday afternoon gigs are the best aren’t they? And how about one that ends with a standing ovation - aye I’ll have some of that thank you. Here’s a little clip of the last two minutes of our encore yesterday at Shotton Comrades club. Makes the back pain on a Monday from humping gear worth it 😎 39c2fca7-3412-4b54-be44-3234f5ad7aac.mov

Some of you may recall that I bought a 1973 Rick 4000-to-4001 conversion from Gunnar of this parish (aka @Studio GC) a few years back. It was cool AF, mojo'd to heck (with Crue carved crudely into the top) and seriously modded. I ended up selling it on eBay to an enthusiast who wanted to convert it back to a 4000. Well, it eventually came up for sale in 2026 and I have snaffled it back. The seller did a superb restoration job on it (only missing the original wavy Grover tuners). The work he did included: adding new old stock pickguard, original pots and pickup, Hipshot USA machineheads, filling in and making good the extensive additional routing under the pickguard, and repairing the paintwork to remove Crue and to cover the newly fixed area under the pickguard.

Well, it’s here… came home this lunch time and discovered that they’d delivered it early - fortunately they’d stashed it behind our bins - not taken it back to the depot. Phew. I have to say that I love it. It looks and sounds great and, of course, the feel of the neck is wonderful. It’s the all-paulownia version but none the worse for that. The sound is in just the Jazz territory that I like with bounce and spring in all the right frequency ranges. Lovely. I’ll be using it at church tomorrow evening and then again at the Weekly Monday Jam on Monday so I will report back on the sound… but I do not expect to be disappointed. Oh yeah… and the number you all want to know… 2.8kg / 6.2lbs which is daft but it still feels great on a suede backed leather strap. No neck dive discernible at all. Love it so far!

Thursday night at The Fox Town Annex in Mequon. I thought we were sloppy. It hasn't been announced but I think our drummer dumped us. He's turned down 8 summer bookings. Great drummer and singer but apparently isn't into us. I was really good about chatting at tables with the punters. I had put a few scripts together that worked very well. Good crowd and a lot of dancing. I guess people are easy to please. I'm starting to question the direction of the band. But where could I find another money making band at 72 years old? Daryl

You weren't far wrong 🤣 It's taking a while for me to pull myself together, not helped by having to be at work in my proper job at 8am this morning. Ouch. So.. yes. Matty Healy! Sting! Lewis Capaldi! The latter two were closely-guarded secrets, and genuinely took the audience by surprise. The bad news: they did self-contained performances that didn't need the house band, so I didn't get to play with them. The good news: they were amazing, so I didn't give it a second thought. We did two shows, each around 3.5 hours long (it isn't just music - there's comedy and that too.). We opened the show with Chris Rea's 'Let's Dance'. As well as being a bit poignant, it also captures the essence of the show and fits the band line-up perfectly. We had loads of dancers on stage, and it was a real high-energy start. From there we went into a reel called Rakish Paddy, again with the dancers aided by a quick costume change. After that, Cuddy's Cave, a beautiful musical poem... it's a love letter to the region by the wonderful Nev Clay. Over the next few hours we played songs including December 1963, I Can't Make You Love Me, Always a Woman and Hit the Road, Jack. It all went swimmingly. Of course our special guests grabbed all the headlines, but that's fine by me... the charity is going to benefit massively. Need to sleep now, 'cos we're doing it again in 2028. Here's a clip of the finale:

Barry Morris posted some excellent pics of Sunday's gig on Facebook 😎

Friday night I had a last minute (8 hours’ notice) dep with tribute band Dire Streets, at Chipping Sodbury Town Hall. I’ve done quite a few rhythm guitar deps with them over the last few months, but I hadn’t looked at the bass parts for a year, so I took my iPad and read the dots where necessary.

Well - this is interesting. Firstly, 'Custom' was a Netherlands importer brand, I think for a specific retailer - somebody on one of the Facebook MIJ guitars groups found the name but it's slipped my mind, annoyingly. They sourced from a number of different manufacturers including Moridaira, Matsumoku & Chushin - so they probably just bought in whatever their supplier had, rather than contracting to specific manufacturers. Customs turn up in the UK pretty regularly, very often in Scotland, which has led to some speculation a Scottish retailer was bringing excess stock over from the Netherlands - no evidence as yet but no-one would be surprised if it turned out to be the very entrepreneurial Jimmy Grant, who had Glasgow & Edinburgh Grant Music shops, his own range of Grant guitars (with UK distribution) & was also UK importer/distributor for Canadian hand-made Odyssey guitars & basses in the 70s & 80s. As for the bass itself - that's really interesting - and this is why: Had this back in 2011, and I could never pin down what it was. This had a plain, oddly home-made looking neckplate & the body was a not-quite right P shape. Came with no hardware, and I pretty much concluded it was likely European, not MIJ, based on the Eko-esque inlay patterns. I have never seen the same neck before today. I think the finish had been stripped under the rattlecan black & it had no hardware or electronics to help ID it - but seeing @Shabbs's pics I'm confident it's the same bass. No logo on mine, the head having been stripped & re-finished, probably with Ronseal! I'll speculate & say this might have come from an organisation called Matsumoto Gakki Seizou Kumiai, the Matsumoto City instrument manufacturers' co-operative. They bought in bodies, necks, electronics & parts from various small manufacturers & assembled instruments from an order-book system, where a customer would choose necks, bodies & parts, and instruments would be built up & branded to their specifications.

50 years old

Right then @Machines, I've compiled the results, and it's a majority 8-2 ruling for... NOT GUILTY In my closing notes I will say that you had a close brush with failure and you would be well advised to steer clear of guitar shops going forward, but the court will not go as far as issuing a restraining order. Be good. Case closed.

Well this is nice, I get to report a new bass acquisition without fear of Tier 1 infraction. This Sandberg California TT4 SuperLight arrived today and is LOVELY!!! Great active Jazz sound and only weights 2.8kg / 6.2lbs too. I ordered it back at the end of August so I understand that means it’s not in scope for this year’s challenge. Yay!!!

Welcome to the thread, and well done for spotting that it is about encouraging us to improve musical skills. I was impressed at how quickly you went from buying "a keyboard stand this year so I can learn to use the keyboard I bought years ago" to "new digital piano, synth and guitar incoming!" - both posts are timestamped "8 hours ago" on my system! It is always good to see that sort of reckless abandon from new players, because it distracts Chief Referee @neepheid from any infractions that I and others might be about to commit.... Keep it up, @brickers!

The gas monster has been satisfied. For more info and gushing see: https://www.talkbass.com/threads/show-me-your-compact-pedalboard-setup.891222/page-563#post-29490999 But in short I’ve finally found what I’ve been searching for, I’ll still be using the Anagram for most things but there is a core setup I’ve been chasing that I’d use in the studio or on a gig where there was a competent soundman and provided IEMs. This board is that, aspirational in terms of the gigs it would be used on but perfect tonally and something that if I only use at home I’ll be fine with. One of the issues with digital is I feel you still need a good analog (pun intended) to make sure you’re not drifting to close to crap, an issue that’s easily possible when you have a unit that can do anything. Maybe I’ll capture what I’ve got going on here, maybe I’ll add in the Camden and capture all that, but one rig is plug and play and the other is plug and play after about 5 hours of programming and comparisons. Anyway enjoy the board with 3 xlr’s and 1 effect 🙃

Then maybe a nice pre and a pickup, have it refinished and...

That they appear happy to fix things that were bought used and therefore likely well out of warranty, to do so with no charge, and then suck up the courier fees as they did with me and have dome for others, is frankly extraordinary. Comparison with businesses who do exactly the opposite, either refusing to accept a unit as faulty - "that whistling sound is normal for this class of amplifier" (mention no names), to meet warranty terms, or quoting bank-breaking fees for repairs - makes it even more so. There will always be exceptions hence my note to @Minininjarob above, but to quote Melody Maker from the mid 70's "Even Stevie Nicks must have the occasional bad day". Whether you like what they produce, brands like Ashdown, Status, Trace, Wal etc are national treasures 👍

Right… update time. Ziricote / sapele body now oil-sanded to 2500 grit and I may have accidentally summoned a small woodland spirit. The ziricote has gone full “brooding Victorian villain”, dark and dramatic, while the sapele is glowing like it’s just been told it’s the favourite child. The carve is doing that hologram thing where it moves every time you tilt it. I’ve spent an unreasonable amount of time just rotating it under the light whispering “oof”. Edges are basically glass now. If this gets any smoother it’ll need a warning label. No stain, no funny business – just oil, patience, and far too much staring at it. Hard wax oil going on next to lock it in and give it that silky satin feel without killing the depth. If this one doesn’t sound good, at least it can sit in the corner looking expensive and judging everyone. MGCS – Made to Play, Built to Last.

I visited Bass Direct for the first time Saturday, wanted to try a Gibson LPB. I phoned a few days before to let them know of my interest. No complaints from me I had a great time there. Left alone to play for I guess an hour before being asked what I thought. Sadly, and I was gutted, I didn't get on with it but not a wasted drive up they bought a the fender p I took up as part exchange. Two great guys working that day.

Dakota Red – clear building up nicely 🔥 Colour’s locked in and now it’s all about the clear. Got the first sessions of nitro clear on and it’s starting to build properly. You can see the depth coming through already — that wet look beginning to form before it’s even been near paper or a mop. A couple more coats of clear to really bury everything and give me some material to level back, then it’ll be hung up to cure while I try very hard not to keep wandering into the workshop “just to look at it”. So far it’s laying down well — no drama, no major sags, just that lovely glossy build that makes you believe you know what you’re doing. Flat, polish, then the real shine. MGCS – Made to Play, Built to Last.

I owned a USA G&L Fallout a few years back with a tribute model as a backup. From a fetish the object point of view, I wish I still had the USA one with it's quarter sawn neck and fancy tuners BUT....sonically it was no better at all than the Tribute. My only basses now are 2 tribute Fallouts, one with flats one with rounds. It's a strange feeling, having played bass for 40 years; you feel there should be a justification for having a vintage fender ( those days are gone now for me) or some other bass with kudos. The brute truth is that in the band I'm in, the basses I currently own work better than anything else I've tried. At around £300 s/h each. OK I've upgraded the tuners, but for no good reason really. I think, like Danelectro guitars ( I read an interview with Lindy Fralin where he said the stock pickups in his Korean Dano where perfectly good enough), by their essence 30 inch scale basses are ' good enough ' at a lower price point than 34 inch scale. You can try and make them more ornate but perhaps the inherent lack of dead spots and the bloom of notes up the dusty end makes them great value and utility. Just my experience anyway.

On another side note i've just joined a blues rock band from Edinburgh area. They've seen me play with the Glam band so no audition required they said. They were just happy to get me the BL said. Guitarist is a mad Gary Moore fan so that should be fun. They seem to be aiming for that Eric Clapton, Cream, Gary Moore style of Blues Rock which can make for some nice interesting basslines. Dave