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So while I have a couple of days off work, I really wanted to take a couple of hours to scratch a P Bass itch I have, I don't know where it came from as I have NEVER liked the look or the thought of a P Bass, but I've been bitten recently and the itch is too much, so got to scratch it. I popped into Guitar Guitar in Newcastle and asked them to unfurl their in stock P Basses, line them up and let me try them all in a shootout fashion to see if any of them were a suitable ointment. With that said I was presented with lots of basses highlighting Fenders highly confusing catalogue of models, with a £5000 50's custom shop propping one end and a Squier Classic Vibe at the other, sandwiched in the middle were American Pro's, Vintera's, and Players series'. What a bloody hit and miss selection of basses they are, some were good, some were awful, combinations of good / bad strings, setups and neck feel, the £800 Vintera having a much better setup than the twice the price American Pro for instance... I can quickly talk about that £5k P bass here, and this is for people who have played it... that neck... WTF... it's a tree, U profile? sheesh!... ...So for an hour I went back and forward between 5 or 6 basses until I was playing just one and didn't want to put it down... that bass was... drum roll please... a... Squier FSR (Factory / Fender Special Run?) Late 50's Custom Vibe P Bass (awful mouthful) in a two tone sunburst (never liked this colour) with a anodised gold (never ever would have wanted this) pickguard... so it's a P Bass in a colour combination that I would never have looked twice at, it's got a maple fingerboard which I have forever told myself I don't like, and it's a squier... so why did I buy it? well put simply it's one of the best basses I have ever played, ever, I couldn't put it down, I went back to it after playing US Pros and Mex Vinteras and Players Series' and for me it was just better, the neck was better, the frets were better, the feel was better, it was just better so I left with it and then played it for 2.5 hours straight when I got it home, it's tremendous. £400, was the American Pro 4 times the bass? not a bloody chance. As for P Basses I thought they could only produce a stuffy wooly thumpy jumper sound, but it knocks most basses out the park for bark and bite, volume up, tone down and it just nails everything I want to play. I'm converted! It's a wonderful instrument, and I'm definitely coming round to the two tone sunburst and gold pickguard, it's classy in a "late 50's" kind of way 🤔.

No, not all immediately recent - obtained over the last year in various ways. First one was the Thunder 3 fretted, acquired locally about a year ago. It was the classic been under the bed for 20 years job, but had a failed pickup, green frets & was a bit sad looking generally. I could see it was fundamentally sound though and just needed a lot of TLC, which I gave it & got the pick up fixed by Kent Armstrong via my local (most excellent) music store, Kempsters. Second one was the Thunder 1A, picked up off of here about 6 months ago. Paid probably top dollar for this one, but it did come with an original case. Also needed some TLC but not as much as my first one did. My first ‘proper’ bass as a teenager in the ‘80’s was a Thunder 1A. By now I was smitten with my more recently acquired Westone’s, & the 1A sounded even better than I remembered when played through my modern decent backline. So when a mint Thunder 3 fretless came up for sale about three months ago at Bass Direct, I was in like a shot! No second thoughts. Due to a talent shortfall on my part, the fretless will probably stay a home player lol. The fretted 3 & 1A have both been out on rehearsal duty already & sounded brilliant. I’d never owned a Thunder 3 before and after playing bass for 40 years or so, I’d say the one I have is one of the nicest basses I have ever heard. Very happy with this trio, it has to be said 🙂.

Anyone who's ever been in a working band knows the band lead bag/box. It's a thing of utmost importance but over the years it collects a few casualties and weirdos along the way. It contains the living, the dead, the injured and the "just in case". Over a year ago I decided to sort the band lead bag out. I disposed of the dead, straightened the injured and nursed them back to health, carefully calculated the various lengths required and purposes, wrapped them neatly and filled the pockets with spares, fuses, connectors, a torch, generic spare strap etc etc. It was a thing of beauty. Then I filled another bag with the walking wounded, weirdo's and stuff that was worth keeping just in case. Guess which fookin bag I picked up and took to our first gig back after the apocalypse 😔 ?

I wouldn't mind so much, but just two hours earlier I'd asked @gary mac if there was anything to watch out for at this pub and did he warn me? 😂

I went to look at a Peavey Zodiac bass advertised in a local shop window for £99 and the guy showed me this Ibanez Roadstar II as well, according to Dr Google its a RB620NT from around 1983 (but open to advice on this). I am a beginner player and don't know much about gear but whatever it is, it spoke to me, and so I went home to find the cash, google it and went back today and got it, very grateful to the seller. I paid £180 It seems in strangely good condition for its age, better than I was at 38 years old, maybe it has been worked on? One of those situations where I don't really know what I bought ... but I like it 🤨. It seems pretty genuine, but again, I have no idea ... I took the photos straight away when I got home before the light left, still undusted, as I wanted to post this and see whether people think I made a wise choice. I practiced with it this evening and it surprised me how lively the output is, for a passive bass it seems to have quite a kick compared to my (one) other passive bass, I love the feel of the neck - it is a P-bass type? No idea, lol. I think it needs a setup and some strings and the neck looks a tiny bit torqued / twisted, is that usual for an old instrument? Plays ok to me, though. I get the impression it has been stored and unplayed for a while 5-10 years, any advice on what I should do with it to restore to full health? Anyway, I am very happy with it, I feel like I need to get some flares to wear while I am playing it to properly do it justice, here are some pics : Groovy! J

I appear to be going through a bit of a phase, as this is the 2nd 70's Japanese P bass I've bought in the last few weeks. This is my perfect P bass. I love the punk aesthetic of the white/black combo, I love the slightly 'wrong' headstock shape. The body seems to be a little undersized, as it's very light. The neck feels somewhere between my 78 Yamaha P and my Fender Japan J. I had been eyeing it up on FB marketplace in Bangkok for a while, a really good deal. It was on sale for just a little too long so I had to go for it. It's a 78 Greco in remarkable condition. It plays superbly and sounds as good. This is a keeper, for sure.

The best laid plans and all that.... Anyway, after managing to get down to three basses (P Bass, SR5 and Fretless) I called in to PMT Cardiff to buy some strings but on the way in my wife spotted this gorgeous US G&L CLF L-2000 in their B-stock section and said "ooh, that's a really nice finish on that bass". I hadn't actually seen it at that stage but on closer examination she was right. Not only was it a lovely looking bass, it was also a really, really decent price too, especially as the only thing I could see that was slightly wrong with it was a very minor lacquer chip near the truss rod access on the headstock and a tiny bit of a lacquer ding on the bottom edge. Other than that it was spotless. I spoke to one of the staff who told me they'd had it hanging around for a while but had only just put it up for sale and would I like to try it. After play it for 10 mins I fell in love with it. I've had a couple of G&L 5 Strings before but this was the first 4 string I'd tried and it's something else. It's a lovely light weight and the electronics sound amazing- more organic than say a Stingray, but equally more hifi than a P Bass. The neck is lovely too. The guy could obviously smell blood in the water as he offered an even bigger discount than on the ticket but I decided to be sensible for once in my life and walk away. About an hour later on our way home my wife asked me why I didn't buy it and I explained that I couldn't really afford it or justify it at this moment in time. She told me to use some of our savings if I wanted to, so when I got home I called the store and asked them if they'd accept an even lower price for it: they wouldn't but reduced what they'd offered it to me for even further and threw in free next day delivery. And here it is. So anyway, as I was saying I'm at four basses, which is obviously far better than three

You may remember this build some months back. I finally got round to lacquering it. I’m super pleased with it. Output is quite low and I’m not sure why, as the preamp was pre-wired. (Noll). just need to set up intonation etc.

On Sunday I took a trip down to what is becoming for me, a standard bass trading place, which is IKEA (in Bristol this time, rather than Exeter as it was last time). This was to meet up and pickup this bass that I had played at the South West bass show, one of @Jabba_the_guts fantastic little basses. Fell in love with these things a few bass bashes ago and finally have one. I am sure most people have seen them unless they don't go into the makers threads, or the short scale thread where I posted it, and if not, there is a link at the bottom of its birth, as well as some much better pictures! This is so fun to play and also easy to use in the house as they are so small (27" scale). It sounds very full and bassy, with single / parallel series switch. And of course LEDs, with two options, very bright or OMG I think i have gone blind Heres the other pictures of it, and its creation thread.

@Andyjr1515 @BassToolI bought some decals from these guys and you guys were right - very pleased with them. This bass was finished a few weeks ago -here's the final photos. Time to finish the next project!!

Cheltenham Hall last night. Fantastic venue although not the easiest for sound. It was a long day there and back from Yorkshire, but worth it!

Is September 24th 1991 the greatest day in music history? No. I have almost no interest in any of those bands or records.

JEDSON TELE.... the worlds worse bass, short scale or otherwise, and I love it! Barely a bass at a 24" scale! Jedson took it's tele guitar and just slapped on some bass hardware. The body is plywood and the neck looks like oak but I'm sure it can't be. Swapped a cheap Ibanez I wasn't getting on with for this just for a laugh as it was so different. It's such a bonkers thing to play that I find myself inventing new lines on it everytime I pick it up, it's quite the inspiration machine. However, looking at it critically for it's craftsmanship, it is truly appalling! I'm not sure what strings were supposed to be on this but the only way to make it work is to use either short scale nylon or baritone bass six strings, then run the strings through the body or there's too much to go on the tuning peg (the original string anchor was a hideous piece of bent tin). And because of the scale length it has a solo tuning of F# or there's not enough tension. The pickups were knackered but I had a EMG MM pickup lying around. The resultant tone actually massive! And having said all this it's great fun to play!

Last week I took my ukulele to a local folk session. I wanted to have a couple of pints, so instead of driving I went by bike. Uke/case on a shoulder strap. That reminded me of the Uke/bike based adventure I treated myself to for my 50th birthday. Hope it's OK to share the memory. My hobbies at the time were open mic nights and a bit of cycling. Basically I put some clothes and toiletries etc in a rucksack, and strapped the uke (in a case) to the back of the rucksack. Then cycled from my home near Dunstable to Portsmouth in 4 legs with overnight stays in hotels. Each of the 5 nights I played the uke at an open mic night. Got lift home. It took a fair amount of planning and preparation. Also had to increase my bike stamina as I was a 10-mile-ride guy prior to this. It only rained once (but absolutely whizzed down for a few hours).... but it was the last leg so didn't seem to matter as much. Here is the itinerary and map (the map still shows a stop at StAlbans which was cancelled by the venue, and replaced by an extra night in London) May 10th – 14th 2015 Sun: Paper Dress, Shoreditch Mon: Bedroom Bar(?), Dalston Tues: Jolly Tanners, Staplefield Weds: Fishbowl, Brighton Thurs: Crown Inn, Portsmouth It was an absolute blast, met some great people - one of my treasured memories.

Sounds like you’ve made yourself a reggae cable , can you let me know what you did 😁

Not to be outdone by @spacecowboybelow, I also bought a bass at Newcastle Guitarguitar yesterday. A Balaguer 'select series' Goliath. And here she is: Double humbucker with pull pots for each pup's volume that turn the pups into single coil. So it can be a jazz, and also a HH. Practising today I really love the bridge pup soloed, it has a lovely bark to it. It's very light, not weighed but would estimate at 4kg or less, so I don't know why it's called 'Goliath'!. The neck is gorgeous, see the pic. It also feels fantastic. I can see no improvement on this with any American made Fender. Apparently the 'Select Series' are made in a factory in Korea with 7 luthiers, so not mass produced a la Cort in Indonesia. It was £899, with a deal so mid range, price wise but the quality is way above MIM Fender (of which I own two). I feel like I've got a top of the range bass for a steal.

Just added a matamp GT150 to my rig! Haven't valved it yet but will do later tonight. Switchable power on the back from 150w to 75w and custom face plate. Can't wait to get it cranked. As ever the guys at matamp have been ace. Top top people.

Ta da! IT'S ALIVE! Going to leave the strings on for a day or so and do a proper set up before testing.

Just picked up this beauty. New best friends with my 1999 AVRI 62 in LPB. Yum

I just had a chance to have all of these beautiful basses at the same time in my studio for a weekend. I used it to make a sound comparison video of 6 Precision type bass guitars, 5 Fender and an alien - Maruszczyk. Always wanted to test different eras and different price range P basses. All the info about the basses and the recording is under the video at YT. Hope You will enjoy and let me know what You think about it ☺️.

To be fair to thoman, it costs a lot of money to send parcels from Europe to the UK, and vice versa. I'm sure they will subsidise the postage, but it doesn't seem financially feasible for them to subsidise returns. I'm afraid it's the cost of doing business with a European company in a post brexit world.

And a bit more progress. This time it's all about getting ready for gluing the wings to the neck. The back will have maple binding. It's a lot easier to cut the slot for this before the sides are glued. I used the great Radius Dish UK's binding cutting jig - with an added high-tech mod (rubber band) of my own. Spent some time working out the neck and headstock angles and then cut the side profile on the band saw, including the curve at the back: Starting to look like a guitar:

He's got the thousand yard stare of bar staff to me. I love the way he just calmly escorts her away and returns the cap in one motion, smoothly done

As a bass player for over 50 years now I feel compelled to present some advice to anyone in a local band to ensure you're capitalizing on the opportunity live shows give you and to make sure your connecting with you audience. Because everyone has internet-connected phones, it's far too easy for people to become disconnected from your performance and relegate your music to background noise. However, there are a number of pitfalls I see band after band falling into that are easy to avoid. Take or leave the following, but I can almost guarantee that bands who put these things into practice will see improvement in their short and long-term audience engagement and growth: 1. Plan what you are going to say to your audience whenever you are not playing a song. I see far too many bands get stone-faced, have awkward pauses while they stare at each other waiting for someone to say anything meaningful, and then vomit up some meaningless word salad that people instantly forget the moment the next song starts. In addition to planning your transitions so that you don't look like idiots, make sure you include at least something that can potentially produce an ROI. Mention where people can go to find your music, when and where your next show is, your social media handles, etc. 2. Stop turning your backs to the audience! Doing this occasionally and briefly is fine, because I know sometimes you get into your groove and face each other, etc. However, I've literally seen people turn their backs to the audience for anywhere from 30 seconds to over a minute, and that is a VERY quick way to get your audience to disconnect. While we're on this subject, LOOK THEM IN THE EYES occasionally. Yes, it can be awkward if you overdo this, but neglecting eye contact all together is an egregious sin. Remember, that part of what you're doing while performing is selling yourselves to the audience. In sales, they always teach you to make eye contact with your customer, and this is no different. 3. Plan your set list to follow some kind of dynamic roller coaster. In other words, don't do a bunch of fast/heavy/upbeat songs in a row or vice versa with slower songs. Have some ups and some downs. Vary it up. Tell a story with your selection of songs and make their ordering purposeful and thoughtful. Designers of roller coasters understand this concept. They make the ascent to the top of the first drop deliberately slow to build suspense. They also don't have every twist, turn, and loop feel exactly the same. There is variety, and that ultimately bodes well for everyone. 4. If you play covers, spice them up a bit. Obviously, I'm not asking you to fundamentally change the song. However, adding some kind of twist to make it your own and the listening experience unique for the audience will make you more memorable. If your audience is engaged with you, and they should be, they'll pick up on even subtle things you do and likely appreciate them. 5. Talk to your audience before and after the show. Thank them for coming, and encourage them to follow up in whatever ways you have open to the public. Take selfies with them. I guarantee you that people appreciate this, whether it's apparent or not at the time. People will remember how you make them feel, and a pleasant conversation with them will drastically increase your chances of building a more long-term fan base. I would further state that you should be doing this on social media as well, even after you become "big". 6. Move around and get animated when you play/sing. Obviously, if you're doing highly technical stuff, then you can concentrate on your playing as needed, but don't stand there the entire show like a plank of wood. If it's not readily apparent that you're having fun on stage, I guarantee you your audience won't either. There are probably allot of variables depending on the band, what do you think. Blue

Inspired by my last licence plate 3 string cbg I decided to build something 'different'. 30.9" scale, flat ebony fretless board (10mm thick) , hollow body, parallel neck and as small a headstock as possible. . Stainless inserts and a 'mistake' in drilling the the bolt holes despite using a pillar drill. Note the anti neck dive fitment, 1 lb of lead! 20mm neck depth and 48mm width (easy using the planer-thicknesser). 48mm neck width results in 13.5mm string spacing. From using the 3 string cbg I hoped that this would be playable (if not the design will let me replace the neck with a conventional taper one). Extended neck join and angle to get neck tilt with shim. Next time I will set the neck support block in at an angle in the body (or rout an angled pocket). Those with sharp eyes will notice the little infill at near the fingerboard end. Careful measurements can fail when user stupidity intervenes in simple mathematics! Wanting to keep the headstock as thick as possible, get the maximum break angle (and not cut / carve / rout a Fender type headstock thinning) I copied this sunken method that I found on another guitar build. If anyone does use it remember to make the depressions large enough to get a box spanner or socket over the machine head bushing nut. These did, just! Self made ebony nut, made with rat tail file, really pleased with how that turned out. Cavity for recessed piezo pre amp control panel. Due to this 'design' evolving rather than being planned correctly (ironic that my professional career relied on planning to prevent p**s poor performance) I ended up routing the recess after assembling the body shell. Much easier if done before. Body is sapele, 60mm wide, 20mm depth. Bridge with stainless adjusters. Angled machine heads to reduce turning moment (and hopefully help with neck dive). Machines are from Retrovibe, 20:1, excellent quality and fairly lightweight. Good price as well. Neck dive has been averted, all up weight is 7.9Lb Joyo piezo pre amp, chosen beacuse of price and features (£24, 5 band eq, tuner and phase. It also had a piezo undersaddle rod thrown in). Bought direct from Joyo so no risk of a 'knock off'. Finish is Tru-Oil. Very easy to use and get a 'glossy' finish. The neck is so stiff that I have had to (for the first time ever in any bass I have owned) use the truss rod to add relief. If you build one be aware that not all USA licence plates are the same thickness, some are very flimsy, some are steel, others aluminium. The Colorado plate was easy to use, the Nebraska one was 'buckled', difficult to get flat and eliminate buzzing / vibrations. Strung with some status flats I had lying around it is quite a 'fun' thing. The box format is surprisingly loud acoustically, string spacing is tight and playing it requires finesse (not my normal right hand technique). Will hopefully post some sound clips, I am pleased with it, it has a jazzy EUB, double bass vibe, plenty of string growl as well.

That looks like a flying V that's been delivered by Hermes

This is the loud rig. It’s really rather a lot better than I am:

Reason for bank transfer is we don't accept Paypal for large purchases because If you change your mind and want a refund, PayPal keep the fees which can be £100 on a guitar. Watch this space to see the total irradiation of PayPal on our site. With a bank transfer we would just send back your payment and no one loses out ,except PayPal. Call me personally if unsure I've been around since 1997, I ain't going anywhere and we certainly don't cheat people, we are musicians first and salesmen second. Robbie Bryan

While Roger Sadowsky is a well-respected luthier, he does have a vested interest in "bigging-up" the contribution of the woods used in solid electric instruments to defining the sounds of those instruments. He is after all a maker of instruments that are essentially Fender copies (admittedly very nice Fender copies - I've played several in his workshop in NYC - but still essentially Fender copies) and therefore to downplay the contribution of the wood to the sound of the instrument would be to instantly remove half the USP of a Sadowsky bass. The problem I have with "tone woods" for solid electric instruments is that they are given as absolutes (which the article very much re-enforces) instead of what I think as VERY rough guides. I've played instruments that contradict probably all of these presumed absolutes. Perhaps if you are Roger Sadowsky and you get all your wood from exactly the same source (and here I don't mean the same wood merchant but from trees grown in the same small geographical location for any given species) then maybe we can put some weight behind those generalisations, but no-one can tell me that wood from an ash tree grown in the US is going to produce the same tone as wood from an ash tree grown in Europe (not withstanding the fact that "ash" covers 40+ different species of trees). Even Mr Sadowsky himself says: "When I coach people on buying an instrument at a music store, I tell them to try to listen to several of the same model, made with the same woods..." If wood of a certain species was a absolute there would be no reason for this statement. The when you consider that most small scale luthiers are at the mercy of whatever their usual wood supplier can get in stock, and the large scale manufactures will on the whole buy with best value for money in mind, it is impossible to make anything other than most sweeping generalisations about tone when it come to choice of woods for an instrument. My position on tone wood is similar to that of Carl Thompson who said that the choice of woods used will have a impact on the sound of a solid electric instrument, but you can't tell what it will be until the instrument is finished. The problem with all these so-called tone wood comparison tests is that none of them are valid from a scientific PoV because of both flawed methodology and sample sizes being far too small to give any meaningful results. I've stopped worrying about the woods used for my solid electric instruments and concentrate instead on how each individual instrument looks feels and sounds when it is complete. It is only sane thing thing to do.

Yamaha BB 2005 - Quick Review I'm loving the Yamaha BB 2005 I picked up a couple of days back – turned out to be a very cheeky wedding anniversary present! It’s a June 2004 build and now has pride of place as the oldest bass in my herd. I’ve previously been tempted to get one on the relatively rare occasions that they have come up for sale but couldn’t really justify it when I had my NE2. If someone said to me that I could have 85% of a BB NE2 for 30% of the cost I would have probably laughed at them. But this bass is it and to find one in such good condition for such a good price and from such a great seller (thanks Rich!) saw me snapping it up on the day it was listed - super happy that I did! I gave it a decent work out through my BF BB2 / Bugera 1001M rig at band rehearsal last night and it sounded great. The bridge J pup adds to the grit of the Bugera amp and cuts through well; I'm tempted to describe the tone it delivers as "woody" but that probably means completely different things to different bass players! But it’s the neck pup where it really shone for me: a rich, warm, punchy tone that sat very well in the mix. The solo’d P pup on my 1025 is great at home but can sometimes struggle to cut through in a band mix and I typically then switch to PJ or solo J on the 1025; the J on the 2005 is more like the 1025’s P on steroids - really loved it! Like the NE2 it has a similarly powerful low end - definitely don’t need to boost the bass EQ! The treble EQ on the 2005 has a decent range and like the BB 604/5 and BB NE2, the sister basses in its range, it sports the variable NE mid cut. My 2005 weighed in at a fraction under 10 lbs, which is pretty much at the top of end of my herd these days, but it balances beautifully with no neck dive whatsoever which is outstanding for a 5 string bass in my experience and meant that “wearing it” for a couple of hours was unexpectedly comfortable. The Yamaha BB JJ range Must admit I’ve not previously looked in any detail at the full range of BB’s that comprise the Yamaha BB “JJ range”, headed up by the BB NE2, partly because the NE2 is the only one of the series still in production. They seem to have a similarity of thinking to the purely passive 424/5, 1024/5 and 2024/5 PJ range, with the purely active 604/5, 2005 and NE2 being the broadly equivalent basses. The budget 604/5 have a bolt on neck whereas the 2005 and NE2 are neck-through (plus other refinements as we move up the range). Just to keep us on our toes the BB 2004 is not JJ but the much sought after reverse-P/J config! With its reverse PJ, neck-through, NE2 shape and 24 frets, it looks great - particularly in white 🙂 - and ticks a lot of boxes for me. If I was still regularly playing 4 strings I’d certainly now be very tempted to get a BB 2004 too! For those of you who have never quite got comfortable with the more traditional Yamaha BB shape, but always wanted to try a Yamaha bass, this could be just the ticket...just need to find one!

Poor Kurt. If only he'd been more entertaining and technically competent... he might have left some sort of legacy behind.