Deep Thought

[quote name='noelk27' post='274883' date='Sep 1 2008, 07:59 PM']Well, as you’ve placed the corporation on notice, by addressing your complaint to the customer services department in the first instance, and assuming you have a warranty or contractual leg to stand on, why I’d always suggest that your next letter should be sent recorded directly to the chief executive/managing director, outlining your complaint and your dissatisfaction with its handling. You’d be amazed at how often, and how quickly, this will get you a favourable outcome.[/quote] It was about a month out of warranty-however I think I might have a crack at this-certainly won't hurt, and you never know what may result. Ta for the advice.

I love my US P-Bass to bits, but I have to admit that it has had issues-mainly the pickup failing after only a year of fairly light use. I planned to replace it anyway, but would have preferred to do it in my own time. It now has a Seymour Duncan Quarter Pounder which sounds stonking. I believe if I was spending a similar amount of cash again, I'd look at the made in Japan route. Incidentally, my letter to Fender UK pointing out my displeasure at the pickup failure has had no reply.

Everything that's not a Fender Precision!! USA one at that! Knickers to the lot of you!!!

That's the way I've got mine, mainly from hearing about Norm's setup-I like a similar sort of sound, and I find the 'sad', downturned EQ with the mids boosted works pretty well for me.

I don't think you can vote until September if I read the Home page correctly. Sounds pretty good to my cloth ears-I'll vote when I'm allowed.

Give yourself plenty of time to get your stuff together before you leave for the gig-it's far better to amble around getting everything together in your own time than to rush around in a panic-that's how things get forgotten. Have a checklist. And remember even if you cock up, it's unlikely anyone will notice, especially if you don't draw attention to it. I've made horrendous balls-ups, and on mentioning it afterwards, nobody knew anything about it. You'll be fine-good luck, and enjoy!

[quote name='Sean' post='270562' date='Aug 26 2008, 08:56 PM']From my loads of pissing about with my H4 I reckon it's the positioning of it rather than the input gain setting. I used to get much the same as you've got here then put it on medium and it would distort loads. Do you use the auto gain? If you use the monitor function and set the level manually and pop the COMP on it might be better. There's so many variables but I find the more you piss about the more of a feel you get. Cool dirty boogie by the way, I like it! [/quote] Cheers Sean! Must try that next time-to be honest I just used the switch on the side, and hoped for the best. Really ought to RTFM. There's a few more like that in the pipeline which we're planning to get decent recordings of soon. 'Cool dirty boogie' -I like that a lot-do you mind if I quote you?

Follow the link in my signature-the song on the MySpace was done on an H4 at a gig a while back-hardly studio-quality, but not bad. We do plan on getting some better stuff on there soon, but it does the trick temporarily, I think. It's a bit quiet because I had the mike on 'Low'-I wish I'd put it to 'Medium', but I was afraid it would clip.

[quote name='Toasted' post='269153' date='Aug 24 2008, 09:57 PM']If I owned a Van Gough (I can spell it ner ner-ner-ner)[/quote] No you bloody can't, Ner ner na ner ner! [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Gogh_Museum"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Gogh_Museum[/url] I'm of the opinion that a bass is a tool to be used, and not put in a case and revered. That being said, old 50's instruments are getting fairly scarce these days, and I think it would be a shame to destroy what is essentially a piece of history just for the sake of it, because it's yours and you can do what you like with it. If you want to trash a bass, buy a Squier (or preferably a Bongo! ) and trash that. I'm a big aviation fan, and love to see old WWII aircraft being flown-some say they shouldn't, that they should be kept grounded and thus preserved, but to me, they were built to fly and that's what I like to see them do. Similarly I like to see old instruments being played, but not trashed. Smashing up instruments was done forty years ago-it's just daft nowadays.

Oooh, me, me! 1998 7215 SMC 300 watt 1X15 combo (plus Hartke transporter 4X10 extension cab). Does the trick for me very nicely. Sure I'd like a more expensive rig, but this is perfectly adequate. I also find it quite pleasantly compact, and not excessively heavy, but then I'm just hard.

Ha-I was right!

[quote name='Galilee' post='265684' date='Aug 19 2008, 05:04 PM']Are you sure it's not just better to wait to see if another of whatever it is turns up closer to home?[/quote] If he's buying what I think he's buying, I don't think that's very likely. If you don't want to miss out on it, I like the 'middle man' idea. If the seller is OK, he should be OK with that.

Ahh, now, depends what you're after. Was the one you played an export model (no scratchplate), or one of the Japan-only ones with a scratchplate? There was one of the export ones on the For sale page:- [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=23227"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=23227[/url] The Japan-only ones do come up on Ebay but to get a new one you'd have to go to one of the companies that deal with Japanese imports (like these folks, although those more knowledgable than me may tell you there are better ways. Not sure if these are even trading any more). [url="http://www.guitaremporium.co.uk/index.php?f=data_fender_japan_new_guitars&a=4"]http://www.guitaremporium.co.uk/index.php?...guitars&a=4[/url] This will at least show you the difference. I had an export version a few years ago which I didn't get on with, but I'm not a Jazz bass man, and the one I had was bit of a dog. It obviously suits you so good luck!

Is that not like the one somebody got for £25 in a car boot sale back along?

I work 12 hour shifts (ambulance service). Fortunately the whole band are ambulance staff so in some ways I suppose it's easier for us-the drummer keeps the 'band diary' with everybody's shift patterns in it, so we know exactly when all three of us are going to be off at the same time. We've had to turn down gigs on occasion because of two or more of us working, but not too many, and we can usually wangle something to get one of us off if necessary. They're long shifts but thankfully we get a lot of time off as well. As seen in the 'Rehearsal time' thread, we do struggle to get enough rehearsal time and are forced to resort to a day or so once a month (if we're lucky!). Don't know how things would be if you're in a band with non-shift workers-it's a thing we've always avoided because we never thought it would work, but I suppose when there's a will there's a way.

[quote name='ste_m3' post='257587' date='Aug 7 2008, 09:00 PM']Obviously, this seems impossible with your shift work, would a couple of hour sessions a week be possible?[/quote] No chance, I'm afraid. Shifts put the mockers on that. I'm not complaining, we manage ok, just wondered how we compared to everybody else.

Curious as to how much practice you boys get, your wonders to perform? I used to think that a band needed to be practicing more than once a week to stand any chance of doing a decent job onstage, however my lot, all being ambulance staff and hence shift workers, are lucky to get three of us in the same place at the same time more than once a month. That's a whole day, or at least several hours, of intense practice in the rehearsal room, but if we get any more than that it's unusual. We rely on everybody doing their homework before we get together. We're gigging on Sunday, and we won't get together to practice before that, except maybe an hour in the van before we go on. Not ideal I grant you, but that's our only option. I don't think we do a bad job considering, but how often are you chaps rehearsing?

I always carry a spare-I saw a bloke break a bottom E on a Gibson Thunderbird a few years ago. A seemingly-endless wait ensued whilst he replaced the string onstage, which didn't do a lot for the flow of the show. If I bust a string or something else goes t*ts-up I'd like to be able to grab another bass and carry on with the minimum of delay.

Alright, not so much dirty as politely pointing out my dissatisfaction. I'm not one to go at these things with all guns blazing, and yes, things do break, and yes, I played loads of wrong notes at last night's gig, but I think I have a right to be a tad aggrieved. I wasn't abusive or anything-but I bet a lot of people would have worded it a lot more strongly than I have.

Well it's already gone back, and I've asked them to put in the new pickup-as I said I'd planned to replace it anyway, and I didn't want another Fender pickup, and I want it back for next Sunday so I wanted to get things shifting ASAP. I've sent a dirty Email to Fender UK, and I may well push for at least some contribution towards the cost of the new one, even though it isn't a Fender. I probably should have done something when the S-1 stopped working, but I didn't use it anyway, and quite frankly as long as it was OK on the normal setting I wasn't too bothered about it, and I had better things to do. Lax I suppose but that's just me.

It's what's known as the Grey Market, and as Old Horse rightly points out, it happens a lot with high end watches like Omegas and Rolexes, (and probably many other goods as well). They're imported and the serial numbers removed, and sold, quite legally I believe, usually at a considerable saving on the manufacturer's RRP. Bad news is the original manufacturer doesn't authorise this, and will have nothing to do with them, at least I know that to be the case with Omega watches, so servicing and warranty work is a problem. Of course on a '97 bass that's not likely to be a worry. It's a genuine Fender, just sold without their approval outside Fender's dealer network, at least that's my understanding of it.

Wrong again-the pickup is knackered apparently, which means I had to gig last night with my old Ibanez. So a new Seymour Duncan Quarter Pounder is going in-I had planned to upgrade the pickup anyway, but I'd sooner not have been forced into it. I'm mildly pee'd off actually, the bass is only just over a year old-dirty E-mail to Fender UK in the pipeline methinks.

Gorgeous. I really like Jon's headstock shape too.