mcnach

I have a Sire Z3-5, and I feel it's closer to my 2002 EBMM Stingray than the SBMM Ray35 I've got (and it doesn't weight more than the Moon, unlike the Ray35). I haven't used my Stingray at least in a couple of years. It's a 4-string, and I'm rarely playing 4-strings anymore. I sometimes think of selling it, as it's worth a few GAS-tokens... but it's a lovely bass (and natural/maple too, yum) and I'd struggle to justify spending what they go for these days, should I want one again later.

I have never visited the store, I'm a little far. I have bought a few things from them over the years, mostly FX pedals/strings, but not many, because I often felt a bit 'meh' about their email communication. My last interaction (a few years ago) was just rude, I felt, and I never went back. But... credit where it's due. I have observed this thread with interest, and it does look like they are addressing many of the complaints. This weekend I was looking at buying a set of "Thunderbrown" strings for my little 23" GoldTone bass... and there weren't in stock in most places. BUT... Bass Direct had 1 set in stock, the website indicated. So I decided to give it a go. I placed the order on Sunday, and I received them today, around 48h later (despite ordering on a Sunday!). I got emails confirming the order, confirming dispatch, and even tracking information... for a measly set of strings. I'm impressed. @Bass Direct I am very glad to see how you've improved the online side of the business. Thank you!

I have one from 2011... well, technically I had (the bass has been modified a lot). I got mine because someone near me was selling it for very little money and at the time I did not have a Precision, so it seemed like a good idea. I loved it! Mine was also very light. Black pickguard and standard knobs. The original pickup was fine, but over the years I tried a couple others and settled with a Seymour Duncan SPB-1. Eventually I replaced the neck as well. The original neck was quite slim and nice, but I prefer maple fingerboards and a bit chunkier necks, so I found a neck from a Squier CV50s and replaced it. I experimented a bit with pickguards of different colours (single ply white and 3-ply mint white). One nice thing is that the pickup route is neat, so it looks pretty good without any pickguard at all. Here's a few pictures of what started as a Squier Mike Dirnt...

Would a Digitech Whammy work? Essentially the "dive bomb" setting, which you can control with the expression pedal.

It's 17.5 mm, for both Z7-5 and Z3-5 (I have both and measured it).

We used to cross paths all the time... happy to see him doing well

Nice bass and not just as an entry point. Affordable no longer needs to mean 'meh'. The bass I'm using the most right now is another Sire (Z3-5), while other basses that cost up to 4x as much stay at home. A Sire V7 is a very nice bass, they can be a bit heavy in my (limited) experience of that model, but they're nice.

+1 for the Chorbot app, very useful and supereasy to use.

I'm only keeping FB because my main band uses Messenger primarily, and we get a lot of interactions with people and gig info etc through it... but I no longer really use it personally. It's become a really ugly place. The videos kept me going for a bit, it was an easy way to kill a few minutes here and there (as long as you don't go into the comments), but there's some much AI-generated crap... that was the last straw. I seem to have substituted it with Reddit. I found a few subforums that are pretty good.

My Z7-5 was just over 9 lbs and Z3-5 under 9 lbs (I don't recall the exact weight right now)... so fingers crossed Edit: No, the Z7-5 was 8.0 lbs actually, I can't trust my memory 😄 BUt both are light.

You know the island doesn't stop at Hadrian's Wall, right?

The RTA together with the parametric EQ makes it soooo easy to tune out feedback frequencies. That function alone is amazing.

Aha! Indeed, we played a new year's gig there this year. It's funny how a lot of this kind of venues look the same, yet they're distinct enough.

What's that venue? It looks very familiar, I'm fairly sure I have played there. I recently bought a Behringer X32 Compact to use with my main band, as we manage our own sound quite often. We were using a small 12 channel analog mixer with a single monitor aux, so it was quite a change. Digital mixers take a bit longer to get to grips with, in particular setting up the routing to do exactly what you want it to do, but what a revelation they are. I was a bit wary at first, delaying using the X32 live until I felt confident enough... but there's so much they can do, I was getting a bit overwhelmed. So I went back to basics and just set it up to be able to use it just like our previous mixer, basic functions only. That was pretty easy. Then, for each gig, we'd work out something new, saving each gig 'scene' as we went along... and before you realise it just makes sense. I think that because they can do so much, it's easy to get lost a bit, a bit like when I get a multiFX: I may spend hours just experimenting with the different sounds but not doing anything 'productive' with them.