dc2009

I'm at the gig now, we are on next. I don't want to be here, the support band's bassist appears to have found the brown note with the most horrible fuzz I've heard in my life. I'm stuck in south London, and it looks like for the second gig in a row I have to play through a f***ing ashdown... /rage

I've used the bass merchant to replace a nut for me. They have a bloke who comes in to do that sort of stuff once a week (think it was on a thursday IIRC), sensible price so got them to fit it for me too.

I thought it was terrible, not a fan of that at all, but my god that bass is jaw-droppingly stunning!

[quote name='bassman7755' post='1343948' date='Aug 18 2011, 07:29 AM']I dont mind paying a moderate premium say 10% more to buy in a shop but I cant justify paying more. Not music related but I saw a laptop I liked in PC world recently but it was around 30% more than several of big online places had it listed for. I offered to buy it if they could come down to only 10 or 15% more than the internet prices but they declined.[/quote] PC World = load of crap, I wouldn't even bother.

On this note, can we have basschat merch/tshirts? I'd gladly wear one about! EDIT: I'm sure loads of us would buy them too if any profit on the sales were an auto-donation to the site!

[quote name='Ben Jamin' post='1343851' date='Aug 17 2011, 11:38 PM']Cheers for all the suggestions guys! I had a look into all of them, and then it turned out my friend was selling his Yamaha BB415, so he's got that for a tidy £200, leaving him with £100 to spend on a nice cable and strap It's all black, nice and classy looking, so it should fit in with most styles he wants to play. Pretty much perfect condition. Very nicely set-up. The main thing is the neck's really great to play and the action's nice and low with no buzzing, so he should be able get around the board easily enough with his smaller hands. Also the P/J combo covers a good deal of tonal ground and sounds pretty good. The construction's solid, being Yamaha, so it should last him too. Strung with DR Fatbeams too, which is a nice bonus! Mission success?[/quote] Sounds great, no sale for me though! Good bass, hopefully he'll go far on it!

[quote name='flyfisher' post='1343465' date='Aug 17 2011, 06:10 PM']I agree that the home delivery thing can be the weak link for internet shopping, though I have to say I've not got any personal horror stories. People being at work during the day can, of course, be a problem. But there are ways around that. I've seen secure 'delivery bin' products where a package can be left and then latched closed by the courier, ready for the owner to return home. There's also a fairly new "safe deposit box" scheme. I'm not sure about the precise details, but my wife has recenly been buying stuff online and having it delivered to a 'locker' (like a left-luggage box at train stations) at our local Morrisons store. The online company emails the locker number and combination code and my wife collect the parcel on the way home from work. Rural post offices could also offer a "box number" type collection service for people who work during the day. Might be some complications with opening hours, though our village shop stays open until 8pm to catch the passing trade from people coming home from work. I'm sure there'll be loads of similar innovations in years to come. The other downside about shops is that anyone working full time is mainly limited to shopping on a saturday - and who wants to waste a precious day off when they can order online at any time of day? I've got no axe to grind against shops, I just can't see them surviving unless they can offer something very unique and appealing - and I can't think what that might be.[/quote] Then of course you get guys like DPD whose staff are too thick to manage to ring a doorbell.

[quote name='Ben Jamin' post='1343247' date='Aug 17 2011, 03:19 PM']Thanks guys! Yamaha/Ibanez are a good call, hadn't really thought of those! That Dean looks pretty sweet, I'll email him the link and see what he reckons [/quote] Thanks mate, let me know. It's the same neck profile as any other Dean Edge of about the same age (6 or 7 years now) so if he tries a regular one of those it'll be the same, minus the sweet Bartolini pickups of course. It's also stupendously light weight, I've never played a lighter bass, which will probably also be good for the lad! If he doesn't like it then I recommend an Ibanez SR as the way to go, as he already has an ibanez, and IMO many yamaha electronics and pickups are a bit weak in comparison. Dan

5 string necks are something of a minefield. The string spacing really affects the feel I find. My three 5ers have vastly different neck profiles, I think owing to their string spacing. The reverse TB Pro-V for example has a wickedly huge string spacing, meaning the neck is really wide, but actually not very deep, so the profile feels very flat and the neck feels very thin. The non-reverse TB 5 has very tight string spacing so the neck isn't very wide, and as a result feels chunkier, but is possibly thinner than the other one. I'm no expert on Warwick necks, though I know I love mine which is a newer German one. Ibanez SR's are a great shout and some of the yamahas out there are sufficiently thin neck wise too.

Bugger it, booked my flights for my trip to Finland last night and have now just realised I'm gonna miss this by a day, which is fairly gutting. I think in lieu of this I'm going to instigate a London Bass pint night perhaps for sometime soon, let me know if anyone would be interested in a general social gathering in some central London pub!

[quote name='flyfisher' post='1343209' date='Aug 17 2011, 02:59 PM']I reckon people only used shops because there was no alternative, so we've built up a sort of nostalgia about them. But the reality is that they're pretty crap really. They only stock a tiny proportion of the products available in their marketplace (how could they afford to do anything else?) so you have to traipse around lots of shops if you want to really check out what's available, which takes time and money. And even if they do normally stock it you can't be sure they will actually have stock on the day you decide to buy. And none of that even starts to address the overhead issues which increases prices. These days we have the internet. We can browse through entire product ranges at the click of mouse in the comfort of our own homes. We can read product reviews from real people, we can see video demonstrations. If we buy, the goods are delivered to our door in a day or two and if we don't like them or change our mind we have a statutory right to return them for a full refund. And, of course, prices are generally lower because they don't have to support expensive property leases, staff and demo stock. If both these options were available at the dawn of commerce then shops would never have got off the ground. They've had a good head-start, so will take a while to die off, but remember that the web has only been with us for 20 years and we're now seeing a generation of consumers who've grown up with it and can't understand the point of shops. I'll give shops another 20 years or so.[/quote] I personally think that for items such as musical instruments, effects and amplifiers, where trying them is so crucial to a sale, that the likes of GAK etc who offer a huge product range, but the facility to come and try them too will be the ones that survive. If I was Thomann I'd be investing in a warehouse in the UK and other countries where people could come and do just that. The gallery is amazing for us bass players, and it's specialism will hopefully keep it going, but it'll never be a big music shop anyway, and nor do I think does it want to be.

For consistency and value most people will say Yamaha, for thin neck and quality they will say a better Ibanez, an SR series ideally. That's a decent price to get a very decent second hand bass. For a thin neck and the price though I'm going to have to shamelessly plug my bartolini equipped Dean Edge q4, up for trade here: [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=150168"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=150168[/url] but most likely about to be put up as for sale too. I bought it when I was about 14 (probably bigger hands but not by much) and I would say it is the bass where I did most of my improving after my starter Crafter MM copy bass. It's great and sounds fantastic, just doesn't get played anymore.

They're awesome. I'd also look at a Fender Marcus Miller sig. A second hand one can be had for about £100 more than a Geddy Lee (give or take), and they play and sound fantastic!

I have to say the same. Many shops will do you a discount from their price (RRP or not) if you can pay cash or lump sum. I got a bit off my Warwick like that. I was in the bass gallery and was just trying bits and pieces out, and noted a thunderbird gig bag I was interested in buying (not urgently) but had decided I would happily buy it from there if it was say £10-15 more than online (which I knew was as low as £40), given the friendly service I'd had in allowing me to try out a Dingwall and a Tanglewater. The gigbag was £70, which IMO is too much more than the competition and I said no thanks. Obviously not a big seller for them, but dv247 as an example, who I have had pleasant dealings with before, trade online and in shops too, and do it for about £42. Incidentally unless I manage to work enough over the next uni year to afford a Sandberg, I think a Tanglewater CJ5 will probably be my next bass, and I'll gladly buy from the gallery.

[quote name='waynepunkdude' post='1342928' date='Aug 17 2011, 11:33 AM']I've never seen one that looks good so I have gone no further.[/quote] This

The other thing is of course the type of music, if it's tech death metal with time sig changes and runs going out of key and all over the place then it'll probably take a while to do. If it's 4/4 indie with 3 x 4-chord-patterns per song then you'll probably have it down in 5 mins.

He could at least give you the main chord patterns! Also, is it covers or originals? If it's originals, can you change the bass parts to what you want to play? I had this situation recently and without music/tab to go off, I wasn't going to play someone else's basslines when I was coming up with things that IMO were better suited to the song (and of course my style of playing).

I'd argue there is a consensus emerging. I went for £400-£599, for me there are a whole host of these professional grade 1k new cost basses that are going second hand, things like a Marcus Miller sig will just about fall into said price category. Now those things are well revered on here for good reason! It doesn't need to be a Fender either, but for you to get more than the entry level model, I think this is how much you need to be spending on most new and second hand basses. That said, my thunderbird Pro-V was only £280 second hand in mint condition, and being an active, 7 piece thru neck, upgraded bridge and pickups thunderbird, I would argue is a whole lot of bass for your money. So there are bargains to be had!

My mate's (and ex bandmate) dad had one of these and I always had a go on his gear. The neck was fantastically thin, and the bass produced some great sounds. Without trying to plug too much, my Dean has a fairly similar neck, just as thin though I think the profile is a bit flatter IIRC. It is for sale on here, and is probably cheaper than some options being suggested. But don't necessarily buy mine, get out and try some. IMO Ibanezes are similar so if you don't mind those try some of them too.