BigRedX

AFAICS the OP is enquiring about a £2700 instrument. I would want a complete written record of all enquiries and negotiations if I was in their position and wanting to spend this much money with anyone. As soon as you use the phone you loose that security, and should anything go wrong with the transactions you have nothing to back up your side of the argument.

If you are a business if you advertise a means of communication then you should also make sure that you are on top of keeping in touch with that particular method of communication for the sake of your customers. If you don't want to deal by a particular method do not publish it. As an example, I no longer give out my mobile number for my business. When I first went self employed, I got a mobile phone because I thought it would be expected of me. I quickly discovered that it was actually of very little use. When I am in my "office" I have a perfectly good landline phone sitting right there on my desk, and when I am out of the office I am almost definitely not going to be in a situation where I can do anything about your call other than acknowledge that you have called me. Very important customers will be given my mobile number, but along with that they will also be informed that it a method of last resort communication. My mobile voice mail message actually tells any caller to email me if their call is important.

This. Also if the communication is done by email there is a written record of everything that was said just in case something goes wrong with the transaction. For my business any important phone calls are followed up with a summary of what was discussed in an email so that can be no confusion at a later date.

If I wanted to play an instrument for the fun of it, I'd choose guitar or keyboards where I could play something that was recognisable as a song to non-musicians. Unfortunately mine are in currently their cases buried under a mountain of other stuff in the one habitable room left in my house.

For me playing an instrument - any instrument - is a means to and end, not the end in itself. And that end is writing songs that can be recorded and/or played live. Unfortunately as you can probably tell from my incoherent ramblings on here I'm not much good with words, so I rely on a songwriting partner for the lyrical side. At the moment it is not possible to work directly with any of the people I write with, so my motivation to pick up any of my instruments has been low. Last year I hadn't really noticed the lack of actual playing since I was involved with the mixing and production of a number of musical projects (and with not being able to attend any of the studios in person to do this it took considerably longer than normal). However all but one of these are now complete, and this thread in particular has made me aware of the fact that I have nearly touched an instrument since March of last year.

Very much this. For me bass is an instrument I play as part of a band. With no band activity in the foreseeable future, there is little incentive for me to play any of my basses.

I don't know why. IME it is impossible to make any meaningful decisions about an amp without using it in a band situation (practice or even better a gig). Even if you are able to play it at gig/rehearsal volumes in the shop it still won't give you any indication of what it will sound like with the other instruments in the mix.

I think there is a good case to protest the "overabundance" of music. I like to listen to music, but mostly when I choose to, and also I value the ability to not have to listen to a load of unnecessary music whose sole purpose appears to be the filling the silence. Maybe this is a subject for a separate thread?

IME it's best to drill the hole as straight as possible in one go. Wires are unusually resistant to being fed through holes with changes in direction, and the closer the diameter of the hole to the diameter of the wire the more resistant they become.

I've sold nearly all of my "collection" I've down to two 5-string basses (for one band) 3 Bass VIs (for the other - one of which needs to be sold as soon as I can organise myself enough to take photos and get it listed) and 4 guitars (for my own amusement two of which will get sold soon, see above!). Unfortunately all my amplification is in one of my band's rehearsal space and I've not been able to access it, although I don't currently have any space for it at home, which is one big reason why I've done so little playing. I was considering doing some electronic music on my own, but I've been struggling to find time and energy outside of my working day. The weird thing is that apart from the absence of band rehearsals none of the lack of motivation has anything to do with the pandemic.

Here WiFi is restricted to devices that have not other way of connecting to the network. When my house finally gets finished (that's another story) there will be wired Gigabit ethernet connections in a variety of locations in every room. Since the vast majority of devices I have are either in a fixed location or require a PSU or both, there seems to be little point in using WiFi. It's just another unnecessary layer of complexity.

It's perfect example of "just because you can doesn't mean that you should". And who is it aimed at? Anyone playing stages big enough to fit something like that on will be going into a massive PA and using in-ears for on-stage monitoring. Even if it was a just for show you'd be better off with a something with something empty that can be built light and foldable so that means you'd need a speaker cloth front.

No. I've barely picked up any instrument, since April last year. Because of my personal situation at the moment, I have little opportunity to play music right now and as neither band are doing anything because of the pandemic I've almost completely stopped playing. If either band starts rehearsing//gigging/recording again then I will make the effort, but without that incentive I find it very hard to get the enthusiasm to play for the sake of it.

Most 8-string basses get around the tuning peg problem by using guitar size tuners for the octave strings.

Looks like height adjusters for the pickups and the bridge.

It was a lot of mucking about on my part (organising posting back the wrong items and then claiming back the money from Bass Direct) to sort out a problem that shouldn't have happened in the first place. A less scrupulous person might have simply kept the pickups and pre-amp and ordered another set of rack ears from different shop, leaving the person who had ordered the items wondering where their electronics were.

Did you buy you Backbeat new? If so where from? UK consumer law states that all electrical appliances must be sold with a UK standard 13A plug or a fused adaptor that fits permanently over the existing plug completely enclosing all the contacts. Supplying a plug-in adaptor is not acceptable. If this was bought new go back to the company you got it from and insist that they either supply a PSU with a UK plug on it, or a legally acceptable locking adaptor for the supplied PSU FoC.

I once ordered some cheap rack ears for my amp from them and was surprised to receive a very expensive set of pickups and pre-amp in return. Inconvenient for both myself and the person who should have had the items I got. All sorted out in the end, but added several days to what should have been a straight-forward order, and TBH in should never have happened in the first place.

Looking very nice. Is the body from a single pice of wood? If not I can't see any obvious joins.

Unfortunately when you apply for your EORI number there is no indication of this. Since IME dealing with HMRC you need to be pretty much spot on or you will run into problems, if not immediately then further down the line, I wanted to be sure that I had the best SIC code to describe what I do and I wanted HMRC to advise me on what that was, so if there did turn out to be problems I could point back that them and say that I had followed their advice on the matter, after specifically asking for their help. The code I got was for "Creative Artist" which is a bit of a stretch for my occupation, and there was at least one other option that was just as "not quite right", but since that was the advice from HMRC, that's the one I've used.

Just had an update regarding my parcel to Belgium which is now in Belgium and awaiting customs clearance at that end. According to the BPost website this could take "up to 24 days"! WTAF...

IME as soon as you drop below B-B tuning, guitar style parts become muddy and indistinct - especially chords, unless you play high up the neck, in which case you might as well use a standard guitar. My HB Baritone (28" scale tuned B-B) was used by The Terrortones guitarist on a couple of tracks on our album, one with it capo'd up to standard E-E guitar tuning. Personally I thought it made the sound overly bright and thin compared with playing the same part on his guitar, but he liked the effect so I didn't argue. If I wasn't so set on not having multiple guitars on stage I'd probably use a Baritone on some of Hurtsfall's songs, but as it is I make do with the Bass VI. And BTW I don't mind the headstock - it's a typical Aria one. It's certainly nicer IMO than the large 70s style Strat one on the Squier Bass VI.

I think it very much depends on what kind of band you are in. Certainly in the last 10 years of playing in originals bands and all over the country (although for some reason never in East Anglia), there has nearly always been a suitable in-house PA that the bass would be put through (that's venues up to 500 capacity). In fact I can't remember the last time I had to rely on my rig for the audience to be able to hear the bass guitar.

Interesting. And weird. 30" scale normally means A-A Baritone tuning but the specs say B-B, although the mentioned string gauges are at the lighter end of Baritone strings so the feel might be OK. Unfortunately the suggested Bass VI strings are the ones which most players get rid of straight away because the E and A are far too light and floppy when tuned E-E. However the important information for my PoV - string spacing at the nut and the bridge are not given, and based on the fact that this appears to be primarily designed as a Baritone guitar and the bridge looks like a standard Strat vibrato unit means it will be guitar spacing, which is too narrow for me. I do have a friend involved with the Aria UK importers so I'll ask him if there is any further info he can find out, which I will share here. However from a playing PoV the Eastwood is the right Bass VI for me. I still haven't been able to try mine out amplified so I can't comment on the sound yet. I'm still interested in the alternatives as the Eastwood is by far the most expensive off-the-shelf option I've come across. Edit: for anyone interested the page it's on is here.

After a week stuck in the UK, my parcel is now in Belgium. However it still has to pass through customs there...