rushbo

Paul Buchanan of the brilliant Blue Nile. "An ordinary girl / Will make the world alright."

Oh dear... I promised myself I'd never buy another 5 string bass, but: https://www.artistguitars.co.uk/products/artist-vhyb5-vintage-hybrid-v-5-string-p-j-style-b-14217

That's yummy, that is.

My thoughts exactly. Before people discovered how great they are and the prices skyrocketed, I loved buying up cheapo Indonesian Squiers and modding them. A few years ago, 50 or 60 quid would buy you a Squier P or J (or if you were lucky, a P/J) in decent nick and with a couple of mods, you'd have a bass you could take on the world with. You don't need to spend a fortune on instruments, just find one that you love to play.

I've done it a couple of times - once quite badly and once pretty well. I heated the fret with a soldering iron and gently eased it up with a Stanley knife blade, before carefully removing it with regular pliers, once I had the fret clear enough from the neck. I then filled the slot with epoxy and sanded the board smooth. The second attempt was better as I went slower and put a little water on the fret and the board just either side of it. The fret came out easier and with no tang marks or tearouts. That was on an OLP MusicMan - it sounded great, but it finally convinced me that I'm no Mick Karn!

I think most of the Dave Lee Roth era Van Halen albums are about the thirty minute mark. They still feel complete though. Nick Drake's Pink Moon album is just over 28 minutes long, but it's so bleak, I doubt if many people would have been able to listen to much more of it. That may sound like a dig, but it's not meant to be, as it's one of my favourite albums.

Here are some goodies. CAUTION! Some may fall into the OP's "obscure twaddle" category: Husker Du: Zen Arcade Husker Du: Warehouse Songs and Stories Game Theory: Lolita Nation XTC: English Settlement ELO: Out of the Blue Prince: 1999 Todd Rundgren: Something/Anything I may be in the minority, but The White Album and Physical Graffiti are among my favourite albums... funny old world, ain't it? I'm surprised to see London Calling getting a pasting as I think that's ace, too. I'm not a fan of War of the Worlds as it's a bit too close to the dreaded musical theatre for me. Yes are (generally) brilliant, but Topographic Oceans was a bit too much for me. I'll keep trying at it tho.

This is an old story (2013), but I thought I'd share it: I purchased a set of Fender flatwounds online (from Sounds Live who I don't think exist anymore...) and set about putting them on my lovely Mexi Jazz Bass. That’s when the fun started. The ‘D’ snapped at the peg end while I was stringing up, leaving me just enough for one wind around the peg. I’ve never snapped a string whilst tuning, so I thought there may be an issue with it, but I still hadn’t ruled out ‘pilot error’ at this stage. So, I dropped a line to the retailer asking if I could buy a single 'D'. the retailer got back to me, saying they'd got in touch with Fender to sort out a replacement. The following day, I received a courteous and apologetic email from Fender saying that the strings (a full set, not just the dodgy one) were in the post and to make up for any inconvenience, they included a couple of custom shop patch leads. I reckon that’s customer service above and beyond the call of duty.

I love the idea of a pedalboard, but I've never really been happy with one of mine. Although, to be fair, the Rockboard is the first actually "proper" board I've ever owned, having used offcuts of MDF in the past. If you're that way inclined, pedals must be great fun to collect and swap like Panini stickers or Pokemon cards. I really enjoy looking at the expansive boards that some Basschatters share on the forum, but it tends to be in a "rather you than me" way... Right now, I'm happy with my teeny little board and my minimal collection of gizmos. They may be small, but they were very carefully planned. And that's half the fun, isn't it?

Where's the fun in that? Seriously, it was a pretty useful exercise as I wanted to get my pedals in as small a footprint as possible, so it was nice to physically move stuff about. I'd imagine that if you had truckloads of gizmos, one of those template dealios would be just the ticket.

I'm an unapologetic planner. My board is pretty tiny (a Rockboard Tres) but before I bought it, I measured out the surface area of the Rockboard on my workbench, marked it with some masking tape and then cut out paper shapes of the area of each pedal. I dutifully shuffled them about to make sure I could get them on comfortably. (No, I don't live alone in my mother's basement - why do you ask?)

I've just picked up one of these: https://www.thomann.de/gb/millenium_mixer_stand.htm?sid=174a0a6518ddea26a5234e3bfdcc43ef With a maximum load of 136kg, it should be sturdy enough for most applications... I've gigged with it a couple of times and it held my combo (a Genz Benz Contour) very nicely. I've actually removed the extendable legs as the height was fine already without having to go any higher. Because I'm a bit OCD, I bought some cheapo black cloth to drape over it, so it doesn't look like the combo is perched on a table.

Sigh. I wish I was cool enough to play one of those.

Yes it was - I sent a message and asked if they could do "Prescription Bass" in Helvetica, Calibri or Arial at 14pt in bold. The seller tried all the options and the one that worked best was Helvetica. So there were two transactions in all - one for the "Fedner" logo and one for the "Prescription Bass" lettering, so the total cost, including P+P was £2.98.

I have a lot of fun putting bitsa basses together - nothing high end, just grafting orphaned necks onto bodies and playing around with spray paint - that sort of thing. I always put on a "Fender style" headstock sticker as I think headstocks look a little bit weird if they're left blank. Generally, I use waterslide decals, but I find them to be very hit and miss - sometimes they go on perfectly, but more often than not, it takes me multiple attempts to get something I'm happy with. Looking for alternatives, I found an eBay seller - morphiuscraftsuk which does cheap and cheerful, die cut stickers. I ordered the "Fender style" version and although it wont fool anyone (which isn't really the point...), I thought it looked rather good. I got back to them to do another sticker in a font which they didn't advertise on the site and they came back straight away with a number of options. I ordered it, and part II came today. Once again, it looks ace. Customer service was incredibly good, especially as the items were so cheap. Total cost: 2 x £1.49 If you're lovingly recreating a 1963 Fender Jazz, this isn't the product for you. If you're using up those bits from the parts box and you want a quick, no mess logo to finish it off, this might be a viable option. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/323769332446?ul_noapp=true

Frank gave me- yes gave me - a Polytune clip on tuner . He even went out and bought a Jiffy bag specially. And paid postage. This obviously makes him a truly righteous dude. Thanks Frank. Now I have no excuse to be out of tune anymore.

Fascinating stuff. He always come across like a real sweetheart, too.

I've had about five variants of this "company" pop up on my FaceBook feed offering £2000 guitars for £86. It's the biggest scam since Scammy McScamster opened up a branch of "Scams R Us" in Scamstown, Scamshire and offered a free scam with every scam purchased over £85. I'd avoid it, if I was you.

Eric Idle is a pretty useful guitarist, but the reason that he may not be 100% convincing as a Bassist here, is the fact that he’s a right handed musician, playing the role of someone who’s left handed. Here’s a little test- flip your bass around the other way and try and play something that sounds like music and look convincing while you do it.