rushbo

A music teacher colleague of mine said something to me many years ago, that has stuck with me ever since. "Lots of people can play something until they get it right - a musician plays it until they can't get it wrong."

After watching an old Led Zeppelin documentary on TV recently, I got terrible GAS for a sunburst Jazz Bass. I've had a Fender Jazz in the past - a lovely Mexi model, purchased from this very forum, but I never really clicked with it. The GAS would not go away and when I saw a beat up Aria STB Jazz bass on FaceBook Marketplace for £40, I thought that would cure it. My initial plan was to replace practically everything with shiny new bits and hope for the best. I tested it briefly and all was good, so I set about removing the many layers of stickers and filth and cleaned it up. It soon became apparent that it didn't need much in the way of upgrading... I'm not a fan of the Aria headstock shape, so out came the jigsaw and once it was reshaped and oiled, I applied my oh-so-funny trademark decals. After it was cleaned and set up, I cranked it up through my gigging rig and it sounded fantastic! Funky and articulate, just like I wish I was. Just to make sure I wasn't dreaming, I took it to both my gigs last weekend to try it out in the wild. I received no scowls from the sound engineers at the sound checks, so it got a run out. Again, it delivered the goods. Hardware is good, solid and accurate, the pickups are more than adequate and even the stock strings are great. I took them off, boiled them and put them back on as I didn't want to risk a brand new set. This thing is great. And brand new, they're only £209! For an investment of £40, plus £13 for the replacement plate and a few hours of my spare time (and an old tugbar), I've got a great sounding, cool looking instrument. If anyone is looking for a cheapo bass for whatever reason you could do a lot worse than one of these. Here's a few before and after pics:

Changing the volume of each pickup quickly at a gig must be quite challenging, although removing that fourth pot must have made things considerably easier: Can you imagine what you might find if you removed the "pickguard"? It would be the luthery equivalemt of an autopsy.

Cheers BRX

I was in a Nuggets-inspired Garage Rock band a few years ago and spent ages looking for the right Bass. I'd have been all over that in a heartbeat. What does it say on the headstock?

Welcome to God's Country, Mike! I'm a displaced Brummie who's lived in Halesowen since 2001. I'm about 10 miles south of Wolvo, so my advice might not all be applicable but here you go... Venues: Some great ones - The Wulfrun Hall, The Civic Hall, KKs Steel Mill, Newhampton Arts Centre, Bilston Robin 2. Rehearsal Rooms - I've only used Base Studios in Stourbridge which was very good. Open Mics: Sunday Shenanigans in Stourbridge is good. Its based at Claptrap which is occasionally used for gigs. I've seen some great bands there. You're a 21 minute train ride from Brum, which opens up loads more possibilities.

Great driving bassline from an excellent, overlooked record.

I've got a comparatively busy few weeks coming up - I'm playing six gigs with Roxy Magic before the end of the year, but I'm hoping to squeeze these shows in as well: Oct 9: 10cc Oct 12: Redd Kross Oct 20: High Llamas Oct 31: Big Star ‘Radio City’ 50th Anniversary Show Dec 6: We Are Not Devo!

REM: Gardening at Night

XTC: Senses Working Overtime

Here's our drummer, about a quarter of the way down the steps, on his way to pick up a bit more of his kit. Every time we've played there, it's rained. Apart from the time when it snowed. It's a fantastic venue and great fun to play, but the load in is ...challenging.

Here's the enormous slab of boutique gizmos I'll be schlepping around to my next few gigs... My band have got a few gigs coming up where space is tight, or the load in/out is horrible.* With that in mind, I found a cheapo Zoom B3 on FB Marketplace which matches the one on my regular board and scooped up a cheap-but-decent tuner. The Zoom has a tuner, but you have to "long press" the middle switch and who's got time for that? As my wireless receiver is on my regular board, I've gone with the Lekato WS 70 bug system. The footprint is about the size of a sheet of A4 and everything sits on an offcut of MDF wrapped in black gaffa tape, making it more PedalTram than PedalTrain. I'll miss the immediacy of being able to scroll through patches quickly which I can do on the modified Zoom B3 on my regular board, but this mini setup fits neatly into my "odds 'n sods" bag. I'll also be using my lovely old, lightweight TC Electronic BG250 combo and leaving my Hercules double instrument stand at home. * Tight space: Acapela, Pentyrch Scary load in/out: Theatre on the Steps, Bridgnorth. They're both lovely venues, but a bit of forward planning is required.

The singer in my band has used a music stand for the last twenty years - it's more of a prop now and he theatrically flips over each page at the end of every song. I'm not a huge fan, but it doesn't get in the way and he's very good at getting his cheat sheets in the right order, so no endless searching through a massive wad of tatty papers. I use an iPad, clipped to my mic stand. I rarely, if ever need to look at it, but there's something about it being there that makes me more confident about my performance. It's very discreet and I use it with a page-turn dealio on my pedal board which makes life a bit easier. As for clip on tuners - I don't understand the hate. And if they're good enough for Leland...

The strap button on the butt end of my P Bass came off at the soundcheck of a gig - fortunately, I managed to catch the instrument on its way to the floor. I bodged it with a couple of matchsticks, screwed the pin back and it seemed secure enough, but I still used my spare - after tightening both the strap buttons on it!

I have the luxury of a spare bass, so it comes with me to every gig. I've broken about five strings at shows since I started gigging in 1986, so some people might think that carting another instrument about is a waste of effort. I would disagree. It takes seconds to swap basses - certainly less time than it takes to change a string. I have also had the strap button come away from the body of my bass at a gig, so the spare was pressed into service on that occasion, too. For me, it's insurance - the mild inconvenience of having one extra thing to bring to a gig is outweighed by the piece of mind. And, if I'm doing a two-set gig and I'm feeling saucy, I might give the backup a run out too.

Maintenance is one of my favourite parts of being a muso... The great thing about passive P and J basses is that they're fairly simple to fettle. The electrics can be daunting at first, but if you go slow and steady and can follow instructions, you should be OK. I've refinished basses, defretted necks, put new frets in, shimmed and straightened necks, replaced pickups and hardware and can do a reasonable set up. It's a lot of fun. Full disclosure: I've never done any active electronics and the vast majority of my instruments tend to be cheap 'n' cheerful bitsas, so there's not a huge amount of potential financial jeopardy involved!

Say what you like about ol' Donny, he's a source of great inspiration to Bassists, it seems...

Since we've resurrected this Zombie thread, I thought I'd do a quick update on my combo stand -the Millenium Mixer Stand (scroll up a few posts.) I've done over 100 gigs since my first posts about it and it's been solid as a rock. The only modification I needed to make was to remove the extendable legs, as the height of the frame was perfect without them. This makes the stand even sturdier. Unlike the tilt-back stands, the Millenium stand doesn't add to the amp's stage footprint. I bought a couple of metres of cheapo black fabric to drape over it which makes it look a bit classier and means you can store that all-important gig rucksack with all your spare leads etc under it. That said, the Mud Stand looks great. The fact that it's made out of foam makes me a little nervous, but it certainly seems to do the job and looks smart, too. I'd be tempted to get busy with some plywood and black spray paint and try replicating it in the shed. It would be heavier, but it would be a lot cheaper!

The main reason I don't do drugs is that I used to hang around with a lot of people who did.

I'll keep playing as long as: It's still fun My health holds All the important bits of me can operate well enough I can hold a bass for between 30-60 minutes at a time (with or without an "appliance") I can travel to and from gigs without needing an ambulance I can manoeuvre my kit from point a to point b somehow My bandmates are happy to have a (XX) year-old bassist in the band I can still read the chord sheets on my iPad from a reasonable distance I've been gigging since the mid 80's (I'm 61) and I still really enjoy it. If that were to have to stop for any of the reasons above, I'd hopefully still be able to play with my mates, informally. The biggest buzz for me isn't the appreciation of the crowd or the money (ha!) - it's the physical act of playing that I love. As long as I can do that, in whatever format, I'll be happy.

You are the bassist in Spygenius and I claim my £5 prize:

I've had an Ignition bass for a few years now - I think when I bought mine, the range was called "Icon." They're a lot of fun - as a few other posters have mentioned, they are very light and after decades of playing P basses, it almost felt like a ukulele! That said, they sound great, especially if you put some flats on them. The Hofner "basic" flats are surprisingly good. It's a shame that teacup knobs seem to have rocketed in price as that used to be an inexpensive mod that got you a little closer to a "real" one. I also removed the writing from the truss rod cover with a bit of Brasso. They're cool, relatively inexpensive basses that are loads of fun to play and sound great. Full disclosure: I've never played a German 500/1, but until the payment from that Nigerian prince arrives, my budget version will do just fine.

I'm a huge fan of Squier PJ basses. The Indonesian models are absolutely superb and (IMHO) are as good as any Mexi Fender equivalent. They're also great modding platforms, too.