D.I. Joe

I'm sold! Bought a Precision off of our very own deanovw a little while ago; when I played it prior to buying my first thought was "Wow, these strings are lovely and new". Turns out they are year-old Elixirs! And gigged regularly to boot! I had been put off before by stories of the coating peeling off and them not being as durable as advertised, but having tried them now I am truly impressed. They feel great - well balanced, nice tension and they sound superb. I think I'll be investing in some more of these for my other basses too! From experience, where is the best/cheapest place to buy them?

You're absolutely right. In my opinion, the strings and the amp are the only parts of the setup (apart from effects obv.) which could affect the tone beyond recognition. But ultimately, an amp can only give out what is fed into it and a string only vibrates in the way that you make it.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1357310257' post='1920748'] I'd try and up your budget by a couple of hundred pounds and look for something second hand. And [b]don't buy without playing it first.[/b] [/quote] +1 This. Whatever budget you settle on, just make sure you play it first. Like me for instance with the Squier - I saw it on the shelf and thought "hmm, an affordable 5-string, might be okay..." then tried it and loved it! I knew these were supposedly good basses but I would never have bought it had I not tried it in the shop.

Fantastic photos there mate. My NYE gig was a bit of a belter. Place was buzzing but not crammed - just the right amount of people on the floor - a full room but still enough space for everyone to dance. I did a hell of a lot more prancing around than I normally do, and didn't touch a drop! (Not that I normally do... ) Photos soon... Then yesterday I had a hair-of-the-dog jam and a BBQ with some friends in the afternoon, then caught Shine in the evening, who are a mixture of pro musicians from Cornwall and London. Great players, and really nice guys as well. They did an impromptu jam-type thing too which went down well. Their drummer is pretty sh*t hot and a joy to play with, and at the end of the evening he told me that he loves my style and I'm a "killer" bass player. Good way to start the year methinks. Oh, and I may have picked up a gig or two from that evening too

Squier Vintage Modified Jazz V. Got mine for £290 and I honestly think it is as good a bass as my Highway One USA Precision. Crazy stuff!

[quote name='DHA' timestamp='1357060168' post='1916975'] I have red, purple and green boxes here ready to be drilled. Can order yellow or blue if you prefer? [/quote] Have ordered in purple Thanks Dave! I'll stop hijacking this thread now!

Excellent! I'll get my order in today then! What colours are available?

[quote name='DHA' timestamp='1357045170' post='1916646'] my new "smaller" range was designed to get the size down but still keep the same circuit design and tone. Dave [/quote] A-ha! Just the man! I love the VT1-EQ-Drive and I'm very keen on the look of the Di-Std for the same quality in a smaller unit. What is the approximate waiting time for delivery at the moment?

I could get my whole stack, pedals, lead bag and two basses into my old Micra, with room to take a plus one in the front. Now I have a Mk2 Clio and I can do the same without putting the seats down! Last week I had a half stack, four basses and a trombone in there, and the Mrs in the front. You don't need a huge car really unless you have an 8x10 or something of the like.

Cool I'll check those out when I get a few minutes. Is there such thing as a compact(ish) overdrive with a valve onboard?

[quote name='paul_5' timestamp='1352406386' post='1862753'] if I hadn't fallen head over heels with my DHA pedal then that's one that I'd have kept. Sounds brilliant and looks awesome. Fairly mahoosive footprint though. [/quote] Sorry to back track the thread somewhat but I'm thinking of looking for an alternative to mine. I have the VT1-bass-drive-eq and the tone is fantastic but its so huge! I'm thinking I might swap it for a smaller DHA or maybe a different more compact valve overdrive, if anybody could recommend one?

The website just seems to go on about the colour of the strings and not the tone or construction etc that you normally see on string sites. Not really selling it to me

Nice one Lozz! I don't have Sky unfortunately but I'll get my better half to record it

My advice would be to start at medium and see how they feel, then you've got options either way, though there are many, many string companies out there all producing different sets of strings which feel and sound completely different, so experiment a bit! Don't be too preoccupied about strings while you are learning though, they can be quite expensive! Also, if you are down tuning a lot then you'll probably find heavy strings best to deal with, unless you don't mind spending the money for some DR DDTs and the lik. Hope this helps

I prefer passive generally. A lot of actives sound clinical almost to the point of being antiseptic to me, and I find that passive pickups are more responsive to the way that I play. Also, as a friend of mine pointed out - however you set your bass compromises your pedals, which in turn compromise your amp, so I like to keep things simple where I can.

Where are you playing on the 29th? Might as well pop put and hear it in action!

Looking good Dean! Don't suppose I could have a go at some point?

[quote name='irvined' timestamp='1354884619' post='1891578'] Hi, Here's a pic of my £21 DIY fretless (hopefully!). I filled with veneer and then applied a really hard varnish. Using roundwounds and the fretboard is standing up o.k. (so far) Cheers, Doug [/quote] Looking good! I still haven't got round to taking any decent photos of mine! I didn't even think about varnishing though... The bass sounds fine but I guess I'll wait and see how much serious use it gets before I varnish. Hopefully it won't need it with flats. Welcome to Basschat btw

Here here! Though I wouldn't necessarily call it 'specialist' personally, but then I suppose I do it about 50% of the time. You just can't get the same attack with fingers and a lot of songs (not necessarily limited to Rock) just need that edge - not just to the sound but it also brings a different feel to the part. All this talk of 'real bassists' using fingers or slap or whatever - Bollocks! Real bassists do whatever fits the music best, regardless.

Seem to be having trouble uploading photos at the moment :-\

Finished it off yesterday and it worked pretty well! Went down the filler route in the end as I figured that veneers would be so much unneccessary time and hassle for what is a tear-up-a-£60-bass-and-see-what-happens kind of job. Got a tube of (rather suspicios looking...) darkwood filler from B&Q for the fret slots, left it to dry overnight and then sanded it off with a power sander - a few times over with 60p, then a couple of times with 100p, then a little 150p and finished off with a once over with wet and dry. Spent a good chunk of the afternoon sliding harmonics Pics to follow...