Jean-Luc Pickguard

A few people (who may or may not have seen or played one in the flesh) might chip in dismiss the Dean Pace as being nothing more than a vertical fretless bass guitar and therefore pointless, but in my opinion that is utter ignorant BS! i used to own one and absolutely loved it. The upright position influences a different playing style and consequently your note choices and rhythms are likely to be different to playing a fretless bas guitar. If I hadn't found a good deal on a Ned Steinberger 5 string CR5M a while ago I'm sure I'd still own & use mine. The other criticism is that it is no good for bowing, but it was not designed for that, so if you're not interested with bowing, for fingerstyle its great fun and looks cool. I played a lot of gigs with the pace. It had a punchy and growly sound which was very easy to hear in the noise of a two-guitar rock band. The materials and quality were good except for the case which looked good, but seemed to be made from expanded polysytrene covered in fabric. The stock strings were very rough & stiff flatties - hopefully they'd have been changed for something better on the S/H one you're looking at. The electronics in mine (an early one- don't know if they were ever revised for later models) consisted of a bridge with piezos and a preamp which only had a single volume knob & no eq knobs. Not a problem if you have a decent eq in the amp or on a pedal - although if you take the access plate off you can tweak bass & treble trimpots on the PCB. A few things which really transformed mine into a really classy sounding instrument for me were a setup including filing the slots in the rosewood nut to get the action low, a behringer ADI-21 acoustic DI/eq pedal - a bargain for £25ish which took away the piezo harshness to really sweeten the tone, & a set of Thomastic JF344 although JF345 would probably fit better. Regarding price - I sold mine for £380 a few years ago & chucked in the TI JF344s it was wearing along with my first ADI-21 (which I had to replace when I realised how much I used it on other things.) You can get a new Dean Pace for £440 delivered: [url="http://www.djmmusic.com/itemdesc.asp?ic=DGB-PACE-CBK"]http://www.djmmusic.com/itemdesc.asp?ic=DGB-PACE-CBK[/url] Mine had a natural maple finish which with its flamed facing looked a lot more classy than the solid colours.

I wonder what happened to my copy of True Spirit - I used to play it a lot. I'll have to find it & get it on my iPod.

I had the geetar version of the MP3 player, but sold it on as it wasn't getting much use as I tend to use my MacBook with guitar rig session I/O. I kept it in a camera case so it easy to keep in pristine condition and I never had any problems with it apart from a couple of times it crashed & froze and needed a paperclip stuck into the reset hole. I wasn't very keen on the clunky user interface - seems a bit prehistoric compared to an iPod, it was fussy about the MP3 format and being limited to 1GB was a pain, but it was a useful thing to have.

Alphabetical

[quote name='gti1396' post='757550' date='Feb 25 2010, 08:43 PM']the damage is where literally where your wrist is[/quote] My wrist was nowhere near it. Honest guv

[quote name='bubinga5' post='756710' date='Feb 25 2010, 07:53 AM']Depends on the piece of ash....and ash isnt really known as a particularly heavy wood... The key thing here is to try before you buy...[/quote] Most Ash used for guitars & basses these days is the lighter variety - like southern swamp ash. In the late 70s when CBS owned fender they cut costs by buying cheaper wood such as Northern 'baseball bat' ash. My '81 Ash Precision could have been used as an anchor on the QE2. Of course when I bought it new I had no idea it was heavier than it should have been as I was young and inexperienced.

[quote name='BigAlonBass' post='755871' date='Feb 24 2010, 10:16 AM']We'll be allowing Vocalists and Drummers to post here before you know it! [/quote] They'll have to learn to read & write first

The rule of thumb* with guitars is 500k for humbuckers, 250k for single coils (& I think its the same for basses) but whatever you get make sure you get CTS ones rather than generic cheapos - & if you're making the whole harness, get a switchcraft jack as well. Assuming it has a pair of humbuckers I would probably use the "SG or Hollow Arch Top Wiring Kit" from [url="http://www.axesrus.com/axeknobs.htm#Kits"]here[/url] [size=1]*yeah I know - anyone that uses rules of thumb should have their thumbs cut off[/size]

I just watched the video of the fire via the link on the talkbass thread. Shocking and very scary. I don't recall hearing of this at the time it happened, but I'm going to ensure I know where the fire exits are every time I arrive at a new venue in future and if a fire breaks out leave the gear where it is.

I like my epiphone - 'limited edition' alpine white t-bird.

[quote name='dave_bass5' post='749567' date='Feb 18 2010, 12:38 PM']The down side to using this might be that now my guitarist wont be able to feel me over his side of the stage[/quote] fnarr!

For most gigs I don't go through a PA as we only have a small vocal PA. My 1212L with LMII has always been either loud enough or too loud.

I don't know why the advice given above was to avoid the dean pace - I thoroughly enjoyed the one I owned & it gave a sound & feel very different to a fretless bass to make it worthwhile. It isn't designed to be bowed as the target market (people like me?) are probably not interested in using a bow. They sometimes come up secondhand at a good price. A set of TI JF354 & a cheapo behringer ADI21 preamp made mine sound very good. I've since upgraded to a Ned Steinberger CR5M which is in a totally different class, but its in a different price range as well.

[quote name='tarcher' post='747046' date='Feb 16 2010, 11:28 AM']I actually feel sorry for the geezer.[/quote] perhaps someone should organise a whip-round for him.

have you tried turning it off & back on again?

I hope you're replying to Chris's suggestion & not mine

hit it with a great big hammer?

Andy/Zsa Zsa in the hamsters uses a custom thumb pick as he has a condition which affects his hand.

10,000 is a ridiculous amount for a limited edition. As a comparison, Epiphone's limited edition thunderbirds such as my alpine white one was a run of 500.

A part of it was rumoured to have been played by the bloke from the hollies? Whoop-de-doo. Whoever told hime to insure it for a grand should have explained that would cover him if it was nicked and he wanted to build another one just like it. If he had asked the same bloke how much he'd give him for it he would have got a very different valuation.

I think my hohner B2A has one. Can't be bothered to get it out if its case to check though.

Yep - certainly sounds like a MIJ 62RI P to me. I have a 1990 one. The necks is wider than my other Ps, but doesn't seem as deep front to back - perhaps that's what makes it comfy to play? Mine is wearing TI flats and it is superfast for such a wide neck.

[quote]DRG: So at the time you worked in the store, seeing them every day, playing them every day — how many Les Pauls actually gave you a hard-on?[/quote] Is that how guitarists talk to each other? I reckon he might just be a crap player. If he was any good he would be able to get a decent sound out of any guitar. Sounds like there's possibly a certain amount of FUD in there to get people to buy instore rather than on that new-fangled interwebs thing.