Jean-Luc Pickguard

Fast Car — Tracy Chapman

This does sound like a setup issue — I have owned a couple of vintera mustangs and once set up they had no issues like this. Dead spots are annoying but i’ve only seen them localised to a single fret of a particular string, never a bunch of adjacent frets, and I’ve never had one on a mustang bass. If there is a friendly basschatter near you who is particularly experienced with bass setups it could be worth having them take a closer look to investigate the problem. Where are you located?

I Thank You — Sam & Dave

My short scale Squier jaguar and Fender Mustang have top loading bridges so I use short scale (30") strings on those for the best fit. My Other Mustangs with thru-body stringing have medium scale (32") strings as does my Guild starfire which has quite a lot of string behind the saddle.

I bet he'd stop hitting his teeth on the grille if you put the mic down your underpants in front of him for a few seconds before the gig

I don’t have a PSU with a mini jack so I can’t try that. I have replaced the battery clip as the original one was corroded from a leaky battery and wasn’t making the multimeter beep in a continuity test. I put a clip over the switching part of the power socket and tested the pedal but it is still not working. Will have to try some more in-depth investigations.

Anything by Coldplay

Sew What — Anti Nowhere League

And No More Shall We Fart — Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

I think that G3 is the same one I saw on reverb this morning: https://reverb.com/uk/item/85356190-gibson-g3-reissue-2012-honeyburst

The gunk keeps the funk. But if you really need to defunk it, napha aka lighter fluid is the way to go. Last time I bought some it was a quid from poundland. It evaporates quickly so once you've wiped it off it won't leave any residue behind. Use it in a well ventilated area (or the garden), and ensure that any rags/kitchen towel is disposed of well away from anything that could set it alight. If you have sticker residue you want to remove from an instrument or case it's also perfect for that.

Eat Yourself Out — Melvins

Thank you — that is a great help. It looks like we have the same version of the circuit board and on initial inspection the wires on mine look like they're all present and connected the same as yours, albeit with some colour differences. One area of interest is the power socket. I was wondering about mine as I can't see it clearly, but I can see from yours that theres a pair of elements that appear to act as a switch to cut off the battery when a psu's mini-jack is plugged in. I wonder whether my issue could be as simple as the two bits on mine that make up the switching part of the socket either not making contact or in need a clean. I will take a closer look and have a poke about with the multimeter.

I recently found my EHX bassballs and Morley sync attack effects which I'd not seen for decades. I'm hoping my 70s coloursound tone bender will turn up as well, but I might have left it somewhere or gave it away back in the distant past. The Sync attack was an easy fix and is now fully working once I'd rigged up a working metal pick to trigger the effect, but the Bass Balls seems to be dead when tested with a 9v battery. It looks like I, or someone else was in there previously with a soldering iron as there appears to be a non-original pink wire. Does anyone know about these or own an similar 70s example of this pedal they can compare with mine to see if I have any wires missing or incorrectly connected?

Automatic Lava — The Vibrators

My JMJs have a lacquer finish that came with fake playwear and any I've added isn't really noticable. Most of my other basses have a poly or similar hard finish so only Edward Scissorhands, Freddie Kruger or that character Hugh Jackman plays would be able to add any playwear.

A drum screen is overkill for a pub gig and will look ridiculous if the setup is anything like the small pubs I've played in. The drummer needs to recognise that he is part of a band, and what the band sounds like as a whole is more important than his fragile ego.

The Woman Next Door — The Felice Brothers

This Charming Man — The Smiths

Brie-Bop-A-Lula — Gene Vincent

Lady Grinning Soul — David Bowie

Recently I was clearing out a cupboard full of boxes that hadn't been disturbed since moving into the house over twenty years ago, and I came across my old Morley Sync-Attack. The 'pik' cable was with it but the metal 'pik' itself was missing. I managed to get some metal picks from aliexpress and today I soldered one to the cable and covered it in adhesive vinyl. I plugged it in to test and it still works exactly as I remember from forty years ago. It is a bit of a weird effect — it detects the pik being grounded when it touches a string. This drops the signal to zero and fades it back in with the speed set by the control on top. I'm sure there are modern pedals that perform this kind of effect better without needing a kludgy pick attachment, so I think this is more of a pedal collector's piece than something that would actually be used on a gig. It was somewhat surprising to see the kind of prices these have gone for, so I'm probably going to list it on reverb and/or ebay for a bit less than the one below.

Dancing On My Own — Robyn

Dandy — The Kinks

Soup 'n Old Clothes — Frank Zappa