molan

I picked up a nice Spector Fretless for under £100 at one in North London a few years back. They had a Tom Anderson Guitarworks Drop Top Strat up for sale at about £400 - £500. At the time these were retailing for over £2K, unfortunately I din;t have enough available to cash to buy it but sent a friend to have a look less than an hour later & it had been snapped up

[quote name='john_the_bass' post='285216' date='Sep 16 2008, 04:58 PM']you can get them from axesrus (but make sure you get the right ones) or you can also get the proper schaller ones from wdmusic.co.uk -actually, I daresay that's your best bet - I can't remember how much they are if but if you're looking at spending 7 quid on a pair of buttons, you might as well buy the whole thing.[/quote] I bought a pair of full Schaller sets - black were £12 & nickel £8.50. You were right that I was being a bit of a skinflint trying to save £4 - £5 by just buying the buttons and/or not sticking to the same brand. Given that each bass is worth over £700 then spending a tenner on some straplocks isn't exactly going to brake the bank!

And they come in some crazy colours as well!

I have a couple of straps that I use regularly and both are already fitted with Schaller straplocks. However I have a couple of basses without the corresponding inserts and wondered if I can just buy the buttons on their own? I've seen some chrome ones on EBay for about half the price of the full system (which seems to make sense) but I also wanted some black ones & can't see them anywhere. Also - I've seen some made by a company called Boston that claim to be fully compatible with original Schallers - I wondered if anyone ahd tried them and thought they were any good?

[url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=300256084671"]http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vie...em=300256084671[/url]

Steve Lawson is a regular solo gig man - check his site for more details, vids, MP3's etc: [url="http://www.stevelawson.net/wordpress/"]http://www.stevelawson.net/wordpress/[/url] Last time I saw him was with Michael Manring - top solo bass night

I was in a Blues Brothers outfit for a while and they insisted on playing almost every song from the first movie including Stand By Your Man. For some reason that I can't really remember I used to play it lying down on stage with the bass draped over me & pretending to be fast asleep - seemed funny at the time :blush: I also played Honky Tonk Women in one band which has that rather distinctive cow bell sound (gotta have more cow bell!) - The drummer couldn't play it at the same time as the rest of the kit so I played the bell because there's no bass in the initial verses. Rather than scrabble around putting the drum stick somewhere safe for the chorus then grabbing it again for the verse I simply played all the bass parts with a full length drum stick. Pre-dated Tony Levin's funk fingers as well I think These days I always wear some 'silly' shoes - band usually plays in all black so I have a selection of brightly coloured shoes. The obligatory electric blue suede brothel creepers, some green matt finish Doc Martins, a rather ornate set of cowboy boots etc. The blue suedies always go down well

[quote name='SJA' post='280224' date='Sep 9 2008, 11:24 AM']re. his chucking technique, he's seen using it on "dance dance dance" at the 1996 Budokan gig- [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvGU_iHlSrk"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvGU_iHlSrk[/url][/quote] What a brilliant series of vids - I'm sitting at my desk downloading the entire set of 10 right now

There's a pretty extensive discography here: [url="http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:a9frxqy5ldje~T4"]http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&a...a9frxqy5ldje~T4[/url] It runs for 3 pages but includes both his production credits and a lot of mentions of compilation albums that he featured on. Worth checking out though for some of the less well known stuff like Stacy Latislaw, Paul Simon, Bowie!, Joe Cocker, Jagger, Rod Stewart, Robert Palmer etc. PS - How great a rhythm guitarist is Nile Rodgers by the way? I can listen to him all day

[quote name='Dr.Dave' post='280153' date='Sep 9 2008, 09:20 AM']Regarding headless basses. As well as being more portable I do find I have more room when using them in small places. I've never done pit work but I have worked in tiny bars that are the pits!! Yes - there would have been room to play a headed bass but a headless gives you a little bit more room. When seated - why have the end of your instrument 5" away from someone elses music stand when it could be a foot away? Why would you do that?[/quote] Having once nearly removed my sax players right ear I swapped to a headless for the next gig and was amazed at how much more freedom I had to move around I've had a few negative comments about my Zon because it's so tiny and can't be a "real" bass, but I just ignore them Here's Michael Manring playing his VB

Where are you based Mr Fluto - I'm sure a few people here would let a 'proper working bassist' try out their equipment - probably a damn sight friendlier than your average bass shop