Maude

Over to you stew 😆 More obstacles and absolutely no willingness on his part to help organise a suitable day or time. Funny thing intuition, I had a gut feeling right from the off he was another facebook waste of time. Another one will turn up. 🙂

Hmm, the more I look into it the more it's looking like the green eyed monster is eating him. I had first spoken with him about buying it before Christmas but I couldn't go up and collect it until after, we'd agreed if he still had it after Christmas I'd come and get it, the ad was a straight sale for £650. After Christmas, before Andy posted the link, I went to message him but the ad was gone, I was disappointed as I assumed he'd sold it, then I found a new ad for £750. I then saw the fresh activity on this thread. After Stew kindly offered to hold off I messaged the seller to query the price change and was told it was £750 trade value but £650 cash, so I said cool I'll take it, I have since then been trying to arrange a time convenient to us both to collect, without any luck. After trying a few different weekends he tells me he can only do weekdays so I tell him I've got the week starting 6th January off work and he's still got it then, I'll come and get it. Then I realise I could go on new years eve so tell him I can be there at midday on Tuesday if that's any good, he read the message yesterday early afternoon but hasn't replied. I since then have clicked on Andys link and seen the messages on Facebook which didn't come up on the ad I viewed, he has told people trade only, no cash sales which appears to have miffed a couple of people as they want to buy it outright. I hate to jump to conclusions but I am starting to assume that he's keeping me at arms length until he gets a better offer, which is fine, if he doesn't want to sell for £650 then just say and we can stop this run around. I'll give him until this evening to get back to me, then over to Stew.

Right that's it! There's so many rediculous topics on here lately and this is the last in a long line. I've had enough of it now, it's just utter nonsense. If all sounds sound the same Mr. Hellzero, answer me this......... How come most of mine sound wrong?

Perhaps I'll send him a postcard about it then, it might be quicker 🤞😁 If he doesn't get back to me tomorrow then I'm done with it. I can't drive that distance to hopefully meet someone with such a reluctance to communicate. 🤪 (why can't you delete an emoji BTW) I might be passing the baton to @stewblackimminently.

What's he do for a job, long haul airline pilot? His availability and response to messages is certainly lacking. I'm still awaiting a reply to a message I sent which was read hours ago about going to collect this bass. I'm about to give up because he really doesn't seem interested in selling it.

Bottom end goes thump, top end goes plink, some claim they growl, and a bow makes them howl. They all look the same, brown, brown is popular.

Is it a period set in time or a rolling thing? Most folks seem to say 70s/early 80s is classic rock but is that because that's what you grew up with? The newer bands listed earlier are still mostly over twenty years old, or rather their classic hits are, so to a newer generation could be considered 'classic rock'. Could current stuff be considered classic rock in another twenty years time? For what's it's worth, I consider classic rock to be a style of rock recorded in a certain time period, that being as per most in the thread, the 70s and 80s, though mainly 70s, Deep Purple, Rainbow, Sabbath, Priest, AC/DC, Skynyrd, Steppen Wolf, the list goes on.

Everything I've ever read of his has been truly fascinating. I'd been after a copy of The Monkey's Tail for years now but only had a quick browse of the Internet every now and then and could only find beaten up old copies for far too much money. Your post jogged my memory and I had another quick look, a copy is now on its way from the good ole US of A for a fiver all in. Thanks @Frank Blank

Mine doesn't 🥺

Surely to a degree all basses of a certain type/style sound the same, ie a jazz sounds like a jazz, a P like a P, a MM like a MM, you get the drift. They should all have that certain characteristic the gives them their trademark sound. Then all the usual things that change the tone will come into play, strings, construction of pickup, tone controls, wood type, (yeah right 😁), etc. You could take ten different Jazz basses, or P's or whatever, and make them all sound extremely alike with strings, pickups EQ, etc, or you could take one Jazz bass and give it ten different sounds with strings, pickups, blah, blah, blah. Take a Rickenbacker 4001/4003, they're all clanky and aggressive aren't they? Roll the tone off, fit flats, play with your thumb and hang on, it's gone all thumpy. Not at all like that aggressive Bruce Foxton tone on a lot of The Jam recordings. What's that? A Precision? But they're those thumpy things on all the Motown and Stax recordings. All basses sound as alike, or as different, as you want them to.

It sounds like a real shitty thing to do to you, but you should rise above it. But before you do you should get another band together, ring around and cancel all the previous bands gigs, then step in at the last minute with your new band and watch the stunned look on their stupid little faces when they arrive to find your new band set up in their place. Ha! Then rise above it 😁

I killed my first bass with fire. ☄️💥👍 It was some sort of terrible EB0 copy

PM returned. 👍 That's very good of you @stewblack. I've said I'll have it but it's starting to look like it's just too difficult to pin down a time when he's happy to meet up.

The bodies and styling are totally Precision or Jazz. The J has a J style offset body with the J arrangement of knobs regardless of control/scratchplate or not and the P has a P style body with P knob layout and scratchplate. They both have P/J pickups and, from what I've read, possibly the same necks, some are saying the Aerodyne P neck is slim like a traditional Jazz, but I'm not sure about the necks.

The Suitcase is the same size as the 4b, from the front they look identical. Every now and then a bargain comes up that you just have to take. I got the Suitcase (barely used) the 4b (second hand but unused) and the stupidly thick PJB speakon cable that comes in a blue satin lined case (also unused) for £560. Some people say they're too sterile but I love it. You can add pedals for extra growl if that's your thing.

Are we talking about the same basses? I've never seen P aerodyne without a scratchplate, a lot of J aerodynes don't have a scratchplate but they are a lot more common as they were produced for longer. I definitely want a P style one as I prefer the shape and trans finish.

I spoke with him about it before Christmas but couldn't get up there until new year. I was going to message him today about going up tomorrow but, and it's a big but, a week ago he wanted £650, we'd agreed if he still had it after Christmas I'd come and get it. Since then he has upped it to £750 which I'm not paying on principle. @stewblack if you are in talks I'll leave you to it as I'm only going to offer him his original price of £650. In all honesty is was going to offer £600 as it's been for sale for a while and the £50 saving would've covered petrol.

Yes but once we've treated them atrociously they soon clear off. 🥺

We're not the mandolinista.

Lipsticks go on the Dano fakers surely.

I see all these Chinese counterfeits as a bass shaped lump of wood with some rather nice templates for where the hardware goes screwed on. On arrival, pull the hardware templates off, give the body and neck a quick rub down and finish in your preferred colour, give the frets a quick tidy up and choose your new hardware to your chosen price point. If you can't do this then maybe Ali express isn't for you. I see it as buying a house or car from auction, you'll get something that is similar to what you eventually want but it will more than likely need a bit of work. If you're not prepared to do the work (or sub it out) then a standard retailer is where you need to be. On the plus side if you do expect to do the work, you might get one that doesn't need as much as you first thought and that's a real win. Once all done it might not represent value for money but that's the risk with all these ways of buying things cheap. You pays yer money, you takes yer chance. 🙂

I can't believe the bridge can cause such debate when the Rickenbacker bridge is IMO such a poor design. Sure there will be people that will say "I've had no problems" but it has to have the worst way of setting intonation I've ever come across, and the tail lift problem is a real problem, for those that don't know, the rear of the bridge is not secured so bends up over time under string tension where the weak point on the bridge is, eventually your have to raise the saddle height so the strings will still sit on them. I like Rickenbackers and am not trying to rubbish them but arguing that a Chickenbacker bridge isn't as good as Rickenbacker bridge seems pretty futile. Unfortunately for what is worth, the HB bridge does look like it's copied the Rickenbacker bridge enough to have incorporated the risk of tail lift, from the pictures it appears that the last rearward fixing is way forwards of the string anchor point, unless there's a fixing I can't see at the back. Also my opinion only but, on an expensive genuine Rick I'd be annoyed, but a £150 bass, I'd just put a couple of fixings neatly down through the rear of the bridge and get on with life.

Merry Christmas everyone, and may I take this opportunity to apologise for a years worth of waffle with very little useful content. I hope everyone has a great day tomorrow whatever, or however you celebrate

What about choking? 🤐

Take that bloody Takemine TB-10 out of my Thomann basket before I do something silly.