Cairobill

They do sound good. I can see one in my future! Hope you're well too. We're all hunkered down here in the weald

Ha ha yes! I retract that statement

Yup - Stingray can do anything apart from dinner jazz I think. Fine for fusion if that's your thing (Scofields Blue Matter for e.g.) Being able to go from droning metallic bass a la Simon Gallup to tight punchy Bernard Edwards is a VERY wide range. Having been around the houses for many years (too long to mention), I would happily argue a single pickup Stingray is the most versatile bass you can own. It's my only bass right now.

Just went back to Stingrays after doing the rounds of Js, Ps P/Js etc (it's an older, gorgeous '89 with the essential 2-band). It's just perfect. Holy moly...it thumps with old nickels on it. As mentioned on the thread, I will probably get a nice J bass to compliment the 'Ray. I 'm very attracted to that combo.

Just picked up a very, very nice '89 Stingray from Claudio. Absolutely as described, a great deal and a BEAUTIFUL bass. Thanks Claudio!

Yeah, total freebie!

On a free Waves plugin tip, the excellent RVox is available via this link. It's free, and amazingly there doesn't;t seem to be a catch (apart from signing up to a mailing list). You have to sign up (I have an email for this kind of thing) and you eventually get the serial link, a process which took a couple of days. It actually works! Expires on the 15th...RVox is very, very good so the palaver is worth it I think. https://rekkerd.org/get-waves-renaissance-vox-for-free-at-valentina-bilancieri/

Mmm nice. How did you find the fretless tone? Did it have graphite zing etc? I'm interested in a fretless Ray at some point and I'm not totally against the graphite fretless tone (I really liked my Zon fretless I sold a while back). But I guess the question is...can you get a warm fretless tone out of Ray/Sabre electrics with the Status neck?

Laurence is brilliant - he used to take very good care of my Bryant at a very reasonable price when I lived in the area.

I have Kevsy's old one (a Studio passive) and it is a lot more DB-like than the Yamaha SLB-200 I used to own. Sounds better too. Interesting EUBs!

I've owned virtually all the bass 'varieties' in my time (except for a Warwick) and the XL design is the closest to perfect (as long as you can handle the look aha ha ha) as I've ever experienced. Ultramodernism in action! One caveat is that I owned one which had a neck bow which was a bit of disaster. One expert assumed it had been left in a hot car which had given it a warp. They can apparently be heat-treated to reset the carbon weave and solve the issue but the bass didn't have the famed straight neck and lovely low, buzz free, action. My next XL2 (now owned by Roger on the board) was just a beauty and I miss it. Would be nice to see Steinberger crack a cost effective moulding process and pop the cute little dub machines out at a reasonable price.

Having owned a couple of mid-eighties XLs (one of them a lovely transitional) I would buy one if it was in the same realm quality wise. Any links to this info? I've owned a couple of Zons and they were just a bit light on the low end and had a glassiness to their tone that didn't really win me over. Steinberger XLs just sound incredibly good and have no problems in the trouser flapping department whatsoever Haven't played a status for many years but my experience with them was that they were super bright (and glassy) tone wise. At the time I wanted the crazy low action and zingy sound to accommodate major thumb abuse so they were definitely aimed at a particular era of bass fashion. I would love one though! Especially an all grey early model with the weave finish.

Yup - saw them as a nipper at the Herne Hill Half Moon in '87. Blew the roof off the venue and covered everyone in flour. Intense (and intensely strange) epic-ness. Such a shame what happened. Brilliant musician!