Lfalex v1.1

I'll qualify whatever I say next with a quick list of some of my stuff, so you'll know where I'm coming from... Musicman Stingray V fretless, tuned CGDAE Vigier Passion V S3 tuned GDAEB Warwick Streamer LX VI tuned CGDAEB I have a good idea (I think) where you're coming from. The Warwick has relatively narrow spacing c.17mm. Yet I find it VERY quick from string to string. That said, I don't really play slap. Every Ken Smith I've played has been great, but when it came to purchasing one, I couldn't justify the expense, and bought the Warwick instead. I must admit, when I first began to read the thread, I concurred with Bubinga5; The SR506. Cheap, cheerful, and you'll get a feel for a narrower spaced 6 with it. The Smiths are 35" scale, too, and can be a little "stretching", but you get used to it. Finding ANY 6 with single-coil Jazz pick-ups may be a bit of a mission! As for Status, the build quality is excellent. If it's in good condition, it'll be great. Just very "modern" sounding. All the best, and good luck in your search. Alex.

I have had this thought also. 2 years later, I've still only done number "3". It's where I started. That, and the (not exactly obvious) DR Miller Fatbeams. They're the REAL secret. The Strings. And Marcus' hands! DO consider that the VMJ's body is Maple, and not Ash, as per the the '77 (?) Jazz he uses. Even as it is, it's pretty damn good! Personally, my next move will be some s**t hot pick-ups (Wizards?) and a stacked control plate with a volume and a tone per pick-up. That Fender EQ is not the best, and there's no tone control available in passive mode (which is a BIG minus IMO) Have fun, but don't spend more than it's worth!

An HSS Bongo might be nice... I'm not entirely sure about the push buttons for pick-up selection. That said, I don't like selectors [i]per se[/i], but I can't see how they'd accomodate 1 volume per pick-up! At least the pick-up selection system is intuitive and flexible. And it looks better than a row of mini toggles! I look forward to the Reflex. Ideal for a Duran Duran covers band!

Was looking at something else on the bay, and this popped up; [url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/MUSICMAN-25th-ANNIVERSARY-BASS-GUITAR-HSS-4-STRING_W0QQitemZ290395386912QQcategoryZ4713QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp4340.m263QQ_trkparmsZalgo%3DSIC%26its%3DI%26itu%3DUCI%252BIA%252BUA%252BIEW%252BFICS%252BUFI%26otn%3D6%26ps%3D63"]Ebay linky. Clickety Click.[/url] Apologies to those who might already have seen it. Better looking than a Big Al, and nice to see the 4 band EQ outside of its Bongo application.

Last CV Jazz I tried was very good indeed. Even better given the price...

I;m not normally an aesthete, but I liked the look of the original, multi-lipstick look. I'd have investigated the possibility of having them re-wound a bit "hotter". I believe Wizard and Armstrong will do such things. Sorry I didn't get in earlier....

There's other choices! Roscoe Beck sig Stu Hamm Urge (1 or2) Precision Deluxe Mark Hoppus sig They're all different permutations of the 2 main Fender bass recipes, which deliver differtent sounds and feels accordingly... If I can't have them, I'll have my 2004 Ash-bodied MIA s1 Jazz in Translucent Sunset Orange, thanks!!

I want one. Eventually. Must have; Canary Yellow paintjob Black hardware. If it has a scratchplate, that'll be black. Matching (Yellow, then!) headstock. Ebony or (stained darker) Rosewood fretboard No exposed polepieces- or I'll coat them with black nail varnish! Natural coloured frets are a necessary evil. Do DR do coated Yellow strings or will I just have to use Warwick yellow labels!!!

I was born this way... Me too!

[quote name='bassbloke' post='725152' date='Jan 26 2010, 01:57 PM']This is black metal. You don't need great tone Someone on here (badgerific?) is selling a BC Rich beast, in black, for silly money.[/quote] [i]Everyone[/i] needs great tone!! Seriously, though, Mog is right when he says there's no specific instrument type or style for a given genre. It's not so much WHAT you play as HOW you play it! He just needs to try everything, and choose an instrument that is comfortable and sounds good!

I have a Hartke VXL, MXR M80, and an Ampeg SVP-Pro. and I struggle to get any of 'em to do what I want!!! Hartke's got a super clean tone. The MXR's built like a tank, but both still just sound like jar of wasps (but less so than an ODB-3!) The Ampeg has an almost liquid mid-range, and will do anything from mild OD to full on scream-athon. It seems to lose bottom end, though. And it isn't footswitchable in a distortion sense. The quest for an ideal distortion unit continues...

Not "famous" in and of itself, but it did once belong to Boz Burrell. He didn't get on with it, and sold it on through the Bass Centre (Wapping) He must've been nuts. Or after something different, 'cos it's a stonker! Neck's got some nice birdseye going on. It's a 1990, so AlNiCo pick-up polepieces and NO quick release battery compartment. Tried all the fretlesses in the place before I bought it, and it stuffed the lot. Perfect condition. Cost me £1k. No provenance, alas....

Are they short scale? Unless there's something odd going on in terms of neck length- No I didn't count the frets (are there 24?), then the bridge saddles look too far up the body (assuming it's more or less a regular J size) Nice, but doubtless [i]brutally[/i] expensive. And they didn't make much of an effort with the headstock design, did they? It'd have to be something to outdo the Super J competition; Shuker Celinder Sei Sadowsky Zoot Funkmeister and so on. Not to mention the fact that you could probably buy two of the above for the cost of one Alembic.

Anything we need to know about the lighting? Is it; Dimmer Switches Fluorescent tubes Transformer driven low-voltage halogen or anything funny like that. All of the above can cause buzzing hell, especially with single coils. No matter how well shielded your instrument might be.

[quote name='lemmywinks' post='718889' date='Jan 20 2010, 12:34 PM']I guess if you look at the work that goes into the higher end Warwicks the cost makes a bit more sense, after all a Fender is basically a bolted together slab bodied instrument with a forearm and belly schamfer, selling for nearly a grand. Warwicks have all the nice curves and rounded edges. Mind you Warwicks are mostly machined now aren't they? I think the Infinity deserves to be pretty pricey, it can't be easy to build what with the cavities and f-holes...[/quote] They ARE machine made. Nothing wrong with that, [i]per se[/i]. Machines generally don't make "Friday afternoon" specials. With regard to the Infinity, you'd be surprised what you can knock up with a good jig, CNC router and some glue!!

[quote name='Exile252' post='226653' date='Jun 25 2008, 12:10 PM']I plan to be cremated so I'd have my fave bass along for the ride, oh, and I intend to have my ashes sent to space, which you can actually do.[/quote] You do know that there's some parts of the human body that survive cremation - Teeth, and other hard, dense bone structures. Same for basses, I guess. Somewhere there's a crematorium selling a job lot of slightly "dusty" bridges, truss rods, polepieces and tuners... From a personal perspective, if none of my family were playing/learning, I'd pass them on to people who would take care of and have a use for a nice bass or two.

The Italians have a word for drummer fatigue; [i]Decelerando[/i], I believe is the term! I was listening to an old live recording recently, and you can hear me trying to "pull" the drummer back into time by over-emphasizing beat "1" of each bar (it was 4/4 rock) That particular band metamorphosed from loose wishy-washy indie to nigh-on precise heavy metal delivery (whilst keeping many of the same songs), depending on the members. A guitarist/ drummer friend of mine replaced their orignal drummer. Which perked them up a lot. There was an internal rift and one guitarist and the bassist left. The drummer friend of mine moved over to guitars (his delivery is very punctual!) I joined. Which perked them up a lot more We got another drummer (as detailed in the live scenario above) He became ill, and we had another drummer dep for a few gigs, and he was the icing on the cake. So much so that the lead singer got a bit upset that our delivery was becoming more of a feature than the songs! That said, we could be very dynamic throughout the course of a song. It's all about the combination of musicians in the band, and their view of how music should be played in terms of tempo. A solid drummer and rhythm guitar along with a tight bassist are a formidable team.

I'd assumed that they were for open-backed cabs/combos... So not exactly aimed at us bassists. Also, how do you know that you've set multiple drivers to the same setting, and what effect might that have on your amp?

[quote name='MarshallBTB' post='717264' date='Jan 18 2010, 10:32 PM']Was reminded of the site today at work...[/quote] I wonder who that could've been? Welcome back!

[quote name='merello' post='715064' date='Jan 16 2010, 06:14 PM']Comments?[/quote] Looks like the guys at Warwick had too many spare bits knocking around! [i]"Hey, we've over-produced on L/H Strykers and R/H Buzzard Neck blanks... What can we do? Let's stick them together in an upside-downy kind of way and get someone really famous to endorse it!"[/i] And after all that, they put MECs in it AGAIN! There must be better pick-ups to put in some mega-expensive Warwick beast? But, on the plus side, it'll be the first Gibson design that doesn't suffer from neck-dive, so well done on thinking "outside of the box" on that one!

[i] "I am Spartacus" [/i] As opposed to; OLP MM3 SUB 5 Sterling by MM 'Ray 5 Sterling by MM Sterling 5 MM Sterling 5 MM Classic Series 'Ray 5 MM Classic Series Sterling 5 Oh, plus any Anniversary editions and "Ball Family Reserve" lines... Didn't post this on the EBMM forum for fear they'd issue a Fatwa. (Cool Name for a wah pedal, though.... FatWah) Edit. In my "excitement", I neglected to mention all the "H", "H/H" and "H/S" variants. Making at least another God knows how many alternatives. Normally, I'm all for choice, but this is getting a bit silly.

[b][u]like[/u][/b] Actually, most things! Bongos Fretboards other than Rosewood Control knobs in a "smile" that follow the shape of the bottom bout of the instrument Unlined fretless necks Fretboards with no front-face markers (only on the edge, thanks!) "Different" material choices - Tokai, Kramer, Travis Bean, Status, Moses, Modulus, Gus - just make for a different "look" to wood [b][u]dislike[/u][/b] Gold hardware, but only because it won't be gold by next week. The MM Big Al Ricky "Shark-fin" inlays Controls that are randomly distributed across the instrument's surface Wooden control knobs Overly colourful silks and ball-ends on otherwise sober-looking basses Overly colourful strings (coated) on otherwise sober-looking basses

£500-£1k is a sizeable budget, especially if you buy second-hand! Try everything you can get your hands on. Hopefully, your guitar playing / purchasing past should stand you in good stead when considering instruments, and you should have an idea of what tone you want and how you'd want it to feel. Got any bass-playing mates? Take one along for a second opinion. Unless you're in a rush, take all the time you need. Do bear in mind that a new set of strings and a decent set-up can make all the difference. Brand-wise, there's loads to choose from. DO have a look at Fender, Musicman, G&L, Warwick, Lakland, Sandberg, Ibanez, Yamaha, Rickenbacker and all the usual suspects, but not exclusively. I've done well out of picking up something I've never heard of that was being neglected in the corner of a showroom! Just because you may not have heard of it, it doesn't mean it's not potentially excellent. Happy hunting!

[quote name='basshead56' post='705648' date='Jan 8 2010, 04:06 PM']I´d go with a Darth Vigier [/quote] [i] Sorry, my master, I forgot me cape! [/i]

It really didn't trouble me at all. Have gone from 4 to 5 to 6 and now play whatever fits. I also have a fretless tuned CGDAE and swap to and fro quite merrily. That said, I am used to playing a broad cross-section of basses... So maybe I can adapt more readily than someone who sticks to just one instrument.