Misdee

 I suspect that the reason that no one makes a proper Steinberger XL bass anymore is, yes,  they were difficult and expensive to manufacture  allied to the fact that that style of bass is very unfashionable nowadays. Nowadays it's all about blokes with beards playing P Basses strung with flats through an all-valve  Preamp  that is so old- school that it  has no controls on it whatsoever and is powered by organic olive oil rather than electricity. Hard as it may be for some younger Basschatters to  believe , there was a time long ago when unless you had a Steinberger or similar with an amp that had an 11 band graphic then  you might as well have been living in the stone age. It was magnificent. 

A full-tilt Steinberger would be very expensive with only a very small niche market. Status have a much wider range of graphite models to sustain their business model, not just the Streamline . They also  have a long-standing brand- identity associated with graphite basses. A  new Steinberger would have to establish itself in an already-crowded marketplace.  Not enough folks would actually buy them, most likely.

Regarding the so-called "clinkers", I am not completely  convinced that these are actually on the master tape. To my ears, it sounds more like there is some kind of degradation to the rendering of the isolated bass track that makes it sound like things have gone slightly askew in places. It would be very interesting to hear a higher fidelity isolated bass track to see if that was really the case. As helpful as this example is (and it has been a fascinating listen for me), it is pretty muffled and clumpy in places. What is actually going on is a bit murky. I am sure there might be some spontaneity  involved somewhere along the line, but maybe not as much as we are supposing.  

I remember this track when it was in the charts and vividly recollect  being mightily impressed by the bass playing. Neil Murray is a superb player( stating the obvious, I know) with great taste in how he uses his ability. 

It's  wrong, however, to focus on how difficult this bass line is to learn and then play ( and for most ordinary folks, it is pretty difficult) .  Its'  real  achievement is in how difficult it was to conceive of, that is the germane point. Anyone can play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, but it took Mozart to  invent  it.  Even though Mozart didn't actually write Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, but you know what I mean. 

I'll throw in UK  postage.

I really like the colour of this bass, and I don't normally go for sparkle finishes, or pink for that matter. But I think the gold hardware is too much. It makes it look as if it is trying too hard to be ostentatious. And EBMM don't offer the option to change it, as others have pointed out previously. Such a shame as I am in the market for a Stingray at the moment. 

Thank you so much to everybody who has offered advice, because I really had no idea where to start looking !

It transpires that the the piano is a Broadwood from the 1920's, and I am making some enquiries about getting a piano dealer to have a look at it. Cheers everybody!

Does anybody know if there is a U.K  website with For Sale ads  similar to Basschat but for piano enthusiasts? Does anybody know the best way to about selling a piano by other means?

I am asking because , I am very sorry to say, my step-father has just been diagnosed with Motor Neuron Disease and we need to get rid of his piano to make space for a conversion downstairs to help accommodate his increasing lack of mobility. It's very sad indeed because he has played piano since he was 5 years old, but he is no longer able to even sit at the piano stool, let alone play anymore. 

I am reliably informed that the piano is a very good quality upright from around 1900. It has been well looked after and maintained by an excellent  piano tuner . I can supply more details if necessary.

Any help or advice very gratefully received

I read somewhere that James Finnegan is a school  music teacher nowadays. 

I remember seeing him playing that bass back in those days. Excellent player, and I quite liked Hue And Cry at the time. Saw them opening for Madonna.  Where has the time gone?

On 25/07/2020 at 18:13, thodrik said:

I am lucky enough own a Sadowsky NYC, a Sadowsky Metro and a Vigier Arpege. I think they there are really great and they have resulted in me being generally GAS free for basses over the last 5 years.

However when cleaning them today I started to wonder whether my basses would pass the QC standards of some of the more discerning members on here if they had received my basses from new.  

In functional terms all three basses are pretty much perfect (for me). However, I have taken a photo of a cosmetic construction/finishing ‘issue’ from each bass. 

Sadowsky NYC: imperfection in quilted maple top which you can only spot if you look at it really close up from less than a foot away.

Sadowsky Metro: strange irregular wood grain pattern or tooling mark (which I personally think looks cool but it could really bother someone else):

 

Vigier Arpege: if you look really closely, you can see that a bit of the finish seems to have bled into the fret marker. This occurs on the third, ninth and a little bit on one of the twelfth fret markers:

 

Obviously the issues are purely cosmetic and have never bothered me. To me they are not so much flaws as much as they are unique identification markers to enable me to pick out ‘my’ bass from identically finished Sadowskys or Vigiers. However, I’m conscious that to others these issues would be seen as flaws which should not  appear on such ‘high end’ instruments which should be ‘perfect’. 

I don’t want this to come across as a thread to  insult people who have had serious faults and problems with high end instruments which is obviously a horrible situation to go through. Nor do I want this thread to be a ‘bash [insert company]’ type thread. 

However, I was wondering if anyone else felt like sharing any interesting finishing quirks/cosmetic issues on their own basses which do not bother them but may bother someone else? 

Thanks in advance.

 

That last "flaw" looks to me very much like a genuine piece of abalone, rather than a defect of any kind. That pinkish vein is the natural patina of genuine mother of pearl, so a mark of quality not a defect. 

Opus - Live Is Life.  

 The lyrics of this stunningly gauche  Euro hit from the summer of 1985 still haunt me. Every word is complete  and utter  nonsense . 

I think John Diggins' son makes them now.  

I seem to remember that at some point in more recent times( i.e after their 1980's heyday) that they changed the laminations in the neck from walnut with maple stingers to maple with walnut stringers, with the aim of making the neck a bit  stiffer and more stable. They also introduced a new truss rod system  some time in the 1990s with the same aim. Maybe a Jaydee buff could shed some light on my dim recollections.

I personally would be inclined to get a new one , especially  in light of the very  reasonable asking prices,  but that is not to say that there aren't plenty of great old ones.

Sold Warren a Lakland case. Superb buyer and  all-round good guy. An absolute pleasure to deal with.

One set of Lakland Stainless Steel strings, made in the USA,  gauged 45/65/85/105 ,  cut for strings-thru-body and  a  traditional   Fender -style headstock .  Brand new except for literally 15 minutes playing time (at the most). These are  superb strings, the ones that come on new USA Lakland basses, but I have had to move exclusively to a lighter gauge nowadays  due to a problem with my right thumb.  Too much slapping back  in the '80's. 🙁

£15 + shipping at  cost.

Has there ever been a  funkier-sounding  location  than Bad Bentheim? I wouldn't be surprised if Bootsy Collins lived there!

Lovely bass, by the way.

I've got the exact same bass but in black rather than  OW and it is a superb instrument,  probably the best passive Fender - style  PJ  you will find.  

I hope Lozz won't mind me giving a little bit of additional info. 

Going by the relatively  early serial no,  this bass  would have come from the factory with Lindy Fralin pickups as standard. Conventional wisdom is that the Fralins sound a bit more vintage than the Lakland pickups that are on my bass.

Also, the neck on these basses is not the same profile as the USA Joe Osborn model.  I know because until recently I had both.  The Jazz Bass- style  profile on the BG PJ  basses is a little bit slimmer and faster than the JO,  which is an  precise replica of Joe's 1960 Fender prototype.   The BG  Jazz necks  are modelled on a 63/64 Jazz profile, the classic slim pre-CBS design.  It's also worth mentioning that the necks on these USA Laklands are quartersawn and graphite -reinforced. 

When you look at the current price of standard new USA Fenders, this bass is a bargain. Especially when you consider the quality of these Laklands is equal to, if not better than, Fender Custom Shop.

I have a Musicman Reflex  HH which has a humbucker in the Stingray position that can be switched to passive (and which also features a passive tone control when used in that mode). From memory, I don't really notice that much difference  in tone  between  the two with the EQ set flat.

I certainly wouldn't rush to modify  the stock electronics on a regular Stingray myself. To me a Stingray is an active bass, even if I usually set the EQ flat. Just my own personal  prejudice though, obviously Stingray owners can do as they see fit.  I always felt with the Joe Dart Sig  that it was just him being contrary in asking for a passive bass with no finish and one knob. 😄

Bands with two drummers immediately puts me in mind of the American "jam bands" ,  a genre  that fills me with almost as much dread as  " blues-rock trio". 

On 24/05/2020 at 18:15, Al Krow said:

Here you go. Changing the EQ does what you would expect in terms of cut / boosting particular frequencies, but in terms of core tone I found it pretty subtle and certainly nothing that has me reaching for my credit card!

Be interested to hear from any BB1200 / 1200S owners if this comes close to emulating their bass tone?

In purely sonic terms,  this  seems a bit of an odd choice for a preamp, to be honest with you.  I am a big fan of Yamaha basses, but they have never really been renown for their preamps. The notable exception would be the Nathan East preamp which Yamaha marketed themselves as a standalone unit in the early 2000's. The selling point for this product  is the Peter Hook association.  If that inspires peoples' imagination then great, but it might not translate to much in terms of tone.  I quite like Peter Hook as a bass player but I'm sceptical his preamp has ever had much to do with his overall tone. It's more his effects and his overall approach.

If a boutique electronics company wanted to make a vintage  Yamaha- inspired product, a reissue of the PB1 rackmount   bass preamp from the early 1980s would be a great choice. It was a  superb bit of kit, almost as good as the Alembic preamp that inspired it. . 

Top quality bass with a  beautifully  tight and  articulate tone.  And some very tasty playing, if I may say so. I've been trying to work out some of your licks!

I suppose whether it is worth the extra money depends on what premium you place on having the real thing.

If you just want a tool to use the Euro will probably do a very satisfactory job for you. If, however, you  have always wanted to own and play a nice example of the iconic American bass guitar brand that is Spector then only the USA- made bass will do.  And there is nothing wrong with that point of view, however irrational it may seem to some, . I love Spector basses , wish I owned one,  but I wouldn't want a Euro version , no matter how good they are. 

Just now, Bilbo said:

I measure chops based on the capacity of others to execute the parts. What Squire plays is, to my mind, reasonably easy to recreate whereas, say, Jaco, Jeff Berlin etc are tougher to cop by mere mortals. 

I take your point entirely, but I think that some of Chris Squire's parts are pretty difficult to recreate by  most standards. What he played on some bits of Relayer immediately  springs to mind.

Also , if you are primarily  a fingerstyle player like me  , his picking technique is pretty formidable and  was a major part of his style and sound . I agree that Chris had his limitations, but he was still a very  tricky customer. I think it would be pretty difficult to play his parts and make them sound like he did. And yes, I know there are some chaps on YT  that manage to imitate him pretty well but they are doing an obsessively detailed job. 

Amazing work doing the transcription, by the way. I'm in awe.  I feel a bit ungrateful that I can hardly read music at all  , despite several attempts at trying to learn.🙁

On 23/05/2020 at 22:30, Bilbo said:

It's all tone and arrangements. He had fairly limited chops by any standards. 

I suppose it depends what you mean by chops. I have difficulty with the idea that Chris Squire was deficient in terms of  technical  ability to express himself on the bass. 

He had  very distinct and individual style that he adapted to different musical contexts, so in that sense he was limited. But then again, you could say the same about Jaco Pastorius, Stanley Clarke,  or most other influential bass players  who have a discernible  personality on the instrument.  Musicians who can be all things to all men, so to speak, tend to end up being fairly anonymous. I see lots of tremendously capable bass players who are dull as dishwater.  I could name names, but I don't want  to offend anybody , including the individuals concerned. Chris Squire was a bass guitar icon , and he was never dull. He used too much treble for that. 😄

I like aggressive -sounding  basses. None of this wishy-washy mellow tone for me. If I am paying a lot of money for a bass I want  it to give me a good kicking. 

All the basses mention in the o.p can sound aggressive, but each one in a different way. The Stingray because of its' treble/upper mid emphasis, the Thumb because of its' inherent low-mids and extended treble ( largely due to the woods used to build them ) and the flexibility of the electronics means the  Wal can sound very aggressive indeed. Try activating  pick attack  and the filters on 10 . Instant Geddy Lee. 

2 hours ago, Barking Spiders said:

Go on, go on, go on, go on..name and shame the guilty parties 😁

I am much too diplomatic to be drawn on exactly who, but suffice to say there are some very high profile bass players who seem to spend their lives going to trade shows , doing endorsements and appearing on Youtube. Where are the albums ? What is their body of work ?😉 

Jaco Pastorius, by comparison, played with Weather Report and Joni Mitchell. Stanley Clarke played with Return To Forever and then made some very accomplished solo albums , as well as doing sessions for major artists. Alphonso Johnson  similarly showed his skills in any number of  musical settings , from jazz to top 40 pop music. I could go on .

 Could I just point out that I certainly would not count Marcus Miller as a trade show bass player, not in a million years. Marcus is as good as it gets in my opinion. He has it all, taste, feel,  chops, and the nous to know how to use it all to great effect. And when it comes to slap, he is the best in the business. And he has played with too many great artists to list.