richrips

Nobody sticking up for the LG1000? I've had mine for nearly 2 years and no problems! sounds great particularly with active basses and the money i saved by not getting a markbass etc paid for more fun than you can have with a hyperactive midget! gets my vote even though they aren't made any more. second hand could be a massive deal though! could even afford 2 midgets.... rich

And use Peavey Gear! The guy i got my 115BX Black widow from said he was selling because their rehearsal space got robbed and the only thing the thieves left was the Peavey! Good advice from the OP that many learn the hard way. Rich

My first amp from Wants in Plymouth was a Peavey Mark 3 combo. Think it was dated 78, cost £80 and came with 3 months guarantee on everything except the speaker. Needless to say the speaker died pretty soon but on a tip off i took the magnet off and varnished the voice coil... hey presto it worked! Frickin heavy, not loud enough for most of the gigs it played, and the parametric eq was harder than the GCSE's i was doing at the time, but hell it was the biggest bass amp at school and i liked the spikey logo!!! Not a bad word to say about peavey really. That amp will probably out live me and make quite a few people happy along the way! Rich

Sounds hopeful! Anyone done (or had done) a refret on an ebony board? any special techniques/precautions that i should know about? cheers, Rich

Hey guys, My bass could do with a refret. the frets look to have been stoned rather crudely at some point and most are a bit on the low and flat side. the bass is still playable and sounds wickid with flats, but i'm quite keen on putting some roundwounds on soon and would like tidy neat looking round frets to get the most out of it. Has anyone had an old ebony board refretted? if so, how much did it cost, and where? i've defretted a rosewood bass before and don't want to chip the ebony so badly hence not so keen to do it myself. if it can be done in a more perfect manner, i'd be keen. any help much appreciated! Rich

good point. for the auction i'd say: good: finish to body finish to hardware frets in good condition looks all original bad: weird yellow bubbles in carbon strip. not present on mine bad looking knock to carbon/wood just near headstock on back of neck action- looks very badly set up. it is quite a difficult bass to set up due to the unorthodox bridge but it can be made a lot lower than pictured!maybe check the truss rod works... looks like some of the screws have been damaged a bit and the allen key bolt on the back of the body looks to be rounded (although should be kept done up fully anyway i have found) non original case. so not bad but not perfect, i would want to look before buying to check rod, pickups, bridge adjusters etc and probably worth 5-700 quid realistically. rich

£550 is a deal. i started looking for one about this time last year when i saw one go on ebay for £420. One seems to pop up every few months and the next went for about £550 then about £600. most recent ebay magnum went for over £800 around easter. Interestingly the magnum 3 on ebay around easter went for just over £300 and the only difference to a magnum 1 is the body shape, so if you are more about the sound than the shape, that could be a cheaper option if you are on a tight budget. I paid £500 for my magnum 1 last november. natural finish, case, passive etc like the one on the moon site. i don't know where they got the date 1973 from as the magnum was only made from around 76 as far as i know. flateric is right that the sound is more flexible than it is made out to be. people seem to look at the huge neck pickup and think DUB straight away. Being long scale and having that pickup does provide the lowest deepest bass sound known to man, that is just one of many. i like messing with playing position and pickup selection/tone and can get a great timmy commerford palying near the bridge pickup. the bass sounds great for slap thanks to the ebony board but this will depend on whether your technique fits around the various chunks of metal that adorn the traditional right hand slap territory. i've managed to work around it and can get a cool larry graham vibe, but would doubt that wooten fans would rave about it! here's the one i ended up getting. absolutely love it! [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=65845"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=65845[/url] 1400 is way tooooo much. £550 is a good deal hope that helps, rich

Do it! get the squier vmj. we a/b tested it with th 75 reissue mia jazz and for the sake of £500 there was no contest. it could be said they sound different, but which is better is purely subjective and as mentioned, a pickup swap makes up 99% of the difference anyway. That way you can have an awesome holiday or get a killer amp with your change. If you aren't particular about buying second hand, a used VMJ nowadays goes for less than £200 and many are mint or upgraded. all this makes the MIA jazz hard to justify to someone like me on a budget! get a gotoh 201 instead of a badass bridge and you've saved another £50. Buy my Dimarzio ultra jazz pickups for not much and you have a classy bass, possibly for less than £180. r

[url="http://www.ikebe-gakki.com/shopping/goods/goods_detail.php?offset=60&category_id=2&sub_category_id=19&brand=70&view=1&count=12&sort=1&search_status=1&id=153097"]http://www.ikebe-gakki.com/shopping/goods/...1&id=153097[/url] anyone tried this pickup arrangement??

we did this at the ICMP diploma. may be worth giving dave marks and crew a PM, tho may be copyrite etc... i have a paper version but no scanner. Incidentally one of my favourite songs to play on bass! from memory: verse (mostly octaves) F (before bar) G then D then Eb then Bb then back to F and repeat before chorus go from the Bb to B to C to F to G chorus (not octaves) Eb B F (fills on F... do them by ear!) thats the basics i think. god i am bad at describing music! can we have someone better at this to help out? r

Technological conservatism.... the reason Fender et al see ever increasing sales of designs dating back 40-60 years. In one sense, if it ain't broke don't fix it. You can get great sounds out of old designs so why upgrade? you wanna sound like a 65 strat through a twin reverb? why not? On the other hand, could this attitude be having a negative effect on musicians in general? By sticking to tried and tested "traditional" designs, we inherently limit the tonal possibilities available. Unfortunately, styles and tastes of music evolve and a "traditional" instrument maynot be capable of producing the sound an artist wants on his/her recording. The result? Traditional instrument gets left out, and replaced by something which can make the sound needed. With regards bass, this is typically a keyboard, synth or computer/software. Surely then the survival of bass guitar (played live and on popular modern music) relies on it's ability to produce the sound needed. This can only be possible via technological advancements in instrument design, and manipulation of the electronic signal produced. If people begin to associate bass guitar with "vintage" sounds and "old" music (i suspect many already do), they would possibly be less likely to choose to feature bass guitar on their new record if they intend it to sound modern, opting instead for keys/synth/computer sounds? My point is, are we shooting the future of bass guitar in the foot by being conservative in our approach to technological advances in bass design? Is every lovely sounding '62 reissue jazz (rosewood, 3T sunburst) purchased a potential nail in the coffin of live bass playing? Discuss/abuse as you deem fit! Rich (p.s. i think cost is the main reason carbon hasn't gone mainstream, rather than looks imho)

My main bass has always been a 3 eq stingray. Recently i have found the bottom end not deep enough for my current reggae band (sure you can boost the lows or use a sub octave, but that tends to sound hollow and flabby). Is it possible to get a standard H modded to HS anywhere in the UK? The bass has sentimental value as my first real bass, and has the odd chip so would be poor performer in retail value. Anyone had a stingray modded??? Cheers, Rich

[quote name='nbtone' post='845728' date='May 23 2010, 01:37 PM']I don't have much time , but if you want a better sounding bass guitar you could delve into the patent documents that I posted online here [url="http://groups.yahoo.com/search?query=nitewalkerpreamp"]http://groups.yahoo.com/search?query=nitewalkerpreamp[/url] in the files section. I don't include the power supply in any of the info, but the one I use uses a Hammond transformer with a full wave bridge with a 15 Henry choke running to the plates and a half wave bridge running to the heater. The overdrive just boosts the plate voltage a bit.[/quote] Any samples of your preamp doing their best Timmy C sound available? Checked out the website and they certainly seem an interesing venture. Cheers, Rich

Dave Pegg = genius. This is my favourite recording of him. different bass, but the skillz are there! [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgqhWVrTmn8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgqhWVrTmn8[/url]

Quick shout out for the Ovation Magnum!! Neck made with 3 carbon support rods, mahogany, ebony fretboard, and set AND bolted on. All this in 1977, thanks to the designer's background in helicopter design. Surprised they aren't mentioned in that link to all the Alembic/Modulus stuff. The Magnum is a great example of the kind of innovation lacking in companies like fender and gibson at the time and years ahead of mainstream bass technology. The neck doesn't feel wildly snappy, probably due to the mahogany, but considering its 33 years old, it is showing no signs of warping and only requires a touch of truss rod adjustment when i swap out heavy flats for something lighter. The sustain, even with flats, is monumental. it's like the strings are attached to a mountain at each end! I think carbon is a great idea. even quarter sawn wood has inconsistencies in density and flex properties. Carbon, if moulded correctly, is far superior from a mechanical point of view. unfortunately, as the link in one of the early posts demonstrates, getting the carbon fibre process spot-on is tricky.getting even amounts of carbon and resin is super difficult and good cloth is $$$$$$$ expensive. I've had a range of problems making fibreglass/foam surfboards over the years and even now i wouldn't want to spend money on the weight/stiffness gains of carbon/epoxy, because i know a few cock-ups in the process will result in critical flaws like over-saturation (cloth floating), under-saturation (bubbles = weak point), and creasing (forces concentrated = more likely to snap). If done correctly, carbon is a winner. Rich

If it's the rage sound i'm after, i think you mean the OD sound on the chorus of War within a breath (for example) from 4.44 onwards in this one: [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAw3MMUSVpw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAw3MMUSVpw[/url] Definitely the best, nastiest rock overdrive bass sound going.... now if someone would list the few simple caps and resistors available for less than 50p which will make exactly that sound (if only.... i have a feeling a few SVT's are needed somewhere...), that would be lovely. r

Well...i have been after 70's pickup placement.....