NancyJohnson

Well it appears the preamp is at fault.  Swapped the battery over, preamp is dead.  There appears to be activity on it; I can tap around exposed contacts and this registers on the amp (you can hear a buzzing), beyond that no sound.

Groan.

Just a quick question on end of battery life.

Most of my kit is now active and I've been fairly diligent in changing the PP3s annually (on my birthday start of December, or thereabouts), but that slipped as I haven't really been doing much musically.  Six months late....

I'm just curious about end of battery life experience.  I pulled one of my Lulls out yesterday/John East circuit.  Circuit was still live, but quite unpleasant tonally, no clarity, farty.  I've experienced batteries being dead, never when they're on their last legs.

I've got a few Duracells arriving today.

I've got an Epiphone FT-140 Dreadnought acoustic I've owned since I was 12/13, so mid-70s.  My gran died, mum treated me off her inheritance.  It came from Adam Music, Staines (see thread elsewhere).  Needs a refret.

Basses, nowhere near.  Ten years.

[EDIT]  I also have a four-way extension cable that's in regular use to this day.  I can age it to summer 1977 because it has a sticker on it that says 'The Dags', a punk band we formed at school.

I've got two:

Many moons ago, I landed a Hamer FBIV on eBay.  It was a Sunday morning, I'd just bought a while Gibson Thunderbird and I was just perusing, like you do.  No Case.  £375.00, BIN.  I did a little panic thing...found some photos of Nikki Sixx for verification purposes and clicked.  It arrived intact, wrapped in about six inches of bubblewrap:

Next up.  Friday night, Gumtree.  Spotted a chap locally selling off a job lot of guitars, a bass and a practice amp for £50.00.  My heart did a little jump.  The bass was a 1978 Aria Primary Bass.  I've played a few Precision basses in my time and this one is easily as good, if not better than the Fenders.  It's gnarly.

Bumpola

Gibson serial numbers really can't be relied upon, even more so the older they allude to be.

From those photos it looks ok.  Wouldn't worry about pot-codes; these are easily swapped out.  

On 29/04/2024 at 15:46, Allaboutthebass said:

Hi All,

 

I have a very nice passive P...

I'd love to know how it would go down with the flock if you turned up with one of these:

I sourced one for a mate of mine.  It's really a very good instrument.

On 27/04/2024 at 12:04, alexa3020 said:

Oh dear, well I was on the fence about getting one of these - but that's me put off. I think maybe an elf or gnome might be better as a backup. Played an elf last night and was super impressed.

Well, full credit to Thomann, they're just sending me a replacement, but I need to hang onto the old one for six months in case they want it back.

When I started using outboard gear, dunno 15 years ago, my initial foray (following a brief dalliance with a BassPOD), was a Sansamp BDDI; at some point I decided to go the rack route, so went with an RBI, then a VTBass rack, then a GED-2112 rack.

I also went with a board set up that contained a BDDI/VTBass and a GT2.  Pre-pandemic ditched everything for a Darkglass AO900 (which I've never been truly happy with) and forked over £££ for DI-2112 and dUg stomps for recording projects.

Today folks, I came home and got an early BDDI off @obbm.  It's weird, I've haemorrhaged hundreds, perhaps several thousand £££ chasing the tone, when I was probably most content with the BDDI.

3 hours ago, alexa3020 said:

 @NancyJohnson have you had the chance to play it in a band environment? 

 

Nope.  I hadn't touched it it for a few days and when it switched it on today it's conked out.  FFS.  It's been used about an hour.  It powers up, but nothing.

I'll need to chase up Thomann.

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/100-greatest-drummers-of-all-time-77933/christian-vander-30083/

Harrumph.  No Mike Portnoy.  No William Calhoun.  No Steve Jansen.  No Bernie Dresel.  Oh, god the omissions speak volumes.  Travis Barker 'only' #99? 

Meg White is in there.  So that's OK, then.

3 hours ago, BigRedX said:

 

Even as an artist I'm conflicted about the advantages of vinyl.

 

In the various bands I've played in, we've tried to run a merch table.  It honestly made me sick to my stomach when a punter would come over and ask, 'Have you got any vinyls?'  Vinyls.  Collective noun, plural.  Vinyls.

I mean, you simply wanted to walk around the other side of the table and beat the guy to a pulp.  "Look, we have t-shirts, little cards with Soundcloud/Spotify links, free stickers and a pile of signed CDs that we've all been burning for the last few days, but do you see vinyls?  No. F*ck off!"

Your average punter has no idea how much hassle it is to get records pressed, and yeah, we don't have vinyls because nobody will buy them and they'll haggle us down because they won't pay enough to cover our pressing costs.  I've spent days in the studio refining these recordings, why should I have them pressed on a format that sounds like we were eating Rice Krispies during the mastering process.

Vinyls.

I've avoided RSD like the plague.  I went to our local record shop for one about six years ago, organisation was a shambles, the shop was ticketing people and not limiting purchases to a couple of records; guys were coming out with bags and bags of stuff, god knows how much if that went on eBay the same day.  The place was full of dozens of blokes who looked like they'd never stepped into a record shop in the last 30 years.

Thing is, I'm of the belief RSD started out with the genuinely good intention of trying to engage the public and getting them into small, independent record shops, but it's transcended that now; in my opinion, if you're a stadium filling band or on a major label, it shouldn't be for you.  If you're just rehashing something under the guise of 'first time release on vinyl' or remix stuff, it shouldn't be for you.  And so on.

By way of a similar analogy, we attend cheese festivals once a year (om-nom); at an event in Cheltenham, Tesco were set up with a big money corporate stall extolling how they supported British cheese makers.  Their stall was dead.  Nobody.  Elsewhere, independent makers were selling tons of stuff.  It's just blind ignorance; Tesco or big labels.  Stay away.

A few years back I popped into Andertons and spent an hour noodling in the bass room.

Most of the stuff was a bit meh, usual mix of knackered/poorly set up Ps and Js etc.  They had a Schecter in there, set up wasn't great, but honestly it was the best bass in there.  I'd never buy one, but it was just a decent guitar, well built, well finished, sounded nice.

I always recall reading that James Honeyman-Scott had threatened to quit The Pretenders because of Farndon's drug use; Farndon was fired and, ironically, James Honeyman-Scott was dead of a drug overdose three days later.

Just say no, kids.

20 hours ago, Wolverinebass said:

So, yesterday, this arrived. Before we get to the photo, if anyone doesn't like pointy things, leave. There is nothing here for you but pain.

That's quite an interesting instrument - I can see the appeal from the other stuff you have.

I shall enjoy putting a dent in it playing it at the Bash.

I ran an old Precision bass for years, this went through several pickup configurations and arguably the best was when I just wired a 1/4 Pounder pickup straight into the output jack.

Not pots, just pure signal; this fed a POD (and later a BDDI), then into the effects return of whatever amp I was using.  Lovely.

End of the day, I always play with everything open; this just takes it a step further.  We obsess too much - just let the bass ring and let your outboard kit and amp do what they're supposed to do; shape and amplify.

The big problem with UK-centric radio is the inconsistency; I detest with the whole BBC playlist model of music-for-the-masses thing, where I simply wouldn't hear one song of merit in a day of output.  Add into this commercial radio and, well, no.

Services like TuneIn and myTuner open the world to you musically.  My go to station is W-EQX, an alternative rock station that broadcasts from Manchester, Vermont.  It's just a wonderful thing.  No song repeats, great music.

https://www.weqx.com/

1 hour ago, ezbass said:

The sexiest looking bass out there and the Firebird is the sexiest guitar ever. However, I just can’t deal with the ergonomics of either of them. If I had untold pots of cash, I think I’d have one of each, just to look at (I’d probably still try and play them though).

I'm all out of Gibson Thunderbird love, but own Spector, Lull and Hamer versions, plus a Lull Thunderbird NR (which, let's face it couldn't be any less non-reverse in shape).

As I've posted elsewhere, Thunderbirds are like a magical fountain of youth elixir, you just strap one on and you're 18 again. I've no idea how this works, but it does.

4 minutes ago, Baloney Balderdash said:

I really think Spector basses look ugly.

 

Something clumsy and deformed about their body shape.

 

But the ultimate bad taste is single cut, "whale jump", especially 5 string, boutique basses with maple burl or flame tops with a blue/green transparent, sort of burst, finish that looks like a cliché amateur new age abstract painting.

 

I've owned an early Warwick Streamer and a couple of Spector NS-design models (Euro LT and a far east 8-string); the body shape is a tad small for my liking, but the shape/rounding/body-arch is very comfortable, very organic.

While it's not possible to quantify a design I detest, it would be fair to say I'm drawn to the Thunderbird body shape and everything else strikes me as a bit meh.  

I often used to chuckle internally when people waxed lyrical and obsessed about the love of car brands like Porsche; this blind faith in whatever Porsche made was 100%, when clearly this isn't the case. 

Same goes brand loyalty for guitars and basses; while I've owned several, I don't really like Fender stuff at all. Yes I know, 70 years and millions of units sold stands for something but the business is based around reinvention/reinterpretation rather than innovation now.  Same goes Gibson.  While I love my Lulls, I would never consider any of the Lull P or J clones that they make, even if they gave me one.

1 hour ago, DDR said:

Right but I need 8 pedals... What's that gonna be? I've seen those thomann 2 pedal portable battery things.... 

Buy a Lekato unit.  Unit can charge both sender and receiver beforehand and just jack the receiver into the front of your signal chain.  Battery life is five to six hours.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07TWQL2JS/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I've got Uni-Pre units in three of mine and have fitted them to other basses previously.  Great units.

John is a top bloke; I've contacted him direct a couple of times and his after service has exceeded expectations in both instances.

2 hours ago, NancyJohnson said:

Truth is, nobody cares, really.  Etc

After I posted this, I was desperately trying to remember something I'd heard years ago that had made it onto an album that related to this.

Quite simply, it was a track called 'Discount List' off the album Feel It by Californian pop/punk band The Penfifteen Club.

The track is a 90 second expletive-ridden answering machine recording left by a female fan who had attended a couple of band shows and now pretty much expected discounted or free entry to shows; sadly the track did not get upped to streaming platforms.