NancyJohnson

My old band regularly gigged in and around London with a band of younglings called Dronningen...there's a couple of people here who tried out for them. They'd carry everything on these little trollies and use public transport, guitars and amps, bits of drumkits, etc; they carry the absolute minimum. Whether this would work for them if they were playing in the middle of Herefordshire is debatable, but in London it's doable.

It's not a thing, no. Well, it might be if you have some kind of affliction where your hands are the size of a red crab, but no, it's not a thing.

People! Please stop screwing needless/useless/nonsensical 'upgrades' onto your basses. Bass player #1; "Leo got it right!" Bass player #2; "What this bass needs is a ramp, a scrunchy thing around the nut, a drop-D tuner and a @Stub Mandrel Tone Shim."

It was kind of refreshing that Music Man just made instruments and didn't really see the necessity to move (so much) into the whole vintage reissue market. The market prices for 70s Stingrays us more than a bit erratic; just look at Reverb, there's a few chancers selling at £6k and above but nobody is biting. There's quite a few sold at £1.8k-£3k, which is quite a broad range. These new models are $3.2k (so read that as £3.2k+ over here); why would anyone consider forking over that kind of money when it's feasible - if you bide your time - to get an original 70s model for less £££?

The irony here is that there would actually be someone who would buy these if they were available to purchase. By someone, I actually mean, lots of people. Time to fire up the computer and set up a Kickstarter campaign. 😂

If you've read enough if my posts, you'll know my stance on swapping out pickups, especially if they're actually functioning without issue. At this point, I suppose it's worth looking at the bass itself; I'll try and be the voice of reason here as we all suffer this affliction of throwing £££ at 'upgrades'. The Q4s are selling on the used market at (Reverb) £200-400, which actually surprised me. Until I saw what they're selling for, I was going to suggest sticking a John East Uni-Pre 4 in it, but at £220 well, you can do the maths. If you went the upgrade path and sold the old/original pickups, you're still going to be potentially £100 (or more) out of pocket. (Do the maths, again.) End of the day, you've pretty much made a decision here. Me, I'd be thinking, 'Do I love this bass enough to throw a bunch of money at it to make it something it's not and understand I'm never going to make any of that money back if I decide to sell it on because I'm still not happy?'

The Lekato is fine. Easy everything really, charging, size, range and so on. Unaffected by active/passive/shim material.

Screws made of lard are my favourite.

Aah, Callan. Heard nothing but good about their business cards. I believe Likkle Sickly Kitteh cards might be an apt replacement.

Seriously now, it honestly makes zero difference what a shim is made of. I've shimmed basses a few times (before I knew how to set up a bass properly) and have used a playing card, breakfast cereal box, perspex, old credit card etc. There's this perceived thing about sustain. Let's address this first. How long do you let your notes ring out for? Ten seconds? 20? For the love of god, forget about sustain. I have no idea what music you play, but if you're doing anything where your tempo is less than say two beats a minute, you're not going to notice anything, if at all. Tone. Ack. Are you a solo bass player, treading the boards alone? Probably not. Any (perceived) change of tone from your choice of shim material will be net zero; you'll want to hear something and will convince yourself things are different, but they won't be. If you're in a band, any (perceived) nuances in tone will be lost completely. If you're playing live, seriously, nobody in the audience cares about your hardwood shim or whether you're apparently getting more whump/ponk/whatever.

Tone? From your hands, bonny lad.

Not that anyone is remotely interested, but I have tomorrow off, we've cracked open a rather nice bottle of red and are listening to Max Richter's reinterpretation of The Four Seasons. Both versions. It's freaking superb.

Meh, meh and meh.

Feasible that you just got lucky and the wood is doing the job of keeping the neck straightish without the truss rod being cranked.

Buy which one you want. Industry standard? Bwahaha. No. Nothing matters any more.

Not in the slightest. Pretty much every band I followed in my youth are (sadly) still out there doing it in some capacity or another and I honestly wish they weren't. It simply dilutes any legacy. I want to remember Vince Neil trying to sing in tune as a skinny drug-riddked brat, not trying to sing in tune as a soberish bloated guy in his middle-60s. Little interest in revisting any of these bands (or singers fronting new line-ups) live, either. Read my post on page 7 of this thread:

It's odd, when I was a kid, it was all 18-30 holidays, the original supermodels, yuppies and so on. All these people are now pushing 60 (at least) and they're all desperately looking to hold onto something from their youth. Look at Kiss, Simmons is 75 or something, Madonna is 65, Nikki Sixx is 64, same goes Joe Elliot. Vince Neil 62 and despite his stomach surgery, he lumps around like a beached pilot whale and still can't sing. I love early Motley and was a huge fan of Kiss until about 1980, but there's no merit whatsoever in what they're doing now and it just p*sses over whatever remains of their legacy. I'm not being ageist, but if that was mum up there doing what Madonna is doing, I'd be horrendously embarrassed. There is nothing remotely sexy or alluring about what she's doing, despite what she probably thinks. Thing is, nobody has got the strength to tell these people that it's time to stop, give it up and go live off your millions. But hey, there's always one more payday.

I have a bit of a nickel allergy, I'll experience tingly/sensitive fingertips and a bit of dry/flaky skin. Strings. Elixir Nanowebs. Coating doesn't flake off and they last yonks. I've had the same ones on my Lulls since pre-pandemic and they're still pretty zingy.

There's certainly a ton of bands out there that are still gigging when they're well past theur sell-by date, but if tickets sell then they'll keep doing shows. Look at recent/ongoing/upcoming tours by Kiss, Motley Crue/Def Leppard, Elton John, Madonna, Stevie Nicks (and so on); IMO these should all have hung up their boots many years ago, but until people stop paying £250 for a seat in the gods to watch a lipsynching granny in basque cavort about with dancers half her age, then they'll keep doing it.

Diminishing returns. It might actually be cheaper to source a new neck rather than to cover the cost of a refret. No idea of the model you're considering selling, the market value or what you reckon you could sell it for, but assume a refret will cost you £250-300. That's a sizeable unrecoverable percentage of the current instrument value.

Good grief. F a n n y.

I have (to give it its full title), Here Come The Double Deckers on DVD. It's a wonderful thing. Pretty frightening to think that Peter Firth, who played Scooper, was 70 yesterday.

I think there's a ton of songs that are so ingrained on me it wouldn't matter if I never heard them again. Doubt very much that when I'm drawing my final breath that I'll have any regrets about not listening to Detroit Rock City one more time.

Chortle. My mum knew a guy who was at DHL when it was a smallish operation here, just expanding into Europe, so mid-late 1970s. He was always on the lookout for 'smart, intelligent kids' to courier documents to New York/Boston and back; flight there, cab (or picked up from the airport) into Manhattan, wait for documents to be signed, overnight somewhere if necessary, cab back to airport, fly home. It was cheaper to fly and pay a 14/15 year old rather than an adult and cheaper as you weren't on the payroll. Foolishly I never took his offer up, but a friend of mine did it quite a few times; he'd just throw a Monday or Friday sickie from school (he'd fly out early Friday morning and be in Manhattan around lunchtime), 'grumbling appendix' was the main reason given, all with his parent's approval! He'd take orders for records, so he'd come back with a rucksack of vinyl and always had loads of ready £££. He claims to have popped his cherry on one trip. What a life. I envy him to this day and he still has his appendix!

When I was reading this part, first thing I thought was - assuming it is/was a production line instrument - surely the same bass would be available somewhere in the colonies already. And cheaper.