NancyJohnson

Not a full time dep, but asked to step in a help a band in need. Short tour, south of England. Did my homework, gigs failed to materialise, so parked. Few months later same thing. Did my homework. One evening rehearsal in Brighton Electric (which was fun considering I was working in Denham, north of Heathrow at the time). We were to do a warm up in High Wycombe (bottom of the bill) and then two or three showcases in central London. High Wycombe was awful; I mean, we played fine, but there were only about five people in at that point. Guitarist cut the set short, drummer moaned constantly about everything and then the London dates were cancelled. Didn't see a penny.

Nope, it's a TBIV. It's a typo. 😁

But then I need to put a price on it.

It's a factory conversion. TBII, plus additional pickup.

Now then. I have a Darkglass A/O900 head - I don't want to necessarily list it as being for sale, because I don't want to sell it as such, looking for a trade/swap deal. I'm wondering whether anyone has a (somewhat less aggressive) Microtubes 900v2 that they might want to swap.

I honestly don't see the point. On the face of it, nobody was really making anything that has any personal appeal to me.

These were simpler/happier times. My first bass had a grounding issue; I quickly worked out that by connecting a bit of twisted wire from the pickup selector switch to the spring on the back of the G-string saddle solved the buzzing, so that was the fix and that's how it was until I sold it. Nobody died.

Nope, we honestly didn't.

Just throwing this out there, I've been playing for more than 40 years and while my (current) preferred amp to speaker connection is Speakons, for the intervening years I just used a regular jack to jack cable. When times were particularly bad (as a teen) it wasn't unusual to have hotwired cable using bell wire, electrical cable or whatever was on hand. You know what? Not one blown speaker or damaged amplifier. Nada. At one point early on, I was running a particularly cheap and nasty bass combo and decided to connect another speaker to it. In the spirit of Eddie Van Halen, I cut a 4" hole in the back of the combo, had about a yard of hi-fi speaker cable and hooked everything up sight unseen with little crocodile clips and electrical tape. I suppose that 4" hole would now be considered a port. No soldering, no idea what out of phase was. Worked fine. We really do need to stop getting our panties in a twist about what's right (or wrong), eh?

I don't mind the finishes, but in these days of all this historic reissue nonsense, you'd think that they'd go the extra mile and get the body geometry and the nuances correct. On the left a 1964 TBII on the right, the Epiphone. Headstock wrong, knobs wrong, sidejack, wrong, body similar, close but no cigar. Still a no from me.

Well. I think you can knock me off the list; last week - and after a considerable amount of pre-2024 research - I bought a Harley Benton GPA-100 power amp. £68.00. I just really needed something small to run my EUB through rather than keep having to set up all my Darkglass kit. Bloody lovely it is too.

Possibly part of the OPs question is largely down to the case being that the first version you hear of something sticks more-so than the (unheard/unknown of) original. By way of example, when I was a mere teen, I remember my mum (very musical) singing along to Japan's version of Don't Rain On My Parade. I mean, at that age I knew nothing about musicals as such (we had The King & I original soundtrack, but that was about it), so why would I know any different? As time went on my record collection was peppered with loads of covers that I knew nothing better about until I started scrutinising the record label or reading the liner notes. Also going back to my late mum, she was at mine one time and I had an album playing by Shudder To Think (US post-hardcore/math rock band) and she said, 'This is 'So Into You' by Atlanta Rhythm Section. I was like, 'What? Whaaaat?' 😂

I'll rotate what I have. There's nothing I own that doesn't get used.

Mods! Teehee 🤣

Now then, you've crossed the line here. While I understand the sentiment in this, I'd raise you the Mott The Hoople live version from the 1974 live album. Man alive, while I have no love for the song, but you have the end of the intro tape (Jupiter from The Planets suite), a bit of crowd noise and then Ian Hunter doing about 70 seconds of it launching the band into The Golden Age Of Rock 'n' Roll. It's magical.

With the John East Uni-Pre range you have flexible units (they'll install into anything). They're all stack-knob (pickup blend/volume, mid frequency seep/mid and bass/treble/pull for brighter), the UNi Pre 4 also includes a passive tone control. Bear in mind too that there also a microswitch that turn the unit from active to passive - you'd need to add an extra hole to the bass, which is no real biggie - I've done it to both my Lulls with the Uni-Pre 3. As you have an existing 4-knob set-up (VT/VT), you could go the Uni-Pre 3 and utilise the extra hole with the power switch. (Incidentally, John is happy to do custom work - he altered a Uni-Pre 3 for me so it was always on, obviating the necessity for a on/off switch). I'd like to see John try something different with the Uni-Pre 4 passive tone knob, maybe a push/pull to turn the actives on/off and maybe double as the passive tone with the knob is in the off position. Shoot him an email; he loves to experiment. The range is here: https://www.east-uk.com/product-category/universal-cavity-mount/?v=79cba1185463 As is the case, you have to weigh up whether you mind doing the work and (maybe) drilling a hole. For me I didn't mind in the slightest, despite the Lulls being £5K/£6K respectively.

One thing that strikes me with most of the songs on this thread is that pretty much all of them could quite easily fall into the category of populist music enjoyed by people who don't really like music. About 30 years ago, a friend of mine was trying (in vain) to prok a girl from the company typing pool. They had zero in common until he heard she liked Babe by Styx and that she, 'really loved Styx.' He was a huge Styx fan (along with all the other bands sharing that pomp rock/yacht rock genre); they were playing at Wembley, he got tickets took her along. Prior to this, he still hadn't been able to go out with him her, so this was effectively a first date scenario. A few days after the gig, she hated Styx. 'They were so loud and heavy and I couldn't stand the singer's voice,' she said. Consequentially, any chance of romance was scuppered as soon as they started playing 'Welcome to Paradise'. This my friends is why we hate the hit singles or the material that breaks the mould of what the real band actually is.

It's in Japan - £1,320, includes shipping. A mate of mine has one of these; I played it for two gigs in Italy about three years ago. The colour is stunning, way nicer than the current crop of Dupont colours being used. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/326063652799?itmmeta=01HT5JK29FXPV84PKKTH2R2MR0&hash=item4beae87fbf:g:EPcAAOSw-nRl~h0k&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAA4KiZwWpnXTyHbL51JdsNlcjvk31BkNY3Idusgw6ewVO%2BJaAcv2Ce7rIIwjqIHvHfizV%2Bva2RZjHYFjnXHlw4CqB7d0OTkwxQ8wkIS6RPUWrNZbOs3d6EgYjJz%2BGKK%2BZ4ufI3IPAdH6ymdsgBMY50u%2BOR4yhxqQVNnnadympcz32NqBcbsJS3dnm8KlNl37GwvCG6XuNzYUNftMXejsGB7%2FTVU7NR9NdpyoG1jCbzFR2qQ6LKTn70go46SMegfICWrj9h7gOwLb4sEb7mf5LowbdyXejT0rXbIS8fVozbKt4n|tkp%3ABk9SR_CkzLLRYw

I've been cranking the thing up. Blimey! Epic. I'm really impressed with the output, clarity, transparency etc. It's completely silent too; no interference from dimmer switches (like the A/O 900). I suppose the real test would be when I get in a room with people, but if it's no good for that, then I'll just use it at home. It's stupid cheap; at £68 it's less than a night out at the pub and a kebab. What's not to like?

We're all too hung up on big name kit. See my post elsewhere (Pedalboard amp). I just bought a Harley Benton GPA100 (£70) for home use. Stick a stomp in front of it (currently a GED 2112 Sansamp). It's pretty loud; I'll take it along to a rehearsal at some point and see how it copes, but so fat, peachy. Amazing little unit.

I wish someone would actually give a tonal definition of what they feel constitutes growl or for that matter hi-fi. Don't get me started on clank or ponk. Point us to a recording of what you're expecting, then the good people of BassChat will guide you on your tonal journey. A pre-amp is just one of another small step that makes up the sound that hits your ears. Christ, I've used East units, Spector, Dark glass preamps and they all do pretty much the same thing.

If it was a toss up between the two for me, I'd go the Bongo 5HH every day of the week.

Are you insane?