Al Krow

A couple of valid points, to which it would be fair to add that the heavier neck on a 5 is likely to lead to a slightly greater weight overall and a greater tendency to neck dive. Some manufacturers have dealt with the issue by having a flatter radius on the 5 than on their 4s (e.g. Yamaha 600mm on 1025 vs 250mm on the 1024) and a decent strap is obviously helpful on both these counts. Be interested to understand a bit more about your "sonic mesh" issue - was it just that the really low notes didn't feel as tight as the other 4 strings? To me e.g. a F# played on the 7th fret of the low B is pretty hard to distinguish from a F# played on the 2nd fret of the E string on my 5 string basses. Fair enough. I've landed in exactly the opposite place - I won't consider buying 4 string basses these days: for me it's a case of why settle for 4 when a 5 can do more as I mentioned earlier - in terms of being able to play certain songs a whole octave down compared to a 4 string and being able to get so much more scale range while not having to dance up and down the fretboard with my left hand, the corollary being easier / quicker reach. However, one final practical point comes to mind. I have reasonable finger span. I'm guessing that if your hands are on the smaller than average size a 4 string will be less of a stretch and simply more comfortable to play, in which case a 4 string is much more of a no brainer.

I suspect the Zoom B1four which the OP ended up getting is not going to be in the same league sound quality wise as the Ashdown or PJB kit. But as I've been finding over the past couple of days, it's pretty good nonetheless! And having a tuner and easy to access and adjust drum machine (a lot more so than it's predecessor B3N), plus a host of other fx, makes it a really useful bit of kit as a standalone headphone amp. And then there's its price...

Squiers and Sires. Two very well regarded basses. Just had a trawl through this thread and it seems that the two gents (apologies if I missed any others out) who have had both have arrived at the same conclusion. Jump on that V7! Btw if you're planning to be playing in band down the line you might want to think about something more than 25W for your amp; but you can always upgrade down the line. Now that's a whole 'nother thread 😉

Must admit when someone of Chris' experience makes a 'pearl' of a statement like that, it makes me sit up and take note!

Precious little is going to be life changing when it comes to bass gear. There will be incremental little jumps along the way that bring a smile to your face and, collectively, can make a decent difference. I've been playing 5ers pretty much exclusively for about 18 months now and as far as I can tell there are really no real downsides to 5 strings and a couple of nice benefits, like being able to play certain songs a whole octave down compared to a 4 string and being able to get so much more scale range while not having to dance up and down the fretboard with my left hand, the corollary being easier / quicker reach. It feels a bit like having 6 valves rather than 4 under the bonnet - you don't always need it but it's great when you do. And, besides, it's nice to have that unnecessary extra thumb rest...😉

Blimey - there's clearly a decent market for second hand Sires then OP - buy with confidence! 😁

The wisdom in that statement is to do with what sort of basses the Yamahas and Sadowskys you've got / recently had are. And they are mostly (taken in the round) P-J configuration. Just sayin'! So, in my books, there's only going to be one bass that is going to trump the OP's Sire V7 in that price bracket and that's the Sire P7. Gratuitous pic...

But for your extra £2,250 to £4,000 (new) over the cost of your Sire V7, which btw looks pretty much identical to a Sadowsky on a darkened stage - just quickly check body shape and headstock, you get this: AND most importantly these, which do look super cool and justify the price premium by themselves: But if you're not fussed about having nice knobs straight out of the box, you can stick with your Sire (at least for the next 23 years) and continue to buy milk for the next 6 months 😉

Thanks for that. I've actually been surprisingly smitten by my recent purchase of the Tech 21 VTBassDi (after my singular disappointment with the somewhat polite BDDI a couple of years back) - it's such a versatile preamp and some of the clean settings really bring the bass tone to life - it feels similar in effect to the zing of a fresh set of strings compared to old dead ones. And that's before you head into the warm tube and the full on dirt its capable of. It's decade old tech now, but continues to be one of the most popular Tech 21 pedals and I can understand why!

Nah - I can't imagine anyone saying a Sad is not tasty!

Yeah, but there's a rather tasty ACG just appeared in the FS. And it's not even just full HD. It does 4K and everything!

I've been self-isolating to try to deal with that. Doesn't seem to work.

Just the Sire, matey. Under pressure to replace it with a proper Sadowsky rather than settle for a body double, though, from the miscreants above. I'm managing to resist so far. However, apparently you can get bottled Sadowsky in a Helix patch, so that works for me. Don't make my schoolboy error. Replaced my 5 rack, with a 7 rack. So far so good. ....But forgot to sell the 5 rack.

Well I went for the P7 which gives me a P bass and a J bass all in one and is a "best of both worlds" option so the P7 would actually be my recommendation. But the V7 is pretty much identical to the P7 otherwise, except having two J pups instead of a P and J pups. And there are plenty of folk on this thread who have or had the V7 and think highly of it.

10 basses? But that's the perfect number! 😁 From another thread, but highly relevant (if I say so myself)... Btw having just got to the magic number of 10 basses, I can formally confirm that it's all in the fingers. Although having a bass to attach to some strings, a cable and some form of amplification does help.

Well that would be entirely consistent with only using 3 bass strings, I guess 😁

Existentialism aside and getting back on topic (haha!) here's the thing - I've been gobsmacked by how much positivity there is around the Sire basses from the BC community on this thread. Kinda feels like the OP is not going to go too far wrong if she decides to go for the V7 she has her eye on, and could well end up with a bass that will serve her well for a long while to come.

Any punk who includes the word 'existentialism' casually in a sentence needs his status examining under the Trades Descriptions Act.

Frank's a real BC gent and that recommendation would certainly sway it for me. It also seems to me that you're keen to explore the tonal options available and something like the Sire is going to be able to go on that journey with you. FWIW, I've been playing bass for a fair few years (although not as many as some of my fellow BC'ers on this thread, Frank included!) but have just bought my first Sire (s P7 5er v2) a few weeks back. It's lovely instrument and holds its own with others in my herd past and present that cost a lot more. I'm really looking forward to gigging it, when such things start happening again!

That's all very well for you to say, you blue-veined custard chucking Member with a zillion gorgeous Spectors and sundry other basses...

Apologies to one and all. I got it wrong. The ideal number of basses is NOT nine as I had droned on about earlier in this thread. After further deep regression analysis (and the recent purchase of "just one more" bass), it's now clear to me where I got my assumptions wrong. The ideal number has nothing to do with not getting into double figures to assist us in shielding our mischief from our better halves, as I had previously incorrectly assumed, but everything to do with the number of fingers on both hands to enable us to properly count them. The ideal number is actually TEN. As you were folks. I will be issuing a press release to this effect shortly.

Blimey Lozz, what's happened to you? Did I just read you recommending a Jazz over a Precision? (Picks himself up off the floor 😁) But for all the reasons you've said, starting out on a Jazz seems to be great advice. There's always the halfway house of a PJ bass of course, where you can maybe get the best of both worlds, particularly if you go for a bass with a relatively slim-line playable neck. For £350 you could get a very nice nearly new Yamaha BB434 or a Sire P7v2. But that would be muddying the waters...although not in a way you would ever likely regret!

Unfortunately Helix doesn't have synth engine under its bonnet (unlike the Mooer GE300 multi-fx) and I didn't find the Dr Tonelab synth patches that good. Old fashioned approach to getting a synth effect = octave + dirt + filter in a chain. Worth trying that as a starting point and having a go at creating a patch (I suspect other folk have maybe already gone down this route and can share). The synth fanboys on this forum tend, from what I've seen, to go for a quality dedicated synth pedal e.g. Panda FI, Source Audio C4 or if you don't want to PC edit then the Boss SY-1

I've come to the conclusion that less can sometimes be more, particularly if it means they're more likely to get used in a band mix!

Fighting talk 😁 You've clearly already been holed up too long, mate.