Al Krow

I know that band was a much bigger part of your life than the one I've just let go of. You managing to move on pretty easily or does hearing about them heading off to Greece give you a slight twinge of regret or just a feeling of relief!

A mixture. For main covers band, I'd say a lot are "very close" i.e. in between close enough and nailed it. There's a few that I've put my own take on - particularly where there's no bass line in the original e.g. Kiss, or where adding a slightly different rhythm mixes it up nicely e.g. Moves like Jagger and a slightly latin feel to Breakfast at Tiffanys for the verse. For the 50s and 60s band - generally close enough is fine; after all they're not the most demanding of 4 chord bass lines in the world on an electric bass! But I suspect will be a whole lot more challenging on EUB.

This one. The most recent of the three.

I listed my Ibby SR 1825 on eBay to take advantage of their £1 selling fee and put a placeholder in of a stock photo, with a view to putting the funds towards one of the new headless range. Chap today asked me for some proper photos, which I duly took, but haven't uploaded. I love playing this bass! It's got such a great punchy tone and is sub 9lbs and I'm going to have a bunch of seller's regret if I move it on! Guess I'll have to wait for next year until some used headless Ibbys come available before taking the plunge.

Haha! Except, I don't think 10:1 is a recognised diet. More like the odds against my team West Ham staying up this season... 😁

I think a 5:2 diet would be perfect with this thread...2 years abstinence interspersed with 5 years back in the game!

Just handed over the reigns of a band I founded 18 months ago to my band-mates, having sorted out my own replacement in the shape of one of the dep bassist from my main covers bands. The band I've left was still too similar to my main covers band at the time of my leaving, and I wanted to focus on my other two bands and also free up some time for my other musical projects. It will still have two of the initial line up, plus four other band members two of whom are just about to join, including the new bass player who is also a very capable lead lead vocalist. Her arrival / my departure has lowered the average age of the band by a decade at a stroke! I'll be very interested to see how it evolves. A first for me in setting up a band and then leaving it to continue without me, particularly one now in potentially better shape than when I was part of it! Any of you done the same i.e. walked away from a band you'd set up which was still a "going concern" (or been in a band where the founder member departed - in my case amicably, but I'm guessing it won't always be thus!) What happened next?

That would be nice. But sadly nope, sorry - it was avoiding getting distracted by "new" bass gear in the first place that's the goal. Otherwise we'd all be able (for the purpose of GAC 2020, obviously nothing stopping us doing that in real life!) to buy a bunch of used gear at bargain prices and enjoy it for 6 months and then if we're lucky enough to sell them on at a profit i.e. without financial loss, we'd still be in the game!

Well if @lozkerr and I aren't disqualified by a retrospective reinterpretation of the rules by the powers that be and his side-kick, relating to whether smaller / replacement pedal boards are bass gear or merely a non-signal-chain accessory to help us make the most of some of our existing bass gear, I think at current rates of progress I could be on target to make a surplus from gear sales and gig monies for the first time since I took up the bass back in 2013. That is both a pleasant and slightly scary realisation! How long has it been since the rest of my fellow trainee monks on this thread similarly made a surplus from gear sales & gig monies?

Thank you, that was just what I needed to hear to stiffen my resistance (my Spector Euro 5LX is a delight to play at the very top end)

Damn, I've been trying to avoid Dingwalls! Might find it harder to resist after seeing yours in action. Love the finish on yours. @Jack_Stroud_Bass not a dissimilar MB / BF rig to the one you have just got and sounding great!

^^ This. Nailed it (not literally thank goodness)! A bass doesn't have to be either purely functional e.g. only there to be gigged, or something that is "just" an object that you can love looking at and holding. Instruments can be both wonderful sounding and a delight to play and also stunning in design as a piece of workmanship. Gratuitous KS pic:

@JellyKnees tasty bass and liked the groove you were laying down! What make / model bass?

Sold Jeff a pedal that is going to seriously Impact whether he can use the pseudonym 'ToneFree' under the Trades Descriptions Act in Future. Pleasure to deal with, fast payment and good comms. Very smooth transaction. Enjoy the pedal!

Soooo much more sophisticated than my 'make do and mend' approach using cut rubber doorstops!

Yeah - but they're less good for playing low D and Cs, than my thumb rest strings 😉

I think you'll be wanting a PT Classic 2 or similar to cater for your pedals. (fyi Mine might be going spare in the near future given my recent run on pedals, however it comes with a mint Mono tour case, which is light / highly protective, but quite £spendy and not sure whether spending the extra on that makes sense unless you're planning on taking your pedals out and about?)

Fair enough (and the same for Muzz's comment also?) I just think gigging bassists can easily fall into the trap of assuming that what we're doing with our basses has more worth than folk who don't gig. But with due respect, that's rubbish. How folk use and enjoy their gear is entirely up to them and if they get pleasure from playing at home or simply enjoying the aesthetic nature of their basses, well that's of no less value to them than to someone who's in a band. Life ain't purely about utility.

Yeah I invested in a PT2 (really good size aren't they) and then sold the heavy tour case and got myself a swanky mono gig bag for it to save on weight, but to hopefully provide really good protection ie best of both worlds. Funny thing is, looks like I'm going to end up just using my smaller boards (a Metro24 and now this HB 50M) and that swanky mono bag is in serious danger of remaining very mint at this rate!

So folk who are not in bands shouldn't own electric basses?

Joined you in getting a "GAC 2020 exempt" smaller pedal board - discovered the budget Harley Benton pedal board range at Thomann and they have a perfect size for my Zoom B1(X)-4 multi in the shape of a 17.5 cm deep board. The HB 50M with hardcase plus their HB Iso-5 pro PSU should be just the ticket and comes to exactly £99, which conveniently means free shipping!