Al Krow

Bloody hell, that would have me completely up s*hit creek 😂 You're clearly less senile than me. ...actually no wait, reading your post again - isn't that pretty standard on most basses now I come to think of it?!

Aha - so still not actually released yet? With you in being seriously tempted. Besides it's 'bout time I tried something else besides Yammy BBs 😂

Yup totally agree. But just need to 'unlearn' previous habits, right?

Will let you know when I've rehearsed and gigged the P35. Was hoping to take it out tonight, but we had to cancel due to our singer losing her voice entirely today after managing to somehow get through a gig last night when not feeling 100%. (Last night's gig went surprisingly well, given the circs, although I need to get the stage monitoring by the venue sorted next time as I could hardly hear myself and, with due respect to the rest of the band, enjoying the bass line is a big part of the fun for me - lol!). I suspect it will boil down to 735A having greater tonal options vs the P35 being the nicer / better quality purely passive bass. It actually takes me a little while to get into a new bass: my reactions tend to be fairly muted until I've got to know them - but I am liking the P35 a lot already. The question I'm going to find equally interesting is whether there is a tangible step up between the older BB1025 (which I rate highly as you know) and Yammy's new flagship P35; I suspect it will be a nuanced improvement rather than anything 'startling' and that was a big reason in my hesitating buying Mark's P35 off him in the first place. But I'm very glad I did now - it was a real pleasure to meet up with him today and it's always a privilege, in my books, to spend time with a pro bass player such as Mark.

Some decent options in 5 string Ricks would certainly be very welcome

One little quirk that initially had me confused earlier. The EQ on the 735A follows a lot of 3 band EQs layout with volume dial, pup selector / blend dial, and then 3 band EQ in active mode and treble / tone roll-off only in passive mode. So 'muscle memory' kicks in and I'm expecting the same i.e, vol dial, pup blend dial, and tone dial on the P35. But, as those of you that already have them will know, that's not the case with the new BB "3 series" passive basses: instead there is a separate volume control for each pup and you blend accordingly. Will just need to make sure I remember which is which and that they are not the same when I take them out gigging!

@mcnach - nice post above. It's totally cool not liking Yammy BBs btw: it's not yet (as far as I'm aware) been defined as a bass sin by the mods so no real risk of getting an upgrade to first class on your flight to down under. Besides, the competition for the really nice BB stuff is already pretty hot, so it's a blessing (note the anti-thesis to sin) not having you to compete with on that front as well 😁 On the other hand, if the OP hasn't yet laid his hands on a BB P35 (if he's into purely passive) or a BB 735A (if he wants a bit of 'activity' in the mix) then he might be pleasantly surprised by the quality of both basses and the outstanding value of the latter. BB eulogy over.

@ReggaebassThat's a sweet looking rig! If a Markbass cab handles the low B well for reggae then no one should be in any doubt that it can handle it well for anything! +1 ^^ that's one fine Trav and a half! Although to (mis)quote Cuzzie, they do appear to be lacking 4 strings 😉

There's a certain delicious irony in my indirectly funding the acquisition of Berg basses, wouldn't you say? 😂

A little (and final for 2019) Yammy addition today to make up a Full Trav:

Haha, I'm sure I already did! 😁

Could well be a fair point. But how much would a typical set of Black Labels or Haussels be to replace both the pups on a VM or VT? (Need to preferably be hum cancelling). If you're 'just' a bass player and not good at tech (I'd be in that camp and I'm guessing from what Dave is saying, he is too) how much would it typically cost to get put in? Then if you need, add in eg a quality John East uni pre (plus fitting)? (Or take the lazy person's route and get a Yammy BB P35 and be really happy with it from day 1).

Oh my, that is lovely!

@Cuzzie fair riposte, buddy. I find myself a little concerned about your digestive tract, however.

Yeah - fair point, I should have more correctly said that it's the electronics that Berg use as 'standard'. Not sure I entirely agree about the second point. There are a lot of great basses out there with dedicated followings ranging from the more marmite ones (Rick, Warwick) to the very widely admired (Fender P). I accept that electronics can be swapped out. But I've shared my views on this: on a >£1k bass I shouldn't expect to have to be thinking about spending another up to £500 to replace pups and / or EQ. In my case it's not something I need to give second thought to on my Yammys and Ibbys SR Pemiums - they just work for me (and, for sure, they're not going to be for everyone) straight 'out the box'. I would have thought that Holger Stonjek might have seen enough threads like this one to have taken the feedback on board? The quality of his finish is really very good. If he produced an 'out of the box' bass with electronics to match, he would have a killer product and I, for one, certainly would be very open to returning to the fold.

@HazBeen that looks lush! (And my Keeley looks happier on your board, where it will be used properly, than it ever did on mine!) But I'm now very intrigued by the Goliath. I'd love to hear some sound samples.

Does seem to be a lot of divided opinion amongst folk who have owned Bergs, but I'm sure that's also true for many basses! The Berg 'marmite' is a very consistent one though, it seems to me. Boils down to: Finish - lovely. Electronics - can be meh.

That looks really good! Have RCF just gone and cloned Behringer (and are looking to charge us double for the privelege)? 😄 😄

Cheers Jack for the thought. But if you A/B the Behringer 1002FX against the Soundcraft 5, the Soundcraft 'wins' on the 2 XLR outputs, but I think an unbiased person would conclude it pretty much loses on everything else, not least significantly on price.

Please don't tell the cutting edge technology boys that a knife on a chopping board is still just as sharp 😂

Just had band mates messaging me asking why don't I just use the bigger one? Ok let's see, I have bass amp plus bass, PA and cables and lights to load and unload for every gig... Youngsters, sometimes don't quite realise they have been born, eh?! 😂😂 PS well at least the drummer has now messaged back to say he understands...