Osiris

Go for as thick a plectrum (as they were called when I were a lad 😀) as you can as different thicknesses sound different to one another. IME the thinner the gauge of plectrum the thinner your tone is. I play with a mixture of finger and plectrum during our set and a 2.0mm gauge allows me to keep the same EQ for both methods without losing the low end and lower mids, you just get more bite in the highs. A lot of guys on here seem to go for <1mm thickness but to me anything that thin sucks out the depth and weight from the sound and makes the bass sound more guitar like, which may be what they want, but I like my bass thick and chewy to underpin the rest of the band and 2.00mm is perfect for that. My current preference is for the Dunlop Prime Grip plectrum which has a 3D moulded texture so it doesn't slip from my sweaty hands. And don't cut out too many low mids with the EQ, it may sound great on its own but that's usually where the weight of the bass resides in the mix. If you're playing a jazz or other 2 pickup bass, a little push in the low mids adds a perceived thickness to the bass tone.

Regarding drinks on stage, it was probably in the early 90's, the guitarist in the band I was in was taking his new multi-fx pedal out on its first gig. Sometime during the second set a drunk punter dropped his pint right on top of the new toy and that was the end of that 😟 Since then I've always used a plastic sports type bottle on stage and tried to encourage other band members to do the same. I don't care what other people think, it's a kind of insurance policy. Any drinks placed on the subs or other equipment get moved ASAP too whether the punters like it or not. And as someone has already said, take a spare everything, or at least as many spares as you can, everything from fuses to cables to basses and amps. If you gig long enough something will eventually fail on you. Learn to use your EQ. It's thankfully not so prevalent now but back in the day you'd often see people with their 150 watt combo running at 11 with the smiley face EQ curve wondering why their massive 30Hz boost wasn't shaking the room like an earthquake. It doesn't matter if it's your sound, if you're not audible in the mix then you might as well not be there. EQ a sound that works with the other instruments and works in the room too. It might not sound so sexy on it's own but it's not all about you - unless you're a guitarist, of course 😃

@dmc79 I moved to playing short scale basses exclusively a few years ago due to a damaged nerve in my left wrist, if you're getting pain in your fretting hand it could possibly be a similar issue. But for me it meant that I could no longer play a 34" bass for more than a few minutes without cramping up. But once I'd tried a short scale I could play for hours without issues. The shorter neck, tighter fret spacing plus me being a bit of a short arse meant that it was a revelation and something I wish I'd have done decades ago. Every time I play a 34" bass now it just feels huge, unwieldy and awkward to play. If you're a Fender guy I'd definitely recommend at least trying a Mustang, you mentioned that you're not too keen on the looks, I wasn't either but once I'd played and owned one I was a convert. There's now a number of different models, each with their own tone and neck profile so there's likely one out there that would suit you if you're willing give them a go. My suggestion for classic Fender tones would be the PJ Mustang although it has more of a jazz profile neck which you may not like being a P man. If you want a chunky necked Mustang then the JMJ is the one. Budget hasn't been mentioned (unless I missed it) but as Maude says the Ibanez Talman is a fantastic bass, more so for how cheap they are. I've been playing for around 35 years now and the Talman is one of my favourite basses I've ever played. It's got a chunky Precision like neck and the PJ pickups may be just what you're after. Mine has had some hardware upgrades as the stock stuff is a bit cheap and cheerful, but you're talking about an entire bass that costs half of what a set of boutique pickups or machine heads would cost. But even so I've only spent another £50 or so on it. Yes it looks a bit daft, like one of the Mr Men has melted, and it's not overly light. But it's solidly built, mine resonates better than just about any other bass I've ever played, and the neck is very comfortable to play and would likely feel familiar coming from a P. As the lovely @Adee says the Sandberg Lionel is sublime, looks great, attention to detail everywhere and impressively lightweight. Its inherent tone is more like that of a 34" scale, some short scales can be a bit deeper and darker sounding than a 34" but it's nothing you can't EQ out if it's not your thing. As for stings, I still use 34" scale on my basses as I had a job lot in my box of odds and sods when I made the switch to short scales exclusively. Depending on the bass you may need to snip off 50 mm or so off them to get them to fit, and again bass dependent, you may get some of the fat part of the E sting (before it tapers) wrapped around the machine head capstan but I've been doing it now for a few years without any trouble or snapped strings. There's a few people online who'll tell you that you shouldn't do it but my experience tells me otherwise. The obvious thing to do is to try and get yourself to shop that has a few short scale models in stock and try as many as you can, hopefully one of them will be right for you.

Ian has just bought and collected a bass from me. He's a great guy and turned up when he said he would, we chewed the fat for a while and he left with a new to him bass! So I'm more than happy to recommend him to other Basschatters. Enjoy the bass, Ian.

Same here, I don't do full bore distortion, just a bit of low gain drive to warm things up, because not very deep down inside I just want to be Geezer Butler*. * Rather than George Roper.

I do like the look of the Digbeth preamp, it seems to be well though out. The only that put me off getting one, other than a lack of video clips online, was the trauma that my first proper rig which was a Laney (amp, 4x10 and 1x15 cabs), back in the late 80's, which - other than the Trace Elliott SMX rig that replaced it - was the biggest turd of a bass amp that I've ever played through. But 35 years later I'm slowly starting to recover... So anyway, you think it's good so far?

The adjustable boot floor is an optional extra on the Skoda as you say but even with the official part or a home made alternative I still can't see it giving the whole boot area a flat load in because the back seats won't lay flat. It's either a cynical ploy to get you to buy an optional extra that you really shouldn't need to buy or just a half arsëd design. Either way, no matter how much space there is in there you really can't use much of it. Once the contract is up I definitely won't be having another one. A wise attitude 👍 I tried to do the same in this thing, I eventually found the option under the highly unintuitive software and disabled it and it was much better. Trouble is that the next time we used the car it had switched itself back on, it must be a default setting, and because of the awful software I haven't been able to find the option again. Fortunately I only drive around once a week so I just accept that it's going to try to kill me and I so I serenade it with a constant sting of obscenities. But I do wonder who thought it was a good idea to release something so dangerous into the wild.

Whatever you do DON'T bother with the Octavia estate, at least not the model introduced in 2020. The drummer in my last band had the previous Octavia estate model and it had a huge boot with an easy flat load in. When the contract was up on my Ford Focus estate - which has already been recommended and rightly so, it's big and has an easy flat load in - around 18 months ago Ford wanted another £150 a month for the equivalent model. I kid you not. After telling them to swivel I ended up with an Octavia estate, partly based on the old drummers car and partly because I know nothing about cars, but people I know who are interested said you can't go wrong with a Skoda. But while the marketing team make a big fuss about the Octavia estates boot space being huge, they fail to point out that in the new model that it's all but unusable. There's a big deep boot lip to catch your cab on when loading it in and out, the rear seats don't fold flat, just the top half pushed down on top of the bit you sit on. I could get my old 2x12 cab in there but anything else was balanced haphazardly on the 70's style fold-down seats that are more bent over at 45 degrees than flat. When I called Skoda to have a whinge about it they offered to sell me an artificial floor to make life easier, can't remember exactly how much they wanted but it was hundreds of pounds. I don't think so. So yeah, don't bother if you want one for shunting your gear around. Especially when you factor in the software that could only have been programmed by a lobotomised porpoise, it controls everything in the car but its only response to anything and everything you do is to constantly beep and squawk at you while throwing up tiny illegible warning messages on the dashboard. And the wonderful nanny steering control which constantly tries to throw you into a ditch or into any oncoming traffic. 🤬 There's a crisp £10 note waiting for the first Basschatter to steal it and burn it out. Just PM me.

Just got home from meeting up with Ben, who has just bought a cab from me. He's a great guy to deal with, turned up when and where he said he would and promptly sorted out payment. Can't ask for anymore than that as a seller! Enjoy the cab, Ben

How's the mid range control on the Super Vintage? From the YouTube clips I've seen it doesn't have that huge void in the mid range that the BDDI has (which is also modelled on the SVT), and coupled with the bloated lows is why I could never get on with the BDDI. The demos that are available so far suggest this has a much more usable core tone and more useful EQ options, for me at least, over the BDDI. (I've not played through an SVT at volume so have no direct reference point 😕) Like a couple of others guys have said, on paper I'd more likely have thought the Black Panel pedal would have been more my thing but from what I've seen and heard online I'm leaning towards the Super Vintage.

Alright me duck (Unfortunately, I'm another one of the many, many people Frank threatened to kick in the pippies if I didn't drop by to say hello)

**COUGH** 😀

How about a 51 Precision pickup but slanted like a strat bridge pickup so that the pole pieces line up under the strings? Would that work?

Agreed that it's not that sexy, but I think on a gig the uncluttered look and LED rings around the controls will make it quick and easy to make adjustments on the fly even on dark stages. And the contrast of the black knobs against the silver make background add to this too, so while it's a bit of a munter I think it makes a lot of sense from a utilitarian perspective.

Try the Boss CS-3 Compression Sustainer, even at its minimum setting it's massively squashed and you can dial in even more from there should you want it! I bet you could probably pick one up as cheap as chips on eBay to give it a go and see if it's squishy enough, and if it's not then your only other option is a steam roller 😀

The various Supro Huntington's look a possibilty, I think the white 2 pickup model looks great. Tried a Gretsch a couple of year back but it didn't grab me, although they seem to be well regarded by many. As for a Hofner... No. Just no. They remind me of Paul Mcartney, he who holds the dubious honour of being the only person who my usually placid Mother has said she'd dearly love to punch in the face. And for that reason alone I just couldn't have one

Thanks, just had another look at the Longhorn online and the more I look at it the more it unsettles me 😃

Cheers, the short scale Grail is already on my shortlist but good shout on dropping Ashdown a line regarding stock. They were released to great fanfare a couple of years ago but I can't currently find any in stock in the UK. The few reviews online are universally positive which is a good sign, add into that Ashdown's legendary customer service and it does indeed look like the one to go for.

Which Danelectro models have you had experience with? I'm only familiar with longhorn but always thought it looked too fragile although I've never seen one in the flesh nor played one. Thanks Colonel, but unfortunately it looks like Bassassin's damming opinion has ruled that out already 😕 and that's before getting into the lack of knowledge, tools and inclination to undertake any major surgery such as routing due to pathological incompetence on my part! A mate of mine had one of the 34" scale J&D jazzes a few years ago and it was a fantastic thing to play, really comfortable and looked great too, it was the seafoam green one with black hardware. I think he may have upgraded the pickups but my opinion of it was it being a cracking bass. But I think I've got caught up in that I need to spend a lot of money to get something decent mentality which I know from experience isn't always the case. For example, I have one of the cheap and cheerful Ibanez Talman short scales and it is one of my favourite basses that I've ever played in more than 35 years. It looks like the unfortunate result of a Fender Jaguar having had a gang bang with several of the Mr. Men but it's a solid, well built and highly resonant bass, plus I love the chunky neck profile. It's had around £50 worth of upgrades to replace the hardware as the original fittings were low quality albeit functional, but then again this is a bass that only costs £150 new. But the flipside of that argument is that a more expensive bass will likely be good to go as is rather than require some tweaks and upgrades.

Quite like the look of those but they're over budget unfortunately. Juries still out on those! I'd need to try one to make a decision as to whether I could live with one, I like the styling oher than the daft headstock and I'm not so sure about all the various buttons which I'd likely try out and then never bother with again! But that's just me being a finicky Sod 😀

Ooh, I like that a lot! Well, not sure about the gold scratch plate but that could easily be binned off for something less blingy! Can't seem to find much online about them, assuming it's not the same as the American Rebirth guitar company if they're built in Yorkshire. Have you got a link or any other details, please?

Thanks Private, I'd forgotten all about the Sire U5 and it's certainly a contender especially considering its price and the fact that they are so highly regarded. On a superficial level I'm not fussed about the huge headstock or the current colour options but it's got to be worth tracking one down to try. I have tried an American Performer Mustang and wasn't overly fussed about it. It was well made but very polite sounding, kind of lacking in character, if that makes sense. Again with the lovely @Adee we did a side by side of the American Performer against the JMJ Mustang and the PJ Mustang. Of the 3 we both felt the JMJ was the clear winner in terms of tone and it just oozes cool. I personally preferred the cheaper PJ over the Performer, the PJ sounded more like a Fender, it does classic P tones and the bridge pickup adds to the versatility. The Performer was better finished and nicer to play but IMO the tone of the PJ had a ton more appeal against the Performer which sounded a bit bland in comparison. I briefly had one of the lower spec Chowny Scott Whitley bass and it sounded fantastic, no idea what the pickups are in it but they are super punchy. But the reason it don't last long for me was the playing position, the lack of top horn means that when playing it on a strap the first fret was more or less the same distance away as on a 34" bass which totally defeated the object of a short scale for me. So off it went PDQ! Hmm, not sure about the looks of the Serek basses but they seem to be highly regarded so might as well add it to the list. But the Atelier Z BabyZ is not something I've seen before and that looks perfect and is within budget, although there's likely to be a 20% or more import fee to add on top. Still, I really like the look of it and although I don't know much about Atelier Z they seem to be a well regarded brand.