Dan Dare

Flats for me, too. On a Jazz Bass, they are the dog's.

This. Combines 1 and 5 and doesn't offend anyone.

If it's a Thunder 1A, they are quite desirable, so selling it and getting something that is more what you want from the off would be a better option than modifying. As far as I'm aware, the original pickups were Di Marzios (if they're the cream coloured ones), so they are pretty decent. Modifying is an expensive route. By the time you you've bought pickups, active electronics, paid to have the frets pulled, etc, you will probably have spent about it would cost you to buy something more to your liking. And you never get back the money you spend on modifications - sometimes, they can even lower the price you can sell for.

Exactly. Taking Lessons and learning technique will take us so far, but we still need the physical attributes that people like Robeson (a great man) had/have. You are either born with those or you aren't.

I initially learned the violin/fiddle. In my teens, all my pals were starting bands and I wanted in. Playing the fiddle definitely wasn't cool/what was wanted. As they all wanted to be guitar heroes, I decided to take up the bass, reasoning that I would get more offers. It worked. I even played it for a living for a while.

No. You just have to play the notes that are below your low E up an octave. It works fine. You don't have to play the whole part up an octave. People are all different - their voices do not all function best in the same key(s). Phil Starr sums it up very well above. I repeat - if the singer is struggling, a song will not sound good, no matter how well the rest of the band plays it. As musicians, we are there to support the singer and the song, not to indulge ourselves or show how clever we are. And if you do pro work, you had better be ready to play a piece in the key required, not the one you think it should be in. I'll give an example. A band I used to play in did 'Grapevine'. Our singer, who was (and still is) very good, could not manage it in the original key. It was just too high for him, so we dropped it to one that was comfortable for him. He was in his fifties. Marvin Gaye was the best part of 30 years younger than that when he recorded the song and we lose our upper register as we age. The guitar player kicked up a terrible fuss about it. The real issue was that he didn't want to learn it in a different key. He would rather the song had sounded poor than make an effort. A bit pathetic, really.

Bad form, imho. The band should always accommodate the singer. If someone's voice works best in a certain key, that's the key the band should play it in. The two most important members of any band are the singer and the drummer. If they're delivering, everything else will be right (assuming competence on the part of the rest of the band, of course). I know we might not like to acknowledge it, but it's the troof.

Jeez. Bouzoukis are very lightly constructed (one reason they have that lovely, airy tone). That thing could be dangerous. It is likely to fold up without warning.

If the new price is £1200, I'd be looking at offering around half that as a start price. £750 is too rich.

The older TE cabs had a XLR speaker connector in addition to a jack. XLRs have been made redundant for speaker connection since the arrival of the Speakon (they were never much better than jacks, save for the fact that they locked. The contact area was small and it was nigh on impossible to use heavy gauge speaker cables with them).

Cannot find a way to edit the illustration, but how about one with no wear for collectors?

Spot on, Bill. Setting the eq at noon merely gives you the preamp designer's tonal preference.

Like one of those books that will make you two inches taller...

"May not be comfortable to play"... I should cocoa.

I reckon it might need modification before stringing up to be safe, unless you use VERY light strings. That tail-piece looks to be thin sheet metal, secured by just 2 screws into the face of the body. Even if they're into a block, it doesn't appear very secure. String tension could easily pull them up/out. The tail-piece ought ideally to run over the edge of the instrument and pull against the end of the body. Or am I being too fussy? Yes, I know bridges on Fenders, etc are screwed into the face of the body, but they use 5 screws.