Passinwind

I can go along with all that, but how about the very frequent cases in my world where the original band never had a definitive arrangement or maybe even played the song the same way twice themselves? I know of Grateful Dead tribute bands that cover a whole live show learned from the Archive recordings, but to me that pretty much misses the whole point of what the band was about. And I never ever want to hear any jazz band play anything just like the record, ever. Did I mention never, ever?

Ughh, I posted my last screed before getting to the punchline. I go to every live show with the hope and expectation of hearing something new, even on the most familiar tunes a band may have been famous for over decades. And I try not to play anything the same way twice myself if at all feasible. Needless to say, studio work is not part of my agenda.

65 years old, but pretty much stopped listening to much rock music by the mid 1970s. I'll play it myself from time to time in order to hang with friends, but in any case, Grunge is "oldies" in my world and Classic Rap is Old School. I frequently bust on my friends' bands by asking if they even play a single tune from this century, many don't. That's fine, a lot of the jazz I play and like is at least 70-80 years old. But for inspiration I've always generally preferred to listen to live performances rather than recordings. Haven't paid to see a cover band in probably at least a decade. My misguided youth wasn't all that much fun, no need to relive it.

The v3 schematic is finally up on fdeck's site now. The Vong unit looks really good too though.

It's also due to the sort of plywood used in many cases, but I'm not sure which builder's website you're referring to.

Yes, for sure. And T-Is are not especially "classic flatwound" sounding in the first place. I used them pretty happily for many years on this particular bass, but the EBCs suit me much much better.

I've had the lighter gauge set on my standard tuned fretless for a few years now. Those are just a bit stiffer feeling than T-I Jazz Flats, but still very supple.

Same here, but then a few years later the jazz bug really hit as well. I could just as easily have gone with guitar, but in my first band we all also tried bass and drums, and the two primary singers found they did best on lead guitar and drums...go figure.

Three: one EUB, one fretless four, and a recent acquisition that actually even has frets, for the first time in 35 years. It's also my first five string bass to boot. Only got that one for testing onboard preamp builds, but it's been getting played quite a bit more than the ancient fretless four I sold off to make room for it was. I have one electric guitar as well, same one for about 20 years or so. I don't really get much GAS for instruments.

I've seen a few on the Interwebz. My BSX is an older stick model, but it's still hollow, has a faux bout to rest on my gut, and at least it doesn't use one of those awful tripod stands. Out of the various EUBs I've played the Yamaha Silent Bass I tried at NAMM a couple of years ago felt and sounded the nicest, but it's very expensive and pretty much just as clunky as a real one to pack around. I've been playing a friend's AUB at a local house jam most weeks for the last 18 months and, as expected, the urge to make room for a nice one at home is pretty strong these days. The Gollihurs are great people to deal with; very knowledgeable, good prices, and no BS.

Very cool. I've still never managed to get hands on an Eminence EUB, but my old beat up BSX has served very well in getting me gigs I would have otherwise lost out on over the last 15 years.

Whereas I'm a Yank...nuff said.

The booze was actually a bit of a problem as time went on, that venue and many others expected the band members to have a full glass of something upscale in plain sight (on their nickel of course), and to be conversant in the whole culture. We would often see bikers loading multiple cases of wine into their saddle bags or trailers, and a pretty crazy amount of consumption on site. My wife watched them ring $14K in under an hour on just one cash register at one show. But in any case, having regular block bookings like that is especially hard to come by for old school jazz groups in a non-urban market out here. And as so often happens, it was all about who I knew, not how great the band was or wasn't. Although holding a gig like that is a lot different from getting it in the first place.

I thought about posting a few of my favorite dive bars too, actually. There used to be one within easy walking distance that somehow conned world class bands into playing a 100 seat venue in a tiny logging town on a regular basis. I worked sound there for those shows a lot too. But the main attraction was a clientele that genuinely appreciated weird original music, and an owner who was on that plan as well, and knew how to make it work.

There are quite a few other really nice ones around here (Washington red wines are a thing these days), plus a couple of dozen small breweries. But driving along the river on a weekend morning on my way to those gigs was always a pretty special feeling. And the owners made it even more special with personal tastings back in the special reserve tanks and the like.

I used to play this winery right above the Columbia River (http://www.maryhillwinery.com/) a few times a month for several years. It was perfect for my jazz trio and the owners and staff were super nice to us. Their wine is first class too, so for years I had a really nice stash at home. And we got to do tasting room pre-show stints before Bob Dylan and ZZ Top, with a few thousand people coming through before they made their into the adjacent 3000 seat amphitheater. This gig paid OK but not great (regular local scale plus a few bottles each, and pretty good tips), but it was one case where exposure really did pay off. All I had to do was tell other venues that we played Maryhill and that was typically enough to get the gig if the style match was workable. Good hours too, usually 1-5 PM, w/ four45 minute sets. The place next door wasn't too shabby either (http://www.maryhillmuseum.org/) : View from back: Mostly we played arts festivals there, out on the lawn with a great family atmosphere, cool food booths, numerous juried art vendors, and good advertising in the big city markets like Seattle, Portland, and Vancouver. If your band made the promo poster as a featured artist you could leverage a ton of mileage out of that. I think we managed that three years in a row.

Marco Bass Guitars TFL5:

Which is doubly bizarre given that Talkbass is chock full of ads for used ones.

Nordstrand would be another option then, and G&L also sell one IIRC. I figured that since you were contemplating DIY work on the woodwork you might also want to at least look into a DIY preamp solution. I think the last MM knockoff I built cost me less than $30.00. But electronics come easily to me and woodwork...nope!

Roger that. Spend the time or spend the money...

Let me throw in for the DIY 2 band Stingray clone preamp from Talkbass. There are a few versions, from straight up clone to quite a few component and layout upgrades. Relatively inexpensive as well. I especially like this guy's version: https://www.talkbass.com/threads/pcbs-for-diy-clone-2-band-preamps.737117/page-20#post-20882155

Just for starters: Pat Metheny Group, Pat Metheny (Mark Egan) Shadows And Light, Joni Mitchell (Jaco Pastorius) Rock Of Ages, The Band (Rick Danko) Give It Up, Bonnie Raitt (Freebo) Extra credit to Bill Wyman.

Most Fusion and and a fair amount of Prog from the mid-70s. The guitar and drum sounds especially are pretty grating to me in many cases.

The branding is meant to be a little more casual than the engineering, but if the shoe fits...

Not exactly. I have my own casual engineering services brand, and I have built around half a dozen proof of concept amp builds to showcase my work, along with quite a few other things. That amp was in a luthier friend's NAMM booth in 2017, and a different version was there this year. The one in the pic does ~650 watts at 4 ohms and weighs about 9 lbs. or so.