Hellzero

Traded my LeFay Herr Schwarz 5 for Victor Stradi Symphony 5 Fretless. We met half way in Brussels, had some pleasant talk and went home on our opposite sides. You can deal in total confidence with Victor, he is a trustful person and very communicative. It was a pleasure to meet him in the flesh and have a cappuccino while talking. ;-) And the Stradi is just awesome ! Hope to deal with him again.

If you find this behaviour a crook act, what about anything you buy each day, like that gasoline you bought for say £100 GBP when the real factory cost all included is £1 GBP... That's called in marketing language : (huge) profit and that's the world we live in. The only illegal thing in what you describe is the use of pictures and text without permission, that's all. The rest is simply a guy who have seen a good opportunity to make some quick and easy money. Don't tell me you never done this as we are all chasing the good deal !

Chinese way.

You would be very disappointed by the UniPre, the SPM02-3B is way far uncompressed and much more user friendly. Try the Mike Pope Flexcore : this is the more transparent and non compressing preamp ever, but the cost is, say, prohibitive. Coming back to your Ibanez SRSC805 it's a neck through single cut construction, so with more attack, harmonics, highs and preciser basses by definition. Maybe it's simply the wrong bass for your ears... That happens sometimes.

My jazz guitar (as a Wes Montgomery fan, I own one Ibanez Jazz Idontknowwhatmodelitis that I hardly play) has the same principle for the volume and tone of the Benedetto floating pickup and it's not THAT easy to use at all...

It's indeed an old LeFay Pangton headless. The growl is mainly due to the padauk neck. I had a few basses with padauk necks (Leduc Maurad 4, Leduc Pad 5, Leduc Pad Rock 5, another Leduc Maurad 4 and a LeFay Herr Schwarz 5 that I still own). Add also the extraordinary ergonomics of the LeFay basses and their own pickups branded Rough Crystal and you'll be growling forever... Mine is an early one totally passive with 28 different pickups combinations in single, parallel and series modes (very clever design) and two tones with two different capacitors usable simultaneously... See pictures below. The rest by PM.

And did you find one? The entire preamp must still be somewhere in the house as I removed it to have a "playable" bass....

Just like George, the older brother who passed away last month. You certainly remember "Friday on my Mind" by the Easybeats and maybe Flash and the Pan with this fantastic album named "Lights in the Night"... That was George with Harry Vanda.

It's THE feature of every Anthony Jackson model.

Salve Simone, Bellissima !

Kalium sells F# strings by unity, but it will be a bit hard to find. That said I play 6 strings basses mainly because you don't have to move your left hand to play 80% of the stuff. I guess that with a 7 seven strings you go to 100% like dood said. Kalium have two types of strings : http://store.kaliumstrings.com/index.php/electric-bass-guitar/shop-by-material/hybrid-bass-guitar/single-strings.html?limit=all http://store.kaliumstrings.com/index.php/electric-bass-guitar/shop-by-material/steel-bass-strings/single-strings.html

I always thought that Mark King was blond. Must be because of the black and white picture, I guess ?

I hope that he wasn't by his clothing too.

No more neck diving. A friend of mine had the same result with his Steamer, after 3 attemps by 3 different luthiers to fix it, he decided to use it for what it was designed at first : barbecue wood.

The story behind Mark King playing a 6 strings bass is more "basic". He simply saw a band and the guy on the bass was using a 6 strings (slapping as fingering), he tried the bass and found the added strings interesting, ask Rob Green to make him one and the rest will become history. Remember that Mark King is also a terrific fingers only player, just like Alain Caron who also plays fretless and only 6 strings electric basses. Listen to his "D-Code" slap anthem :

This guy is much clever than what Bono claims... And Adam Clayton also has really good taste for women, but not for basses.