lemmywinks

That's a great score, has the old stock MIJ Aria bridge on it as well.

I used a pair of Club121 cabs with excellent results, only sold them as I stopped using amps otherwise I'd stil have them now. Still kinda miss that rig, very versatile little modular setup.

46 minutes ago, Born 2B Mild said:

Adapting to fan frets is a good issue, basexperience.   I found when playing a bassline from muscle memory, that all was well.  The interesting thing is that when you break from a flowing line and then need to hit a note, perhaps a sustained one, I had to look to see where to fret my finger.  In the dark, I did find that was a bit challenging.  I bought Chicken as pre-loved, but I notice that listings for new ones say that they come with luminescent side dot inlays. I've not noticed any luminescence! Makes me wonder about having LED side dots installed. 

The side dots need to be under quite bright lights for a while to work and don't last that long, they're not as good as luminlays and a few people had issues with them.

8 hours ago, Richard R said:

Thanks for all the suggestions!

@lemmywinks - that looks quite handy and can run at 45W off a proper USBC power bank, which might be useful. Have you done big joints with it, such as earth leads onto pot cases on older basses?

The Tiswall looks good too, but the link was US, I'll try to find a UK link. 

Yeah I've done pot grounds with it, just works like a regular iron. You can buy different tips like fine, chisel etc and can get also handy little zip cases for them as well. Mine is the older T100 so DC power only but they did bring out a USB-C version called the TS60, looks like they've made the TS101 with both options so I'll probably upgrade to one at some point. Loads of reviews online

For bass and hobby stuff I wouldn't go back to using a traditional solder station as I find the pen type much more convenient and nicer to use.

I just use a TS100, the new version is the TS101 I think which can be powered by DC or USB-C so handy to take to gigs with a power bank. Can pick them up for around £60:

https://www.unmannedtechshop.co.uk/product/ts101-soldering-iron-b2/

You'll need a seperate stand with foam but these are a couple of quid. I've done cables and quite delicate board repair with mine, it's been great.

Definitely try and play some of the shortlisted basses before buying, especially the Hofner which can be quite polarising - I had to use one for a jam night (the pricier one too) and thought it was a horrid little thing. Also why the focus on hollow/semi-hollow bodies?

If I was looking for a 30" scale bass to cover a wide range of pop sounds covering several decades I'd get a Sire U5 or an Ibanez TMB30 if the budget was tighter. A pal of mine as a U5 and it's excellent.

I was always against Summer of '69 but ended up playing it for a few dep gigs and it always went down well. Somebody mentioned Chumbawumba earlier, I think that's where I'd draw the line!

7 minutes ago, No lust in Jazz said:

I joined a band where two band members did exactly this. It wasn't that they had massive egos - they are lovely people. It was more of a 'Wouldn't it be great to play this...' vibe. But no one had questioned why long forgotten album tracks weren't going to get them repeat bookings. 

 

Same, was in a band with a mate going back years who just wanted to play his favourite songs. No malice in it but it does make life frustrating and personally I find being on a stage playing songs the audience aren't interested in extremely embarrassing.

What sort of venues are you playing btw? Apologies if that's already been answered.

Around here there's one venue where 90s nostalgia rock/grunge would go down well and those bars have a regular circuit of rock tribute and covers acts on, if you have a more rock focused scene then things may be different.

Yep, that AiC song is going to be greeted mainly by blank stares and backs of heads unless you're playing to a very specific audience.

The worry now is that there's a detrimental, self indulgent element to song choices which is going to be very hard to get rid of, this sort of thing stifles/kills covers acts as there's no shortage of them and on most circuits there's no room for the ones that sacrifice entertaining a crowd for living out their own personal stage fantasies. Nip it in the bud, it might take playing the song a few times but if it bombs on say 3 consecutive gigs then put your foot down as this is going to be an ongoing issue.

I've played plenty of songs I actively hate playing as that's just an unavoidable part of being in a covers band, as long as they audience are having a good time then I'm not bothered really as that's the most important thing and it's only a few minutes of my time. Tbh I'd rather play songs I dislike and have gig photos with full dancefloors than the other way around.

The only time I get really annoyed is when band members pick self indulgent songs and insist on keeping them in the set even when they empty a dancefloor every gig, especially if it's at the expense of songs which get people up and dancing. I've had to argue to keep Dancing Queen and Young Hearts Run Free in the set when the guitarist wants to play some crusty old dad rock in place of it. If someone tries to make me play Pat Benetar again I'll probably just set fire to them.

I don't think this is an AliExpress bass as I've not seen that shape before, wouldn't automatically assume they're fake. Would be easy to tell I guess.

On closer inspection it looks like the not so great Overlord of Tone bridge with a metal plate stuck over it bearing what looks to be the sellers name - McVeigh.

Hmmm.

35 minutes ago, Steve1250 said:

Well I didn't really need this one...but here we are 🙄

Yeah but a tenner though, can't pass that up.

RIght I don't even play a 4 string live and have been having a clearout but every time I click on this thread I start trawling eBay and FB for an old cheap Jazz. Probably gonna have to unfollow before I buy another bass don't need.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/134810424453?

Looks pretty cool, anybody know what the bridge hardware is?

Looks smart that, tort on black is a great combo for F style basses.

Your 3B will be the volume (push/pull), blend and stacked bass/treble if it still has standard Corvette controls won't it?

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1941/7837/files/2B-3b_epoxy.pdf?744051323792808354

Does your output jack have two or three lugs on it? With active basses the jack is used to complete the circuit across the sleeve and ring so when you unplug the cable it doesn't drain the battery, that's why they use a 3 lug stereo jack (tip, ring and sleeve) rather than a standard two lug one. The negative terminal of your battery should be wired to one and the other should go to the preamp somewhere.

It was there about a week ago in the accessories section, funnily enough checked earlier today and it's gone. Wasn't anything in there the last few times I've looked though.

I didn't disassemble the pickup, just removed the tube thing. When I spoke to Soloette they just said they were active stereo condenser mics inside the bridge tube, just looked and I no longer have the email though. Annoyingly I seem to have misplaced the pickup tube, still have the rest of it.

@Richard R  I have a piezo strip in mine and a preamp from Analog Workshop. I modified a cheap acoustic bass bridge from AliExpress and fitted a cheap Fishman Sonicore copy (AliExpress again), looks like this now:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QH7fhzkttwpsXcU6LLxjXsxPTBU3BuqO/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QEIshaB9uS3yR_B5eLN_JISpOXn01K-V/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QDio8TexXWOQ-bVlluD5FLkBGHSI2nrq/view?usp=sharing

Well worth it, a Peavey Microbass is a very nice little practice amp and the Indian Encore (prob 90s?) is a solid bass.

I had a broken screw removed and some scruffy neck holes repaired by a local guy, he made maple dowels with the grain in the correct position. You can probably buy suitable dowels online or use a plug cutter bit to make some.

Tuners you can get away with cocktail sticks or matches but I'm not sure I'd want to risk it with neck bolts.

I use IEMs live but still own a little TC BH250 head for home use and rehearsals. I like it because I'm very lazy and it has a tuner, mute switch, aux in and compression (via Toneprint) built in which means I don't have to set my preamp pedal up at practice. I also modified it with a Speakon combo jack, again out of laziness so I can take a single cable and use whatever cabs are at the rehearsal room.

Btw with my Ibanez (9 piece laminate neck with graphite inserts) the neck hasn't moved once since I first set it up over a year ago, no need for seasonal adjustment. Truss rod adjustment was quite gradual as well, if you're used to seeing a change straight away it might be a bit of a shock.

Weird how plenty of people who have put serious money into boutique basses also own mass produced instruments and hold them in high regard despite them being utter junk.

Ibanez often build laminate necks with either carbon or titanium rods, very stiff necks and probably built that way to cater for the metal players the Iron label instruments are marketed towards with very little relief and a low action.