ZilchWoolham

After a week and a half of having barraged her with polite inquiries to no avail I decided to do a bit of investigative work. I looked up all the phone numbers I could find belonging to the seller's namesakes and sent them all a collective text message, asking them if they had attempted to sell a Moog Prodigy recently. I got a few rather nice responses, most importantly one from the woman I had first assumed to be the seller, saying that she hadn't sold anyone a Prodigy. So I sent yet another email to the "seller", this time forgoing all the pretences, preferring instead to jump right into Liam Neeson in Taken. Well, nearly anyway. After threatening to have a chat with the police, I finally received a response.

She told me she was terribly sorry, but that her life had taken a very bad turn and that she was in a rough condition, having been evicted and living off a former co-worker, as well as weighing below 8 stone (not especially shocking for a woman, but oh well). She offered no explanation as to why she decided she should rip off a stranger looking for a synth, or if she had been doing this systematically, but she said she wanted to pay me back, with interest, but in instalments. I told her I was not interested in the compensation, and that I simply wanted my money back, immediately and all at once. After this she stopped replying again.

After a few days I thought I should remind her that I could still very well go and have a chat with the police, and as it turns out, that same trick worked wonders again. I got a new response, and this time he signed it using a different name. Yes, he. It came as no surprise really; I was fairly certain the identity was assumed. This time he told me he had been robbed in Spain. His writing was quite scrambled, so I'm not sure if he means to say that this was the reason for his dire situation, or if it happened afterwards. I'm not even sure he remembers what he previously told me. At any rate, it's plain to see I can't trust anything he says. Once again he asked me if he could give me my money back in instalments, much like a hired purchase. I told him that a hired purchase usually entails a purchase, one of which he obviously hasn't made, and that I really can't afford to wait for my money to be doled out to me in portions.

Now, he seems to have dropped the instalment plan, but is asking for three weeks to get ahold of the money. I've no desire to wait three weeks just to see if he'll keep his word, which is worth bugger all at this point. And of course, I've absolutely nothing to do with his being "robbed in spain" or whatever story he'll come up with next. But I'm not quite sure how to respond now. If I tell him I need the money by Monday or I'll file a report with the police, and he is bluffing and indeed has the money, and he actually repays me, then I'll be all set. However, if I do that and he doesn't actually have the money, then I've lost my leverage and the chances of being reunited with that money anytime soon, and the only thing I can do is hope that the police do their job, quickly.

So, any advice?

[b]TO BE CONTINUED[/b]

I've made a couple of status updates concerning this predicament I'm in, but I decided a proper thread was in order. So, some of you might have heard the beginning of this story, but for the sake of reading convenience I'm going to take it, once more, from the top.

Three weeks back I received a reply, via email, to a LTB ad I had posted for a Moog Prodigy. It came from a woman who said she had one she would be willing to part with for the price I had suggested. She didn't live nearby, but she could send the synth with a courier. This was only the morning after I had posted the ad, so I was excited to have found a seller so quickly, and she was very eager to respond to my questions and get the deal going. I absolutely hate waiting for deliveries, and can't stand sales that seem to trudge on, slowly, with no end in sight, so I'm always chuffed to find a seller who's willing to get it over with as quickly as possible. I've a feeling a few others on this forum might sympathise!

I asked her if there was any way I could be assured that the deal transpired according to the agreement, and she told me she could drop the synth off at the courier and snap a photo of the receipt before I made the transfer. If I didn't pay, she could just fetch it back. Since she was so accommodating I thought it would be nice of me to not bother her too much, so I decided to just pay her in advance. Of course, if this were someone else's story, I'm quite sure I'd start hearing the alarm bells right about now.

I am not, however, completely stupid (or so I thought), so I figured a few safety measures were in order before I parted with my £500. I looked her name up on Facebook and found a girl who indeed was a musician; more specifically a seemingly very bright, very non-shady young musician studying to be a doctor. I also asked for pictures and quickly received a couple of snaps of a nice looking Prodigy in a flight case. I did the usual reverse Google search and found they passed the test: no matches. They were, however, strangely low-res, but my then state of chuffedness quickly brushed that detail off as not important.

The first warning signs materialised in front of me as I had transferred the money and realised that she was supposedly already at the courier's, and I still hadn't given her my shipping adress. I quickly sent it to her. She replied that she was just about to ask me for it, as soon as she had made sure that the transfer had been completed. Maybe not entirely comforting, but at this point, I couldn't do much at all but hope for the best.

As it turns out, the best wasn't going to happen. The warning signs that had materialised earlier were now more or less hitting me in the face. I was given a tracking number for the courier which didn't work. This didn't seem so strange, as it could probably take more than a few minutes for the shipment to appear on the website, but I still craved some type of reassurance, so I asked her for a photo of the receipt. She replied that she hadn't been given one. Now that did seem a little strange. I asked her for an estimated delivery date, and got a reply the next day saying that it should be with me that day (Friday the 25th) or the following Monday. Well, it didn't show up that Friday. It didn't show up on Monday either. As you've probably fathomed by now, I still don't have it, and neither, in fact, did she have it.



[b]INTERMISSION[/b]

Reminds me of Pete Shelley's broken Starway guitar!

[quote name='MoJo' timestamp='1479639311' post='3177966']
I was going to say, isn't a considerable part of the 'stingray tone' down to it's electronics? I had a passive OLP some years ago. It had the pickup in the correct position but sounded nothing like a stingray
[/quote]
There's another obvious factor I missed completely. And again it depends on what you think of when you think of Stingray tone. They have a 3-band as standard nowadays, right?

[quote name='Bassassin' timestamp='1479583084' post='3177678']
Anecdotally, it was a simple typo - the Roadstar range was meant to be called "Roadster II".

Would make sense if it was true, and odd Japlish mistranslations are not without precedent - if not for a similar spelling error, Nintendo's platform-jumping simian videogame mascot Donkey Kong would have been boring old Monkey Kong. Which realistically would have been a bit less confusing.
[/quote]

I've heard the typo explanation as well, but as you stated, close sources seem to be, well, elusive. If it was a typo, I'd argue it wasn't that bad; Roadstar does have an air of confidence to it.

That Donkey Kong story is a bit of a myth though, it seems. Apparently Miyamoto-san was actually looking for a word that meant something along the lines of "silly" or "foolish". So, in reality, it was probably closer to being called Ass Kong than it ever was to being called Monkey Kong!

The Roadsters belong to an earlier line of instruments and were not sold alongside this particular model. At this point they were all called "Deluxe", so it doesn't really refer to anything in particular. There's also the interesting question of why the Roadster series' successor was called Roadstar II. There is no Roadstar I, nor is there a Roadster II. That's Japanese brands for you!

Sting is another famous user of the Musicians. In 1985 the Musician MC924 was indeed quite similar to the RS960. Both had the same pickups and a similar body, although the Musician had a more dramatic arch and was made out of ash, while the Roadstar was made out of basswood. The main difference throughout their lifespans was of course that the Musician was neck-through, and the Roadstar bolt-on.

^Very true. I was focusing on the pickup in isolation, but taking the construction into consideration, the differences could be even bigger. It's hard to say just how much the tone changes with a different bridge, neck construction etc. but eventually there are several reasons why not all basses sound alike.

Oh, and by the way, bubinga, Enfield Guitars do make something not entirely dissimilar to your hypothetical bridge-to-neck pickup. They share some similarities to the Musicman Reflex circuits drT mentioned, as well. I haven't tried one of their basses myself but I've only heard nice things about them.

This would all depend on your definition of Jazz and Stingray tone, of course, but I suspect a Stingray and a Jazz pickup are just too different in construction for those two tones to exist within the same pickup. Even superficially they aren't exactly similar; a Jazz pickup doesn't look a whole lot like a Stingray pickup sawed in half.

Depending on the era of the pickups we could be dealing with different magnets, different wire, different everything between the two really. And of course the pole pieces will always be different. The pickup placement certainly makes a difference as well, although looking at images of a Stingray and the Lakland, the bridge pickup does seem to be very similarly placed.

Anyway, minor variations do make a difference when added up, so I think a reasonable approximation is as close as you're going to get, and depending on your needs, that might just be good enough.

That's an RS950! The non-humbucker versions you've seen are slightly earlier models. The Roadstar series went through a few different incarnations, with some differences between the export and domestic models, as well. The XLR is indeed a modification. I was looking for a Roadstar II (quite intensely) a few months back, but then ended up with a newer Soundgear. I have to say, looking at this thread I can just almost feel the GAS coming back. Here's a scan of an old brochure with a bit of info: [url="http://www.ibanez.com/anniversary/expansion.php?cat_id=102&now=2"]http://www.ibanez.co...at_id=102&now=2[/url]

So anyway, congrats on your lovely new Ibanez! Might I ask what you paid for it, and what the original asking price was?

Welcome! (I might not be the best to welcome you, though, as I'm new too!)

I don't know too much about the Korean models, but it's definitely from the 90's, or possibly newer. Since enthusiasts usually focus on the Japanese models, they are more well documented around the internet. Hopefully someone else here might be more knowledgeable than me about this particular model. Anyhow, it's not going to be worth a whole lot. If you like it you should certainly keep it, as I don't think you'll be making a profit if you sell it.

It does seem your working tubon must have been quite significantly modified, then. It was certainly made to be a bass instrument. From my recollection it sounds quite reedy, more like a bass clarinet than a tuba, in fact. You should definitely get the other one working! I think you're correct about the Beatles thing, as well.

EDIT: [url="https://youtu.be/A9R6bqcBPfc?t=16s"]Here's a video[/url] of a dashing Ralf Hütter in a leather jacket bewildering/boring/exciting an audience with a tubon in 1970. I really think it has a sort of band pass quality to it.

Surely everyone recognises the mighty tubon!
Actually, I used to be a big Kraftwerk fan, and Ralf Hütter played one on their first record (the closest thing to a synth on that album), and I also have a bit of a penchant for analog synths and old and arcane musical equipment in general. I had thought, for some reason, that the tubon also had some type of connection with Harald Bode, but it appears I was wrong on that one.

Good lord, is that a tubon?

Am I crazy or doesn't that bass have a control cavity?

Also, to get that ultra-high end, you'd want as much headroom as possible. And maybe use the DI out on your amp instead of the cab, as even relatively bright cabs do tend to round out the sound a bit.

Sounds like a pretty normal clean, modern, slap-happy tone to me. In the video annotations he mentions he's using an "Audere Audio" pre-amp, but I'd assume you could get something similar with most hi-fi styled pre-amps or Class D amps, which do seem to be dominating the market. Should be fairly easy to dial in with common equipment, and of course, in agreement with the previous speaker, in every way the opposite of what I'd consider good tone! (Go for it, though!)

I think it's quite elegant in a way but it does seem strange that they would make the body out of figured ash and then top it off with a wood that looks just like mahogany. It's certainly no more boring than a solid colour, though. The price, however, is a joke, obviously.

Personally I'd rather have the Status than the Dingwall (and Kestrel), and I'm assuming you feel the same way since you're considering the offer. Going purely by market value, though, he would certainly be the real winner of the two of you. Is he looking to sell it, or was he interested in the Dingwall specifically? Who initiated the negotiations? Since he's looking to trade his bass for two others, I've a feeling he isn't desperately wanting for your particular duo, and might just end up selling one or both shortly after the deal's been made. If he agrees to sell it, that might be preferable for you, provided you're given enough time to sell the Dingwall.

I'd say it's quite steep indeed. As you can see, this particular bass was 65000 yen in 1989. Adjusted for inflation, that's about £560. Very few Japanese instruments, or any instruments, for that matter, actually increase in value as time goes by. Going back far enough, a US Fender certainly does, but this is a Japanese Fender, and not one of the more famous models either (like the Squier JV series), so unless this particular model has some special connection I've missed I would not recommend paying more for it now than you would've payed for it back in the day.
In fact, there's one on eBay right now (from a Japanese seller) that's priced at just under £400. Even with shipping and import charges that might still be cheaper than the local one you've found.

The reduced number of strings got me thinking about what might just be the most revolutionary bass design ever:

To me it just seems like another variation on the general boutique blobiness we've seen in recent years, albeit slightly more angular. What strikes me as more interesting is the number of strings on the bass in the timelapse video.

I've always associated the Stagg name with the very bottom of the barrel, but in all honesty I've never tried one myself. The body is supposed to be solid, though, which is good to know. If you can find a nice picture of the sunburst one you might even be able to tell how many pieces of wood they use. The hardware and pickups will most likely be utter rubbish, but you're probably OK with that fact if you're going to be modding it anyway. My main worry would be the fit and stability. A setup upon arrival is of course to be expected, but I've no idea for how long those necks stay in shape.

Sometime in the future I'd like to own an old EB3, but I can't really see myself using it for a whole lot. In fact, it would mostly be because of the Cornick connection. I've tried one of the newer SG basses but it didn't feel particularly great to me, and of course they don't have the interesting 5-way (I think) chicken switch.

Have you got a CITES permit for that top?