prowla

Thunder are a really good band and the bass playing is rock-solid. (They are great live and Danny dances like a dad at a party!)

But anyway, I think it's good that there are folks who are prepared to point out the non-genuine items, regardless of them being scams or errors.

You have to wonder who will pay decent money for one of those old lumps of plywood toot; they were utter crap when they were new and they're not going to have improved with age.

I saw them on the Lights Out tour (Newark) and Obsessions (Nottingham - met them after, except Schenker who went off and sat in his car). Used to play Doctor Doctor and Lights out in the band I was in at school!

Beware of buying used Fenders - it's a jungle out there! (I saw UFO on the Obsession tour!)

Distance selling or in shop?

In the end, if they put the customer in the position they were before they pressed the Buy button, then they've fulfilled their obligations. I think it's very easy for mistakes to creep in with online sites.

If it's an error, they don't have to; there was a thing with Dell a few years back where they refused to ship some laptops which were up at a plainly incorrect price.

I keep finding myself going back to take another look at it, and then stepping away shaking my head again!

Yep - god forbid everbody liked the exact same bass and wanted to play it in exactly the same way! Me, I've got Rics, Statii (4 and 5-string), fretless P-bass, a J-bass with a Warmoth body/Status Graphite neck, a 70s Zenta, a Music Man 5-string, Fender parts to build a Precision, a Warwick neck & parts waiting for a body (I've had a couple of Warwicks), and probably one or two others, and the one which inspires me is the Ric. But there is no one ring to rule them all and these definitive declarations that one is better than another are really just personal preference. For me, the Ric has the best looks, sound and neck of any bass, regardless of brand; it's a design classic like the Coke bottle, the Aeron chair, the E-type Jag, the MiniMoog, the Fender Strat, the Gibson Les Paul, the Kenwood Chef, the Leatherman knife, the Smiley logo, the Dualit toaster, and many things you'll find on an internet search which stand out from all of the other examples of their ilk. I think the only telling thing is where folks need to justify their preference by saying that brand whatever is better than a Ric.

My opinion of your opinion... The Ric is as modern as any piece of wood with 4 strings on it. I do have a couple of Status basses whose composition might make them more modern. I find the Ric comfortable to play and the neck is a delight, all the way up the fingerboard. The pickups are as powerful as is required; some actives may have higher output (eg. my John East), but that's what volume controls are for. The idea that Rics don't have a range of tones is amusing; it's just that their most well known one is better than anything anybody else does. The Ric's body is small compared to many instruments (eg. I have a Music Man and P- & J- basses.) and is thinner than pretty much all of them. The Rics have great hardware, finished to a high standard. The gripe about being easy to adjust is a red-herring - how many times do you adjust a bass once it's set up? The effort of taking it to a tech is more than that required to do the job itself. Rics are no heavier than a lot of other instruments, but I suppose if you contrast them with a violin bass (I wonder if that's where the myth came from?) then any solid bodied instrument would be. The Ric does its signature sound well, but the built-in mute, push/pull pot, stereo outputs, tone controls, option of playing fingers or plectrum give a wide range of options. The fact that a lot of people play Rics could be because a lot of people like playing Rics; they certainly helped bring the bass to the fore in music. So, whilst you are entitled to your opinion and what its its associated logic leads you to conclude, it differs from mine. I can't say that my logic would ever lead me to consider a Spector as an instrument of choice; it's not even in the contest, not something I would consider. (The only thing I would say a Ric is not so good for is slap'n'pop bass, but many folks don't like that anyway.)

Mine's an Elise - get it on an A-road and it just makes you smile. Same with a Ric - it's the only bass that does that for me. So, not wanting to push the car analogy too far, they have a similar effect on me. Current production Ric quality matches anything else. The style, feel and performance of a Ric matches anything else. If you don't like them, it's your personal preference, which is fine, but it's not fact. I can walk in to a shop and walk straight past all of the other brands, but I'll stop at the Rics. To me, most other mainstream basses look samey, be it Fender-alikes or Warwick/Spector/blobby looking ones. That's my preference.

(I just noticed that bumnote seems to have a rather exhilarating sports car too...)

Going with the car analogy, I'd put the Ric alongside a Lambo or Lotus: a bit rough around the edges but full of personality and capable of the most exhilarating performance in the right hands. (Then again, I've got a Ric and a Lotus...)

It's a bit like the brand of Rugby where if you're tackled you have to do a Mexican worm on the floor to show that you're trying to get up; if you don't, you'll get a penalty against you.

Rickenbacker's business model is fine; they're keeping the family business going and have hands-on control over the production. I don't see why they need to change.

I'm thinking of making an offer.

Well, well, well - I have a Warwick 5-string neck waiting for a body to turn up...

I admire the fact that he protects his brand, which he has to do or he'll tacitly accept them and thus lose the right to the intellectual property. Contast that with all of the "Fender"s and "Gibson"s you see about with fake logos. I quite like the vintage Japanese, etc. Ric copies, which have their own point in time and indeed I've had a couple of Matsumoku ones and currently have a Shaftesbury; I nearly paid good money recently for a John Birch a short while ago. However, I dislike the more recent Ric copies, including the Rockinbetters and Chickenbackers (with fake logos on their TRC). That said, I accept BC's position that they are better just keeping away from the whole thing.

Curious - I've just followed the link and it says "This product has been viewed 1 times."...

It's still got a Fender logo on it...