edwn

Update: I sourced a replacement switch and soldered it in. It switches between serial and parallel mode aka 'Dual Tone' as people here have kindly pointed out already.

UPPDATE: I have gotten the truss rod working. Quite simple technique actually -- loosen the strings and then bow the neck across your knee so there is no tension on the rod at all, and it comes undone easily.

Gave it a clean and set it as I thought best, gave it a general action setup as well, so it is all good to go ...

Love how the fingerboard dots/leds are slightly offset and so not hidden by the D string as they are on almost all 5 strings I have ever seen ... also the body wings are lovely bare ?ash I presume, lovely sounding tonewood of course.

Not for me, but almost worth learning how to play southpaw for ... 😃

.

On 10/04/2024 at 09:20, lowregisterhead said:

Lovely. What's the spacing at the bridge please? I struggled to find much info on the ETS site.

 

*Edit* According to the Marleaux site, it's 19mm.

Thanks for your question.   The saddles can adjust for width.

This photo is from when it was strung EADGC and shows about 19mm string centre to string centre. I ended up with the G and C strings are a little closer together than that. (I quite like variable/compound spacing so the acutal air gap / finger space between the strings is about the same)

The bass now has the original Marleaux BEADG set back on. I have adjusted the spacing to be 19mm across the board. They could go down to perhaps 18 and maybe up to 20; not sure.

Heh, if only it was a four (ducks) ... I loved the Lundgren pickup on my 8 string guitar, BTW I believe they are based in Sweden ... GLWTS ...

I purchased this lovely little 1968 bass from The Starving Musician, Santa Clara, California in 1986. It had obviously had a colourful life before I met it -- one wildy mismatched replacement tuning head, another one a little dodgy but which hangs in there once set. The bridge can't be original either, with hacksawed notches to keep the strings vaguely in line. Be careful not to bend higher up the E string as you will fall off the side of the neck ...

Yeah, the truss rod doesn't turn but I only tried for the first time today so the neck is perfectly playable. There are probably luthier tricks to loosen up a truss rod if you really need to. The pots are little crackly sometimes but only when you are actually turning them. There used to be a pickguard as you can see from the screwholes and the original catalogue entry that I found. Oh, and it has that vintage instrument 'aura' (OK, it smells old ...)

Despite all this, it's been one of my favourite basses to play. Currrently strung with Chromes (flatwounds) so smooth and slinky. The shortscale also makes it easy to play, and semi acoustic so no need for an amp -- just grab it and write a song on it.

Soundwise, it doesn't seem as plunky-thumpy as a Hofner, it's a bit more zingy, more towards a Mustang sort of sound, but not that either -- it is its own thing really.

Winston basses were made in Japan during the 60's at the Kawai Teisco factory which was known for high quality instruments and competed with the American market with their copies (known as the lawsuit era). Winston basses were a trading brand from the American importer Buegeleisen&Jacobson. This Kawai made model is one of the rare Klira copies, according to the 'cat's eyes' f hole which is quite unique and stylish. I would be surpised if there was another Winston 435 in the UK, so this is a chance to grab a unique looking and feeling bass.

Just like a Hofner it is fully hollow with a 30" scale. Unlike a 1968 Hofner, this is not for sale at upwards of £1500 ...

2.4 kg according to my kitchen scales. Yup, you have to tie it down otherwise it floats away ...

The rosewood fingerboard has 22 frets, including a zero fret and cool string tee/retainer thing.

Tatty original case as is de rigeur for a 56 year-old instrument.

Cash on Collection from Caterham, Surrey or willing to meet up up to an hour away.

£300 including hard case

Fantastic solid bass with great Japanese craftsmanship, 9-piece ash/maple/walnut body, three-piece maple neck and rosewood fingerboard.

Active circuit has a centre detent. Turn one way to boost bass, turn the other to boost treble. The passive tone keeps working during this, allowing for everything from Dub Reggae to the Stranglers.

Passive / Active switch. This also works as a kill switch if you take out the battery and use it passive for thirty years like I did. One final toggle switch has broken off. I never knew what it did (not much) but it could easily be replaced with a switchcraft replacement and a little soldering.

One small chip on the body (repaired) by the electronics cavity, and one little ding  on the side of the fretboard -- useful for finding the third fret by feel on a dark stage 🙂 Not bad for a 44 year old ...

Currently strung with Rotosound Swing Bass 66 which have been on for about 23 years so just starting to settle in. Another few years and they will be bedded in nicely. I have never touched the action, intonation or truss rod as it is always just right. It's been tuned once a year, whether it needed it or not. I just checked and gave the truss rod a quarter turn one way and then back again and it was very stiff but it does move.

4.3kg

19mm string spacing

One owner since new -- I bought this from Kingfisher Music in 1983 for £155 with the case which according to the Bank of England is £636.78 in today's money ... however feels much better quality than £600 instruments are today ... outstanding value ...

Cash on Collection from Caterham, Surrey or willing to meet up up to an hour away.

Wow! Just look at it! Lush ebony fingerboard, smooth and sensual matt neck-through, great pickups, gentle fan frets which take about one nanosecond to get used to, all hand crafted in Germany with master-grade precision and attention to detail by Gerald Marleaux. When you see video of their workshop, there's no computers or CNC in sight, just an old bandsaw and a lot of chisels and rasps ... serious, high quality German chisels and rasps of course ...  I love the grain of the maple neck and the ash wings, don't you? The way it just .flows. ...

This fine bass has to find a new owner as I'm reverting back to 4 strings (having been on a very happy decade-long journey through 8, 6, and 5 string basses). Purchased new from Thomann in 2023, I am obviously taking a major hit on this but hey ho I went in with my eyes open. Snap up a bargain while you can.

Body: Brushed Ash
Neck: Maple
Fretboard: Ebony
Controls: Vol, Pan, Active Bass Mid Treble, singlecoil/serial/parallel switches, passive/active switch
Neck: Multiscale 34-35"
Construction: Neck Through
Bridge: ETS
Tuners: Schaller

Case: Gig Bag (I know, WTF? But many high-end makers are only suppling gig bags these days, and it is a very nice one ...)
Colour: Satin Blackburst
Current List Price: £4694 (See options pricelist image)
Condition: Like New

Cash on Collection from Caterham, Surrey or willing to meet up up to an hour away.

@Hellzero nice bump for all the 6ers. Everyone should try one out sometime; Oteil says so so it must be true ...

@CamdenRob is right about Fodera -- I just counted 43 out of 445 newborns as 6ers -- that's 9.7%

Dingwalls at Bass direct who have more than anyone, are 7 out of 35 i.e. a genuinely whopping 20%

Interested in Ken Smith numbers as they invented the 6 string of course ... any way to count those?

I'm afraid that, statistically speaking, you 7 and 8 string folks are in 'the margin of error' -- a whopping 0.25% ... but you knew that already I think ... ☺️

@therealting Overall from 3 shops and 1182 instruments for sale both new and secondhand (a statistically useful sample size) we get: (drumroll)

4 string basses          67%

5 string basses         29%

6 string basses          4%

.... So it goes without saying that 6 string players are cooler than 96% of the bassplaying population, just sayin' .... 😎

I'd guess about half of these are people who want to sell their 6 and get a nicer one, and the other half are having a spring clearout having enjoyed their trial of a 6 (as everyone should do) but found that it's not for them.

I have previously monitored the retailers for their ratio of available 6s and it seems as low today as normal:

                guitarguitar: 10 6ers, 95 5ers and 337 4s ... (2% 6ers)

               bassdirect: 21 6ers, 101 5ers and 139 ...  (8% 6ers)

             the gallery   12, 152,  315        (2.5% 6ers)

So varying from 2% to 8% of available basses at those three outlets. Thus we would expect only one in 12 ads on basschat to be 6ers ...

Or we could say that the more advanced the forum, the more 6ers there are ... 😁

Put your nominations here for Bassline of the Year 2019 ...

(An award I made up just now, for fun)

Here's mine:

Well as this thread has a fantasy element to it, my sig bass would have fantastical technologies.

It would look just like a nice P bass on the surface, but with the following capabilities:

1. Upper C and F strings and lower B and F# strings would just appear instantly now and again, exactly when you need them, as if they had always been there. Making it a virtual 8 string. Sort of like the Room of Requirement in Harry Potter ...

2. The frets that are not on the note you are playing automagically sink so there is never any fret buzz.

3. It also senses what key you are in, and drops those frets (or part frets) that are not in the key so you never play a wrong note.

4. There are two knobs as on a normal P,  but volume is always full on and tone automatically adjusts according to the material you are playing. So in the case of my magic P one knob is variable fret height, from super jumbo to banjo and finally dropping all the frets, making it temporarily a fretless.

5. The other knob varies the string type from round to flat and all the shades inbetween.

6. Obviously the tuning gears are automatic.

7. The bass is spookily light until a long note is played, when it becomes really heavy and allowing massive sustain. The strap senses this and deploys instantaneous anti-gravity measures so you don't even notice the weight changes.

8. The cable has memorised all the great bass sounds ever and lets you DI with no amp. Actually maybe this already exists in the form of a Kemper ...

I enjoyed that video a lot, thanks!

Oh and +1 for wingbeat fantastic, highly recommeded.

I though I'd pretty much heard it all when it comes to basslines but I have been taken to school by the many amazing bassists used on the Scary Pockets and Pamplamoose funk covers.

They all have amazing groove and in-the-pocket-ness and it's a joy to watch the musicians nodding and smiling and giving cues and signals to each other as they play.

Here are my top picks for the bassists. Usually I have linked towards the end of the track when things are building up and getting fruity. All P-bass, all the time!

Sam Wilkes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cl7a9YztLN4
https://youtu.be/lTq0WLThOyY?t=101

Nick Lawrence
https://youtu.be/vO8aHX24o2g?t=89
https://youtu.be/VHtV3N8Otcs?t=123

Joe Ayoub
https://youtu.be/gRkgC6sUC-o?t=124
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y63m5JqCziE

And while we're here, Jacob Collier's recent bass playing is also becoming fascinating, in part because he is a keyboard player but he sure has interesting lines when he picks up a bass:

Jacob Collier
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nspqYGz-Z1s&feature=youtu.be&t=309

Rob Mullarkey plays in his band and is on fire with his Moollon in this section:
https://youtu.be/AzQKID8AUHM?t=426

Q: How many BassChatters does It take to change a lightbulb?

A: It takes: 

Four to say they'd be all over it if only it was a 5 string lightbulb ...

Six to ask how much the lightbulb weighs

Fourteen to say all you really need is a Precision lightbulb

Nine to say they used to have a lightbulb just like that, but it was an original '63 and how they regretted selling it

Three to say how great the service is at Bass Direct and how if they were in the market for a lightbulb, that's where they'd go

Seven to wonder how the lightbulb would sound if it had different capacitors

Eleven to say that the bulbs are less bright with flats but that's how they like it

Fifteen to say they have not changed their lightbulbs in over a decade ...

Oh, and one to actually change the bulb .... 🙂

wowza ... I wonder if those fingerboard lines could actually be an aid to navigation, rather like the ding on the neck on one of my basses is where G is ...?

But mostly it's doing my eyes in 😵

... amazing that andertons have 4 of these -- rare to see even one unlined high-end bass ...

I tried a lined fretless Squier Jazz in a shop the other day and really liked it but it had the exact same problem (could have been 8th fret of the D) -- the assistant gave it to the their tech to try and fix, though I wasn't optimistic ... especally as I could see the lump by squinting down the neck (it wasn't just a raised fret filler) ... after about 20 mins of hanging around the answer came back that it couldn't be fixed and was going to be sent back to Squier ... shame it it was otherwise nice, and on rounds, felt better than a USA on flats that was also in the shop ...

Very informative poll, thank you. I never realised there were quite so many combinations!

I suppose we can also say from this that 43 of us prefer unlined whilst 18 prefer lined?

And if we can say that, I wonder why the majority of new fretlesses for sale today seem to be lined?

So is this lined? The pictures are too small for me to see ... Thanks,

Great story, thanks for sharing.

Zero. Out of the house, anyway. I don't gig. I only write and record, and I use the Hof copy strung A to C for twiddly bits and chords the Westone for basslines. Recently got a 6er which may replace both, we'll see ...

So I use all of them.

@CamdenRob I've been looking for fretless and recently noticed Thomann had a fretless contra in stock now; they don't seem to come up very often ... https://www.thomann.de/gb/marleaux_contra_5_fretless.htm ... just in case you wanted to sell your car or kidney or whatever 😊