Bassassin

KD Lang was the star, no doubt - wonderful voice, even if she does appear to be transforming in to some sort of lesbian Elvis. I quite enjoyed Fleet Foxes - very much their own thing, if that makes sense, and reminded me of the power of a good, overblown vocal harmony arrangement. Hugh Laurie - clearly a fine musician but singing was a mistake - a stuffy English comic actor trying to sound like an old black American guy from the 30s just seemed like a comedy skit with no punchline. So along with Hugh, the rest of the show was varying levels of wince & cringe. Vintage Trouble were OK, nothing special but played well, the singer has the voice & the moves, but the rest of the band had plainly been practicing their gurning & Twitchy-Dancing in front of the mirror. It became like a themed evening of trying too hard - the ranty bloke with the two drummers was just awful, and as forced & contrived as any manufactured boy-band, and the special needs guy in the other band needs to learn when to just sing, rather than doing the same little trick all the time. Sad fact is that if Jools is the last gasp of live music on UK TV, maybe it would be for the best if someone just stuck a pillow over its face. Jon.

These got discussed at length a couple of months back, with much head-shaking & eye-rolling at the price: [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=118571"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=118571[/url] I like the look of it, but pay 2 grand for it? Would I 'eck as like. J.

First of all, anecdotally the difference between Roadsters & Roadstar IIs is just a typo - it was originally meant to be Roadster II, but the mistake stuck. All it really is was an update to the Roadster range, which had been around since the late 70s - they were never available at the same time. Anyway this is a Roadstar II RB850, but the switches are a bit confusing, and it's a pity the Gallery site doesn't tell us the year of manufacture, which is part of the serial number. The catalogues I've found show slight variations between the '84 & '85 models (smaller fretboard dots on the later ones) but none of them have switches. Apparently they had coil splits activated by push/pull pots, so it's possible the pots have been replaced with standard ones & the switches were added to retain that functionality. However the Roadstar II range first showed up in '83. The RB850 isn't in the '83 catalogues, but the basses that are shown have switches for coil splitting etc. So perhaps this one's an earlier iteration that predates the push-pots. But if it is, why does it have the later, small fretboard dots? No straight answers then, but these are damn fine basses, & the price is surprisingly not that much more than you'd expect to see on an Ebay listing. Jon.

I would compromise my principles sideways, with a greased-up barrel cactus, if the money was right. J.

It is JapCrap - one of these Guyatone-made early 70s starter jobs that were sometimes badged Jedson in the UK. Here's a guitar version: [url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Teisco-Jedson-Tele-69-74-collectable-Made-Japan-/190525622865"]http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Teisco-Jedson-Tele-6...n-/190525622865[/url] Nothing to do with Teisco. J.

I think I'd break the law a bit. In secrecy, if it's punishable by death. Jon.

Actually Mr DelVar's correct, as he usually is - I was - perhaps unreasonably, perhaps not - suggesting it would be advisable for Mr Conklin to change his name. It's not without precedent, if old Uncle Leo hadn't made the decision to Americanise his own handle when launching his range of new-fangled electromatic instuments, we'd all be playing Mudguard Precisions, and then how stupid would we all feel, eh? J.

[quote name='warwickhunt' post='1208920' date='Apr 23 2011, 08:54 AM']However for the ultimate PJ you get this... [/quote] Nah, this is what you want - 1982 Washburn SB40 Vulture II: Except you can't have it 'cos it's mine. J.

[quote name='el borracho' post='1209146' date='Apr 23 2011, 01:23 PM']It sold for £375 Time I listed mine I think!![/quote] Depends if you're prepared to fib about it being made in the US, now you know that it ain't! The Epiphone name on a vintage instrument of any origin does help a lot, though. J.

No. I'm sure they're excellent quality instruments, but they look ghastly and have a stupid name. And I'm fundamentally very shallow. Jon.

Amazing. Is there really money to be made by ruining guitars for cretins? Jon.

The bass on Ebay is a Matsumoku build and apart from the headstock shape would have been identical to the Aria 5120 pictured [url="http://www.matsumoku.org/models/aria/hollow/sem/semi.html"]here[/url]. The model number's a little bit of a giveaway. The EA-260 in [url="http://www.matsumoku.org/models/epiphone/catalogs/1974/pg5.html"]this 1974 Epi catalogue[/url] would appear to be basically the same. This bass is also pretty common in the UK branded as Commodore - I think a couple of BCers have or have had them. The pickups on the Ebay one aren't original & I don't think the bridge is either.. Like all the Japanese factories, Matsumoku built to order, & if the customer requested that there was no MIJ stamp then that's what they'd get. Jon.

[quote name='Doddy' post='1208110' date='Apr 22 2011, 11:26 AM']Just as an aside,I know that Yamahas official line now is that the BB stands for 'broad bass',but I seem to remember that the bass was originally designed in conjunction with Bunny Brunel,hence the name. Am I alone in thinking this?[/quote] Interesting, this (if you're an anorak like me, anyway) - "Broad Bass" is exactly the sort of Japlish acronym you'd expect, but doing a bit of Googling it seems Brunel was involved in the development of the BB3000 fretless, which he apparently still uses. However according to [url="http://www.yamaha.co.jp/product/guitar/archive/"]Yamaha's guitar database[/url] the BB range debuted in 1977 with the BB800, BB1000 & BB1200 models - the BB3000 appeared in 1982, so no idea if BB would have been involved in those early models. It's an incomplete archive (my 80s BB400S ain't on it) and since it's in Japanese I have no idea if Brunel's mentioned in the text - stick it through Babelfish & the result is a part-translated mishmash of Kanji & references to mosquitos & the Soviet Union. Really. Anyway, on topic - I'm definitely favouring P/J configurations at the moment, loads more versatile than single P or J/J. Jon.

Academic since Spotify's been borked on my PC since the last update anyway. I used it a lot at first but have to say I haven't really missed it much, so they can do what they want, not really interested any more. This looks like a misstep though & I strongly suspect it'll be the end of Spotify. But so what, eh? Jon.

[quote name='LukeFRC' post='1207046' date='Apr 21 2011, 01:32 PM']it looks like someones covered the top horn with their s.... actually lets not go there in a family friendly forum...[/quote] Presumably it's a Jizz Bass. J.

[quote name='Mihales' post='1206413' date='Apr 20 2011, 09:00 PM'][/quote] These guys might be able to help: [url="http://www.ibanezcollectors.com/forum/"]http://www.ibanezcollectors.com/forum/[/url] It's mostly concerned with vintage 70s & 80s stuff, but they do have a basses section & a contemporary electrics section, so you could try there. Jon.

As far as JapCrap J copies go, I'd say this is a bit of a bargain: [url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=220771735382"]£79 BIN[/url] Jon.

Still worth watching because it's live* music, even if 90% of it is wincingly awful guff. Jon. [i]*Unless those Glasvegas tossers have set a precedent, in which case I'm out.[/i]

That's working now! Nothing like that in my parts drawer, but similar things do pop up on Ebay, in fact quite a few on the 60s-era JapCrap guitars had semicircular bridge covers, dunno if they'd fit a bass though. Spotted this last night, although it's probably a bit too square: [url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Vintage-Jedson-Kay-Tiesco-japanese-Bass-tailpiece-/260771499841"]http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Vintage-Jedson-Kay-T...e-/260771499841[/url] Either way you'd have to make new holes for it - is it a vintage or modern Burns? Seems not so bad if it's a new one. J.

Another vid: Bit of a pop choon, this one - a song about monkeys, confusingly called Monkeys. This is actually the last complete song I composed myself - music, lyrics & arrangement, everything since has been a collaboration of sorts. J.

Sorry Mr Pow - link ain't working! J.

[quote name='Bloodaxe' post='1205148' date='Apr 19 2011, 08:13 PM']Another factor in all of this is people's individual learning style. I have great difficulty with 'learning for the sake of learning', but [u]not[/u] when I have a focussed application. I suspect that a good number of the 'antis' here are in the same boat & no amount of proselytising by the 'pros' will change that. Pete.[/quote] I think the one thing I disagree with about that is that there are no "Antis"! There are people who, for whatever reason, do not read and are (largely) happy with their playing & progress. I think it's fair to say that none of them have suggested that it's the readers who have got it wrong and are nothing but lazy wannabes with no serious commitment to music. The negativity and bias in this thread has been strictly one-sided. I suppose it's interesting that I started out learning to read music for the sake of it - the vagaries of the 16-year-old attention span soon made me realise I progressed faster & had a lot more fun playing along to Rattus Norvegicus. If I'd persisted & learned the skill, I very much doubt I would regret it - although I'm not sure what I'd ever have actually [i]done[/i] with it. J.

I made a similar suggestion last year when I was after a new rig: [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=75727"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=75727[/url] The idea made perfect sense to me, but for reasons I'm not clear about most other people seemed to think it was a rubbish idea, and the fact that most For Sale posts still seem to be located in Mysteryland would probably suggest that it was. Maybe I'm thick, but I still can't work out why. Jon.