Bassassin

Tuners might be standard - there was a Maya 'deluxe' version with the only obvious difference being 'proper' open-gear units.

Mid 70s Japanese-made, probably by Chushin Gakki, would originally have had a big chrome truss rod cover, most common in the UK branded Columbus but sold with a thousand other brands, best-known would be Maya. Looks like tuners & control knobs have been changed, would have been sold with chrome ashtray covers, but 99% of those went straight in the bin. I think the scratchplate's original but pretty sure control plate's not. It should have an MIJ-stamped neckplate, if it's not then probably that's been changed too. I've had one - OK but not great, pickups a bit weak, body is butcher-block with front & back veneers, as mentioned earlier the black oversprays cover the lamination edges. Depends how cheap it is - I'm not really across values of this sort of stuff these days but I'd think a good one would probably fetch £200-odd. If it's massively cheaper than that then it's maybe worth a punt if you can be bothered!

Talbo = Tokai Aluminium Body. This seller = Talking boll0cks.

It's plainly the same bass & I'm 100% sure parts will be completely interchangeable - my point was that a high-end Japanese-made Aria version pretty clearly implies that the design's the property of Shiro Arai Co, rather than whatever 3rd party manufacturer made them. So IMO there are 3 ways this has happened: Aria has a deal of some sort with HB. The copyright/exclusivity of the design has lapsed - looks like the Aria version's out of production so that's possible. HB have done a dodgy deal with the factory and are flogging their own 'version', hoping that changing the headstock will keep them out of court! Never done a bulleted list on BC before! Anyway, maybe if it's point 3, we should all buy two (at least), lock them in a vault & wait for them to be worth a fortune after the LAWSUIT!

Custom Shop Bass Of Doom copy, innit? The meticulously-replicated wear and tear was achieved by throwing it in the very same skip Jaco chucked the original in. (Allegedly.) Played one of these in a shop years ago, it didn't motivate me to part with an insane amount of money for it, or make me sound like Jaco.

The plot thickens when you notice that the HB JJ headstock is almost identical to the Aria IGB's, only reversed! WHAT CAN IT MEAN???

That is very close, now you mention it. TBH when Aria launched these I was a bit disappointed they didn't use the original Matsumoku-era design, very elegant shape. The fact these new HBs are the same bass as the Aria RSBs is interesting & I think there has to be some sort of collaboration between Arai Co (Aria parent company) & HB/Thomann. On the other thread (which I hadn't read/noticed before this one was posted!) there's speculation that the design is the property of the manufacturing factory, probably in China, and therefore available to anyone who wants to use it - but the high-end versions of the RSB designs are, like many Aria designs, Japanese-made & with price tags to match: Think we even had a pink one on here in Basses For Sale a couple of years back.

It's the current Aria RSB with a different headstock: Looks like they'll be a fair bit cheaper, too. Which is nice.

Gougers are going to be all over that.

Happy to help! These are popular basses around these parts (which is why I was surprised it hung around as long as it did), if you do a search there are a few different threads about them. Up to you if you strip it, but these are pretty rare vintage basses these days, and that would affect resale value in the future. I would definitely do something with the fingerboard though, maybe take it back to the wood & epoxy it. With the sound you're looking for, a finish that would handle roundwounds without too much damage would be worth thinking about.

Not any more, inclined to think I might be done with it. My last band started in the mid 90s as an original recording project with me & the singer/co-writer, grew into a band which gigged a lot, achieved very little and ultimately ran its course. Now things have gone full-circle, me & singer are (very sporadically) writing & recording again with no consideration to playing the music live. This is surprisingly liberating as we don't have to be restricted by what we can realistically reproduce live, and without the cat-herding chore of trying to arrange rehearsals or gigs.

I strongly suspect there's a good collector's market for Hoyers. It's not the most well-known brand on the planet, but this is hardly a garden-shed one-off. I'm pretty interested in vintage guitars from the 70s/80s era and have seen a good few Hoyers, and they do command good prices. I have never seen this before, had no idea this model existed, and I think it's likely to be a high-value instrument. Please don't try to modify it - that will destroy its value & collectability. Just had a quick look & there's a Hoyer FB group, this would be a good place to enquire about your bass & try to get some idea of its value - https://www.facebook.com/groups/139968829374228

I'd try fitting the original pickup (not just the cover) and wire the two pickups to a stacked volume pot. That'd probably be fairly raucous.

There's a lot of love for Sire MM V7s around these parts: https://www.thomann.de/gb/marcus_miller_v7_alder_4_fl_bmr_2nd_gen.htm I do like mine to mwaah (for me, that's sort of the point!) but the active EQ (switchable) means it's capable of more aggressive tones & would probably do what you want. Mine's a 1st gen and the current ones are apparently even better. Also just remembered, there's a 1980 Ibanez RS940 Roadster fretless in the Basses For Sale section - I have the fretted version of the same bass (RS924) and these can be very aggressive sounding, thanks to a very hot J pickup, mine reads about 12.5k. Also feature a switchable active EQ. Could be worth a look.

Forgot that this thread started as an early discussion of YT stunt bassists. While new & different techniques are always interesting & worth investigating as an exercise, I think not liking what it actually sounds like is very much the point. For all the clever technique in the world, the electric bass guitar is, in my view, not naturally suited to being a solo instrument. Someone on here (OK, it was me) once observed that bass solos tend to fall broadly into two areas of either frenzied, frenetic clattering or insipid, anaemic blooping.

Interesting to read my own comments 15 years on. Back to not playing in a band, never say never but right now I don't really anticipate returning to gigging. So as a consequence bass has taken much more of a back-seat again (although I'm quite enjoying messing around with fretless) and music's once more a composing/recording affair. Not really too focused on improving technique as a result, but 'good enough' is good enough to be able to compose & play what I think the song requires. Which is still typically too many notes in too short a space...

Anyone who'd heard Victor shouldn't be remotely surprised it's nowt like Rush.

Have the album but not got around to giving it a listen yet. The two tracks I've heard are great, one very darkwave/electro & the other blatantly channeling Type O Negative! Who'd a' thunk Lerxst would join/form a Goth band?

Some great songwriting, but for me that was the album where I lost touch with them for a few years. Maybe a production/management decision but it sounded like the album was a deliberate attempt to dilute the band for US market palatability - Stuart adopting a forced-sounding, mid-Atlantic nasal vocal style & AOR radio-friendly production wasn't what I expected, or wanted to hear. I'd seen them at the Astoria in December '87, when they played a few tracks from the forthcoming album (I remember Peace In Our Time & Thousand Yard Stare), which sounded phenomenal, but seemed so watered-down when they were recorded. Thinking about it (and apropos of very little) that was the last London gig I went to before I moved to Scotland.

To my ears BC were initially very much a post punk/celtic rock band with a full-on prog rhythm section - Butler/Brezicki were phenomenal and a massive part of the sound. Early extended, multi-part songs like Porrohman & The Crossing really show that Adamson wasn't afraid to get a bit proggy! Bit unfair to dismiss The Skids (assuming that's who you mean!) as an 'awful punk' band - while a lot of their debut Scared To Dance has its roots in that style, both Days In Europa & The Absolute Game move well beyond the limitations of the genre, and I suspect a lot of the early BC material would have made up the next Skids album had Stuart not left. I'd certainly recommend giving them another listen, particularly TAG - some superb, atmospheric songs like A Woman In Winter & Arena - and Stuart reprised the riff from Out Of Town (with a few differences) on Tall Ships Go, on Steeltown. Jobson was never a 'conventional' singer but he had a hell of a set of pipes on him (as well as being a bizarre and intriguing lyricist) and you can hear his influence on Stuart's singing.

That Aria's the spit of mine, which I had new in 1984! Apart from mine, I don't think I've seen another blue/black burst outside of a catalogue, very uncommon finish. This was my main gigging bass up to the late 90s, by which point it had developed a severe & irreparable neck twist. It's currently wearing an RSB Straycat neck which is not a perfect fit or of the same proportions, so it's nothing like as nice a player as it was originally. Still the second most versatile passive bass (after a Peavey T40) I've ever played, thanks to the plethora of switching options. I live in hope of a good replacement RSB Deluxe neck turning up!

In fairness, Bruce is all over the shop for the first 3 or 4 bars!

Seemed like a good idea at the time - my band was performing some long-ish compositions which would have benefited from fretless in some sections. Never even made it to a rehearsal as our drummer emigrated & was never replaced. Now it's nothing but a (massively heavy) albatross around my neck...

Love that massive centre stringer - like the Fujigen/Ibanez Fakers on steroids!

I was at that gig - first time I saw BC, if I remember at that point they'd only released the Harvest Home & Fields Of Fire singles. I was a massive, massive Adamson fan - he was a unique guitarist and an incredibly gifted songwriter, and probably still my single biggest influence as a composer. It's one of my great regrets that I never saw The Skids, but I saw BC many times between '83 and '96. Got to meet him briefly in 1994 (they did an acoustic set in Edinburgh HMV to promote an album release) and he seemed such a pleasant, genuine soul, appearing flattered (and a bit surprised!) when I mentioned how much I rated him as a guitarist & writer. A month or two ago I came across this on YouTube, completely by accident. BBC Radio recording of their gig at Hammersmith Palais in 1983 - the second BC gig I went to. Had no idea it existed!