Stub Mandrel

Absolutely! My brother recently picked a 1963 one up for £2,400 because the body had been professionally refinished (and the nitro crazed) to cover up a past bodge fitting a tremolo. Absolutely gorgeous to play and the descriptions of the P90 sound above are spot on. Saw him gig it with Stonehouse the night he got it. That's a Flea bass through an SVT on teh left.

Looks like plastic.

Yes. I hate being a tyre-kicker. I generally will only try instruments if I am making a reasonable purchase: strings, gig bag, pedal - not a pick! Or if invited - downside of this is that it can lead to 'unplanned expenditure'.

Should be easy to get it rewound. As long as the wire gauge and number of turns are the same, it will sound the same. BUT it's probably a break near where the wire enters the coil and it may be repairable without a rewind. My experiencing of my own SS bass an playing some of these 24" specials is that decent new SS strings should solve your floppiness issue.

If you can get 150 hours community service and a £350 fine for throwing a milkshake, what are the police going to do about all the people who lob pints of amber nectar at crowds? I demand action!

I get really wound up by screw holes. My 70s p-bass copy has two holes for a thumb rest under the e-string by the bridge. When I fitted a new scratchplate I decided to move the rest back to the proper (upper) position. Now I have two holes looking at me. I have two spare thumb rests. Should i fit a second. Oh no! Should I fit a bottom one as well?

Anyone her who has only been to post-2000 festivals really can't moan about toilets! This is a documentary about Glastonbury 1986... My best Festival memory is the Mutoid Waste Company's 'Carhenge' and Mad-Max-style lorry cutting a swathe through the crowds powered by a blue guy with a mohican on the back beating out a galley-rhythm on a pair of oildrums.

I know these things because I was in a band called Head in a Helix 🙂

I used to have an Arion one, many years ago (still have the cardboard box it was in! - Now full of fishing lures and I haven't fished for over 20 years!) Bought a TC Forcefield - it was inexpensive but as well as compressing it sprinkled fairy dust all over the sound of the Peavey I was playing through a cheap amp in the shop. The tone improvement isn't as marked with my own gear, but it still works as a sort of 'better knob'.

I enjoyed Reading in 83, stayed away from thr front and watched the Agincourt Bottle effect from a safe distance. Glastonbury mid 80s , not sure if I went once twice or three times. Remember a handful of bands... abiding memory is the loos Various minor festivals, all good but some weird. Went to Cropredy about 10 years in succession late 80s to mid 90s - best of the lot, and family friendly. Now sad enough to be considering Rockstock. Might try this which combines two of my interests! http://www.solarsphere.events/

The pearl one makes your bum look fat.

Och! I couldn't stand on concrete for four hours! You need a foam pad!

Helices 😝

Mirror, of course!

I always think how could Gibson design such a beautiful shape, and then make it look cheap and nasty by barely even rounding corners? It just looks like it's been cut out of plywood like an old Kay...

Don't overthink it! It's a bit of fun not a scientific experiment. I couldn't swear to tell a start from telecaster by its sound, but plenty of times I've recognised guitarists like Hendrix, Clapton or Billy Gibbons on a recording, often in odd contexts, like Clapton on 'Think I'll Go Back Home', a Steven Stills track. And I can be fooled by imitators, like SRV doing Hendrix. So someone's 'signature' sound is rather like their voice. They can disguise it and others can imitate it*, but some people have one distinctive enough to be recognisable. *Chetaing is easy. I've got an Ibanez '335', plenty of gain, bridge pickup and back off the tone -bend a few pentatonic licks and you get instant Clapton. Or use a modelling amp...

Carol Kaye on Bass Fingering: I can't argue with that 🙂

This is the closest you can get, although I would not be surprised to see a Geddy solo album in the next year or two:

Sponsored by British Gas?

Does anyone remember the old screw-in TV legs? You used to get four plates with an angled boss on them and four wooden legs with tilting feet on the end taht fitted to a TV but you could use them to make coffee tables with any convenient slab of flat stuff. Thinking about dad's shop and looking at the Westone slab of wood body made me think....

I've been playing electronics since I was a kid (my dad had a shop selling /repairing electricals and renting TVs until the 80s) so if I change the electrics I'd want to do it myself - but in this case the pots are totally noiseless and the wiring is very neat.

Phil Alexander introduced a John Martyn track on Planet Rock. I've never heard 'Go Down Easy' (the DAB told me that) but my instant reaction was 'That's Danny Thompson!' Sure enough, a quick google and it's Danny. Who are the bass players you can spot just by their tone and style?

You mean... it's a smorgasboard! 🤣

If ou can cope with the surfeit of cool Hohner B2 basses weigh less than 6 1/2 lbs.