Bassfinger

Fit a new jack soldered to suit the polarity.  Centre positive is more common place, bit guitar pedals seem to be t'opposite for some reason.  Decent PSU's allow you to switch the pooatiry.

Tom Sholz recorded almost the entirety of Boston's first album at home on his own, using only a session drummer and Brad Delp's vocals.  That not only kept him busy for a couple of years, it ended up making him a couple of quid too.  Perhaps a project such as this would keep your pecker up, and with modern computer sound processing techniques you'd have it so much easier than he did.

3 hours ago, Monkey Steve said:

Oddly timely - I've just been listening to the Jerthro Tull live in Den Haag in 1980 that comes with the Stormwatch remaster, and Pegg's bass is front and centre of everything (as is right).  Filthy tone - brilliant stuff

I know it's an unfashionable choice, but Stormwatch is my favourite Tull album.  Just sublime.

13 hours ago, Rexel Matador said:

Well, this build has slowed to a crawl because I decided to make custom pickup covers. It seemed a shame to use cheap black plastic in the middle of all the lovely wood.

One down...

...and now I have to do the whole process all over again. I really should have made them at the same time, but I wasn't entirely convinced it would come together!

My Y fronts just exploded at the sight of that! 😜

Justin Bieber will reveal that he is really Rob Halford of Judas Priest, and had done the whole thing for a bet.

Of course, its largely for nought if you can't emulate his style 🤯 As it happens, I'm not bad at it 😁

And the cherry on top went on today...a rosewood tug bar.  Can't rest my precious pinkies on piece of mere plastic, eh?

And she plays great.  The supposed G&L neck is very nice and true, and the frets well finished.  The bronze nut is maybe 0.5mm too high, not enough to bother doing anything with until it next needs new strings.  Capable of a low, buzz free action but I like it cranked a fraction higher.

The pickups are something else.  If the company slapped up some slick advertising they could charge 50 quid apiece for these and no one would feel short changed.  A warm, but very punchy tone, precise and articulate - a sort of hybrid vintage tone with modern edges. Not potted, but not at all microphonic like many cheapo pickups.  I run them on my other rig and still they impress me greatly.

Being a big lad I appreciate the slightly larger Jazz body, and the offset waist makes it very nice for playing sitting down.

I just intend to play it as much as possible now to get some real patina to go with the minor fake wrinkles I bestowed upon it, and I'm sure it won't be a hardship at all.

Heartbreaker, Led Zeppelin.

She's finished.  500k logarithmic pots have finally arrived.  All soldered together, hands trembling with excitement...and she sounds absolutely fantastic!

I use a compressor pedal live.  I don't run much in the way of levels, but it's there.  For me it's the audio equivalent of firing a sniper rifle instead of a long bow.

36 minutes ago, binky_bass said:

Hugely disagree.

The basses in question have potential, but they were so poorly 'set up' (or whatever better use of words there are) that the bass didn't shine to anywhere near close to its potential and just played like a dog.

I will not buy a bass brand new where I don't know (to at least some degree) what it is capable of. A: its foolish as you're essentially buying blind and B: to me it shows the shop has no real care over their trade.

Yes, of course set ups are subjective, but playing a bowed neck, a rattley fretboard, with dying batteries, crackly pots, biting strings, bad intonation etc etc are not subjective. 

The comparison to a car is quite apt, would you buy a car with four flat tyres, iffy breaks and a cracked windscreen? Doubtful.

Set ups are subjective, but there is a degree of 'set up' that will show case a bass's best side to 90% of punters, having £1500+ basses hanging from a wall that play like a piece of Far Eastern tripe does no one any favours.

That's your opinion, fair play.  However, with my big hands and long fingers the set up I personally favour would probably bring similar disdain were you to try one of my basses.

If they set a bass up that just happened to suit you and sold it in store, then itd need setting up differently to suit me without any doubt.

Do you always keep the standard strings? The monent you change them you're into setting it up yet again, the extent of fiddling required depending on the type of strings employed. Intonation will require setting up the moment different strings go on, so there's little point me demanding a shop set that up to perfection for me (u less they also fitted my strings too).

How do you respond to these two points above re set up?

Unlike inflating car tyres to the recommended pressures, setting up a stringed instrument is not a universal proposition.  Everyone's needs, tastes and requirements differ. Stuff like noisy pots is cheap componentry, and nothing to do with the set up.  Contact cleaner might help, but it won't make a poor quality pot a top quality one - that's hardly the shops fault, or within their reasonable ability to correct.

The OPs observations are all well and good, but set up is subjective.  The type of strings used, the amount of permissible fret buzz, and action are all individual choices.  If the shop had set them all up to suit  me then the OP would likely find it indifferent at best, and vice versa.

First thing I do on any new bass, and guitar prior to that, is bin the strings and fit my own favoured variety.  That immediately throws any existing set up straight out the window, so what the big deal?

It's like bicycles of any real value come with cheap saddles and pedals, or even no pedals at all, because they know the first thing the rider will do is fit their own favoured pedal system and seat.  If customers, be they cyclists or bassists, all performed with exactly the same ability, had exactly the same tastes, and exactly the same hands and bodies then a universal set up prior to sale would be super smashing lovely.  Unfortunately they don't, so it's pointless.  

I have my Butler lug my gear and set it up for me.  In fact, my female butler is a keen musician herself - I've heard that she likes a strum.

Stormbringer.

On 29/09/2019 at 13:08, 12stringbassist said:

Kiss could license the name Kiss to a band to perform using the name, but it wouldn't be Kiss. Not by a long way. They'd probably have to call it THE KISS SHOW. I could never see the show being staged like an actual Kiss show.

I haven't read mention of Thin Lizzy without Phil Lynott.
Scott Gorham said it felt wrong for it to continue with the Lizzy name after a while.

Slade have been continuing without Noddy Holder and Jim Lea since 1992.
In the world of Slade fans, this causes either much controversy or delight.

Some guys I used to be in a band with joined up with some other guys who had bought the name of a 60's chart band, (who were long defunct) for a couple of grand. The funniest thing I have ever heard is them announcing "This was our big hit in 1965" or whatever, then doing a hatchet job on it. It's a way to make living, I suppose - playing to people who have no clue about the original bands in social clubs and on holiday camp weekend bashes.

Thin Lizzy is a case in point.  Even worse than simply carrying on, Lynott had called time on the band and it had folded, so it wasn't even a continuation effort with simply less one more member.  I'm a big TL fan myself and can't help thinking the revival without Phil was nothing more than an attempt to milk money out of the name of the act while they still could.

Last nights was fun.  The venue was packed and loud so we cranked it out solid and loud to match the mood.  It was a private do for coppers and their families so despite the booze being consumed everyone was pretty well behaved.

Only real downside for me was that Sultans of Swing was on the set list, and I just don't enjoy playing it.  One of my favourite songs, but a dull bassline to play.

I like mine on the high side too - not complete and utter cheese cutter, but perhaps higher than most prefer it. Vive big hands with long fingers and I just feels right to me.  I'm glad there may even be some science behind it.

That looks fantastic!

Get the Knack, by The Knack.  I had to learn My Sharona for our set.  Not at all difficult (although it tires my pinky out somewhat) but it got me into the song and I realised then how blummen good it was, so Mrs Bassfinger downloaded the album for me.

For me its...

Jeffrey Hammomd-Hammond.  Not even a bassist, took uo the instrument when invited by his good friend Ian Anderson to join Jethro Tull.  Despite learning songs note for note by rote he could deliver some punchy fast lines, and knew how to be subtle too.  Also the guy had true rock style.  It was common back then for musos to smoke on stage, a la Page, Hendrix etc, but Hammond-Hammomd smoked a pipe on stage - style that only the eccentric British members of 70s Tull could pull off.  He eventually quit Tull, gave away his bass, burned the stripey suit, and never played again. 

John Paul Jones.  I'll go out on a limb and say circa Them Crooked Vultures.  Man, hes still got it.

Lemmy.  A rock God so awesome I even named my dog after him.  Ok, his playing wasn't technically exciting, but the guy was shamefully unconventional in his style and it just kinda worked.  Throw in a hefty dose of attitude, and there's a man who lived through his art. We're not worthy.

I don't go put of my way to copy other bassists style, but I wouldn't be unhappy to be compared to any of these bass gods.

All mine sound the same as I tend to use a pick.

Age doesn't make a classic - awesomeness does.  Stairway and Layla were classics from the moment they were first performed.  

Stuff that was rubbish when new is equally rubbish now.  The Allegro will never be a classic, except in any league of classic crap.

Jazz basses do all sound the same, that being AWESOME!

Perhaps the shiny headed hardman of Basschat could don their tight leather jackets and go and have a friendly chat with the rest of the band? 

I am Spartacus.