Paul S

I bought Mark's Ashdown ABM amp. He actually drove from SW London to deliver it himself. Total gent from start to finish and an absolute pleasure doing business. I look forward to next time, Sir.

Go West/ Nick Kershaw/ Carol Decker at the Cliff's pavilion last night in a 'we've been doing it for 30 years' type tour. Carol Decker had a 30 min slot (fnarr etc) the others mixed and matched all night. Been a fan of Go West all that time and they were as good as they have ever been. Never seen Carol Decker - she still belts it out but probably 30mins was the limit of listenable-to material. Nick Kershaw was a revelation - a surprisingly small man, especially when he walked on stage with Peter Cox, but huge stage presence, charisma and musicianship. Another top evening's entertainment.

Simple Minds at the O2 last night with the Stranglers doing a 50 minute support. Great night's entertainment! Sound was spot on for both. I know Simple Minds are a great live band as I saw them twice last year and they were just as good this time. But I was unsure what to expect from the Stranglers, especially with only 2 original members. Shouldn't have worried, they played like they meant it - JJB certainly hits you in guts as soon as he starts up!

I wondered if you'd read that

Whilst on subject of Katana basses, I put a Fender Original pickup in mine a couple of days ago and used it at rehearsal last night. Wow! A mod that is definitely worth doing.

I got one of these 'high impact' cases from Maplin for my TC Electronic head - [url="http://www.maplin.co.uk/p/large-high-impact-case-with-pre-cut-foam-interior-n14gr"]http://www.maplin.co.uk/p/large-high-impact-case-with-pre-cut-foam-interior-n14gr[/url] -I can fit the amp, leads and also the footswitch in it. Not as cheap as some of the ali ones but extremely sturdy indeed - I have actually stood on top of it (I weigh around 100kg).

I just missed seeing bands like Sabbath, Led Zep and Deep Purple in the period 1970-73, which I reckon was about the best time for any of those.

Absolute steal - better end of the quality scale 80s MIJ Squier for so little - I have one and it is a lovely lovely thing. Someone should be smiling today!

Above waist level? This fella used to, don't suppose many people pointed and laughed.

Fitted them just now. As predicted the silks were overhanging the nut by a fair bit so I took the bridge off and mounted it as little further up on the body. No detrimental effects, it seems, and the strings fit just nicely now. They feel great and, at home level practice, sound much better than the mis-matched strings that were on there when I bought it. Have to say they look pretty cool too. [attachment=205618:eub1.jpg] Edit - i don't mean I moved the bridge, do I. The tailpiece.

In the current trend of posts - how about gigs you went to full of expectation that left you feeling really deflated at the end? Always going to be subjective, of course, but I think for me it was Joe Bonamassa some years back at the Royal Albert Hall. At that point I had most of his back catalogue and a live DVD at Rockpalast and was excited at the prospect of seeing someone who was widely being lauded as the 'new' talent in blues guitar perform live. It was dire. How they managed to get such a poor sound at the RAH is beyond me, but they did - only sorting it out around half way through. And it was all about Joe showing off his licks all night. All speed, no taste, no space, almost a different guitar for each track for Mr Bonamassa to masturbate with. Eric Clapton shuffled on to a 1 minute standing ovation, dusted off one of his bog standard, middle of the road solos and got another 2 minute ovation at the end. Paul Jones shuffled on and played what might well have been a blindingly good harmonica solo but Joe masturbated over it and you couldn't really tell. Did I say it was dire?

Average White Band at Royal Festival Hall. A masterclass of funk bass playing from Alan Gorrie and IMO as good as they have ever been without Hamish. Edit - a reformed Kokomo as support were pretty good, too.

I am rapidly going off Parcel Force. Some while back I bought a bass from Japan - 3 days from Tokyo to Parcel Force at Coventry where it sat for over w eek before getting rubber stamped for delivery. It arrived at my local depot, from where I had to pick it up, nearly a week after that. Was charged VAT and duty amounting to around 20% plus a £13 handling fee. Compare and contrast to more purchases I have made from Japan using DHL. Both dispatched from Tokyo on a Monday, emailed to request payment of duty online (which amounted to around 10%) on a Tuesday and arrived on my doorstep on Wednesday. Currently I am waiting for a bit I bought from Spain to arrive via Parcelforce. It was posted on 28th October in Spain using Correos, arrived in UK 2nd November. Still a no show. I've tried to find out when they might get around to delivering it and have been told I should allow 15 working days. Unbelievable.

In view of all that I've just bought a set of Innovation Rockabilly strings - Bonners music store on eBay had them for £75 which seems a pretty good price. Thanks for the input! I'm going on holiday tomorrow so I won't get to try them for a bit but I'll report back once I've fitted them.

Thank you. Using similar dimensions from the Stagg, bridge to nut A = 41.5", tailpiece to bridge B = 12" , so A+B= 53.5". nut to tuning peg C = 5", or 2.5" to the start of the silk. From that, Innovation 3/4 and 7/8 are both the same size and would fit.

[quote name='karlfer' timestamp='1447324081' post='2906649'] Really glad to hear the smell diminishes, guess it's taking a while because they are always in their covers. [/quote] Leave them outside with the covers off, Karl - the smell will wear off much quicker.

Genz Benz Shuttle was the cleanest amp I've played through.

thanks for that! I will compare with what is currently on there.

While we are here, then - what tapewound strings do we know definitely fit the Stagg? I've emailed Pyramid custumer service to ask about string length but suspect I may as well have emailed my cat.

Small update - I played this through my gigging rig last night and it does sound rather nice as is. Bottom end suddenly flowered Perhaps not that vintage, but certainly got balls enough for my rock band.

Shameless plug laced with well meant opinion!... I have a Precision Lyte for sale at the moment - one of two that have been for sale in the classifieds for weeks, Mojobass is selling the other. These are active, P/J, Jazz neck and somewhere between 7 to 7.5lbs in weight. Proper Japanese quality Fenders for Squier money. The P pup is similar to but not exactly like a Precision, the Jazz similarly not exactly like a Jazz. The blend between them is a very nice dark but burpy tone.

Do they have a Phall range speaker? Or is the bottom end tikka?