Saul Panzer

I'm capping myself at £3500, including the cost of getting it into the UK since my 2 planned choices are a custom Sandberg or a custom Bite bass which are both in germany/austria.

4 hours ago, bass_dinger said:

I am very curious to learn about this! I am thinking Stag Beetle larvae - am I right?

Among others yeah, I had 2 lines of Dorcus titanus breeding, tried to breed out specific color lines for some Mecynorhina flower beetles, a selection of sun beetles, Darklings, tried to breed some local Rove beetles, even managed to buy a pair of Allotopus golden stag beetles but couldn't breed them (could've brought a nice mid range bass for the cost of that pair alone).

I'll generally get new stuff if it's easily available but ultimately if I want something and have the funds then I just buy it.

I don't strictly buy into the "overpaying" philosophy, something is worth what someone is willing to pay.

The amount I'm prepared to spend on rotting wood chips and beetles that only live a few months would be stupid money for most people but I consider them bargain prices.

It gets broader over time, I latch on to new genres that catch my ear as they appear.

A lot of the stuff I listen to now didn't exist when I was a kid and picking up bass added appreciation for some of the older jazz, Motown and funk that would've been around but I didn't get into at the time.

Also in the floating thumb gang, I generally leave it more or less relaxed parallel to my index finger to mute the E and A.

If I'm doing something that just involves the E/A for long period of time I kind of half rest it on the P pickup region of my bass if I'm plucking in a position that allows it.

I use 3 methods for my quiet practice:

1 - Regular Fender Rumble Bass amp with a pair of headphones using an adaptor for the earphones...works great.

2 - Vox Bass Amplug pocket amp with rechargeable batteries and a decent set of earphones, lets you move around and the batteries last a while.

3 - PC with a USB to jack adaptor that plugs the Bass into the PC as a microphone device, works great if you figure out what software to use on the PC side.

Key to all of them is a set of headphones that actually handle Bass frequencies, lots of earphones are just not good for Bass.

2 basses right now, I sold my other ones to make space for 2 "dream" basses I'm getting next year.

I have a 4 slot rack to make sure I don't go crazy, the other single bass stands totally don't count.

Hope she gets it back, I'm a Sire fanboy so I'll keep my eyes open for it when googling for bargain ones.

Vintage whites seem a lot less common than the bright white, sunbursts and wood varieties so she might get lucky with that if she can prove it's her one.

Can't say I ever felt isolated by my tastes, I listen to stuff for my enjoyment and not to discuss it or go to gigs with mates.

There's usually a degree of tolerance with some people, it might not be their particular taste but they don't recoil at the sound of it same for me with their tastes.

For the more niche stuff the internet is there for like minded folks, no one I know in real life would get gachi music (tbh I don't but it amuses me), however some dark corners of the meme communities are into the "right version" of songs.

First time hearing of them, not to my taste visually but the vid above sounds good.

That neck fitting would give me anxiety though, looks like it's barely attached. Making me wonder if it has some kind of custom extra bit slotting further into the body behind the screws.

Nice guitar, I had a cream version of the 3156 before switching to bass...very strumable, seems like they're similar.

Doesn't seem limited to parcel services, even Amazon delivery times are just estimates now and they're not using RM in any way as far as I'm aware.

37 minutes ago, PaulWarning said:

they will give me the cash on collection, how does this scam work?

The only way I see that working would be via. a person who has found/brought something with the DPD name and logo (can't be impossible to get a cheap high-viz and hat made) and also has a handful of forged cash at the ready.

Wouldn't be much of a scam if they turn up wearing DPD gear and still pay you with real money, they'd just be buying the item...in costume.

Sounds scammy yeah, legit companies want the paper trail of bank transfers or real payment processors.

5 hours ago, stewblack said:

Yeah me too. I didn't realise how much I like them, but there's no getting away from it, I love them.

Part of the reason I'm saving for a pricey custom aged sandberg, they do a matching headstock option (300euro though) that has the same degree of aging. Worn hardware, ciggy burn, scuffed edges etc.

I'm a sucker for matching headstocks.

I go fanboy for MISA from Band-Maid, great bassist in a great band...winning combo.

She can switch between fingerstyle, pick and slap without skipping a beat, great sound and vibe, knows her theory, happy sitting back and being a rhythm section with their drummer but she able to pull out the tricks when needed.

Maybe there's just more money and clout in posting bass vids on instagram and tiktok...they seem to be doing well there and you don't even have to leave the house.

double post, sorry.

I like those vids for a bit casual "ooh ahh", it's usually just seeing something cool again and occasionally finding something new, I wouldn't have found dirty loops, charles berthoud, snarky puppy and a bunch of others without them.

Just a bit of fun and some inspiration.

As for the kids, getting good at stuff fast is kind if their thing. Probably better that they're getting good at instruments rather than the kind of stuff I got good at as a kid. 

Hopefully some go on and do great things but I imagine most will "outgrow" it and lose interest.

I know my nephew did, he's impressive on a double bass having picked it up at a crazy young age and spending years doing special classes, shows and such...now he never touches the thing, too busy working warehouse jobs and taking drugs with his mates.

If you're not living in the vehicle then things are going great, if you are living in the vehicle then I recommend moving 1 of those to a roof box for bit more sleeping space.

2 hours ago, Woodinblack said:

Can lift it for about 3-4 hours but after that it gets way too heavy. two months? forget it!

3-4 minutes would've been enough at that time, best I could manage was sad glances and plucking a string on the neck to remind myself what they sounded like.

I think taking a break can be a good thing if you haven't fallen out of love with the instrument, makes the heart grow fonder and all that.

A forced break when I injured my back earlier this year, couldn't physically hold up enough weight to lift the thing up for nearly 2 months.

If it was an option while buying a new bass (and wasn't hiking up the price a stupid amount) then I'd consider it just to say I'd tried it if nothing else, seems like kind of a waste though since I wouldn't know how much difference it made having never tried the instrument beforehand though.

I can't see me ever sending off a bass to have it done though, purely because I'd expect some kind of damage/loss during shipping there or back.

Perhaps if a local place offered the service and I could do a collection/drop-off type thing I'd give it a shot.

More of a Band-Maid fan personally but yeah don't mind a bit of Lovebites.

Same sort of thing here, I just schedule for release the next day now if I care about the HD version.
My uploads are generally 1-2 hours long, 1080@60fps in mp4 format...if I upload around 10pm the SD processing is fairly fast, the HD is often still processing when I check at around 7am the next morning.

I'm not sure if there's a kind of latent ghost processing going on, the SD gets a % progress count where the HD just says processing and eventually just appears completed at some point.
I also sync to Rumble which kind of backs up my thinking, the 240/480 videos sync across fast and the HD ones take a lot longer.