Agent 00Soul

For the flip side, I was in a band without a guitar player for a couple of years. It was mostly electronica influenced and a plenty big sound (3 singers, live drum programming, Nord keyboard, trumpet, sometimes congas/bongos, me on bass through a pedalboard of fx). It certainly didn't need a guitarist and we never mentioned that we didn't have one unless asked. And we were asked a lot, even by electronica fans who I didn't think cared about stuff like that. The fact was, and we had to admit it to ourselves, that people like electric guitars and at least some people really missed seeing/hearing one on stage.

A heavily modified Hofner Beatle bass. The control plate had been completely replaced with a conventional switch set-up. I only kept it for a short while. About 15 years later I went to see a local band and their bassist was playing it. I'm glad it got a good home, but by that point I so wished that I never got rid of it.

The Rascals/Young Rascals - who were more of a soul band from the same period as The Doors - also left it to the organ to handle the bass stuff live. But they used bass guitars on all their albums except for the first one. I think the Dandy Warhols do the same thing. In the 1990s, some of the riot grrrl bands like Sleater-Kinney and Bratmobile didn't use bassists either. Neither did Germany's Stereo Total.

Very cool suit and trilby!

The story has a happy ending! The Bruce Thomas pickups have been installed. I haven't played out with them yet, but I have practiced. The video review on YouTube posted above is quite accurate at portraying what the sound is like. This is very much what I associate the 70s P-Bass sound with, although I guess that's actually wrong since Thomas based this on his 64 model, but souped up. So maybe Fender's 62 reissue also sounds like this. BTW as other reviewers have said online, these pickups are quite loud: easily the loudest bass pickups I have ever owned in fact. But that is of no importance to me, I was concerned about the tone which is just what I was looking for. Thanks everyone for all your advice!

Jefferson Airplane did indeed use a lot of hollow & semi-hollows between their Guild Starfires, ES-345s, and Rick 360-12s.

I'm thrilled they finally made a production run of the Casady model. Would have been all over it 10 or 15 years ago, but I can't bring myself to buy any more instruments.

Many thanks for this suggestion! They did, in fact, send me the pickups separately. It probably wouldn't have occurred to me to ask if not for you. They were a little confused by the fact that my P-bass pickup is installed "upside down" on my left-handed Frankenbass (treble side in the front), but they went with it in the end. I will post a report when it's installed. BTW for what it's worth, they told me a lefty version of the Bruce Thomas Profile bass is coming out around July.

Wow - that's the exact sound. It doesn't look like the pickups are sold separately unfortunately.

Thank you everyone for all this! It's very useful - I know much more than I did when I asked the question. An embarrassment of riches really.

Hi - the P-bass pickup on my Frankenbass are shot and need replacing. I've always been partial to the punchy P-bass sound of the 1970s. Think Sting, Roger Waters, Bruce Thomas. Does anyone know if any aftermarket replacement brands lean towards that sound? Even including the stuff Fender themselves make. Thanks

You know the band you were in has developed cult following when someone is teaching one of your basslines on YouTube a decade after after the song was released. 🤪

I was able to buy a hardcase from him for this bass. I didn't realize the Bachbird was so long that it wouldn't fit in a regular case. And Bach was all out by the time I decided to buy one but luckily he had one for sale

Not a chance. It would have happened by now if I was so inclined. One of the silver linings of being a lefty is it's a giant wet blanket for G.A.S. spending! Although the amount of lefty stuff on the internet has changed things slightly as there are more than ever before for sale from all over the place. I never thought I would own a non-reverse Firebird copy, but a company in Bratislava did indeed make a run of them about 10 years ago so there you are.

That is one Goth looking bass!

Definitely true! I actually recorded an EP in 2019 that was a tribute to the library music used on the TV/radio shows of the time, and I did indeed string the Jazz with flats and used a pick. Palm muting is also quite important to nail the sound in many cases.

If you have one with flats already, you may as well try rounds on the other so you have options for different songs or gigs.

As someone who played in a shoegaze band where both myself and the guitar player used lots of stomp boxes and not rack mounts, I feel lucky to have avoided this considering some of the stories I've read on this thread. For us, we simply got as close as possible to the sound on the record without having to make changes mid-gig. If any one pedal absolutely positively needed to have a knob turned, we either incorporated it into the show, which can sound quite cool and psychedelic, or we would make a lightning knob twirl between tracks without a sound. You can memorize approximately where the knob goes to or use masking tape to show the destination setting. It took less than a second. The guitarist had more complicated pedal boards - yes, boardS - but they had patches that he memorized and could easily change multiple times mid-song without anyone noticing, including us. The trick with all this is rehearse, rehearse, rehearse all this in your normal practices. We got so used to doing all these, that we would play 40 minutes without stopping unless someone broke a string or had a similar legit issue.

Veteran rock and gear journalist Tony Bacon, a lefty himself apparently, just published this: https://reverb.com/news/musical-implications-of-being-a-left-hander

Thank you! Very helpful and also good news.

I got to try an Aerodyne in a Japanese music shop. One of the best bass sounds I've heard for the "rock" end of the rock n roll spectrum. You can easily get lefties in Japan, but for some reason they don't export them - or didn't last time I checked. Interestingly, the models they do export have Strat-style output jacks with knobs flush to the body which I prefer over the standard Jazz jacks/panels on the domestic models.

Hi - I have an RH450 bass amp head that I bought in the USA a decade ago. I recently moved to the UK. Can I simply swap the USA power cable for a UK one like I do for my computer? Or do I need to plug the unit into a step-down transformer to externally convert the 220 volts to 110 like on my vintage amps? Its plug is removable and goes into a generic three pronged socket, so I wasn't sure. Thanks in advance!

Wow - I’ve been interested enough in these bases to keep my eye on them since they first came out in 1982, but I’d never seen a lefty in anything other than black before. I just assumed they didn’t exist.

Today's email blast from online music empire Reverb features a video and article about what they call upside-down guitarists, that is left-handed players who play lefty, but with the strings reversed (the low string is on the bottom). The vast majority of these players seem to have learned this way simply because they picked up right-handed models, flipped them over into the more comfortable/natural left-handed position, and never changed the string order. It looks like a lot of people featured were self-taught and didn't know any better, although some, including host Malina Moye, knew but preferred it upside-down: https://reverb.com/news/a-brief-history-of-upside-down-guitarists-with-malina-moye No bassists, but I have seen photos of lefties who do the same thing.

I hope this thing survived it's six weeks on a container ship!