Agent 00Soul

As the owener of two semi solid guitars and one bass, I would be afraid to put any of them in a gig bag, even one of the heavy duty ones that Mono make. Too scared.

Thanks! That's great info.

This Frankenbass began life as a 1993 Fender Custom Shop Jazz. What a lemon! By 2005, the neck needed replacing - the truss rod couldn't get more maxxed out - and one by one the elctronics went: individual pots and then a pickup I think. Talk about a Friday afternoon guitar! The neck replacement is a Warmoth that we put a Fender sticker on. Since the original electronics were shot too, it was turned into a P/J configuration, which I always wanted, with some re-routing and having a new pickguard made. We also replaced one of the volume controls wth a pickup selector. I believe the new pickups were Duncan vintage models. Years later the P-pickup was replaced with a Bruce Thomas model from Bass Centre. I think only the body and hardware are left from the original bass. Skilled techs did all the work. I'm hopeless at DIY.

Has anyone here tried either of the Electro-Harmonix organ simulation pedals with a bass? I'm speaking of the Organ Machines B9 and C9.

It's an Alembic price, but it did play Live Aid with The Style Council. https://thebassgallery.com/products/goodfellow-bass

Black Precisions with black guards and maple fretboards: the official bass of the British New Wave!

In the studio they can be more versatile than you think. Did you know that the low-end of Air's classic Moon Safari was recorded entirely with a Hofner bass? In my own dreampop/trip-hop work I would play one directly into Twin Reverb amp simulation software. The sound was really edgy.

A Czech company called Bach made some reasonably priced non reverse T-birds a while back. I thought their pick ups were closer to the original sound than Gibson's current ones. Not sure if they are still being made though.

At this point all my basses are strung with flats: Fender Jaguar Bass - Sadowsky flats - my favourite flats - I hope they last because they don't make them any more and I only have 1 new set left Frankenbass - made from deceased Fender CS, Warmoth, Seymour Duncan, and Bass Centre bits - Rotosound Tru-Bass black nylons Epiphone Jack Casady semi-hollow - Pyramid flats Epiphone Viola fully hollow - also Pyramid Bach Non-Reverse Thunderbird - Rotosound Jazz Bass - this was my bass for rounds as it's good for distorted hard rock, but in the end I caved and put on the Jazz which has a similar twang that's just as good but feels like what I'm used to and prefer

Sounds great!

I hear you about the pedalboard thing. I also have a well-stocked one. I come from a shoegaze background so it's just normal for me. You wouldn't believe how many times other bassists in shared rehearsal spaces have told me that I have too many for a bassist or that all I really need as a bassist is a tuner.

I'm the opposite. When I was starting bass and trhe first few years in bands, flats were unknown to me. (It was the 80s and I was a teen.) There was "something" I didn't like about my sound/feel and after a few years I got so frustrated, I stopped playing bass. In the mid-1990s someone demoed flats to me and I realized that was the answer! All my fave recorded bass sounds were from flats and I never looked back. In my opinion Sadowsky made the best set of flats but judging from the crazy prices for them on Reverb at the moment, they might be discontinued.

I would recommend Bandmix.co.uk as a place you can get yourself and also see what's out there. It definitely works. I've worked with a stunningly good singer-songwriter and have joined a very quirky band after only a year of putting myself out there. I've also been asked to audition for other acts, which I've politely declined, and got to see a good cross section of acts. When I first signed up I was 52 and had just moved to the UK and knew no musicians at all.

Does anyone know how the Epiphone Jack Casady Bass' low impedance pickups connect to a high impedance output jack without a preamp? My previous low-z bass needed an onboard preamp with a 9 volt battery to connect to a high-z outpit. The Les Paul Signature bass that the Casady modelled on had both high and low I believe.

Actually, that info is really useful. Based on your experience there is no change in high quality when Epiphone changed manufacturing plants for this instrument. Makes looking for one much easier. I'm 55 and unfortunately have been burned by cool instruments that turn out to be lemons long before the internet arrived, so it's very much a case of (more than) once bitten twice shy.

It matters if you are in the market for one. You don't want to buy something that has a good chance of being a lemon. You can also go the wine route I suppose and ask what years are the best, but that is pedantic and not something people on a board should be expected to know. Milestones such as "pre-CBS" or "post-Norlin" are much better starting points.

Is there a difference in quality between the Koran and Chinese manufactured instruments?

They are beasts.

I like it so the strings are just above the waist with the neck angled up. For whatever reason, after a few songs I tend to start playing sideways a bit.

The people above are correct when they say that young musicians don't go on "old fashioned" tech like a forum or play in pub cover nights/jams with any frequency. But there are still tons of them out there nonetheless. These is also still a healthy rock scene. I go to about 2 or 3 small-to-medium sized-venue gigs a month and, at 54, am inevitably old enough to be the dad of the band and most of the audience. Nonetheless, those venues tend to be packed with the under-30 crowd. The biggest difference is that rock isn't mainstream music any more and really hasn't been since the late 1990s. If you want to see for yourselves who's out there on bass and what age they are, you can probably get an approximation by checking out Bandmix

Do you have any songs on streaming (Spotify, Soundcloud, YouTube etc)? From either band. Would love to hear them.