Ajoten

Hmm. So Guitar Slinger in Berkhamstead has closed down, Percy Prior/Rainbow Bridge in Wycombe has closed down, Perfect Pitch in Chesham and Rosehill in Beaconsfield sell only budget brands, and Kingfisher Music in Loudwater and Planet Guitars in Flackwell Heath both stock a mere 4 basses of varying qualities.

Do I have to travel for a couple of hours to find shops with a reasonable selection of basses? How come people on this forum have Spectors, Stati, Moduli, Ricks, G&Ls? Are you all taking punts on online purchases? Take lots of holidays in the US?

Where does one go when one lives in Bucks? I know I could get to London, where I might have more success (as long as I don't mind the extortionate prices and rude staff). And even then Sound Control has closed down and Andy's didn't have any basses last time I looked.

Cool, thanks for everyone's input on this.

[quote name='OutToPlayJazz' post='304440' date='Oct 11 2008, 04:07 PM']Sounds like you need a Warwick Corvette standard passive...)

Rich.[/quote]

Yes, sadly it's a bit annoying that I don't like the Corvette shape.

Over the weekend I remembered that years back another bass I played with the ace fat neck was a Hohner 5 string headless wotsit. I presume the fatness was a design choice rather than headless necessity (Mr Status Owner?)?

Daft electronics = anything with more than one tone control. I don't understand all this fancy EQ malarkey, I just want my [b]one [/b]good sound, and if I have 4 or 5 knobs AND 2 switches to twiddle a) how do I know what to twiddle and ii) surely I don't have to write down each setting etc in order to keep a tone after things get twiddled accidentally?

So: I want passive Precision tone and style but a Warwick neck. And I'd be wasting lots of wonga on things I'd never use if I went Warwick. I think it's the waste that troubles me most.

Feel free to recommend a passive 5 string with the mother of all necks (depth not width).

I tried two £1.5k basses the other day. One had the best neck profile I've ever played, the other has the tone and class that I want but a pretty ordinary neck, not much different to my current bass 1/10th the price.

In the past the neck has always sold a guitar to me, but the shape and stupidly complicated electronics of this particular model puts me right off in this case.

Give me some ideas re how to choose.

Apologies for straying off the black topic, but what brand are these? If it was missing the J pickup the sunburst P5 would be EXACTLY what I want (lookwise anyway).

Not really much of a reply, but there's an ad for a beautiful 6 string on the noticeboard at our rehearsal studios. Which are in the distant, but still vaguely southeast, Welwyn Garden City.

Wor, smashing.

I have absolutely no idea what this is worth, so I must add this inane post so I can get instant notification of updates when someone chips in with a price. No doubt there's a way of doing it without posting etc etc.

[quote name='eubassix' post='187420' date='Apr 28 2008, 04:49 PM']Thanks Mick - great to have some 'sounds' on this one, in addition to the photos etc. !![/quote]

[url="http://www.myspace.com/ajoten"]More sounds for you. Buy buy buy an Ashbory![/url] (only those tracks mentioning Boing)

I might be missing it, but I can't find a P-bass on the Fender website in all its wooden "natural" glory, a la John Deacon.

Do they simply not do one these days? If so, what previous years and models should I be looking for (pref with black scratchplate)? It would have to be very cheap* for me to strip one.

*out of interest, does/did Squier ever do one?