LeftyJ

I use an EBS NeoDrome 12-150 at home. It's a bit overkill really, but I love it. And it feels right at home in rehearsal spaces and at small gigs too. It doesn't have a cooling fan at all. At 14 kg it isn't particularly light due to the heavy plywood housing, but it's tough as nails and sounds great. At €450 used (but in brand new condition) mine wasn't exactly expensive either. You can sometimes find the regular Drome 12 (without neodynium speaker) for even less, and there's the Drome Classic too that's even more affordable because it's made in China. That one doesn't have a tweeter though, which is normally a major part of EBS's clean fullrange sound!

When I started playing 20 years ago, a lot of stuff I'd love to own now was still much more affordable. The hype around Wal wasn't as crazy as it is now, Warwick was still fairly affordable (a new German Corvette Standard for 600 euros! They charge at least twice that now. I won't even start about used prices), you could still buy a USA Fender under 1000 euros new (almost doubled now), and Fender's shortscale endeavours weren't as hyped up as they are now and therefore very affordable. I would have looked for a cool Wal Mk1, a Warwick Streamer Stage 1 5-string and a cheap lefty Fender Musicmaster or (rare as a lefty) Mustang.

Bring a big friend / family member / gang member though just to be sure.

Spot on I think!

Famous last words 😆 Is it that sexy 48 that Bass Direct had in stock? Congrats!

Those damn Japanese sellers and their crazy pricing.

I had a laminated woven carbon fibre nut on a custom ESP guitar, and it was great and looked neat. Pretty much like this: https://www.browndogbanjos.co.uk/carbon-fibre-nut-blanks-guitar-5016-p.asp

Looks great, and the price is fair too!

For the use you're describing, I would rather look at something like an EBS Valvedrive. It seems like it is exactly what you're looking for: a subtle, tube-driven overdrive pedal with a 3-band EQ and two modes that are accessible by footswitch independently from the on/off-footswitch. According to the manual, "The vintage character changes the tube timbre, eq and compresses the signal over the gain stage." The Le Bass looks cool, but I think it is an "always on" kind of pedal, where you either select channel A, channel B or both but with no option of bypassing the pedal. I'm not sure about this, but from what I gather it appears that way. Edit: nope, sorry. There is indeed a bypass mode on the Le Bass by simply tapping the footswitch of the channel that is currently engaged.

That's an interesting one! Looks like it uses the Warwick tailpiece, and the saddles look very much like those used on ABM Mueller bridges (like the monorail headless bridge I posted above). Looks nice, I like the look of a 2-piece bridge. The ones used by Mayones and Jerzy Drozd also look very appealing, and match well with the overall design of their basses.

Only thing I don't like about it is the claw that holds the ball end of the string slides freely over the finish of my bass body when I turn the tuning wheel.

I have played Elixir strings for years and love the feel and long-lasting brightness of coated strings, but try finding coated double-balls I use Status strings on both my S2's now and do like them, but they don't keep their brightness as long.

Out with the subtlety then, and in with some hot J-sized buckers! Ignore the broken English, and take a look at the Roswell hot rails.

That looks awesome! I've lusted after these before, and I loved the very yellow one that @wombatboter owned for a while. Do tell me more about the gauge of that B string! That looks HUGE.

Italia Modulo in Belgium: link.