thodrik

I won’t dispute that, for me it is part of the charm.

I still have never tried a proper World Tour head. I really enjoyed the Bass Pod Eden sim back in the day. At the right price used I would certainly consider one. In terms of the Marshall DBS amps, I liked them but they never appealed to me and I didn't think that they offered the flexibility of a Trace Elliot, Eden or Mesa or the 'cool factor' of Ampeg. However the VBA 400 was an absolute monster, if they had just downsized it to 200 watts it would have been a brilliant gigging amp.

It’s actually cherry sunburst but it had faded quite a bit over the years. My brother called it ‘rotten fruitburst’

It’s weird but I actually really like it!

Vigier Excess: bought new in 2004. If you like really closely you can see some wear and tear from 18 years of gigging and rehearsals and years of carting the bass around in whatever gig bag I could afford for £30 in taxis, busses etc. Generally I'm not overly precious with instruments either. Two chips. That is pretty much it in terms of cosmetics however I am onto the second nut, second zero fret and second jack socket. I have had my Fender since 1999. It is an S9 series so is probably anywhere from late 1978-1980. The lacquer on the neck has started to flake off, probably from years of sudden temperature changes from being transported in the cold and then brought into warm venues etc. The neck was actually pretty much in mint condition until about 2013-14 and then the peeling started. The actual body is perfectly fine and hasn't got many scratches, chips or dings whatsoever. Scratch plate 'work' was done by the previous owner. I think that is the original scratch plate but cut in two to allow easy access to the jack socket for repairs. However I haven't needed to ever repair the jack socket in 23 years. I thought about getting the neck re-lacquered but I would probably go for a satin refinish rather than nitro. At this point I don't care about devaluing it because I will never sell it and I will never realistically consider late 70s Fenders to be 'valuable' commodities. I just got this because it was significantly cheaper than a 'new' American Standard when I was 13!

I love the V2 as well. I love the mids control boosted at the 1K setting. Really allows that bass to cut through the mix a lot better than the old V1 which I used on and off for about a decade. I thought about getting a Para Driver, however nearly all of my amps have a sweepable mids feature so I didn't need that. I just wanted a little bit of the Sansamp flavour by running the blend at about halfway.

I did but then LED blew as well after 18 months. During the pandemic though I bought a red LED which is still working two years on!

Being serious, I have always found D'addario to be very good. I once received a set of D'addarios with a missing E string from Stringbusters who went bust immediately after I received an order. I contacted D'addario UK, who promptly sent me a whole new set free of charge. EBS are also great to deal with when I contact them every 3 years to get a new replacement red bulb for the Fafner when it blows.

I thought it was obvious on account that I am not Henry Juszkiewicz and he is the only person on planet earth who thought it was a good idea.

When Gibson put automatic tuners on all their instruments with no option to request the outdated 'normal' tuners. Designed entirely with the musician in mind, this innovation allowed musicians to spend more time playing music rather as opposed to wasting time tuning their instrument. Unfortunately the general public were too resistant to change to truly appreciate this groundbreaking consumer-friendly technological development.

Great collection! I have an Excess and Arpege five string. Need a Passion to complete the set!

I don't have much familiarity with the basses, but the Yamaha guitars like the Pacifica and now the Revstar are seriously good value. In general Yamaha just do not make poorly designed products: pianos, keyboards, guitars, basses, woodwind etc, you name it and they will generally have produced a very good product for the price point and the top end stuff is generally outstanding.

I love the look of the them but the neck radius is a no-go for me irrespective of the weight, even though the neck radius is 'period correct'. I learned to play on 9.5 inch radius late seventies Precision (back when they were cheap because they were considered to be worse than the new Fenders in the 1990s) I tried playing on a few Fender custom shop jazz basses which all had the 7.5 inch radius a couple of years ago in Guitar Guitar and I just really didn't enjoy playing them as much as I thought I would. I'm much more at home with a slightly flatter radius. In terms of looks though I think that these are step forward from the previous AV line.

As someone who is constantly struggling with website guys in my own job, I really do sympathise with the frustration that it can bring!

I like the fact that listings for all amps, cabinets and effects on the site include a statement detailing 'A professional setup will be carried out on this bass'.

I really like the stylings. The green would go perfectly with my Trace Elliot V6. Interested to see the release of the 10 inch speakers in due course.

Thanks for the insight, that is interesting to hear. Stunning basses there! I didn't actually like the neck proline of the Laklands I tried. Solid and versatile basses though. Clover basses though, I haven't seen them for a while. I quite fancied one of those Xpression basses about 12 years ago but their website just stopped getting updated. I heard that they moved production to the Czech Republic.

I think that both models are in stock at Bass Direct in Warwick. I would definitely give them a call with a view to going for a visit. Neck shape, neck radius, body shape, number of frets needed, string spacing etc is down to personal taste. I would highly recommend trying both, or even whatever other basses are in stock. Between the two I would go with the Warwick, on account that if I wanted a Warwick type bass I would get a Warwick and if I wanted an active jazz style bass my first choices be a Sandberg, Fender Ultra or Sadowsky Metro (which is now made by Warwick) over the Maruszcyk. However that is my view and lots of folk on here really rate the Maruszcyk basses. As a compromise the Warwick Streamer LX5 might offer a compromise of Warwick growl and more traditional jazz style pickups. The Maruszcyk will have wider string spacing at 18mm whereas Warwick five strings have about 16.5mm spacing (so less space to slap, double thumb if you are into that kind of stuff).

Cheers I might try them next!

My NYXLs are still okay a couple of months in but starting to get a bit duller. Great strings but I think I will be going back to Elixirs which just last so much longer. On reflection I’m not sure I consider the NYXLs to be noticeably better than the standard D’Addario nickel strings, which I still really rate as my favourite non coated string.

The description of the amp on Bergantino website refers to ‘Class D’ power. So in marketing terms it is a class D amp even if it technically isn’t. https://bergantino.com/fortehp/ I have no idea why says class A on the back. Though I would guess a more technically minded Basschatter will be able describe the differences between Class A, Class A/B and Class D.

I always thought that it never really went away, especially in the US. I don’t consider nu metal to be any worse than other genre periods I didn’t like. For example, I would rather listen to Taproot or Spineshank than Winger or Cinderella from the 80s.

Anyhoo, I quick play through everything tonight. I am pretty familiar with all of the amps, having owned the Fafner and Walkabout since 2009, the V6 since 2013 and the Big Block since 2019. All played through the impractically big, loud and heavy Mesa 6x10 which I got for an absolute steal on this forum in 2018. Cab is pretty aggressively voiced in the upper mids so it might skew my views on the EQs of the amps a bit compared to someone using a Barefaced or Bergantino type cab. V6: massive low end. Massive headroom. Very mid scooped with all settings at noon. Different tones are available but are not immediately apparent or obvious and can seem like guesswork, so if you are a 'I EQ to suit the room' kind of person it can be frustrating. I can easily lose twenty minutes finding a variety of tones which are great but not quite right. Sounds amazing when you finally get the power tube saturation but is only achievable at impractical volume levels which can make you physically ill. Doesn’t really do overdrive without a pedal at useable volume levels. 2 and 4 ohm operation means I am not chancing it with an 8 ohm cab which limits cab choice. I really don't like the 'Deep' and 'Bright' character settings and think that they really interfere with the core tone so I never use them. Pulling the mid control changes the character of the amp into a less scooped, less subby, aggressive tone which I really like and I think cuts through better with live use. With the mid knob in the 'in' position the sound can be a bit scooped and bass heavy unless the Bass knob is backed off and Mids and Treble are added but the depth of sound is really exceptional. Despite the above nit-picks it is a truly exceptional amp. The level of headroom available means that it works really well with pedals. Not so much a ‘practical gigging amp’ as it is ‘an experience’ to play. I’ve used SVTs and other valve amps but this is still pretty unique, (though I would guess the Ashdown CTM amps would come close?). I probably would be happier with a V4 in terms of the lower levels of headroom. One final thing, for an all valve amp I really don't find it particularly heavy. It is about the same weight as the Fafner and Big Block when both are in their rack cases. Much lighter than an SVT. EBS Fafner: very flexible EQ, studio quiet in use, not massive sub lows. A bit like hearing your recorded and processed signal through a quality hi-fi. Huge treble capabilities, really good compressor. Drive actually ‘farts out’ sooner than I would like so runs better clean but it doesn't have the depth of sound of the V6. Not very ‘tubey’ in terms of feel or response compared to the V6 or Mesa heads because there is only a single tube in the 'drive' stage but the preamp is otherwise all solid state. However there is impressively fast transient response and exceptional clarity. Great slap sound and can do fingerstyle rock/blues/pop/metal, pretty much anything. Brilliant master volume taper so brilliant for gigging as really the character of the sound stays consistent across all volume levels and the amp never strains, compresses or adds in unwanted artefacts at high volume levels. Generally, a bit weedy through an 8 ohm cab but still useable (I generally gig with a Peavey era Trace Elliot 1x15 - the 500 watt one). Mesa Big Block 750: has a natural mid-heavy grunt. In terms of 'depth' of sound it is ahead of the EBS and behind the V6. The V6 has way more low bass. Huge levels of gain available and a much bigger gain sweep compared to the V6. EQ is pretty good, but less sophisticated than the Fafner or the Walkabout. Bass and treble controls generally need to stay at 11-1 in clock positions or the sound gets unbalanced. As a result it isn’t a tweaking amp, it is a turn on, set gain, set the mids and then turn up and play amp. Clean headroom is actually fairly limited relative to the power on tap but I think it was designed to be run 'pushed' and slightly hairy. Best bass fuzz I have every tried with footswitch-able drive. Does ‘doom/fuzz rock’ perfectly. I wanted this amp for over ten years before I could find one second hand that I could afford. It has lived up to my expectations. Plenty of volume through an 8 ohm cabinet, in fact it is probably more practical as with a 4 ohm cabinet controlling the master volume can be tricky. Mesa Walkabout: very low amounts of headroom but plenty enough when used with a big/efficient cab. Actually overdrives when pushed and behaves a bit more like a traditional valve amp than the V6 which is a clean machine. Awesome EQ but it becomes a bit redundant when you start to run out of headroom. Lacks the aggression and gain capabilities of the Big Block. Still love it. My nephew just bought an Ampeg SVT 3 Pro, so I'm eager to compare it to the above heads. Overall, I don't have a 'favourite', but the Walkabout and Fafner have generally been the 'workhorse' amps. The Big Block was going to be the new workhorse, but the pandemic has slowed gigs immeasurably. The V6 was a impulse purchase because I thought that it was an absolute steal for the price I paid.

I have a V6, Mesa Big Block and EBS Fafner. I will try and do a detailed comparison later but in short, your description of the EQ of the V6 essentially matches mine.