msb

You quickly learn leverage with a fridge. The tolex on mine was trashed from sliding it in and out of vans and dragging it up and down stairs. Today I appreciate modern lightweight cabs. And a little tube preamp.

An SVT with a fridge is an absolute misery to cart around. 

Most of my 34 in basses have TI flats except for a Ray I keep fresh round Slinkies on , and an old Pbass with ancient rounds. Most short scales have LaBella flats , my Longhorn still has the factory rounds. It was also gigged a lot. They still intonate , and it thumps. I have some short scale Gibson rounds if I wish to change anything. They came on my DC LP Jr and I really liked them , bought several packs , the Jr has LaBellas at the moment , might return the rounds on that.

I find I can leave flats on for years before I have any urge to change them. I’m mostly aiming for a classic old school thump. They deliver that. 

Serious packing for a non standard shape.

Yes it does! Congratulations. I have a “Chan Armstrong” lucite bass and was pleasantly surprised by the build quality.

I’m visiting in Mexico at the moment , and my Facebook account has been locked up. I tried to log in using airport wifi and they are saying my account might have been hacked. I believe it’s just me trying to get into my account. Nothing has worked , this has been going on for four days now , the “help” bots have been useless. No way to actually talk to a human. 
Getting totally fed up.

6 hours ago, Dan Dare said:

 

It's that time of year. People have loaded the credit cards to the max for Xmas and won't be making large purchases until they've made a bit of a dent in the debt. It's always that way at this time.

 

A good time to buy if you have money burning a hole in your pocket as sellers know it will be March-April before things pick up, so you can make cheeky offers.

That happens this time of year , but in the months leading into Christmas I’ve noticed that things that would have instantly sold , have been sitting. Especially in the US , but to a lesser degree our local market on kijiji as well. Things are unusually slow. 

5 hours ago, SimonK said:

I play in a church with a number of other bass players who are all quite young or beginners. I was asked a few weeks back by our music director to have a look at the amp settings they use (a Trace GP7, 4x10) as they don't sound "as full as you do". My initial response was to feel please that my 1k+ pedal board and much better basses were making the difference (given the amp setting are exactly the same), but having now sat down with three of them it turns out that technique makes the biggest change to the sound. Playing closer to the bridge, not using open strings, left hand muting other strings, playing passing notes rather than just roots etc. and we all start to sound far more similar!

 

Annoyingly for GAS new/different equipment is seldom the answer to these sorts of things!

I’m in a house band that does a weekly jam , and let other players use my gear. Four different players , same bass , same amp , same settings will sound completely different. 

10 hours ago, neepheid said:

 

Umm, look where I live.  There's the internet, couriers and road trips.  That's a dangerous false sense of security you've got there.  My top tip - stay the flock out of of Facebook Marketplace.  That has been the source of many a "damn, that's a good price, and it's only 3-5 hours away..." shenanigans for me.

I’ve managed to stop buying stuff simply because it was a great deal. Now I tend to msg a friend that might appreciate the deal. I’ve been called the expensive friend.

12 hours ago, fergs40 said:

I’m in too.

 

I’m not going to stop looking at stuff, because I’m not an alcoholic, sorry, bassoholic, but as things stand I really don’t know what might present itself to break my resolve.

 

Maybe one of those eight-string Hagstroms. But they come up like never.

 

Right?

I’ve seen several 8 string Hagstroms go in our local market. I was kinda shocked to see several around from the old days. A girl in a local punk band is making them popular again. Good player. She drives the bus.

I’m in. And seriously hope to last the year. I hope to downsize a bit this year.
 

I’m not going to stop scouring the local classifieds though. 
 

edit … I had to replace a broken Snark tuner , did it yesterday. 

I just replaced a broken Snark tuner , that’s ok in the rules , but I wanted to get it replaced before the next year begins. 

I’ve been noticing on many forums and classified sites that things are not selling as quickly as they used to. Facebook advertising can be annoying , and yet in the local marketplace section deals can be found.
It seems that things are unusually slow right now. 

Mostly play old school blues and roots music , so I’m looking for a rich old school thump , that has authority. So I like hollow body basses with flats , I can get an upright ish thump palm muting. I usually gig with a big orange Gretsch hollow body. Nice deep woody tone. It has TVJones pickups. I use a boutique tube preamp , and have a couple of Class D amps I use for back end power. Bergantino cabs. Now I drive my stuff downtown , load it in and out , and drive it home. Not a teenager any more. This gear is surprisingly compact and light. I get that big old school depth I was looking for. Much of the time I am not in the PA , so my stage sound is exactly what the room gets. This delivers. I’ve been nerdy about gear for some time now , no longer looking for that perfect tone , this is close enough for me. 
 

Big orange Gretsch in the back there , Monique pre , Jo Choui power , Berg cab. The power amp was built by Jon Chouinard in Quebec. He has a great YouTube channel comparing preamps. Great guy. A lot of folks are familiar with him , here’s his channel for those that are not. 
https://www.youtube.com/user/jochoui.
Check out his archive for the preamp comparisons.

edit … there’s a bunch of other stuff in the pic , Barefaced One 10 , PhilJones C-2 cabs , an Aguilar TH350 , Darkglass m200 , Darkglass e500 Exponent amp and a Batwing Harmony H-22 stuff I goof around with at home , the Berg , Monique , back end power , and Gretsch are what I drive downtown. The Jo Choui is 500 watts , if I think I will need more I tend to grab an older Bergantino Forte with the compressor , and use the effect return channel.

I was given a plexi bass from an old forum friend in California , and about 3/4 of the way in I found a Batwing Harmony I could not pass. I had been looking for one for years. No plans to purchase anything more , I think I’m more than satisfied with what I have , I should sell several amps and some basses so I’m definitely going to sign up in the New Year. I’ve managed to stop buying things simply because the deal was too good to pass up. 
At least I’m hoping that will be the case next year.

I tend to use my stuff , it’s not heavy , and I know it well. I’ve used may backline rigs over the years , and that’s why I use mine.

I picked up a HoTone Thunderbass 5 watt amp for a song on kijiji. Fairly cheap , it looked like a funky little thing , total impulse buy. I had a nice practice rig , so I didn’t spend much time using a speaker with it , but I was surprised by the time I spent using it as a headphone amp. Had a mini aux in so I could plug in a tablet and play along. I was spending considerable time with the headphones memorizing material.  I didn’t want to drive Herself bonkers. Later I found a Phil Jones BigHead on kijiji , the HoTone worked wonderfully but I couldn’t resist the PJ. It’s a more elegant solution. Before the HoTone I had been using a GK MB200. It also has a mini aux input. Many little Class D heads can be run without a load , and have a mini input.

https://i.postimg.cc/B68wBfcn/IMG-2672.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/G2358s95/IMG-0060.jpg

Nice looking thing , priced reasonably. Now most things I’ve imported have come from the US , and a bargain is no longer a bargain after you factor in the exchange , duty , shipping , and occasional brokerage fees. I haven’t done any imports from the UK , yet …

Broughton make great stuff , and it’s a tiny owner/operator business. 

Here in Canada Long & McQuade are saying they will be available sometime in 2026. 

We were beginning to look after my mother-in-law. I didn’t want to be dragging an amp between our place and hers , so I thought something small and cheap would do the trick. I was accustomed to a little GK MB150 at home. 
That started my quest for funky practice rigs.

I found the Rumble 15 awful. Couldn’t flip it fast enough.

Harmony H22 batwing , SG , and Gretsch Thunderjet 6128B , all with flats , I’m a thumper.

I loved Pentangle , and the Martyn songs , and I felt gutted when I heard he passed. I’ve looked up a lot of YouTube videos in the last several days. Legend.

Mine had been modded by previous owners , Badass bridge , Jazz pickup , but I liked the mods. 
one of my regrets. Still have the fretted rosewood , 72 too. I was once a Pbass guy. Not so much now , I’ve come to prefer shortscales.