EMG456

I'm blissfully ignorant as to how they are done but can confirm that whatever factory in Japan that was making Ibanez in the 1970s could do it too coz they're on my 1978 Antoria Fretless P bass. (black, not metal) I like them because it still has the look of an unlined board but the player gets strong guidance on where the notes lie. Particularly useful if you're launching yourself into a tune that starts somewhere away up the neck!

Mr C has been busy as ever in the workshop and has just sent me this pic of the neck/ fingerboard. Side/ top partial fretlines and position dots are in some kind of metal alloy and look great to my eyes. You can also see the 5 piece laminate of maple/ wenge that the neck is made from at the "headstock" which of course will be disappearing as this bass will be headless.

If you want the amp to be quieter when you're driving it hard, there used to be devices you would put in the speaker circuit that would soak up that power - had a quick look on line and they are still being made although mostly not cheap. Search for amp attenuators. Or get a less efficient cab. Or, how are the speakers wired in your cab - if in parallel then maybe they could be rewired in series to present a bigger load to the amp - no idea if that would affect the tone or not but as long as the effective resistance was within the amp's capabilities, it might be worth trying?

I don't know you Andy, other than reading some of your posts on here but I suspect that although you are asking this question, you already know the answer- the time has come to take a break. I've done this before- I've been playing the bass since school in the 70s and at a point just before the millennium, I had had enough. I wasn't enjoying gigging, wasn't getting a buzz out of original material so I wrapped it in. I did no gigs for about 5 years and the break did me good. If you feel that you need to liquidate the value in your gear then plan it carefully so as to avoid regret later on down the line. For me, amps, cabs and effects would be the first to go - you won't need them and if you ever do again, the gear you'll be able to buy will be louder/ smaller/ lighter than the stuff you got rid of. If you don't have one however, get yourself a good practise amp - ie one that really does sound like a big rig only quieter - if it takes headphones and an aux input that's all you'll need. Basses to me are more personal and I form a greater attachment to them. You may be the same so work out the one(s) you would save first if the house was on fire and keep them. If it was me, I'd need to keep a fretted and a fretless - you'll have your own criteria. Also bear in mind that older instruments are likely to retain their current value or increase whereas newer instruments will still generally be on a depreciation cycle. Life's too short to be unhappy. I wish you well.

Did you make them yourself - could you do left hand ones to order?

@MPU any left hand ones? It's a habit I can't break- I've always played my right hand Steineys with left hand strap pivots but I don't have enough and so end up having to swap them around all the time.

I'm running Cubase 9.5 on my Surface Pro 4. It's an i7 with 16Gb ram and 512Gb ssd. Use it with a MOTU Ultralite Mk3 interface and if at my desk a big 27" touchscreen monitor. It's working well so far and it is also running the rest of my life - ie not a dedicated music machine. Robin Vincent runs a very informative Blog on using the surface range for music here - http://surfaceproaudio.com/ Laptops and in particular ultra mobile devices like the Surface line will never match the processing power of a big, dedicated desktop but may well be enough to get the job done especially if you apply some tweaks to help optimise for audio.

What a great story! I also remember the desks with the inkwells to take the little glass jars of ink! The perfect footnote to your tale would be something like “and later, Brian May built his famous guitar from the wood in that floor and that’s why it has that deep red colour.” 😀

I don’t know the technical details but it’s basically a piece of wood that’s dyed using a vacuum process to draw the dye right into the wood grain. On a figured piece of wood, the different parts of the patterns have different densities and so draw less or more dye, which gives the overall effect that varied,organic,natural look.

It is indeed something to look forward to but of course it's also a test of patience. In fairness to me, I do have form with this so I don't treat the decision to have an instrument built lightly. There has to be a requirement which isn't met by any of my existing instruments and I'm quite careful with the spec and choice of builder so that there's a good chance that it will match what I'm looking for. That has been successful so far and all four instruments I have had built are still with me. Only once did I cave in to the frustration of the wait and that's why I now own two Chapman Sticks!!

snap!!

'On song' is pretty comprehensive for lyrics, chord sheets, setlists. You can sync all band members tablets together, project lyrics to a big screen, connect your pc for editing. It does metronomes, audio playback, quick key changes etc. etc. etc. I only use a tiny part of it's fuctionality but it's good.

Haha - yes. very good! If you tilt your head to the left, the red area on the top looks like some scary character from Donnie Darko! In fairness, a lot of those extreme figurings along the centreline will be covered over by tuners, bridge, pickups and fingerboard. Still going to look pretty amazing though.

Next, the body has been assembled and preliminary shaping has taken place - this is going to be good... and the back... And that's where we are at the moment. I can't wait but I just have to. Exciting!

Also, by this time Alan had figured out the logistics of the body shape and control cavity conundrum and emailed me a rough sketch of the shape, which I liked very much... So he went off to make the template and crack on.

An email arrives from Alan - suggested fingerboards - here they are. Without seeing them against the top wood, I wasn't so sure but I reckoned 2 was a bit too figured for a fretless board, 3would be very black and plain, nice.. but probably 1 would have a bit of character without being too busy. So here it is against chosen top, brace yourselves... And a bit closer...

This year it was the big 60 for me. Since the big 40 (LOL) it has been my choice to mark these decades with a new instrument commissioned to my own, often niche, specification. The hole in my family of basses if there is one, is in extended range fretlesses - I've never had one so this will be the aim. Now I naturally would gravitate towards a Wal for this and that would indeed be nice but I have for many years been an admirer of the work of Alan Cringean at ACG. His woodworking is easily the match of any of the top makers and his development of the Wal philosophy of pickups and active EQ very much appeal to me. So a couple of initial emails later and off I go to Moffat to speak with the man. As a long term player of Steinberger basses, I'm not exactly hidebound by convention so my opening gambit is "Do you think a bass would work with the body shape of your Reiver Kompakt six string guitar?" For anyone who doesn't know, Alan also makes guitars under the Reiver name and his most popular model has been the Kompakt which is a headless guitar with a body vaguely reminiscent of the Strandberg Boden. Turns out that he had been thinking of it and so with the proviso that he would need to work out if that shape would give room for a control cavity big enough to take the preamp and still have a decent control layout, this is what we will move forward with. Here then is the spec. Krell Kompakt 6 string 32" scale headless Body Black Limba with ART Maple Burl top. Neck bolt on 5 piece maple/ wenge laminate with carbon rods Fingerboard at that time not chosen. Pickups MC6 multicoil Preamp ACG DFM I picked a nice piece of Black Limba for the body and after some deliberation, threw cation to the wind with the choice of top - it wont be to everyone's taste but I Think it will look stunning! Unfortunately, no pictures were taken that day so we need to wait till Alan offered me suggested fingerboards to see what we are talking about.

It's all very subjective too. Interesting you mentioning Warwicks- I like the look and sound of many Warwicks but have never enjoyed playing any I have ever tried. I know they're good but just don't seem to be for me. Fortunately, I'm only about an hour away from ACG HQ so I'll probably take a run down and spend some time with a couple of examples.

I've got a couple of pics of the rough body carve - I'll start a build thread for it so y'all can share the drama!

Can I ask what the odd exceptions might have been? This is the perennial problem with having instruments made - you can't try it before you buy it!

Thanks for the replies all - it seems you all like the flat board so I think I'll go with it - variety being the spice of life and all that! eude - it's going to be an Uber spec. 32" scale headless, with the multicoil pickups and the new(ish) DFM preamp. Body shape is the first of a new model, based on Alan's Reiver Guitars Kompakt model. Oh, and a completely mental ART top! ikay - Alan was saying that the neck carve he is doing now is less pronounced than he has done in the past so that will be interesting to me. Again, I don't have any with an asymmetric carve - brave new world!

Guilty as charged... thanks!

Big birthday year for me and being celebrated in the time honoured fashion of having a new bass made. So I have a build in progress with Alan Cringean at ACG. It's a six string fretless and I've gone with what is becoming a standard feature of ACG's - a completely flat fingerboard. Anyone using a bass setup like that and if so, what are your perceptions? Like/ dislike? All of my basses so far are radiused and I don't think it's too late to change my mind so any informed opinions welcome.

A “big strat” Fender bass with 24 (25 in the picture!) frets. I like that.