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Anti-GAS, or being happy with what you've got.


mcnach
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Funny you I should see this today of all days.

I've got all I need. I have. I know that.

I've got a Streamer Stage 1. I love the sound of that and it feels good.

The ideal fretless companion to the Streamer; because the neck is an almost exact match, sits next to it in the rack; a Streamer LX Fretless. This doesn't get played much, but being new to playing bass I have that masochistic fascination that gives me a love/hate fascination for fretless that needs to be massaged from time to time.
.
Corvette; the throw-arround bass. Great for tone variation. (As if the others arn't)

Fender P - I had an itch for a P. It was affordable and I'm not disappointed.

And now.... well I have an itch for a 5er. I know it doesn't makes sense. It's like needing to climb a hill; because it's there. Well I saw this bass, beaut of a finish, affordable and it's a 5. So Mrs G and I are about to drive 200 miles to go and get this thing and meet up with another BCer. It won't break the bank. It'll be a project as I can do some other work to it. It's in need of TLC....

Theory: Our GAS isn't helped by the poor range of basses in shops. I go to my "local" and I feel nothing. No curiosity, nothing. It's un-inspiring. I don't feel a NEED to try anything out. If I want to try out the "sweet things" in bass I have to buy them.

Anyway, I must go, time I hit the road.

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My mindset with regard to GAS has evolved. I no longer regard it as a bad thing and now decided that if I want something I'll get it. :)

I have 5 basses I am really happy with and unlikely to sell any time soon. One in particular (mid 80s MIJ 32" scale Squier Precision) is best and favourite that I will keep until I stop playing. On top of those I have basses for specific purposes - an EUB, a fretless, a semi-acoustic, a U-Bass. I have several more that were bought for various reasons - some are currently for sale, some will be soon. I seem to have this insatiable curiosity and constantly find myself wanting to try more stuff. I bought two more last week - one arrived a couple of days back, one is incoming! For me it isn't about having basses to gig with - I have those already - it is about trying, playing and enjoying different basses. I keep them a while, then move them on - a kind of revolving door approach. Once in a while I get a real surprise like when I gave in to GAS for a Danelectro Longorn and discovered I love it (one of the five). Bottom line is I can afford it, I enjoy it, have (just about) got room and I have a wonderful and indulgent wife who says, when I start taking pictures to sell a bass, 'why don't you just keep it?' So when it comes to the point when I physically can't fit another one in I have a cull then start over.

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Ive been happy with my markbass gear for a number of years, but ive recently brought a multi amp, this is due to me using all of effects recently (80s stuff) and really getting into emulating sounds, the multi amp has all the effects in. So I can stop buying and messing with pedals now.

With regards to basses, Ive got 2 precisions which I love, am experimenting with a cheap 5 string for now, and have just done a deal on a Jazz bass

Im quite relaxed chopping and changing basses as GAS hits me because 2nd hand you can always sell on without much loss , if any

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I really do think I'm done! With the emphasis on the 'think'. I still like to look at things of course and keep up to speed on what's about, but having spent years (and quite a lot of cash) amassing the gear I think I need, the process needs to stop. If I had unlimited cash then it wouldn't matter, but I haven't! :)

I think for quite a few of us who remember when 'affordable' bass gear meant 'unplayable' bass gear, the process of constant upgrading was logical and desirable, but that has long fallen by the wayside. I'm sure most players on this forum could easily do what they need to do with a half-decent Squier. Budget basses are no longer terrible, and it's a good time to be a novice player what with all the choice and all the support available online.

Eeeh, when I were a lad you had a couple of magazines and newspapers with pictures of bass gear in them, a crappy local shop that had rubbish bass gear in it, and that was that. You could only dream of owning a Fender or Gibson or Gretsch or Shergold... these basses represented around three month's wages for the average worker, and were well out of reach of spotty youths such as myself...

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[quote name='Paul S' timestamp='1431850639' post='2775448']
My mindset with regard to GAS has evolved. I no longer regard it as a bad thing and now decided that if I want something I'll get it. :)
[...] So when it comes to the point when I physically can't fit another one in I have a cull then start over.
[/quote]

The first sentence is my point of view too.

The second has become a factor :lol:

I have a room for the music stuff (which is little, but the nicest in the house actually, with the right amount of sunlight, overlooking the garden, quiet... It's actually my music room & workshop & office) and the agreement with "she-who-knows best" is that she's cool with it as long as I keep it all in that room.
That's the agreement... and I end up having a stack of cabs in the corridor near the entrance, and basses overspilling (2 in one room, 5 more in another)... then it's time to reconsider the situation, before she does :lol:

It's under those circumstances that I went "... and I barely touch most of these things!" :P

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[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1431853852' post='2775492']
I think for quite a few of us who remember when 'affordable' bass gear meant 'unplayable' bass gear,

Eeeh, when I were a lad you had a couple of magazines and newspapers with pictures of bass gear in them, a crappy local shop that had rubbish bass gear in it, and that was that. You could only dream of owning a Fender
[/quote]
Exchange and Mart and the classifieds page in the local paper were the "Internet" back then. If you had a Burns, WEM or a Hofner with 3 strings you were royalty.

Most of the "affordable" gear was totally unplayable but you still yearned for it as that was the only stuff you were ever likely to see "in the flesh".

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[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1431853852' post='2775492']
.........You could only dream of owning a Fender or Gibson or Gretsch or Shergold... ...............
[/quote]

I've never ever yearned for a Gibson, Gretsch or Shergold.. :lol: :lol:
I've always regarded them as planks.. certainly sound-wise..and that is allowing for the fact that they were playable..??
:lol:

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It's modern life , it's not just bass gear , sports equipment and I'd guess all other similar activities have gear issues.

I remember reaching county level MA and still having a second hand uniform that was 2nd hand and way to big, chuncky football boots with studs missing etc. Now you go to buy football boots for kids who don't even know the rules yet and there are lightweight space tech Ronaldo versions , along with MA clubs who make beginners buy gear that would look good in Hollywood movies.

Try buy a road bike or anything and GAS has it's place.

The 1st world has moved on from tea chest basses and home made cricket bats

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[quote name='CamdenRob' timestamp='1431929565' post='2776189']
I'm a lost cause... I even get GAS for instruments I can't play, I was looking at cellos online last week. :blink:
[/quote]

Really? Can I insterest you in a set of bag-pipes?

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[quote name='CamdenRob' timestamp='1431932191' post='2776209']
Are they any good for metal?
[/quote]good for punk ask the Real McKenzies.
my GAS stopped when I finally took the plunge and bought a MIA P, and a Marshall MB4210, Oh hang on I've just sold that (got fed up with lugging it around)for a lightweight Fender Rumble, here we go again

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[quote name='CamdenRob' timestamp='1431929565' post='2776189']
I'm a lost cause... I even get GAS for instruments I can't play, I was looking at cellos online last week. :blink:
[/quote]

I have a trombone... :blush:

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At one time I had this strange idea that I'd like to have one each of the common iconic basses but I got as far as having a pre EB MM (I already had a P, Jazz and a Ric), decided that it really wasn't my sort of instrument and would therefore just end up on a hanger so I ditched the plan and have been very low key in terms of gear changes ever since. I think my total bass dealings on this forum (including the bassworld years) is sold 2, bought 1. I use the same combo I bought second hand in about 2006 and it just replaced a near identical combo I'd used before that (both TE, just went from one that couldn't run an extension cab to one that could) and I've swapped from using a 4x10 to a 2x10 ext cab to save my back. My gear purchases are invariably driven by new project requirements. If what I have pre existing is fine for the next project then nothing new gets bought. The only thing I've picked up for my new band is a PA power amp as that was the main thing they hadn't kept between them from when they last played together.

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I can honestly say I'm very happy with my current gear and I'm pretty much GAS free!....well, pretty much :D

When it comes to bass guitars, I have owned many, active and passive, cheap and expensive, and I got to the point I knew what I liked about each one of them but I was never 100% at home with any.
I'm very particular when it comes to playability, instrument balance, tone, colour and other specs...so, knowing from experience what I wanted, I went ahead and ordered a Custom Fender Jazz bass to my specs. I've had it for a few months now and I can say that, for me, this is "The Bass"! It has everything I have always wanted on a bass and since then, believe it or not, I have even sold my '66 Jazz and my '65 P bass!

As far as amp/cabs, I'm settled and well content with my Aguilar TH500 and Barefaced SuperTwin. This setup gives me plenty of power and a nice tone in a relatively small and light package. I have no problems keeping up in our loud rock band and it works great on the wedding/function band I'm in.

Now I barely check the Market section and, when I do I don't really have GAS for anything. Well, a bit maybe, but just only for amps I'd like to try and see how they compare to the TH500.

Edited by PauBass
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From a thread in the "Amps and cabs" section I have learnt that my Berg AE112s are dreadfully inferior to the CN112, which apparently is also quite a rubbish sound. So I've decided that as I'm happy with the sound that they produce, and I have actually had complimentary remarks on the sound (not something I have had very often in the past) I have no cab (or amp, the Tecamp Puma does the job very well) GAS.

My two main basses are now almost identical and very conservative, a Sei Original headless fretless and a Warwick Buzzard notlob. I also have another near-identical bass, a Hohner B2AV, as a backup. I would rather like a Sei Flamboyant but other than that, I have no current bass GAS.

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[quote name='tauzero' timestamp='1431942315' post='2776335']
From a thread in the "Amps and cabs" section I have learnt that my Berg AE112s are dreadfully inferior to the CN112, which apparently is also quite a rubbish sound. So I've decided that as I'm happy with the sound that they produce, and I have actually had complimentary remarks on the sound
[/quote]

I just read in a post that experience doesn't equal evidence. We do get some BS posted here, don't we!

My AE112 cabs were the best sounding cabs I'd used up to that point. I have switched to a CN212 (one bit of GAS I did suffer from) but not because the AE112's were bad in any way. Those AE cabs were a great sound and I got compliments on many, many gigs and from most of the guys I played with.

But apparently none of that counts!

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Pretty happy with what I'm using right now, however a couple of new pedals wouldn't go amiss for me. I've got everything else apart from a good cab and a more expensive bass. Got a rule that I'm not buying any more gear with cash till next year though, as I've pretty much got no money!

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[quote name='tauzero' timestamp='1431942315' post='2776335']
I have learnt that my Berg AE112s are dreadfully inferior to the CN112, which apparently is also quite a rubbish sound.
[/quote]

I've not used them myself but given their reputation, I can't imagine ANY Berg cab being inferior to anything, much! :blink: Sound is very subjective, and one man's dulcet heavenly choir of vestal virgins is another man's elephant being rogered with a chainsaw. Your mileage may vary...

Edited by discreet
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[quote name='hiram.k.hackenbacker' timestamp='1431948553' post='2776423']
I explained that they are very expensive (think £5k to £10k bracket). She didn't bat an eyelid and said "Well, it is what you enjoy". Love that woman. Not going buy a new one, but it's the thought that counts.
[/quote]

Ritter or Fodera?

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