Not quite new and it didn't come in today, but I haven't got around to posting it yet.

Kiesel Icon 6. fretless ebony board with acrylic lines. translucent dragon burst finish with black burst edges. swamp ash body with three-piece maple/walnut neck. gold hipshot hardware. radium radiused humbuckers. plus a few cosmetic changes.

this thing sounds ridiculously good. I've played a decent amount of boutique instruments and this can proudly stand up there with them. Kiesel takes a lot of shit because well, frankly, recently they've made a lot of stupid shit. this is one of the last holdovers from the Carvin era and I'm super happy I got it before it's inevitably discontinued. they suck at promoting them but the electronics are truly great. and the neck profile - thin and flat - is crazy comfortable. (imagine an Ibanez SR, but somehow even more comfortable.)

Kiesel's service was... fine. there were some payment issues, and it shipped on the exact last day of the promised window, but we're talking about weeks, not years. my dream instrument is an F-Bass Alain Caron, but this'll work 'til then.

Took home my bucket list bass today! Someone backed out of their factory order and this ended up at my local dealer. This thing is absolutely insane and the pictures do no justice to how gorgeous the colour is.

I was skeptical that it would be THAT much better than my NG3 but it absolutely is. Probably the last bass I'll ever buy.

I have been drooling over the Reverend Wattplower for a long time. Finally pulled the trigger and ordered one on zzounds. It arrived this morning and quite frankly I am pissed. Two cracks in the neck on either side of the nut (the bass side being the worst), shoddy workmanship on the nut (black scuffs/tool marks), and the blades of the P pickup are recessed into pickup cover while the others are flush. Also, while purely cosmetic the routing job for Wattplower inlay looks like absolute garbage. This bass is over $1800 with tax and shipping! I have never had my hands on a Reverend instrument before this and quite frankly I am completely turned off by the company at this point. They post countless videos on YouTube raving about their high QC standard, all of final setup and QC at their Toledo shop etc and this is what I receive!? I did a little research online this morning and found several cases of Wattplower’s with cracks in the neck. Hagerty’s Music is currently selling one with similar cracks for $1500. Seems like a design flaw to me. Zzounds has been absolutely wonderful. They will be sending me a return label next week and a refund. Not to mention their packaging of the instrument was flawless. The bass sounds great but I will never consider purchasing a Reverend instrument ever again. I’ll stick with my Musicman and Spector.

Ok so I’m 50 yo (yes, someday it will happen to you too ;), haven’t played to support myself in maybe 15 years, and have most always favored the playing side of the instrument over gear. I love gear, I just prefer playing over turning knobs or whatever. I tend to keep gear a LONG time. So I’m feeling saucy one day recently and decide to order this amp head that I played at a jam recently and really enjoyed playing on. An Orange Terror Bass. It arrives, I switch the impedance to 8ohm to match my cabinet, plug it in, have a blast playing on it for about 10 minutes when there’s no longer any sound other than this hum AND it smelled so strongly like smoke I thought there seriously might be a fire. The SWR Goliath 4x10 was toast. I spend a whole effin day trying to figure out what fried - I even bypassed the crossover. It would play but something was def not right.

So of course I had pretty badly neglected this cab for a long time - it’s gross. Things have LIVED inside of it when it was stored in a garage. I assume the cab was just old and finally kicked the bucket.

I go to Guitar Center and decide on a Mark Bass 4x10 that was a really good deal, so I bring that one home, plug in the Orange, turn it on.

THE SAME HUM AND SAME BLOWN CAB. I can’t believe that I wrecked the cab I loved for years and a brand spanking new cab in the span of 3 days. Amp came from Sweetwater and I know they’ll do what they can, but other than not actually testing the output of that amp before plugging into No 2, I get the feeling like I’m not entirely at fault and that Orange might possibly owe me - an apology at least. Has anyone ever successfully or otherwise gotten comped by an amp mfg for something like this or am I delusional? Any smart techies out there have an idea what might have happened here? I’m definitely testing the output before I send it back but haven’t yet. What a day.

Be good out there.

My friend just sold me his Warwick for $400. I always wanted one of those

got a humbucker bass for a first time and dont know which angle level to set (flat with pickguard / lower level on screw closer to the neck and higher level on screw closer to bridge / opposite to previous?)

----> also what about the horizontal angle on trebble side

Would like to get your tips on setting humbucker bass pickup correctly, since is my first one.

Bass: fender squier CV tele bass - love this bass anyway!!!! feels sooo premium to me, great instriment regardless.

Strings: la bella flats

My school gave me this bass a year ago. It's paint was black, it was rusty and falling apart but we repaired and painted it. Now we don't know its brand, there was no text or brand mark on it either.

Stand for my squier sonic(e) bass

I’ve been playing mostly shorties the last few years but there’s always been that urge to try a Dingwall. Well I came upon a great offer for a D Roc (new) in sparkling green and took the plunge..

Awesome addition to the arsenal! I was so impressed I used it straight away for our single and video. I get it now.

Gonna preface this. I have zero plans to actually do this. This is just pure, unadulterated curiosity for me. That said heres the post:

nonsense backstory

you can skip the next two paragraphs if you don't care

I've always been a big fan of old school Grabber/Ripper/G3 style basses. Hearing recently that epiphone had released a grabber reissue had me kinda hyped. I've been planning on buying my first bass (I'm primarily a guitarist, been playing guitar and bass for 20+ years, just never focused on actually getting myself a bass until now) so it seemed like a good omen.

I went into the guitar shop the other day and tried out the Mike Dirnt G3 and the grabber reissue and honestly the grabber was a bit of a dissapointment. The neck on the G3 felt a lot nicer (more satiny and smoother than the grabber I tried) and the pickup options heavily beat the grabber reissue. Honestly I was kinda annoyed cus Itd be nice if my preference wasnt for the expensive option at least once in my life but it was night and day for me 🤣. The G3 is probably the most comfortable bass I've ever played and I've played a lot of nice basses in my time deapite never having owned one, and the variety of sound was super appealing ontop of that so I think i know which I'm after.

/nonsense backstory

I've been doing some research and it seems that I'm not the only one to be underwhelmed by the grabber reissue, most agreeing that the big dissappintment is the lack of a grabber pickup that gives it the name (or if not a lack of a grabber pickup, the fact that the sound out of the reissue just isnt really that great)

Lots of people agree the build quality is good but the pickup is a let down, so I had a look at aftermarket pickups and saw that you can get vintage grabber style pickups and slide plates online, and while it wouldnt be trivial to install itd definetely be doable.

Have you or anybody you know tried this? Do you think its worth it?

In the end I've found an inexpensive Mike Dirnt G3 nearby thats actually cheaper than the Grabber reissue from my local guitar store so I think I'll be going for that but I'm really curious if folks think the mod I mentioned would be a good remedy for the slightly underwhelming grabber re-issue?

TLDR:

Have you put a proper, movable, grabber style pickup into your epiphone reissue or known someone who has? Do you think it's worth it?

If you haven't done the mod do you think it would be the thing to elevate this slightly underwhelming bass into a reissue worthy of being called a grabber?

Don't forget your floaties! ;P

Has anyone played these? I love this thing. I almost pulled the trigger on a sire last year. Got it for almost half off for b stock, a minor body blemish that is in the photo. Every time people talk about alternative to fender someone brings up sire. They were right.

Made this video to send to my friends, expressing my frustration, but figured I'd post it here as well, since you guys actually know what you're looking at.

Basically, I got roped into performing Breed by Nirvana in November, and I feel way in over my head, because this shit is too difficult for my giga noob ass. My cousin, who is just as new to guitar as I am to bass, has her part nailed down, but I'm floundering.

I just want to work my way through Bass Buzz's course, like I was before this, and take my time actually learning shit properly, but now I feel like I need to hurry the fuck up and get this shit down. Like, I could totally back out, but I don't want to let anybody down, so I'm feeling pretty wound up about it.

Edit: Thank you guys for all the advice. I appreciate it. <3

Sharing current progress on adapting this section of the Golberg Variations to 6 strings fretless bass

Bam!