My Victory and I - rest of world, unimportant

[the mojo hobo]

The SG-Z is all maho with a pao ferro fingerboard.

Dangit Uwe, every time you say anything about the SG-Z it makes me want one.

[uwe]

Nearly 25 years of practice without a professional liability case, why risk anything now? You won't get a recommendation out of me! 

Ok, if you are neither looking for assertiveness/snap nor bass kalamazooomph, plus you regard nuanced mids as your personal nirvana, then the SG-Z might be for you. There are pretty accurate sound clips here, the first one is how low and deep as it gets:

http://www.flyguitars.com/gibson/bass/2000gibsonSGZ.php

Hard to imagine either Geezer Butler or Chris Squire queuing up for one.

[neepheid]

Here are some I did, to add fuel to the fire: http://www.ifb.co.uk/~matthew/mp3/sgz%20soundclips/

Sorry they're a bit ropey - McCartney I ain't.  I should add that there's no tone shaping amp/preamp trickery going on here, this is the bass directly into an E-MU 0202 USB sound interface and recorded in Audacity.  The only thing I did afterwards was normalise the volume.

[Highlander]

Dare I say... my knob's never looked so good, Matt...

[Pilgrim]

Dare I say... my knob's never looked so good, Matt...

Been waiting for the chance to drop in this shot I took this week...

[Highlander]

That's trippy, maaan...

[Granny Gremlin]

Also, I've just realised that I have a history of being photographed with a gormless grin while playing Gibson basses

Bass face 

 Also, I had forgotten until I saw this pic that some RD Artists had 2 minitoggles for the fx modes vs 1 large.

[Granny Gremlin]

Nice looking bass! I think the Victory Artists are some of the coolest looking basses Gibson made, and I really love the pickup/pickguard arrrangement on them..

The neck profile (plus 24th fret access) are the best features of the Victory series.  The neck is wide but shallow; surprisingly comfortable in my small hands. .. I just wish the fretboard went all the way for the bass strings as well but the slant end looks pretty suave.

[Highlander]

... some RD Artists had 2 minitoggles for the fx modes vs 1 large.

'79 onwards... iirc...?

One of the things that always irked me with mine ('78) were the switch positions, so I moved the pup selector to the Les Paul position and split the single FX to two minis located near the pointed section of the scratch below the bridge pup...
The other thing was the white dot markers which Peter Cook kindly changed over to black when he also ground the frets down so I could experiment as a fretless...
I really should finish my rebuild...

[neepheid]

Dare I say... my knob's never looked so good, Matt...

The icing on a very delicious cake, my friend

[neepheid]

'79 onwards... iirc...?

One of the things that always irked me with mine ('78) were the switch positions, so I moved the pup selector to the Les Paul position and split the single FX to two minis located near the pointed section of the scratch below the bridge pup...
The other thing was the white dot markers which Peter Cook kindly changed over to black when he also ground the frets down so I could experiment as a fretless...
I really should finish my rebuild...

Yeah, mine is a very late '79 model (stamped on 5th Dec).

And yes, you should finish your rebuild, because they're amazing basses.  The people who had a go of mine at the weekend were surprised at how easy it was to play, considering they do look like giant, recalcitrant beasts

[Highlander]

... And yes, you should finish your rebuild...

The Curse of the Shed...