The Last Bass Outpost

This is hard to look at, but also hard not to look. Being a Realtor has taken me into the "hard times" sections of Chicago, but nothing like this. Along with the demise of Detroit go the fortunes of many small towns where suppliers churned out bearings and components but may have lacked to capital to transform manufacturing methods or even find an offshore partner. 

On the flip side, there must be cities that have found new used for old architecture, alongside newer buildings. Milwaukee comes to mind.

John, just to clarify, Lakland has always shared (expanding) space within a family industry that recycles truck tires into useful components.  The German steel foundry, Finkls, is around the corner.  For years, the area has been earmarked for alternative use, but I don't believe any property owner has a specific timeline for moving, especially in a slow economy where development has slowed.  It's a very cool place to visit if you get the chance.

tabla machine...that's rich.   

Very cool.  The leader of one praise band I'm in brought a sitar back from a business trip. He used it for two songs at last year's Christmas drama with great effect instead of the same-old versions everyone does.  It forced me to change up my bass lines also.  Do you have a paisley Nehru jacket?

Deja vous, John...didn't you post a similar thread last year?

It's amazing how many shootings there are in a city that restricts gun ownership.
Maybe we need more laws, and more cameras on poles with blue lights on top.
Yes, that should do it.

Quote from: jumbodbassman on April 08, 2010, 02:38:38 PM
how do the chi sonics compare to dark stars.  looks like lakland copied fred .....

I have a Dark Star Decade and a 55-02CS. A CS is not a copy of a DS as much as an alternative.  For one, the CS pole pieces are not encased, not adjustable, and there may be other internal construction differences.  Sonically, a DS saturates and blooms in a unique way, whereas Laklands have a more well-produced sound (Dan's description).  I think Lakland's main goal was to have a steady supply at reasonable cost, since they build almost all their own pickups now. One other point of difference is you can order a Chi Sonic as single coil only, or a CS humcanceller that is switchable to single coil (though some say the pure single coil version has sonic differences).

I agree that it was more fun ten years ago.  I've bought and sold internationally with some great experiences where we traded items of interest after the initial deal.  It felt like Facebook then - making friends in a new marketplace - versus today where stuff just gets shipped using automated tools.  Since there seem to be more scams now, I've stopped selling outside the U.S. - just because it would be more difficult to rectify a problem if something went wrong.

That reminds me - I should wear my Trans Am Club of Sweden T-shirt more often. A Swedish drag racer sent me that along with Swedish Hot Rod magazines, after I sold him Indianapolis 500 memorabilia from the year his Turbo Trans Am was the pace car.  I returned the favor by sending some other items for his collection.  It was friends trading for fun, not commerce, at that point.

At least Ebay and craiglist have been useful for making my hobbies sustainable.

I have the Stax live from Norway DVD. Great stuff.

We have quite a few Stax tunes in our sets also. I'm using a well-worn set of DR Black Beauties on a DS'd P-bass with good effect. Maybe that's what Duck was using?  According to Ed Friedland's 'R&B Masters" book, Duck used a slightly brighter tone than his contemporaries.

Thanks for the responses.  The DS harness came from Butch Ammons 3 years ago. Since he does impeccable soldering work as you probably know, I'll look for what I might have cocked up.

Had a weird incident with my Dark Star P-bass where the tone pot (CTS) or .047 cap seems to have blown out. Was playing with moderate aggression, heard a loud noise, then the bass lost volume so I quickly shut things down. The amp is fine since I carried on using another bass. Testing later at home, I have a working Vol pot but no tone attenuation. A quick visual looks like all connections are normal.

I'm assuming a Dark Star doesn't put out enough energy to blow out a pot or cap, but I'd appreciate hearing if anyone thinks this could be component failure. I'll double check solder connections for now.

If you guys are replacing all the pots, has anyone installed a Varitone yet?

I got one from Big D Guitars and built a project box to use with any bass.
Besides the deep and grind settings, I found the thin "woman tone" "suck switch"
setting is very useful live for driving outboard effects like an octaver.

Good job with the forensics.  The tape shot is very cool.

This topic never ceases to amuse. I don't think those f-hole cutouts are tone chambers.  Maybe they're intended as nesting sites for brown recluse spiders when you leave the bass on the porch?

Dang, that's nice. Looks like an ebony board.