LeftyBassist.com

Got to briefly see Marc, Chris, and Pete so far. Friday traffic in the Regenerate booth was larger than all of the 2012 show combined. We were busy last year, but nothing like the show open to close busy we've had this year.

All of our top end $$$ basses are gone, and the player priced models are getting great attention from both players and industry buyers. There has also been attention from a larger cross section of players this year, ranging from a 65 year old phenomenal country picker to jazz greats like Jay Roberts to doobie Brothers' Skunk Baxter to extreme metal players. Diversity has been the key to my sonic sanity

Heading back out for another day

All the best,

R

FYI, Rod brought a lefty 4 string "Stingray-style" bass (Sorry, Rod, I don't know the model name) that I played and I have to tell you folks, it SMOKES any EB made Musicman. Maple neck, natural ash? body, 2 band EQ (not usre who's preamp it is) just like the good 'ole pre-EB MMs. Rod also told me that he'd love to sell it so he doesn't have to haul it back home. The price he quoted me was $1100, which is a steal, especially for a custom made instrument. You can't even get an EB MM for that price! If I had the money, I'd snatch it up immediately.

Get in touch with Rod for more details.

Spotted a handful of additional lefties yesterday. I'm not near my camera right now, but from memory:

- There was a lefty Boulder Creek acoustic bass on display. I'm not a big acoustic bass fan, as I've yet to hear one that can project, and naturally you couldn't hear it unplugged in a noisy center, but I did like the neck and the playability and it sounded cool amplified.

- Sandburg had a 4 string California PJJ Jazz bass in vintage white which was very nice and had a cool active on board 3 band EQ passive/active pull knob. Sounded great, played great, but it didn't feel $2595 great to me.

- Rickenbacker had a lefty Mapleglo 4003 on display. They told me lefties are available in Mapleglo, Fireglo, Jetglo, as well as the new Ruby and Midnight Blue colors. These colors are different than Rick's previous Ruby/Midnight Blue finishes, as they had a touch of sparkle flakes in them now. Looked pretty cool. They also told me they've gotten a lot of response from players who miss the old 70's slim neck profiles, and they're planning on moving back in that direction in the future as previous 4003s were considered too chunky.

- Gibson had no lefties on display, but we all know they're now offering lefty basses in most models. They had a non-reverse T-Bird on display as well. I'm heading back there today to ask about lefties, and specifically whether or not the non-reverse T-Bird will be available. I did sample the righties they had just to get a feel for them. (You couldn't plug them in though).


More to come...

Brubaker had a 6string in a really cool copper color. My pics will not do it justice. Zon had a Sonus 5 which Addison was playing the crap out of . And a Redwood Legacy which did not make it to the showroom floor. Hopefully Addison can post some
Pics of that beauty.

As for guitars, Anderson had a killer Les Paul which is headed to JerrysLeftyGuitars. Hahn had a killer killer Tele - black body and maple neck. James Beard - lap steel builder extraordinare - nearly got me to drop a butt load of cash on one of his instruments. He would have converted it overnight at the hotel. Now how's that for service? Santa Cruz had one of Jerry's pre sold dreads on the wall.
I may be repeating myself but Gretsch had a Steven Stern master built Penguin.

Got to play the Fender Super bass man 300, I'll give it two thumbs up. also got to play Baer amps and cabs? Liked them a lot?

Jaguar amps has a new 100 watt head based on the AC-100 (?). It sounds similar to his 200 watt head. Kinda hard to classify tho. It is in the old school camp, but an analogy escapes me.

Sweet fanny moses that is a deal!!

I'll second that emotion! I'm glad that there are others out there starting to take notice of this amp. I got one shortly after it came on the market. Been using it with the matching 6x10 cabinet. Two channels of pure freakin' awesome. Sounds great at almost any volume, super versatile and LOTS of power and headroom.

+1 to what PJ said. I don't even like Stingrays or Stingray style basses, natural finished basses, but if I were ever to get one, this would have been it. I really liked how it sounded and play. I am more of a jazz, p bass guy.

MESA did not plan to attend. They were not there last year or this year. Most likely will be in attendance next year. I have heard the sealed cab. I um... played thru it demo-ing some things several months back @ Mesa. Good sounding cab. If you like the sealed tweeter-less cabs, you might like it. It's supposed to be real loud too. I myself prefer the PowerHouse with tweeter but I don't play old school music that would benefit the sealed cab.

I will be doing a Boulder Creek review here shortly. I took home the 4 string a month ago to test out. The fretless was cool. They have some other things coming as well. I'll post shortly. Also I have been in talks with them on the headstock design. We will see what happens in 2013.

As far as the RIC 4003 colors, the Midnight Blue and Ruby will be shipping in 2013 in small batches. The current 3 are more produced. There was one Ruby 1 off 2012 at PickoftheRicks but got snagged. The Ruby finish is killer!

I'm literally exhausted right now, so I'll keep this pretty short... it was a long-ass crazy weekend. My travel time started at 7:AM yesterday, and I didn't walk into my house until 12:AM this morning... and I was up at 5:30 to help get my wife and kids out the door.

I need sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep...

Anyway, it was really nice to finally meet some of you... great talking to everyone... I really wish I could have hung out more, but the Zon booth was ridiculously busy and we were all stretched pretty thin.

I was only able to get away to look for lefties twice... I played Rod's SR bass for a minute, a Sandberg that was pretty cool (but, from what I gather, WAY overpriced), and a SR5 that was HORRIBLE. In fact, I'm pretty sure there was something wrong with it. The neck had no relief and the saddles were almost bottomed out, but the action was what I would consider pretty high. I also played Bill's Lakland (I want it) and Joe Zon brought a Sonus Standard that sounded killer, but the string spacing was too tight for me. Still fun to play though.

Bass-wise, the highlight of the weekend for me was being able to set up and play Joe Lester's new fretless Legacy Elite 5. I think everyone here was already gone by the time this bass showed up on Sunday, but... it was a work of art and made me GAS hard for another Zon. It sounded and played absolutely KILLER... Joe is a lucky guy! It's too bad he's such a cool dude or I might have beat him up and taken it from him.

Here are some pics...









Anyway, I have a ton of day-job work to catch up on so I better roll for now... I hope I don't fall asleep on my desk!

Nice meeting everyone!

Chris

Very pretty!
I played a Dean Edge 4 last week that was upgraded with a pair of those new EMG-X humbuckers (either the 35DCX or the 35CSX) and I was impressed! I don't care for Deans, but I liked this one and it sounded awesome and incredibly versatile. It was paired to a master volume, pickup pan and one basic (active) tonepot for each pickup, and it was absolutely killer!

Here's the link to my pics from NAMM. I'll post some individual pics and stories behind them as time permits

http://s32.photobucket.com/albums/d14/mrberger/NAMM%202013/

I made the mistake of putting my camera in our NAMM box, so I just got my pictures back. Marc and Peter, here's what you missed on Saturday night after the show!