And the way I look at it, the guitar cost me nothing - looking at her 400 pair of heels and my one guitar how else could I look at it? - so why not spend a little to mod it? I WAS going to get a new nut, graphite or even bone - silly I know for a lp100- but I was told by someone at one of the local music stores - very respected store - that a.
I feel like 70s pbasses can generally have a distinct beefiness to them, that Paul Simonon sound, etc. For me, personally, that would be the reason I’d get a 70s pbass.
Of course, I’m under the impression Fender in this era isn’t known for its consistency and there are plenty of duds in the bunch.I’d go for the pup sound you want and don’t worry about keeping it original (though keep the original in your possession). If you want a better specimen of a 70s- sounding P pup, I’d contact Curtis Novak, he could get you where you need to go. Click to expand.I fully agree with this!Take advantage of Leo's assembly-line practices, and get a new pickguard with new electronics. Come to think of it, you could even put a preamp in it, as long as it doesn't require routing. I have a friend that have done that to his 70s strats, going for stacked humbuckers and 3 switches, instead of the blade switch.
The rest of the guitar is original and if he wants to sell, he can put the original pickguard again, with the old pickups and pots. He even put a crimp connector to the ground wire, to prevent too much soldering.Make sure the screw holes match!!! Click to expand.Never say never, but the demographics are against it. Boomer musicians with loads of cash, reliving their childhoods (I'm of that age, but not a nostalgaphile) are what's driven up the prices of basses that were cool when we were young.I don't think the next generation is as excited about old Fenders as some of my contemporaries are - once us boomers are gone, there's a good chance that demand for old Fenders will go down (the supply will go up as our kids sell off our old gear). Up until 2008, common wisdom (I didn't agree, but most folks did) was that housing prices never go down. Housing is less elastic than basses (people have to live somewhere, people don't have to have multiple basses).
Basses may very well crash harder than housing. If you like old basses, having a few is just fine; I just wouldn't think of it as a safe long term investment. Click to expand.These things are cyclical, and such extreme attitudes will die out with the boomers. I doubt Millennials will settle for old guitars that can barely pass a clean signal because the components have turned to dung.I personally find it perverse that people worry about such minutiae in production-line guitars. A factory worked soldered all of those pots into those guitars.
They reached into a big bin of pots with one hand, and soldered with the other. They probably had a cigarette hanging out the corner of their mouth, and they probably were thinking about what was for dinner or where to take the kids at the weekend.
These weren't master craftsmen, or even luthiers. Those pots weren't rare, special items.I saw a post of a crusted up old 1972 CTS pot on my Instagram feed today. The comment on it was something like '1972!!!' , as though a worn out, generic electrical component needs to be celebrated.Get it in the bin! Buy a replacement for $4!
Get back to making music! These things are cyclical, and such extreme attitudes will die out with the boomers. I doubt Millennials will settle for old guitars that can barely pass a clean signal because the components have turned to dung.I personally find it perverse that people worry about such minutiae in production-line guitars. A factory worked soldered all of those pots into those guitars. They reached into a big bin of pots with one hand, and soldered with the other. They probably had a cigarette hanging out the corner of their mouth, and they probably were thinking about what was for dinner or where to take the kids at the weekend.
These weren't master craftsmen, or even luthiers. Those pots weren't rare, special items.I saw a post of a crusted up old 1972 CTS pot on my Instagram feed today.
The comment on it was something like '1972!!!' , as though a worn out, generic electrical component needs to be celebrated.Get it in the bin! Buy a replacement for $4! Get back to making music!There is something to buying another bass to 'sandbox' on and to tide you over. However it can backfire! I bought a Mustang bass so that I had a smaller shortscale bass to take to rehearsals so that I could leave my Coronado at home.
The Coronado pretty much never saw any action after that.So, OP might find that a Squier actually out-plays their '78 P bass. Click to expand.No absolutely not, a 1959 les Paul will continue to appreciate in value unfortunately for me and musicians everywhere. If you think they’ve turned dumpy you’ve never played one.
But collectors don’t play them anyway, they collect them.A CTS pot is better than anything you can buy today. Not high end boutique pots, nothing is as good.
They don’t make them anywhere like they used to. The carbon traces today are much, much thinner. You can successfully open up and old CTS pot and refurbish it multiple times.
So a crusty old CTS pot still has inherent value unless it’s basically totally destroyed from corrosion.Now pots of today, they get scratchy and intermittent, yeah you’ve got to replace them because the carbon traces will already be worn through in spots, and if not the tabs on the casing will more likely snap off now anyway. Straight to the landfill. And if you care, you won’t find any made in The USA anymore.Don’t get me wrong there are plenty of high end potentiometers available that work ok and have a pleasing taper now, in fact copying the CTS taper, but it’s not the same thing.
Click to expand.Will they, though? The people who put them on that pedestal are dying out. They are only worth as much people believe them to be worth, and that demographic is shifting (into the grave, mostly).
As you say, they are priced out the hands of us mere musicians, so we will collectively lose interest in them over time. I never saw Peter Green or Eric Clapton play one in 1967. I have no connection with them.
They didn't make the music of my misspent youth. If I were a millionaire they wouldn't be one of the talismanic icons of my childhood and teenage years that I felt the need to pay crazy money for. Old Les Pauls do all of these things for the sort of 60+ year old guys who own baseball teams. When their kids are divvying up their estates those Les Pauls will go back to being 'that old guitar', and that will be that!
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Plug it into a Line6 Spyder and, don't ya know it, the switch is worn out. A CTS pot is better than anything you can buy today. Not high end boutique pots, nothing is as good. They don’t make them anywhere like they used to. The carbon traces today are much, much thinner. You can successfully open up and old CTS pot and refurbish it multiple times.
So a crusty old CTS pot still has inherent value unless it’s basically totally destroyed from corrosion.Now pots of today, they get scratchy and intermittent, yeah you’ve got to replace them because the carbon traces will already be worn through in spots, and if not the tabs on the casing will more likely snap off now anyway. Straight to the landfill. And if you care, you won’t find any made in The USA anymore. Click to expand.I've not had any issue with modern CTS pots that I've bought as aftermarket components. I've encountered some cheaper CTS pots in Mexican Fenders that have been pretty worn out. Probably not all CTS pots are built the same.I've used Bourns pots as well, but they seem a bit gritty?
'Alpha' brand pots seem to be all over the map in terms of quality (smoothness of travel, taper), and also the most widely available.' Made in the USA' means nothing to me.
Swapping out a pot is like changing a tire on a car for me. Or maybe a brake pad? The old pads were full of asbestos but didn't wear out as quickly.
The modern part maybe doesn't last as long, but it does the job for a while and then is easy to replace when it goes bad. Will they, though? The people who put them on that pedestal are dying out. They are only worth as much people believe them to be worth, and that demographic is shifting (into the grave, mostly). As you say, they are priced out the hands of us mere musicians, so we will collectively lose interest in them over time. I never saw Peter Green or Eric Clapton play one in 1967.
I have no connection with them. They didn't make the music of my misspent youth. If I were a millionaire they wouldn't be one of the talismanic icons of my childhood and teenage years that I felt the need to pay crazy money for. Old Les Pauls do all of these things for the sort of 60+ year old guys who own baseball teams. When their kids are divvying up their estates those Les Pauls will go back to being 'that old guitar', and that will be that! Plug it into a Line6 Spyder and, don't ya know it, the switch is worn out.I've not had any issue with modern CTS pots that I've bought as aftermarket components. I've encountered some cheaper CTS pots in Mexican Fenders that have been pretty worn out.
Probably not all CTS pots are built the same.I've used Bourns pots as well, but they seem a bit gritty? 'Alpha' brand pots seem to be all over the map in terms of quality (smoothness of travel, taper), and also the most widely available.' Made in the USA' means nothing to me. Swapping out a pot is like changing a tire on a car for me. Or maybe a brake pad? The old pads were full of asbestos but didn't wear out as quickly. The modern part maybe doesn't last as long, but it does the job for a while and then is easy to replace when it goes bad.It is exactly the same thing, as far as I can see.
You find some top dollar boutique part that performs exactly the same as the perceived higher quality vintage part. Where is the difference?
Your Emerson pot probably has a closer tolerance than the old CTS pots anyway. Click to expand.All CTS pots are different now, you can buy better and worse but the vintage is better than any new. It doesn’t matter if you see it, trust me it’s different, or take it apart and look for yourself. You can’t get an exact replication, is what I’m saying. If you’re happy then awesome!As far as 59 les Paul - yes they will retain prices.
The people who “put them on the pedestal” at first might dying out but that doesn’t mean no one else cares. I’m half the age of those people, as are many people who are buying them today. I like Metallica more than I ever liked Led Zepplin. If I had enough money to buy a 59 lp at current prices, I would.The people that put Stradivarius instruments on a pedestal are dead dead, but prices continue to increase. Click to expand.The weird irony is that most Stradivarius instruments have been rebuilt over time. Most are running on newer fingerboards at least, if they've not had more intrusive work carried out.
It is guitar collectors alone that value complete originality in their instruments, which just reinforces the whole 'Emperor's New Clothes' element of guitar collecting to me.Les Paul collectors remind me of 'Tulip mania'; that brief period in Dutch history where everybody started feverishly collecting tulips and tulip-shaped objects. We're at the point in time where any 1950s Goldtop Les Paul with more than a light scratch in the finish is considered the 'ideal conversion candidate' and is chopped into an approximation of a real 'burst by luthiers with varying degrees of skill. These guys try and pass off their ugly pretend sunburst Les Pauls, with three piece un-matching off-center-seam tops, as almost as good as the real thing. The needless destruction of non-sunburst '50s Gibsons does annoy me, slightly, yet the desire for burst-shaped guitars is more important at the moment.I don't think a 100% hand-built, one-at-a-time instrument can ever be compared to a factory-built production line guitar.
Collectors can fetishise router chew marks in control cavities, tooling chatter on binding nibs or casting anomalies on the underside of pickup rings, but they are ultimately worshiping the mundane rather than the sublime.