DESCRIPTION:
https://www.buymeacoffee.com/TJH3113

As I approached the end of my second year of playing the bass, I’d come a long way. I’d been practicing a lot. My first band had played a school dance. My ear was developing. I’d outgrown my worship of Gene Simmons. And I was actually starting to be able to get around a bit on the instrument. I had also been through quite a few basses during that (what I now consider to be) relatively short period of time. Back then, it seemed like a lifetime. Around this time, Journey’s ”Escape” album came out and I was immediately drawn to the sound of Ross Valory’s bass. I’d seen a Peavey T-40 in my local music store but never really gave it a second glance until I saw a picture of Ross playing one on the inside cover of their ”Captured” album. Assuming that was the bass he used to get “that” sound, I traded my black Precision in towards the T-40. I think it might have been close to an even swap which was pretty rare for a trade-in. I may have had to kick in a couple of bucks, I don’t quite remember. Anyway, I didn’t sound any more like Ross Valory when I played the Peavey than I did Chris Squire when I played my first Ric, but it was a nice bass with the finest, most luxurious case I had ever seen. It was a really well built, well designed instrument that had a lot of interesting features that were way ahead of their time. I learned my first Rush songs on a bass like this and have fond memories of that period of time and of the bass itself. Recently, I started reading up on the basses and decided to buy one for purely nostalgic reasons. I found this one on Reverb.com and it was advertised as a “Time Capsule Bass” meaning that it had, essentially, been bought, put in the case and never played. The bass, made in 1981, is in absolute mint condition and even had the vinyl overlay that tells you what the knobs and switches do still on the pick-guard. My old bass had a natural ash finish and, while I’m a big fan of white basses, I thought, how cool would it be to have the exact same bass as I did when I was a kid? So I bought another one.

To be continued…

One quick thing…at the 1:45 mark in the video, I was so pleased with the way the bass sounded that it caused me to smile.

One more quick thing…it was only much later on that I learned Ross Valory had actually played an Ovation Magnum bass on this album.