Edwin, I have a couple of gigs in my diary this month and next so there should be an opportunity to give it some live experience.
I've been playing it so much over the past couple of days and thankfully it does have it's own voice compared to my other series basses. I'm still blown away by it. It's 16 years old, still has original strings, that are showing signs of corrosion under the silk at the headstock but soundwise they sound almost as bright as a new set of strings. There is only one ding on the tip of the headstock which is about 1mm in size other than that i'ts absolutely spotless no signs of playing no fret-wear or smoothing of pickups from contact with fingers, chrome plating is flawless. It's like brand new, there were not even batteries inside as it don't even think the covers were ever removed as it was quite a challenge to get them off. Interesting that the three continuous backplates are fixed to brass plates which is not the case on my other two newer basses with continuous backplates. I guess it helps with the balance and durability. It really is like brand new and the sound is incredible just like i expected.
StephenR, as well as this bass I have a series I and a series II Europa and when comparing them like this I tend to do it with the filters fully open and no Q then fully closed again without q because thats easier to reproduce and compare kind of like for like. On first impressions and playing at home the differences I would describe as this. The two basses with the ebony neck laminations seem to have more of the fundamental note that you play plus more of the higher overtones than the lower ones so they sound extremely clean, punchy and more sparkly toned and if you move the filters they seem to respond more audibly to smaller tweaks. Playing harmonics is much easier and they are louder and the notes sustain much longer. The series I with purpleheart neck lams has less of a pronounced fundamental in comparison but more of the warmer overtones and less of the higher overtones so the bass has a very big warm bassy tone and a little less of the higher overtones. What i do like about all of them is that even when the filters are completey closed there are still enough of the mids and higher frequencies in the output to stop the notes becoming woolly and indestinct but not so much that it competes with the bottom end. The twist in the tail is that all of them have the neck pickup in a slightly different place which makes a big difference to what is being picked up from the moving string so that really makes it harder for me categorically attribute things definitively to the woods that make up the bass. But it gives me three different sounding basses I can choose from.
