I am living abroad this year and I wanted to buy a bass, probably 20" or 22", so that I can practice on for dci 2012. I was wondering if it is a good idea to buy one of those cheap "verve x" drums or invest in something more expensive (yamaha, pearl, dynasty, etc)? The problem is, I would love to buy something used or new but I haven't had much luck looking online, especially for shipping to the UK. Can anyone hoop me up with a bass? My price range is $0 - $300 ish

Don't get a cheap "brand x" drum like Verve. Most of them probably can't handle the tension of corps-style tuning.

If you're looking for something really cheap, maybe you can re-purpose a drum set bass. A late 1970s or '80s Ludwig drum set bass with a thick 6-ply shell would be a pretty good substitute for a marching bass:

• The Ludwig "large classic" lugs on those drums are plenty strong -- they were used on Ludwig marching tenors, too.
• The most common size is 22" by 14", which happens to be the same size as a standard 22" marching bass.
• They should be plentiful and reasonably cheap since Ludwig probably made over a million of them.

You can also get regular Marching Bass Drums on EBAY used and a very good price. Many come with case and harness so it is already to go. Most of the ones I`ve seen are Yamaha and a few Pearl.

I believe "shipping to the UK" was the problem with this. Otherwise, yeah, used marching BDs are relatively cheap on ebay. I shudder to think what shipping across the Atlantic would be for something the size of a bass drum.

Checking ebay.uk, though, I see only one very small (16") older Premier marching bass worth bothering with. Next best thing is a sub-Pearl-Competitor level Premier. Oddly (to me) the german Drum-Tec Parade Line stuff doesn't look like complete dreck - depends on the quality of the BD lugs and shell.

(unrelated: looking at the Drum-Tec site, why can't companies at least copy a *good* multitenor design instead of only the really, really bad ones? Are they just not paying attention? Even cruddy build quality with a decent starting point is better than than cruddy quality AND a horrible design! I mean, they basically have a 90% copy of Premier's snare but don't do a knock-off set of tenors?!? \rant)

Thanks for the help guys. I think what I'll do is ship a drum to my house in the US, and when I go home in a month I'll pick it up and bring it back under the plane when I fly back to the UK.

We have a couple of drums listed right now Yamaha 16 and 20 Bass Drums. Just posted from RMcSlash and could sell at a good price. Try to PM him and I`m sure you can get a better price than ebay since he is looking for a buyer right now.


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I really appreciate this, thanks! However I actually already took care of that situation and ended up buying a 22" dynasty, but if I hadn't I would definitely have looked into this. Always glad to help a fellow DLO'er out!