deepbass5

On 25/03/2021 at 21:44, AxelF said:

I guess like a lot of people this was my first introduction to him

That lick at 2.05... The genre leaves me cold but damn...

I loved this post from AxelF

Just look at all those bass Apostles sat round the pit, taking it all in, beautiful.

About as close as I can get ( widdling)

A couple of questions

Is that an Ebony board and what weight does this come in at ?

cheers

Depends on your line up.  we were just Guitar, bass and drums and female singer. So often had to play an amalgam of what was on the original.

Guitar would have to play the guitar parts and pick up on brass and string fills, I would cover Bass and maybe Keyboard part if guitar is playing important other fills, Sometimes I would find I am playing a completely different line to the original bass but it works as a whole. As above some songs work for your line up others not. Some we thought would never work amazed us.   Just agree on what exact version you are doing and ensure everyone has a copy of that.

Yah - you get what you pay for 🙂  great keys from her wow  thanks.

Padauk  a favorite of mine - I have to say, but thats it

OK

Well i have spent the last three days making a 1/2 scale bass out of none tone woods, well woods i personally wouldn't choose to have a bass made out of. pictures attached.  Looks quite nice but sounds stinky poo.  some of you may point out, but it has no pick up or E.Q.

So this just goes to prove If you use none Tone woods you had better concentrate on getting a good Pick up and pre-amp in the thing. otherwise ya lost. 

This is for my two year old grand daughter as she destroys Kiddie acoustic guitars by standing on them.

Here is the sales pitch. 

Lime body ( basswood ) to you. actually an old chopping board.

Nice English aged Oak top , from my Fathers wood collection

Pine neck, with Light flamed Oak board and matching head stock.

Padauk bridge and bone nut, left overs from a Shuker build course.

Only had three old machine heads so its a 3 string bass.

So that's it, If you want a real bass get someone who knows what he is doing and ask for some nice tone wood.

1 hour ago, Dad3353 said:

I wonder how many concerts and recordings, over the years, have been messed up because the bass wasn't the 'right' wood..? 

i have been to a few Gigs like that, can't hear the Bass for the kick drum, could be the sound engineer hates bass players i suppose

Some MD's in my experience are out of their comfort zone, and more worried about showing their inadequacies to their peers. Those in the band that feel they have the monopoly of being musically correct. So they concentrate on obvious things like volume and dynamics, they never seem to address individual sections not playing in time, or explaining why we are called the rhythm section.  What ever bass you buy, if you have to plug into the mains you are not a real musician. Apparently.

Don't get me started 😡

who zips up the last one in.

Like a few bands i've played in, the sections are never playing together.

wonder who was still in the band the next week

Dead Kennedys -  large underground following

I am genuinely surprised at how many people are sighting Pups and pre-amps where good tone comes from, I am open to that but have tried to improve basses which don't speak well by adding new pups and changing EQ,s but still not turned them into a good instrument. I use John East pre-amps because they primarily give me flexibility playing live when jumping from number to number in a set, without turning round and changing amp settings. Not because the make the bass sound better, that, i believe is in the wood and construction.

The only exception to that was because John did me a deal on two pre's one for a bass with scratchy pots that needed replacing anyway and the other was for my M Bass as i wanted a para mid and the top end hi and hi mids didn't speak well. It did help it breath better in the top end, but the bass never got the gig over my Shuker, But interestingly 8 years on it has improved so much with age and gigging, it now sounds better than ever, and is now the last i would sell. So to me even though I am sure Marleaux select the best quality tone woods, after construction basses all need to be played so all those woods can work together in harmony, some more than others I guess.

Hope its not just that set of SIT strings i haven't used before ?

If you play in a Folk band, then it is acceptable to have a bass made from Oak, Elm or Beech. It'll sounds crap but you'll probably get away with it due to all the other odd sounds from whistles and squeeze boxes wafting round the pub garden.

New York Dolls  - no fluff in sight

25 minutes ago, Doctor J said:

Yeah, I know, but I'm asking about toneacrylic and tonegraphite now

Then someone goes and raps a nice piece of tonewood in carbon fiber so you can't tell what its made from and it sounds great

But is it better than a solid resin one, I need more basses, to prove these theories beyond doubt.

Just now, Muzz said:

I have a Dingwall, and it's a fantastic bass, there are several design features which taken together IMHO make it a step up from much of the normal designs around. It's made from Ash and Maple, but it's the way it's made that makes it extraordinary.

No Bass wood then, must be the pickups

8 minutes ago, Kev said:

Its certainly interesting when you compare the comments to that of someone like Sheldon Dingwall.  He designed the Z series bass to have two piece bodies made of different woods, specially selected to enhance the qualities of the low and high strings.  Is this just complete BS from him then?  Who is wrong?

Funny, I watched that Bass show video yesterday, it sounds good to be thinking about the best way to bring out the bass side and also the treble side, I was originally taken in by this but the fact he also mentioned inconsistency in weight being a problem for fender in the past, I think he is more concerned with heavy basses sitting in shops unsold.  I would also think his fan fret design has already given the bass advantages for both bass and treble side.

The last time i mentioned Him in a thread here he jumped in on the next line so, stand back would be nice to get a manufacturers opinion 🤐

I remember an article in the Bass player mag, about special bass amp mains cables, ( very expensive ?) possibly oxygen free copper etc. and how bad leads and mains cables can degrade your tone.  I did make up my own speaker cables with good hi-fi oxygen free cable anyway. But I was concerned after reading this, that on gigs I would often have to connect an extension into another extension for not only my bass but PA etc. So following the article I cleaned all three pins of my mains plugs with a fibre-glass stick to remove any oxidization, It was a noticeable improvement. After that i always made sure my bass amp was always first off a mains socket.

36 minutes ago, Killed_by_Death said:

When the string vibrates at a frequency resonant to the wood, you get dead spots, so yes it does make a difference.

When the wood is vibrating at a resonant frequency it saps away the energy from the vibration of the string

And specific harmonics are produced that we can distinguish as tonal variations, it's harmonics that we use to identify different instruments.

a guitar from a bass playing the same note or clarinet to a piano, the vibrations of a 440hz  'A' reaching our ears is an A but our brains can interoperate tonal variation including those on the same type of instrument, one bass to another depending on its construction. Tone is just volume of a particular frequency but add a unique harmonic signature to that. and Bobs your Aunt ☺️ tone wood starts to matter.

I may have to leave this thread as I have basses that need to be vibrated, just so they sound as good as they have done when i start gigging again.

shall we start on 35" v 34 " v 32" necks 😉

I accept all the above, but not if said red guitar is made from a non tone wood,

Are we heading for agreement on   -   Red guitars are louder conclusion to this topic

I remember being surprised that Kubicki factor bass's had a ply constructed neck, which i guess is the next step on from a 5 or 7 laminate neck employed for stability, but with 30 -40 lamination's working against the relief.  one would assume these lamination's are tone wood strips not just from 'construction site' shuttering ply ?   😦all those tones the lamination's add to the sound ! 😁

Or are you in the camp where some luthiers say glue actually detracts form the sound and resonance of the neck so should be minimized.

Is the Carbon rod introduction.  snake oil as well ?

what would you call all the woods that bass makers reject? and have learnt to not use because they sound bad,  (non tone woods) ?

logic says hundreds of years of musical instrument making, using wood has led to some favorite woods now known as tone woods