Brave Sir Robin

[quote name='eude' post='75627' date='Oct 17 2007, 03:47 PM']Sweet sounding bass dude. Looking forward to watching this one! Cheers, Eude[/quote] Hey Eude, I'll keep you all posted I believe I bought a Thumb BO 5 (wenge neck) from you, feels like ages ago! That bass kicked major bottoms, but really too hard to play for me in the end. That little monster is in good hands now, and it's seeing some serious live action!

I finally took the plunge, and some bonus money from work came in handy to cure my GAS for a custom! I'm going for a ACG Recurve Single Cut 5 String, specced with all the bells and whistles : - Walnut top and back. - Limba core. - 5 piece Wenge / Bubinga neck. - 18 mm spacing. - Macassar ebony fretboard. - MM / HB pickups (both switchable). - ACG filter preamp. - Oil finish. - Macassar Ebony wooden knobs. It's gonna be a belter I recon. I've got pics of the woods, the deposit and final details aren't yet done, but I can't wait (even though the build is gonna take a while)!

Repeating myself, but check out the ATK305.

They are great little basses. I was impressed by a 615 I tried. Same thing with the added pre-amp. Sounded good passive or active. Tight B. In the world of cheapies, I would consider : - Ibanez BTB 405QM. - Ibanez ATK305. - Yamaha BB415 / 615. - Ibanez SR505. That would be my GAS list is I was broke. Ibanez makes great low to mid-range basses.

That's a mad top! That thumb is gorgeous. I owned a Thumb BO 5 1998 for a while, 5 piece wenge neck. The neck was pretty thick. In fact, quite different from a Corvette $$ 5 string I owned as well. It felt fatter and rounder than the new $$ neck, which was quite big in its own right but had a flatter feel. It wasn't neckdiving as such, more like the balance was horizontal, which can be considered neckdiving (I prefer a more upright balance myself), and really heavy. It felt more dense and 'pro' than the $$. The sound was thunderous, a real badass Metal monster. I really like the looks too. BTW, according to the legends, the 5 strings seems to be suffering from neckdive more than the 4 strings.

[quote name='BigRedX' post='65622' date='Sep 25 2007, 11:15 PM']Todays basses come from the [url="http://www.littleguitarworks.com/"]Little Guitar Works[/url] This is the Torzal: No there's nothing wrong with the neck on these basses. It's designed to be twisted like that! This design, initially conceived by Jerome Little has the bridge at a 15° angle to plane of the body and the nut rotated 20° in the opposite direction giving a total twist of 35°. This allows for a more 'neutral' wrist position for both the freting picking hands. The twist concept was developed in conjunction with Xavier Padilla, bass player with the Gipsy Kings who would have been unable to carry on playing due to DeQuervain’s syndrome in his arm until he got his twisted bass. Have a look at his even more extreme custom model on the Little Guitar Works web site.[/quote] There is a gool video review of the Torzal in action on youtube. [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLi8pOa6zYk"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLi8pOa6zYk[/url]

[quote name='bass_ferret' post='58893' date='Sep 11 2007, 07:02 PM']The music is sh*t [/quote] Yeah, but unless it's really sh*t, I don't mind usually. Here, I felt strangely compelled to watch it. They must be on drugs. That's what being on a cocktail of Prozac and crack must feel like.

I still think a MM + P would be more intresting than a deluxe P. WOuld be a cool project anyhow. Problem is the pickups are fighting for position. A P in place of where the single J sits in the H/S? Would that really capture the Precision tone? BTW, that video creeps me out somehow... There's something wrong, and it's not the Stingray Precision, I can't put my finger on it. My opinion of course!

Give it a good sending off and burn it and smash it on stage.

[url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/warwick_corvette_std_bubinga_4_aa.htm"]http://www.thomann.de/gb/warwick_corvette_...ubinga_4_aa.htm[/url] [url="http://www.thomann.de/gb/yamaha_trb1004_nt.htm"]http://www.thomann.de/gb/yamaha_trb1004_nt.htm[/url] [url="http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/74195"]http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/74195[/url] [url="http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/73055"]http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/73055[/url] [url="http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/73055"]http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/73055[/url] More second hand (Spector, Musicman, Warwick, ect...).

Gold on white... Yuk! But it reminds me of : - The dodgy 80's. - Slappers on a Saturday night (I guess that's convenient for a Stingray!). - Horrible birthday/wedding cake (the white kind with flakes and gold letters). - The girlie version of Gold On Black, which is equally cheesy. I don't think I'd be caught alive playing one of these! (Sorry!).

Hardware colour? I wonder how chrome would look with that. Maybe not the bridge though.

[b]- Stagg P bass copy[/b]. Cheap plywood crap. Turned it into a fretless. But gave it away and bought a... [b]- Hohner BBass IV Professional[/b]. Good bass. Noisy, but good sound. Light, well balanced, super thin neck, great to look at, not so good slapped, and the bridge pickup had a weird dry sound by itself. Served me well though. Then I had a break for 5 years, and came back to bass recently, and decided to go for 5 strings, so I went to buy a cheap... [b]- Ibanez K5[/b]. £200. Good deal. Good bass, great to look at (bar the cheesy Korn inlay), good sounding. Then I had some cash to spare, and always wanted a warwick, so I got myself a... [b]- Warwick Thumb BO 5[/b]. I bought it from Eude (same Eude?). I really liked it, except it was impossible to play. Very heavy, neckdive, fat neck, but sounded really aggressive and fat and full at the same time. The nu-metal king. So I sold it and bought a... [b]- Warwick Corvette $$ 5 strings[/b]. I liked it enough, but the pickups were terrible. Mud city in the low end, and not particularly versatile. Strangely enough it sounded wicked when slapped. Why does warwick put those p.o.s. MECs in their bass. THen now I'm on the prawl for a... [b]- custom 5 string[/b]! What, I don't know yet. Amps, well, I got a grand total of two. [b]- Ross 60 watt[/b]. A real piece of crap. I don't think I could have found worse if I tried. So when I started bass again, I decided to get me a... [b]- Sansamp Bass Driver[/b]. I though I didn't need a amp for playing by my lonesome, but I was wrong, so I bought a... [b]- Gallien-Krueger GK400RBIV-210[/b]. Now we're talking! Lovely amp. That's the proper stuff. Not super loud, but good enough for me. I can beef it up to 380 watts with an extra cab.

If the plane's gonna crash, the bass will survive at least.

If you stick to known brands, you'll be ok (yamaha, Ibanez, Squier, Peavey, OLP). Best is to try them yourself of course. At this price range, build quality and comfort are probably more important than pure tone. Also, cheap active basses usually have noisy preamps. examples : [url="http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/flypage/product_id/10206"]http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/fl...roduct_id/10206[/url] [url="http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/flypage/product_id/13880"]http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/fl...roduct_id/13880[/url] [url="http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/flypage/product_id/10520"]http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/fl...roduct_id/10520[/url] [url="http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/flypage/product_id/15860"]http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/fl...roduct_id/15860[/url] [url="http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/flypage/product_id/10217"]http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/shop/fl...roduct_id/10217[/url] You'll also get more bang for bucks on the second hand market. Although a lefty maybe hard to find, the low price bracket is quite populated. If you check out the local shops, you can find good deals, basses they can't shift (left handed are good candidate). While looking for a 5 string, I personnaly tried and liked the Ibanez RD, Yamaha BB (both have a nice vintage tone, and had a nice sounding low B if you go 5 string), and the BTBs (higher up market). Didn't think too much about OLPs, but some like them. Peaveys (Millenium BXP) were good too, but 'harsh' sounding and felt a bit cheap. Some like squiers, but Fenders not being my thing, I don't have first hand opinions. If you plan on recording via a computer, you may find problems with impedance matching, and the bass sounding thin and hollow, and clipping on the low end. A compressor is useful, also a DI box to level the signals. Don't have to be expensive. Again, second hand market.

I think those videos sum it up

That's gonna be something special. I think your colour scheme will work great with the bass. It's one funky organic look. I'm not even sure I prefer the front or the back of the bass! Very alien-esque, super cool! And yead, lots of gloss and shine would be great with the top. Love the cutaways. Adds more dynamics to the look, especially on curvy basses

I'd give the Ibanez ATK a shot as well.

Looks wal-esque.

Red Hot Chili Peppers - too many to count! (notably from BSSM, Soul To Squeeze, Mellowship Slinky, Naked In The Rain, My lovely Man, Give it away... the whole album in fact!). Tool - Many. Jamiroquai - Many. I haven't learned the lines, but they really tickle my bass bones. Mavin Gaye - What's going on. Faith No More - Surprise! You're dead! Meshuggah - New Millenium Cyanide Christ (Hard to play! That gets my pick technique in overdrive).

[quote name='dood' post='36520' date='Jul 24 2007, 07:22 PM']If it's pickups you are refering to, in an electric bass, a large percentage of the tone comes from the electronics/ pups. More so than the woods used. What I mean is that you can make a more noticeable difference to the voice of a bass by changing its electronics than you can by changing the wood alone. Sounds unlikely doesn't it?[/quote] One part of me wants to agree, the other part is in denial An all maple bass would sound different than a wenge/bubinga bass, but a bass with two active humbuckers would sound equally or more different than a bass with two passive jazz pups, and the pickup placement would alter the sound even more, that's for sure. But I like woods. Dark woods especially. And lots of them! I like the look of them, the sound of them, the feel of them, and if the bass design allows the sound characteristics of the wood (yes! I believe!) to shine though, I'm all up for it. I found spectors, status and bongos don't really work like that, where as warwicks do. It's more towards what I want, but more open and practical . It would be a very boring world if you could make a bass made out of plastic bits sound every bit like a corvette passive (I tried one, it was really sweet and woody and mellow) or a Fender Jazz (Jaco burp) or a P bass. Which I'm sure you can if you really wanted to (Variax?). Hence my quest for a nice looking, nice sounding bass and great looks. Active electronics seem to blure the edges a lot more as well. It's quite interesting, everywhere I read about guys investing in boutique bass, they tend to prefer the passive sound than the active sound. Or with just a slight tweak of active to shape the sound according to the environment or the type of music. I like that. For custom and exotic stuff, I believe everyone chooses a bass and it's wood / electronics combination in equal terms. And the luthier brings his skills and knowledge to make everything stick. It's all a package. my 2 cents. After all that incoherent rambling, I feel like on a merry-go-round!

Thanks for the input. I've thought about it for a while. I'm pretty overworked, so I haven't been able to commit to a new purchase, but I've been looking around and trying things. - Corvette $$ NT. I've considered it. I like the Corvette $$ BO enough, but they didn't grabbed me. As per usual, it seems that the electronics in the warwicks just lets down the whole package. Especially on the $$ 5 string I tried. It was quite muddy in the lows. It's like the MECs give warwicks a bad cold. I'm gonna have to leave warwicks aside. My old Thumb was nice though, quite clear and clean. They sounded a bit like EMGs. - Not a fan of the bongo. The looks, the design. Really not big on pickguards and opaque finishes. Form before function maybe, but I'm not a pro looking for a work tool. I like coffee table woods, and not a fan of basses where the sound mostly comes from the electronics. - I considered spectors. I like them ok. String spacing is tight though. Tried a NS5 and it was good. But again, I mostly heard the electronics. Sounded a bit synthetic. - Not really looking for Fender or musicmans. I tried some, yeah, they are ok, nothing special. I like the musicman vibe, but like Fenders, they practically grow on trees. I want something a bit special, and if I can give a local luthier some reason to work then why not. Plus, they are still expensive when you compare to the local production. If I can spend an extra £200 on something really banging, I can and I will. I'm just curious I guess.

All righty. I'll check out the local builders (I'm not english BTW, but I plan on staying in the country for a while). Man, an eye-popping neckthrough boutique for £1200. Even second hand, still amazes me. That, or a MM, Fender Deluxe or a Warwick... No contest I think! I've got some shopping to do now.