drTStingray

I even bought a bass from them a few years back - I got it out to photograph the headstock for another Basschat thread a few days back and was astonished the strings still sound fresh. Seriously though it's got a good stock and certainly had friendly staff last time I went - as with all places of this sort (eg Andertons), the best time to go to try instruments is when they are not busy (eg weekday morning - never Saturday!!).

I got a herringbone tweed flat cap - lots of people, especially of advancing years (like me) always perform in a hat - so I can now join in. Next step, a Persian rug to stand my rig and myself on - appears to be becoming de rigeur amongst many bands these days 😬😂👍

This is refreshing to hear. A 5 string is very useful for that - I once watched in awe Dave Marks playing jazz solos on a Stingray 5.

Haha!! This is true and Im sorry, i misread what you'd said!! 😀 I have to say Sir Duke is the ONLY tine I've needed to use top Eb - although the same player uses the top Db slid as part of an almost double stop upper part of Eb7 in I Wish (Jazz through an Alembic studio pre amp).

+1 It never ceases to amaze me how some of the @rseholes manage to retain their front teeth or avoid occassional black eyes!! Or perhaps they don't sack the more volatile personalities!! Seriously though, you've been treated pretty badly there. Move on to something better and definitely make use of the contacts you've made (such as gigs or even suitable musicians) in the future 👍

What a great looking Bass. Looks great - love the body figuring. What I'm wondering is how you managed to persuade Mrs H you really do need some more basses again! From your description this has come up used - where did you come across it?

You've clearly never had to play Sir Duke in its original key!! Until I played that song I could not see any sense in Fender basses having 20 frets!! The unison riff uses the top note (played brilliantly by Nate Watts - Precison through an Alembic pre amp). Top E flat is an unusual top note choice, particular since guitar-based music is often in E and A. Of course, the standard Fender scale was introduced way before guitar based music had taken over from keyboard or brass based music, they are that old!!! 😧 E flat is useful for the afore mentioned song, and a number of other Stevie Wonder songs. Of course, the Fender does also permit playing a high F7 triad or slid double stop, if you're so inclined. The 22 fret Sterlings, Stingray 5s (and now Stingray Specials) can be useful dependent on the key you're playing in - the Stingray with 21 seemed perfect to me in 1979 or so, especially play songs in E. I've always found the Bongo 5 with 24 frets a little more tricky - probably because of playing it less often - I find I can get a bit confused exactly where I am when playing above 12th/14th fret - as I say - entirely my fault - lack of practice. I'm sure 24 frets is great for soloing as well. 😬👍

That looks like a very bad replacement logo to me on a pre EB Stingray!! The 'Stingray Bass' bit looks hand scribed!!!

Congratulations @Lozz196 I hope you're enjoying that beauty. A good tip for the EQ on the 3 band is to cut the mid quite a bit, and boost the bass and treble a bit - gets close to the 2 band sound. Then use the Mid as a tone control - it cuts through more/ becomes more prominent as you increase the mid. Best of luck anyway.

@MoJo I like your updated decal - looks great. However I won't be changing mine - and what a great Musicman it is - for those in the know it's a US made 'Sports Utility Bass' - hence SUB - classic 2 band EQ a basically a Stingray with cheaper finishes - it's fabulous!! 😏👍 @Stub Mandrel how very dare you - that's based on the original 1970s Musicman logo - definitely 70s but corny - I don't think so. That one looks a bit odd btw - here is the one on my Classic Stingray. Looks magnificent to me (as Stingrays always have as far as I'm concerned!!) 👍 Heres a modern one - Stingray Special.

Sounds and looks very nice. I've long given up on Fender naming conventions, in fact anything like colour and features. How wide is the neck on the Jazz Ultra 5? It looks quite wide from the recording - one thing that often puts me off Fender 5 strings.

Great info in this thread guys - just a pity there aren't a few more around to contribute.

This is bit déjà vu!! They don't have that logo any longer - haven't for at least a year or more. I think all the SBMM models have Stingray in the logo these days. Have a look at their website for details. The SBMM company is not owned by Musicman so the title of your thread needs changing as well. It's completely separate, making instruments (they do guitars as well as basses) licenced by Musicman.

Good luck also - it would be good to get sensible advice on these basses without endless trolling. The moderators should be able to support such a request also 😏👍

Sorry - as I said previously my memory and age ......... lol. Only 6-7 yrs. Thanks for posting the info - having read it I can't really see the problem and Mr Hall's posts are really quite reasoned and even supportive of Basschat - they've said they don't care about Basschat banning Rickenbacker sales threads although think it's a bit OTT. I really don't see the justification for all the vitriol quite honestly and each to their own, for something notable to still persist after 7 yrs is, in my book, extremely odd.... and seems to prevent any sensible discussion about their instruments. It all seems a bit vitriolic to me - but each to their own 😐

Apology accepted 👍

I think it'll need a few more action scenes - but this sounds excellent - have you any showbiz style ditties in mind as well - I think it's 55 yrs this year that one of Britain's most iconic bands of the v early 60s, none other than Cliff and The Shadows, were steered into panto in the West End (Alladin) - producing several songs which became part of their repertoire, in the process. Wild West theme is good but you need some baddies in the form of fakers and counterfeiters to get the whole dynamic 😀

Well definitely veteran at my age - if I was my 20 yr old bass playing self still, someone my current age would have been positively archaic and largely irrelevant - such is the march of time!! But this Basschat fixation - we've debated this before - Rickenbacker at the time was suffering from shops full of fakers in London - I remember asking a well known retailer in the guitar touristy part of London if they had any real ones and was figuratively grabbed by the lapel and wheeled out of the shop - not quite a slap round the face with a leather glove but not far off........ such was the Wild West nature of the market place and counterfeiting/ fakery then. So various manufacturers took strong action to protect their brands - all very reasonable in my book. However th Basschat grandees were dealt with by Rickenbacker, it fitted the same process - in response Basschat implemented a complete selling ban - decent response and move on, I'd have thought. Was this 10 or 15 yrs back? Some members have thought this a tiny bit heavy handed from time to time but it is no doubt backed with sound legal advice. However, I do think (and have expressed this several times before) that some members here, and possibly the underlying tone of the forum, is in danger of being consumed by a quantity of long out of date and stale vitriol. About time we moved on from that surely 👍 most of us seem to like the bloody things after all!!! Grudge holding is surely the stuff of the more odious of our politicians, leading businessmen, criminals and ex partners 😬

Oh dear - two pages in and only one sensible answer to the OP. We're back to the same Basschat members with the same fixations on the same CEO with the same jokes as the last Rickenbacker thread disintegration...... A shame really because they're great sounding basses if you like that sort of thing (from what I see quite a few people do but don't bother with bass guitar forums these days - I wonder why 😬).

I think you'll find you got your answer - merest mention of this manufacturer here brings out the 'basschatanythingbutaPrecisionwithflatsisverbotengestapo' - and the thread is bombarded - not many Ric owners on here anymore I suspect 😏😬

Oops - sorry about that - however looks and sounds great 👍

Congratulations - nothing like a USA Sub 5, especially a white one (I have one as well). Band sounds good as well.

This sounds really good. For a short scale, lightweight, passive bass it's very full sounding, and plenty of variation available with the pick up settings and tone control. But most of all, it does a very nice Stingray sound. Excellent demo (and Alberto's).

In my experience, even when you don't have a sound engineer or the luxury of setting up the sound in an empty room, there are many occasions when rooms have an area, frequency wise, of major resonance - I.e if you play, say an A on the bass (and it's often the bass which is heavily affected) it sounds much louder than any other note. As a result that note enters the mikes and is also 'over amplified', in the worst cases causing a feedback loop. Being able to isolate the frequency and reduce it accordingly is essential to avoid boominess (might need an adjustment of FOH EQ on the PA even if the vocals don't cause a problem). The worst example I ever heard was a club in London, the room in which we played had walls and ceiling rather like a 60s/70s design school gym - the sound was incredibly boomy and the guitarists needed to cut their bass but retain their low mid - as only vocals could go through the PA. Both guitarists had vintage style amps with only bass and treble controls, and guitars with a standard tone control they couldn't do it, other than marginally, by pick up selection - this is a time when an EQ pedal is very useful. I was able to adjust my bass sound to compensate (from the amp generally and bass on the fly song by song)

You clearly need to try a Stingray Special, especially in HH form. Light, powerful and fabulous tone. You can get them in the traditional brownish hues but also some quite spectacular colours. This is one of mine. I don't know how they do it, but the combination of neck radius and profile, and the finish give these basses the best playing neck I've ever encountered. So much better than other makes with this type of neck width.