drTStingray

The Stingray HS is dropped - I recall there being some discussion about it on the MM forum and EBMM revealed hardly any were being ordered. They're certainly not available in the 2018 version of the Stingray (H and HH only). There's a thread on the MM bass forum that lists what you can order - I think only the Sterling had options like Fretless, lefty etc - H, HS, HH were listed as available options (circa late January)

Goes well with the black also. I'm betting the chrome will reflect light as well as the Phil Lynott or Noddy Holder's mirrored top hat 😀

Oi - how very dare you - love my checker plate, industrial Ray!! And the plain white come to that 👍 there again I'm willing to accept my taste doesn't always follow the conventional standard 'wisdom' - I once swapped a tort Bongo pg for a much nicer one from a chap in Europe!! Nice work - just not for me though. Not too bling IMO. Sort of Phil Lynott with a Gothic twist.

Hi, to an extent I understand how you feel as I had a pre EB from new and sold it in the late 80s - would love to have it back. Ive played various pre EBs since but never bought one - there are indeed variances in sound but that is not surprising when you consider the EQ was updated several times between 76 and 79, the body woods were different on some colours (alder) especially in the early 80s plus they went from strings through to top load and 3 bolt to 4 bolt neck joint around 79/80. All of those points change the sound slightly although not fundamentally. I have an EBMM Classic and Old Smoothie - these get as close to the pre EB vibe as I think you can - in fact I've compared recordings made with my pre EB and the classic - they are very close - the pre EB had an alder body whereas the Classic has ash and is slightly brighter especially for popping/slapping. The Old Smoothie (which has an alder body and replica 76 EQ - including degraded performance electrical components and an epoxy coating to the pre amp) is as close you'll get to a pre EB in a new package. A standard 3 band EQ Stingray will get very similar sounds to a 3 band if you boost treble, bass and cut mids (quite a bit). So you can get the old vibe in a new package (what I've done basically - a matter of opinion but as the largest proportion of my bass playing life has been as a Stingray lover I feel in a good position to say this). You could go for a pre EB and there are nice ones around - depends whether you feel like paying over £2k and with no guarantee its all original, especially electronically. Andy Baxter has some nice ones but they often don't have their original cases - if that bothers you (I know it does buyers of old Fender basses). Anyway I wish you luck in your quest - as a matter of interest what colour was your pre-EB?

Indeed - but you have to turn the knobs a little to get signature sounds (and I suspect the P was on full tone). An interesting comparison. I preferred the Stingray here (not much surprise there!!). In a mix each of these would sound very different. However there were a number of things either notable or missing for me:- 1) Jazz ludicrously scooped (pick ups on full?) 2) Ric even more ludicrously scooped. No McCartney or Squire sound here!! 3) Thunderbird - far more defined version of the Ric (in this test). 4) Where was the Stingray sizzle and bottom end fatness? 5) Where was the Warwick signature woody sound. 6) The P was ash bodied and maple board probably with rounds - as trebly as it gets. So as comparisons go this probably favoured the P over the others because it got the signature sound. You have to turn the knobs on the others for the signature sound!

+1 - the bass is a Wal which Alan Spenner changed to in the mid/late 70s. Prior to that he played a Precision and with Kokomo got some great sounds. However the Wal was a step forward in sophistication and made a great player sound even better. It is the sound of that era of Roxymusic and Gary Tibbs played one as well. For anyone who doesn't know already Alan Spenner is on the original Jesus Christ Superstar soundtrack and plays some fabulous bass on that as well. He is a big reason why some of us (well me particularly) chase the Wal sound (Percy Jones being another).

Sounds great - the Old Smoothies are fine basses eh? I concur with you on string tension on Rays - the tighter flats really don't work as well (for me at least - and I've heard other people say this). I really think the tighter flats on P basses were probably because the early players were ex double bass players who were used to it. The original Old Smoothie as an early production 76 bass would probably have had flats fitted from new unless Sterling Ball was experimenting with rounds as well as the 'Smoothie' pick up.

I agree with you - not only were those bands a reference point if you were into jazz/funk in the early 70s, I well recall trying to learn a particularly funky Santana from one of their early 70s albums, an instrumental, for a band back then - and the bass part was extremely difficult (actually I never mastered it properly) - it was similar to the synthesiser bass part on StarCycle by Jeff Beck (there is superb version of this with Pino playing the sequencer style line on MM Fretless). However none of this stuff was played in clubs and was not club music, so I can see where Bean9seventy is coming from. It's also earlier than the big crossover with jazz/funk things like Birdland.

When we played that song in clubs you could see people at the front saying to each other in a slightly outraged/shocked way "they're singing we want a f**k" 😂 A bit like "Get the f**k outa my face" - I'm sure they these guys wrote them to sound like this!! Spookily we covered several of those you mentioned but also War and Brass Construction (Brass Construction were played a lot in clubs I went to (before playing in the band).

Yeah agreed entirely. Northern soul is another influencer in a different way (that dance craze was quite region specific as well). I get that needing to much better to play some of the stuff as well - trying to do some of Jaco and Stanley's stuff was impossible for me by ear. Bands like AWB and Kokomo had such feel as well - single note bass parts with incredible timing and you needed the right drummer, rythmn guitar and feel for playing together as a unit to get anywhere near it. Anyone else get influenced by James Brown through clubs? I loved Get Up Offa That Thing and learned the bass part from hearing it and seeing/feeling its effect in a club!!

I first heard Bootsy on Flashlight in a club - and on other Parliament stuff which I had to learn as I was fortunate enough to get the bass job in a soul/funk band in the later 70s, which gradually morphed into disco/funk. The main men were Jamaican and had an encyclopaedic knowledge of black music since the 60s - hence covering bands like Fatback and Parliament. If you saw Bootsy with Funkadelic they had up to 40 odd people on stage, with three or four bassists and each song went on for about 30 mins - you couldn't really pick out who was doing what and it was more of an experience than a gig/concert - a bit like a funk version of Zappa!! Except that squelching bass sound ha ha!!

Yep agreed - I also resonate with the local player thing - we had several - one of our best local funk bands actually supported the Stanley Clark Band when they performed for the first time in Brum. Also Jaco with Birdland - I was astonished when I saw him in concert playing the melody on false harmonics. Incredibly, looking back, I came to this through a prog and blues rock background - my group of mates basically diverged from prog - some towards Steely Dan, some AWB, Tom Scott and Marley, Mahivishnu, Return to Forever and Back Door - I think two or three of us got into clubbing in a big way also - myself a bass player, along with a drummer and guitarist - club music changed our playing fundamentally, though we still played Greenslade and Camel covers for a while (with V funky rythmn section) ha ha! The biggest tracks in clubs often didn't become mainstream hits - although some have in recent years having been resurrected by people like Joey Negro and Giles Peterson. The 80s Brit funk scene was very much dance orientated - and indeed dance music has always been far more influential on music than commentators give credit - even to this day. Level 42 got its audience from UK clubbers and the jazz funk fans - I never fail to be amazed the number of women at Level 42 concerts these days - not the sort of demographic you'd expect and surely evidence of their fan base being different from say, Genesis - whose concerts would be frequented by mostly guys often with long hair with beards etc!!

I think so. Certainly from what Ive seen of such things in the UK, and that is a microcosm of the US stuff.

I like the way it looks like a miniature AJ Presentation bass. But without the bulk, if you see what I mean. Good to see Sting following your lead Ped!

Very smart web page. Looks very C and W circuit to me. Shovel Drums is a new one on me - I've heard of the term 'drummer building a shed'. i reckon unless your mind is attuned to that type of country act you possibly wouldn't enjoy it. And it's all upright?

Hey Lowdown, Graham Central Station were one of a number of new acts being pushed in the mid seventies by their record company in the UK (also included - Earth Wind and Fire). Kokomo was a UK band in that also. As far as the mainstream was concerned their music did not figure much and neither did it figure in clubs at the time. EWF took off to become global stars whilst Graham Central Station did not to anywhere near that level. So Larry Graham did not figure to the same level - I was around in the late 70s and although had heard some GCS (and tried to learn it) I'd never even heard Hair until more recent years. In my opinion, Stanley Clark was a bigger influence on bass players than given credit, and particularly his sound. This influenced all of the big acts - listen to Rose Royce or Brothers Johnson, say 1976 and then again 1979 - the bass sound (particularly pop and slap) has changed from a thumpy P bass to a far more focussed Alembic/Musicman sound. Bean9seventy is right about dance music being a catalyst in bass playing - after all that's what disco is/was - for me and many of my peers, T Connection (Do What You Want To Do) was equally if not more influential than, say GCS. This seismic shift in bass sound at that time did result in the Brit Funk players of the early 80s generally following the late 70s bass sound and style rather than the early 70s - using an Alembic type of sound (although you never a UK player playing one because they were largely unobtanium and fearsomely expensive). Musicman, Ibanez Musician and Aria were the basses of choice (with MK using Jaydee - which sounded very Alembic). This track (released early 76) demonstrates the sound - and some similarities with some of Level 42's work

+1 I had a 5-6 month wait for my Classic Stingray in 2010. I ordered it the day after they were announced and the dealer swapped one of the stock basses on order for mine (coral red) - which would not have figured in the first order by S and T otherwise (mostly black, white and burst). It was well worth the wait so hang in there!! I got a fabulous bad which I won't be selling. I think they are very busy as the guitar side has really taken off. I'm waiting to order one of the new Stingrays but haven't been able to yet.

I'll be interested to hear how you get on with these on the Ray.

Interesting - I would agree they sound fat on a Stingray (as do flats generally) - I tend to compensate with the EQ setting. To be fair the Reflex and 25th Anniversary are very different basses from the Stingray, with their Bongo inspired 4 band EQ and multi mode (active/passive/series/parallel). Did you try it in passive with the TIs? Ive heard people rave about using flats on both MM Bongos and especially the passive Cutlass/Caprice basses. I guess as with everything, our ears are differently tuned and one person's utopia can be another's anathema.

The various EB groups refer I think to the tension. Group 3 is on a par probably with TIs and Cobalts and certainly roundwounds. Ive never used chromes so am not familiar with how close they are to the EB group strings but I think I recall some reference to them being very similar. Best of luck with this - flats can be a bit of a lottery as they're all so different and none of them are particularly cheap.

I have always liked that picture but it always struck me as a bit of an odd marketing ploy by Fender to advertise it's wares in relation to surfing long after the Beach Boys' surf music heyday and surfing music generally - although it is often perhaps associated with Fender instruments - the ad is late 70s/early 80s I think!! Unfortunately, as discussed many moons ago on this very forum Fender basses can't walk on water - they unfortunately sink. Anyway sorry for the interlude - back on topic 😀

I'm glad you mentioned this one Bean9Seventy. I started bass playing well before I got into clubbing - my first experience of this was in the mid 70s and I was mesmerised by the bass lines on lots if not all of the stuff the DJs played - and that T Connection track was played regularly and filled the dance floor. It struck me as a similar type of line that Stanley Clark was playing on his first solo album. There quite a lot of other tracks making a regular appearance - some of them quite obscure - I guess this was the 'dance culture' of the time. I think Boogie Nights started as a track played in clubs - I certainly remember it being played (12" version?) Interesting to hear your views on bass and disco music, particularly as it was the disco dancing which got you into bass. I was already a bass player but was further inspired by the music in clubs in that era. This is one of the first pop and slap parts I ever heard - 1976 - I definitely hear some MK grooves in there after the first guitar breakdown - Love Games for instance

Ive had mixed results playing through provided back line amps in the past - however by far the biggest impediment has been not understanding the controls of an unfamiliar amp - particularly things like pre shape push buttons which if you're not familiar with the amp, and in a dark area can cause problems of ludicrously scooped tone if depressed - as a for instance. Ive used Ashdown in the past (I have an ABM 500 with ABM cabinets which I don't gig currently) and it's true their sound is a combination of hi fi and vintage - but generally pretty good. I've also played through an Electric Blue combo as described which produced a perfectly good sound when set up neutrally, using a Stingray. It was set up anything but neutral before - IIRC at least one tone control on the amp was full on. I think the issue is trying to get a neutral sound when the amp has other gizmos which may be switched on and also when the people providing the amp either haven't a clue how to set such an amp up or use an extreme tone. My worst recent example at an open mike was where the 'house band' shares duties every other month with another - when I attended as a guest on my month off, myself (and several others) used the bass equipment provided by the other band, with our own basses and appeared to produce a bass sound a fraction of the volume of the house bassist - to the extent that every 'guest' bassist complained they couldn't hear themselves and worse still neither could their co-performers who also complained. It seems there was some trickery afoot in the signal - perhaps a boost button or maybe the amp had some gizmo engaged - anyway it was not very satisfactory and just shows the levels of tomfoolery which can occur when using provided equipment.

I have TI flats on a 2 band Classic Stingray and EB Cobalt on my 3 band fretless. Number one reason is the tension - similar to the roundwounds I use, and with the same gauge (usually with a 100 on the E). Secondly the tone of each type is excellent and you can get quite a bright sound with either type if you want. Thirdly neither set have been changed for over 2 years so they last well. I can't be doing with high tension 60s style flatwounds, in fact anything which makes a bass less playable to me is an impediment rather than a facilitator of music In fact just such a set caused me to all but stop playing one of my basses, until I put a set of round wounds on and rediscovered it. These Stingrays do sound good with flatwounds but I'm still not totally convinced as roundwounds have their advantages and with muting can sound just as thumpy - however as a Bernard Edwards fan since 1977, and with the knowledge his Stingray was in the period (to early 78) when they shipped with flats (GHS to be precise) - I sort of like them and flats have proved to be the only way on a Stingray to get his recorded pop sound as per We Are Family I have ever been able to achieve (having played the song since 79, playing it with flats a couple of years ago was a revelation). I still think of flats as a bit of 60s throw back..... although Pino's sound with them also makes me persevere!! I have also used Ernie Ball Group 3 which are also similar tension and are good. I might try some GHS at some point out of curiosity if nothing else.