mattpbass

First live use tonight, probably psychological but everything felt a bit punchier, must be the bouncy lights. 😂

First impressions, it feels quite dinky after being used to old one! Seems about as tall and wide but length is quite a bit smaller. Metering is so much more useful than the crappy old jewel light, makes seeing what's happening so much easier. Plus will be fun to see the lights bouncing around on stage! 😆

Sound wise I'm not hearing (nor was I expecting) much difference but that's only after a quick play on my desk, will gig it this weekend and see how it behaves.

Looks great but please pop the E string back into the bridge saddle, that extra wide gap is making my OCD hurt. 😅

Bass The World Review

He seems to think it’s good!

Will do, I’m not expecting much difference but we’ll see. Interesting that it’s now 9V only, must remember to switch down from 18V on the power supply!

Cheers for the heads up, ordered for delivery tomorrow, straight swap on my board for the V1, it’s all about that metering for me, sure it will sound basically the same. 

Yeah I’ve not tried to reach those subsonic limits. 😂

On 13/04/2024 at 07:20, steviedee said:

Really an academic question but the other day, I was asked to tune down a semi tone for a section of a song. I was using 5er so potentially a semitone down from a low B. I’ve modified what I play so it’s fine but there was a wee bit of discussion about pedals etc and I was wondering if there is a pedal that can handle down tuning low notes? Played about with detuning on the Helix briefly and it was surprisingly good in the higher register but shit as it got lower! 

Which effect were you using on the Stomp? I regularly use Poly Capo to drop a semi-tone or two and it works great, although I’ve not tried it below low E. 

Stock strings are usually Sandberg 40-100 so not particularly heavy. 

41 minutes ago, Reggaebass said:

I’d happily play the Ida Nielsen Signature Sandberg, I nearly bought one a year or so back, not because of anything to do with Ida or what she plays, it’s just a lovely bass, 

 

I play the 5-string for the bulk of my gigs and it’s fantastic, way better than the American Elite/Deluxe Jazzes (jazz’s? jazzi?) I was using previously. 

18 hours ago, fretmeister said:

And I just remembered there is Hardcore Reserve between Hardcore and Masterpiece. 
 

Reserve has some gentle fretboard aging. HC doesn’t have any, Masterpiece has loads.

Reserve fretboard aging must be seriously gentle if there is any, there was nothing that was visible on the two I’ve owned. Maybe they apply a bit of dirt? They do however have a little bit of wear applied to the back of the neck. 
 

Masterpiece has the back of the neck nearly completely worn, and aging to the front but it is massively more noticeable on maple fingerboards, I have both rosewood and maple masterpieces and you can barely tell on the rosewood. 

45 minutes ago, matt_leblanc said:

Hi, i bought an old model california  from a friend. 

He says its a masterpiece, but i dont know, It could be a regular heavy aged model. (He bought It used from a friend of hes).

Is there anyway to know? 

I tried to write to sandberg but i got no answer.

 

The bass is awesome and he sold It pretty cheap, so either way its a win.

Im just curious

Should be able to tell from the amount of relicing. HCA the neck won’t be reliced, HCAR there will be a bit on the back of the neck, Masterpiece will be fully worn with wear to fingerboard as well. 

Anybody selling one of these is not of sound mind and therefore not safe to deal with. 😅

I mean, 600euros is quite a lot extra. 😂

You’re right though, it would be more or less the same. 

Seems like the Sisma (valve pre-amp, same power section) is the head that’s getting all the attention rather than the Coda, I couldn’t find any reviews or even other owners comments about the Coda anywhere in the world! As a stand-alone bass head the Sisma may well be the one to go for, but I don’t really see the point of pre-amps going into pre-amps, I was getting annoyed that the TH700 I had was colouring the Capo sound. 
 

So the Coda was a bit of a punt but on the quality of the Capo I thought a safe enough one. 

I played my first gig with the JF Coda head the other day, first impressions are very good. Been using the Capo for almost a year now, straight into the desk and using in-ears 90% of the time, so I wanted something for the odd gig where I actually use backline that was just the Capo sound but amplified. The Coda is interesting being as it’s really just a power amp, no controls to tweak other than input and output volume. Class G instead of class D; might be placebo effect but felt like it had more of the traditional heft that I’ve always found lacking with the class D amps I’ve used. Early days but really liking it so far. 

Yeah I get that, I’ve always lived within half an hour of a decent sized city so it was the norm to be able to pop in and pick up some strings, try a few things etc, if you’re more in the sticks then online is great. 

I’m not sure the decimation of high street instrument retail could be classed as us never having had it better, having a local shop stacked with bass gear was actually a pretty good thing. 

I think they’re just white without visible pole pieces.  

I’ve been gigging a 5-string Ida Nielsen (black/gold one) for the last 4 years and it’s an awesome bass, replaced an American Elite Jazz which it played and sounded better than. I also own a shell pink TT, but this new Ida just doesn’t hang together for me. Even the newer black ones aren’t as nice since they ran out of the original gold fabric for the pickguards. 

I’m just setting off down this path, been running a Jad Freer Capo (pre amp pedal) for almost a year, love the thing and 90% of the time going straight to desk/PA and working on in-ears. For smaller gigs where amp is needed the pedalboard is going into an Aguilar Tonehammer 700 and SL410 cab, which is fine but I really just want the sound of the Capo amplified, not further colouring from the TH. So I’ve recently ordered the Coda head that JF make specifically for use with the Capo (or any other pre-amp), it’s just a 700w power amp which in itself is quite unusual, and it’s also a class G amp rather than D, which I’m really curious about. 
 

Taking a punt being as I can’t find a single review or user anywhere online but the Capo is amazing so I trust their quality, counting down the weeks till it arrives…

I’m playing Sandbergs, 4 and 5 strings, flats and rounds. All sorts of genres, 70s disco, 80s and 90s pop/rock, modern r&b/pop. I don’t use drive very much like some of the other guys but just as a set and forget mojo machine with some nice saturation it works great for everything. 

Yeah, as an owner I’m still reading, I just haven’t got much to say other than I plugged it in, found a setting I liked and just left it at that. 😅

8 hours ago, hiram.k.hackenbacker said:

You’re quite right and I don’t think they’re supposed to be as per the album cover.

Yeah I checked too, I don’t think my OCD could live with that. 😅

Might be an optical illusion but to me the pin stripes look wider at the pickguard than they do near the strap buttons, now I’ve seen it I can’t un-see it!