NickA

The only bass I've tried that had a b string I like is my Mk2 Wal ( though it has other issues that make it less perfect). Mr Chowny told me, at a bass bash, that you can go down to 32.5" and still get a good B ( hence the Chowny nt5 )... He's wrong, it wasn't great. But I'm not sure it's scale length that matters, as stingray and fender 5s have the same scale as the Wal but the b sounds "flobby" ..yet I've heard ( but not played) a few Warwick 5ers that really do sound great all the way down and a medium scale ACG 6 string that sounds great. Get the pickups right and the scale is maybe less important?

Just buy it. Weird looks but superb do almost anything bass. Sonically comparable to a Wal which would be 5x or more the price...just doesn't look as nice. If you don't like it, I'll buy it off you at cost 😉

Setup is a good start, but you reach a ceiling, beyond which a better bass is the only way. At least these days you can check out options on tinterweb whereas back in 1988 when I bought mine there was a lot of phone calling and going round places to find anything. Still be prepped to travel a fair bit tho. You get more bass for your money and more character from used, but also more worries. Nowhere I know near Norwich. Depending on budget... Bassbags in Heanor (twixt derby and Sheffield) good for brand new low end to mid end...plenty of stock up to £7000 or so all impeccably set up plus good (if possibly a little biased towards spending a bit more) advice. No snobbery if you wanted a shiny black bass set up for psychobilly... The double bass rooms in Hastings, good for miscellaneous old basses from very little up to £6k or so. Some lovely stuff, but the setup is maybe not perfect. Also in Hastings is Gallery Strings ( where mine came from in 1988). So a weekend in Hastings has to be on the cards! Also: little dealers, mostly repair but often have nice stuff for sale: Tim Bachelar in Leicester Lawrence Dixon in London Finally: The "big dealers" lots of basses from a few £k to " price on application". They have more than is listed on their websites, so you still have to call ahead. The Contrabass Shoppe in Walton on Thames - big stock; must be very expensive as nothing has a stated price! Thwaites near Watford ( though I went in with a £10k budget and was told most of their stock in that range was out on rental to shows and orchestras!) T&G Martin near Banbury...make superb basses in house and sell quality 2nd hand hand. Total experts, but cagey on stock and prices. Turners near Nottingham... big showroom, big prices. Tim Toft in Stone ( I actually like these people as they have a really good on site workshop) stock not huge tho. Thomann & Cresswell's ...avoid. cheap crap, badly set up.

But that I had the space.

Not sure mine have that or if I'd be able to tell. Feels like "a neck" to me. The 5-string gives me rsi tho.

Don't they just. My current set of spiros were from basschat...Unbeatable and a bargain. But swapping them out between jazz and classical gigs got too much bother.

No kidding. One school of thought is that spiros "can't be bowed". They can but are hard to get going and sound quite harsh. it's not your technique! Switching to Eva Pirazzi s has been a revelation. Still much louder bowed than pizz tho.

I have one of each and quite agree. The fretted one is a 5 and has the best b string of any bass I've tried but it's not "special" the way the 4-string fretless is ( also quite hard to play as it's a big heavy body, the neck is chunky and the neck joint chunkier). NB: there is no "calibration" of the Wal electronics.they make the exact thing they've made since the 80s and a "service" involves swapping out a couple of capacitors. When I took my whole bass in, Paul plugged it into the massive Hellborg, played a few notes while twiddling the knobs and declared "that's all working then"...

Cheaper than a grille? Masks the harshness of the little driver? Or just somewhere to park your bike.

The stingray has a near overlap with a Wal. We did a head to head between an old fretless ray and my Wal MK1 at the last em bass bash. Pretty similar if we turned the Wal to bridge pickup. So Wals can do stingray but stingrays can only do some Wal. There was also a fretted Wal pro2e there, which was different again. Ps: I was in the Wal workshop a few years back; their test amp is a massive Hellborg one. The connection runs deep. Jonas still posts on the Wal Facebook page now and then too.

I guess if you stick it to your thumb instead of to the bass.

Between phrases, verses, songs?

But which exact Wal positions? I'll bet Paul Herman uses a jig and/or veneer calipers...but the older ones are not very "exact".

Bit limiting of where you put your thumb / pluck the strings, isn't it. Never used a thumb rest myself, but isn't something longer and more parallel to the strings more useable?

Indeed some of that sounds like unprocessed MK2 played rather hard.

Any old flexible 2-core cable will do. 6A or 13A 2-core mains flex for instance. But if you want to go posh try belden5000 10gauge which is about £15 for 2m. http://www.bluejeanscable.co.uk/store/speaker/index.htm Or ...buy a 20m speakon to speakon cable for under £20: https://www.simplysoundandlighting.co.uk/products/roar-speaker-speakon-to-speakon-cable-20m and use your connectors to make it into two shorter ones.

Chancellor and Lee's sound are almost entirely due to their effects chains surely. My Wals sound nothing like theirs... though I can "do" Jones and Jaco on the fretless one (easy mwah and harmonics) Bit of a mystery why rush &tool fans pay top dollar for Wals; tho as they only want red and black Wals ( rush) or maple faced mk2s (tool) , we can sumise that they're not buying them for the sound. Hopefully the passing of the peak prices will get people actually playing them again .... though there's a lot more competition these days and the under 35s are still ( inexplicably ) obsessed with fenders. ...and never mind the price of Wals, the most expensive bass at the gallery is a beat up precision.

Peaked I reckon. Price goes silly high, collectors and speculators sell, market floods, price plummets. Bloke on Facebook is selling two he ordered before the order book closed, meticulously modelled on basses that bloke from rush played for a bit. I'm guessing they've never been played. "Price on application". People will pay £10k for something that will soon be worth £15k, but not £15k for something that might soon be worth £10k. All for the good if it stops the speculation and people can buy them to play them again. There are loads out there at the moment with unrealistic prices .. especially the slab ash bodied, passive, single pick up ones being sold for the price of ( and incorrectly described as ) MK1s by the gallery. Those basses were cheap models sold in the 80s for £250 when the active, twin pickup "custom" was £750. Two / three years ago they sold for £2k max. No wonder they haven't sold. NB: no cache in owning one ...except with other bass players over 50 years of age. I'm out playing mine very week or so and mostly get "Love the sound of your bass. What is it? ".

Should definitely have done that with my old trace rig. Sold it for £150 😞

Super cheap!!! But not actually very nice. Back in the day I had a go with one of these, but the gp12smx equipped 1x15" was so much more the real trace deal and only twice the price! I guess it was trace's attempt at a cheaper line of kit.

I was advised to use regular Eva's rather than weichs on my 4/4 bass on the basis I would use them for Arco as well as pizz. I don't know the reasoning behind that advice, but with the bridge cranked up they do sound great and I don't find the tension too high. But I do drop the adjustable bridge down for jazz, part for a muzzier tone, part for an easier time for my left hand. The lower tension Eva's are better for both pizz and Arco than the helicore hybrids I had before. The bass does sound a bit better for pizz ( louder, more sustain) with full strength spiros on, but not enough to make it worth swapping around for jazz gigs. Evidently there's more to a good tone and ease of playing than just string tension. Go Eva's, you won't regret it!

New bridge = £200 to £300 fitted. Decent new strings £230. 'taint cheap this doublebassin'. You may get 2nd hand strings from these pages. Fitting your own bridge is not "that" hard but it's labourious ( lots of sanding feet) and there's a risk of dropping your sound post while doing it. A cheap bridge blank is £50, £120 with adjusters. Or £140 for one with "self levelling feet" ( not brill sound wise but easier to fit). There's usually a reason why a cheap double bass is cheap! Bit like buying a cheap Porsche and finding it needs new tyres ( and brakes ).

Don't think it's neo magnets. Pjb do neo (neo-powr) and ferrite (piranha) drivers allowing a direct comparison and it's the ferrite ones that sound brighter. Fashion maybe? If you have a full range, flat response HiFi cab you can always take some frequencies away. If you have a "dull thud" vintage cab it's harder to put stuff back? Can you not get the sound you want by tweaking eq ...and still save your back on physical weight?. Or do the "vintage" cabs "add" something (like the distortion and octaving you can get out a valve amp)?

1. Adjustable bridge .. definitely. I have mine high for max sensitivity when playing classical, keep it high for strength training and drop it right down for maximum mwah and minimum effort when playing jazz. 2. I'm in my 60s and it's gotten easier with practice (and decent setup) 3. the ONLY thing that touches the back of the bass's neck is your thumb! Squeezing your whole hand round it will make for hard work, not strengthen the right muscles and make changing position near impossible. One other thing is .. don't put too much spike out. If the neck is high above your shoulder then the blood runs from the important muscles and you lose strength; It doesn't look very cool but having the bass quite low generally makes it easier to play. Nut no higher than ear level so you're not reaching up above your head in half position This guy has it about right, but many classical bassists go lower.

My one of those actually had a full tapered shim ... I took it off and replaced it with a bit of sanded down lolly stick. I may have knocked a few £k off it's value, but it plays better and Andyjrr checked it out at a bass bash and declared it just fine. So yeh. For all people swoon about Wals, Wal & Pete knocked them out apace back in the day and they're usually a bit wonky.... still great basses tho. One day I'll get a new, and correctly angled, full shim fitted.