Misdee

I use the Diamond BC1 and it is a fabulous bit of kit. I use it on the 9v setting and it copes just fine Makes my bass sound like the ones on my favourite recordings, if that makes sense. I will say that the Diamond is maybe a fairly subtle compressor more for overall tone shaping than aggressive limiting of your signal compared to some other pedals. It all depends what you are after. The Cali 76 and EBS Multicomp are also great choices in terms of tone. Can't go too far wrong with any of those. The opposite end of the spectrum would be something like the MXR M87 , a bit sterile for my taste but lots of control over the actual compression / limiting.

If it helps, the 5 string version has a profile that is fairly un-chunky for a 5 string , if you see what I mean.

I remember playing those basses , sunburst with one passive pickup towards the bridge and little toggle switch. More like a simplified Custom than the original Pro . They were indeed very tasty basses.

The new Wals are proportionately much more expensive than the earlier incarnation, allowing for inflation ect. However, the basses that Paul Herman is building now are of the the very highest quality. I would put them up against the very best available, Fodera, F Bass, whoever. By comparison with similar builders nowadays , Wals prices are o.k. But then again , from another perspective , I remember back in the late 1980's when a Status Graphite Series 2 was a few hundred quid more expensive than a MK1 Wal Custom. The equivalent Status bass is now a few thousand quid cheaper than a MK1 Wal. Status Graphite are also a small independent UK- only manufacturer. What has happened to make Wal basses so much more expensive to make ? Is it rising costs, or bigger profit margins? Or both. Either way is alright with me, by the way. Paul, like anybody else, has the perfect right to charge what he feels his work is worth, the potential customer can decide to pay it or not. The problem for me is that I can't make my mind up what side of the fence I am on regarding this. I am reticent to pay 6 grand for a bass that used to cost the equivalent to £ 2377 in today's money ( including the blue "dogbone" case) back in 1988. But the again I really want one. All the time I keep prevaricating the prices are going up and the wait time is getting longer (so obviously plenty of folks think the price is ok!)

I have never played a 1024x, but I have got a 2024x and it must be said that the neck profile is pretty chunky so the 1024X you tried may well be very similar in profile if not the same. I still find it perfectly playable though, and I have got fairly small hands/short fingers.

I would be hesitant to spend a lot of money on some new "boutique" pickups for a relatively inexpensive bass, and as others have pointed out, the used market is full of bargains. And as Hooky-Lowdown wisely states , don't automatically reject the stock pickups. If you are going to replace them though, don't overlook Fender pickups as an option. Despite the burgeoning market in replacement pickups' implicit suggestion that Fender are somehow inadequate or getting it wrong in some way , I have always found Fender pickups to be very good indeed. Stating the obvious maybe, but they seem to nail that Fender sound pretty well!

Me too. A timeless classic.

I remember seeing the bass player for The Cure playing a Wal Pro bass , and that must be about 40 years ago!

I take your point entirely. On reflection, it would be more appropriate for Paul to do a run of Pro basses and charge more than a standard MK1 Custom , rather than less. I recall that Status Graphite did a run of early -1980's-style basses to mark some anniversary or other a few years ago. If Wal were to follow suit with some Pro basses I bet they would all be sold on pre-order in no time at all. I see why that is very unlikely to happen, though. What I find a bit unsettling in all of this is that the 1980's is now a "vintage" era. How is this possible? That decade was supposed to epitomise modernity. I was young and thin . We had video recorders, walkmans, leg warmers, brass bridges, graphite necks , active electronics. and mass unemployment. How has it come to this? Nowadays I need something as heavy as a vintage Wal to flatten my gut enough to stop the bass pivoting on my belly when I play standing up.😄

I love the fact that Wal have never and hopefully will never start manufacturing a budget model overseas. Lets face it a " budget" UK -made Wal Pro would be 3-4 thousand quid , in all likelihood. That is o.k by me. Didn't Sam Rivers from Limp Bizkit have a Pro - style Custom built a few years back IIRC? I would dearly love a Pro-style bass for so may reasons, not least of all Alan Spenner and Gary Tibbs with Roxy Music. Both were so inspiring to me when I first started playing.

Given the ongoing trend for retro gear, if Wal reissued the Pro Basses they would be fighting customers off with the proverbial unhygienic stick . I know Wal are back-ordered for years already, but maybe they could expand their operation if they had consistent demand for a bass that was slightly simpler to manufacture . I would buy one, that's for sure.

Chiswick has always been choc-a-block with actors and media people in general, still is and probably always will be.

I am really into these early '70'S bass tones, and have been using TI flats on a Fender Precision and 74 Jazz reissue to try and get my own approximation. I had been thinking that buying a valve preamp might be the last piece of the jigsaw, but after reading this thread now I am beginning to wonder if getting a bronze- coloured Ford Granada might be what I need to get the sound I crave.

All just goes to show how a "nasty" sound soloed is necessary to have some cut-through in the final mix.

This isolated bass track sounds pretty "ponky" too, to my ears at least. All the more surprising when you consider that it is LA session ace David Hungate in the early 1980's: Sounds great in the finished track, though.

Dave Richmond is a brilliant bass player, absolutely fantastic. His work with Serge Gainsbourg is especially good: Yes, I know that at least three different bass players claim to have played on this album, but as far as I know, Dave Richmond is the most likely candidate.

Definitely less clicky than the first example, but still some pick-like attack, even if it is fingers. Not dissimilar to Wilton Felder in that respect.

If you listen to the decay of the notes , it sounds like flats to me, especially allowing for the extended frequency range inherent to Alembic basses. Rounds would likely have been much more twangy on that bass. Even allowing for pick/muting technique, it sounds like flats. This example from the same sessions sounds a bit less ambiguous : Alembic were not at all averse to flatwound strings on their basses in this era, and were enthusiastic exponents of Pyramid Gold flats back in their early days . Phil Lesh and also ,I think, Jack Cassidy used flats on their Alembics. Maybe John McVie was still old school enough in the mid-70's to be reluctant to move to roundwounds. I know Chuck Rainey and Willie Weeks, for example, didn't switch to rounds until the early 1980s.

100% pick and flats for John McVie, I'm less sure whether Wilton Felder is using a pick .

Wilton Felder's tone on this track was pretty typical of so many examples from that era , and as others have pointed out, it sounds magnificent in the track. The fact that Wilton is a great player helps a bit , too. I was listening to the isolated bass track of John McVie ( another great player) on Go Your Own Way from Rumours the other day and considering he played it on an Alembic, that sounds pretty "ponky" too ( I would say "plunky", but we'll agree to differ😄) It makes me smile when I think how fashionable these more muted retro tones have become again . What happened the the 1980's when modern was best and flatwounds were practically illegal ? The more" ponky " the better seems to be the zeitgeist of our time when it comes to bass nowadays. Its interesting to consider that it's twenty years since D'Angelo released Voodoo with Pino Palladino reinventing himself with a P Bass sporting flatwound strings to such great effect, and legions of would-be trendy and hip bass players have subsequently fallen over themselves to copy his inspired approach. How ironic! I love these vintage bass tones, and the instruments they were created with, but it would be nice to see a bit more creativity from some contemporary players. Its nice to be inspired and emulate, but I always feel that the players being emulated were more often than not inspiring because they were original and individual in some way, if that makes sense. Anyhow, if you can't beat them, join 'em, I'm off to play my 74 AVRI Jazz with TI flats this afternoon😄.

Totally get both your points, and the potential replacements all look like mouthwatering prospects. I am interested how this turns out as I am very into idiosyncratic passive pickups. Keep us posted.

The pickup is kind of the point of the Carbonita, otherwise it would be just another P Bass, as Im sure you are well aware. All the retro -fit alternatives Cuzzie mentions are superb choices, but so is the FideliTron that is already in it. You could be spending plenty of money making a sideways move. I was under the impression that Fender had copied the FilterTron for this bass, anyway

The 2024 has indeed got a pretty chunky neck but I still find it very playable. FWIW, I think they are fabulous basses and well worth the premium over the 10 Series made in Indonesia. Regarding the weight, the X basses are inherently heavier, usually around 9 1/2lbs for a 4 string, 9 3/4 for a 5 string. The non-X version is normally lighter by about half a lb or so.

My other thought is that it might be something to do with how the Focusrite interacts with the pedal. Maybe I need to add some EQ and/or compression at the interface stage to make it sound a bit more palatable.