oldbass

On 19/02/2018 at 14:11, discreet said:

The belief that a bass sounds different depending which wood the  body is made from (tonewood), is largely risible IMHO, but in my experience the chunkiness of a neck does seem to have a bearung ob tobe. I'm sorry, I have a cold.

Totally agree. My baseball bat 71 had a rounded vroom to the tone that I cant find in any modern P at all. Those fat old necks are 80% the tone IMHO.

And if might add. If you ever see a Duncan Designed PU out of a VM P, snag it!. They sound big and bold.

On 16/02/2018 at 18:38, Rayman said:

Thanks for all the responses. 

I love the look, and feel of Precisions. Some of my favourite players use them, and I just really want to like them.... its nothing to do with anything other than the tone. I just can't get a tone I like. I've tried TI flats, Superbrights, DI High Beams etc..... 

Straight out of the case the Jazz and the Ray are just perfect.... I guess I'm going to just persevere for a bit or trade it out for something else. Its a beautiful instrument, I guess just maybe it's not my sound.

P's are peculiar in a way, and that simplicity can be deceptively difficult to make right.

Try this, you might just be amazed..I know I was.  Get some old well used dead flats off evil bay or somewhere...cheap. Then take ur practise rig outside where there's a bit of background noise,  ie traffic, noisy neighbours..planes going overhead etc, now play it with a light touch and eh voila!..you will suddenly notice that flat sounding mid range come alive with a dry low punch....

Played with a pick when I was young but after seeing Mr B Edwards the first time..well it was bye bye pick..I mean, how do u play fast mute strokes with a pick?...

Its taken me decades to realise that a light but positive touch is actually more efficient and powerful than fingers a flailing.

Its Philly soul for me.  O'jays, Archie Bell, David Ruffin..the list is endless. I can play bass all night to this stuff its soooo melodic with subtle bass lines....  eg

6 hours ago, LegateNaarifin said:

Oohh, now that's playing with fire   I don't much like his tone in isolation, but really like it most of the time when it's in the mix in the band. Different strokes eh?

Ha... ur not kidding its just the way he plucks the strings, it all seems kinda awkward.

Heaven: Jamersons slightly distorted tone in those isolated bass tracks.

Hell....and I'm running for the door as I say this...Geddys tone and the way he hits the strings...eew  

Bit cheesy but bass playing heaven. ....3 Degrees Get Ur Lurve Back.

Flats encourage me to play with a lighter moire controlled touch which kinda translates into a punchier sound...have tried rounds over the years but there's too much movement in them for my liking. Course if a clever BL barks..rounds only bass guy, them I'll surely oblige.

On 12/02/2018 at 17:33, mikel said:

Yep, and the bassist probably thought he had a killer tone. Spent years defining his sound and spent a fortune on bass, amp, cabs and effects. His tone was not appropriate to the music. Subjective, but some people search for their tone with little thought to what genre of music they will be playing. Horses for courses.

Here's a thought. Do upright players ...."search for their tone" if they do, well it all sounds the same to me.   I tell you, with leccy bass as far as the audience are concerned, a rounded taught bassy tone will work with 999999% of all music.

Guy said to me recently, wow you sounded great..I said oh, how'd you mean was it a good tone?, no idea he said ..but I could hear that low sound under everyone else. Dosent that just go to show you what this is all about..the audience havent a clue!And to be honest Ive been to a few gigs lateley (big and small) and even I started loosing interest in the various bass tones I was hearing....seems out in audience land bass is just a drone that seems to be lower than everything else!!

11 hours ago, Bluewine said:

I'm completely down on QJ right now. He picked on the wrong guys.

I'm maintaing my position on principal. In my world you don't rip on The Beatles.

Blue

I agree with u totally. Lnn & Mctny were an amazing writing duo..incredible, but Ringo a drummer?...not when you put him up against the pool QJ had to choose from.

22 hours ago, Bluewine said:

I say completely un-understandable. Everyone knows the Beatles were not seasoned pro jazz studio musicians. Most ignorant comment of 2018.

 

Way to go Q.

Blue

Plse re-read Lemmywinks quote. Ringo comes back probably feeling postive and happy after a break and thinking I can do it only to be shot to pieces by QJ. That was my comment..   Ignorant?..Nope.

Interesting and totally understandable. He spent his life working with top tier pros who could read a chart in a second and who could play anything. Would hate to have been Ringo when he realised. Refreshing in this era of PC strangulation.

Hard to imagine how MB cant sound good but, and I know this might sound a bit odd.....check ur technique. Playing with a fim but light touch away from the neck will tighten up ur tone like nothing else. The other thing of course is that tone out in the middle of the crowd will sound nothing like the tone we get on stage. Ive always found a thinner stage tone sounds thick and tight on the dance floor!

The best way of dealing with this scurge?....for every band to start a few bars then to stop, and if said annoyance wasn't put away then they would not play on and show is effectively over.

Just bought a PU from Dan...top notch Bass Chatter'er indeed.

GLWTS

14 hours ago, NancyJohnson said:

When I read this story earlier today, I did kind of think, 'Where does this correctness end?'

What about a blind person who buys tickets for an art exhibition or a film?  

Yes, it's tragic this woman is stone deaf, but surely you makes your choices, deaf, blind, disabled, whatever, don't you?  I'm all for equality...I'm struggling for the words here, but if I was deaf, I wouldn't have bought tickets, let alone be inclined or even know how to instruct a solicitor to take action.

Going back to my 'Where will it end?' comment, where does it end?  Bands playing in pubs?  

+1

I get just a little bit fed up with this idea that cause ur disabled the world owes you a ton of everything. I have a mildly debilitating neurological condition which is very difficult to explain, do I keep on about it.....nope, I get on with it and there are days when its so bloody difficult I just wanna lay on the sofa and to hell with it all, but you dont cause life goes on and waits for no-one so you compensate as best you can and keep going.

This was bought new and fitted to a bass last yr but never gigged. Its in superb condition and the wires have lost none of their length during soldering.

Forty five quid all in or £40 cash if you can collect from the Portsmouth area.

Cheers 

Well after yrs of lugging the weight around and spending way too much on vintage stuff I didn't really need I have finally come to my very happy and satisfied senses.

Lightweight Squier Vintage Mod P, P/J basses.

Two stacked Fender Rumble 100v3 combos with line outs.

The whole lot weighs next to nothing, looks pretty, and sounds good.

Plagarism....plain and simple. Did Bowie et al nick stuff, course not they were...."original".

35 minutes ago, BigRedX said:

All basses sound different when played on their own.

And they all sound like bass guitars in the band mix.

Absolutely. Just wondering how many on here can honestly say that out in the audience they could tell the difference between a P and a J for eg.

Ive been to a few concerts this year and the myriad of diff basses might have well been wash tubs for the difference each instrument made.

2 hours ago, wateroftyne said:

I haven't read the thread - apologies - but my view is this:

All other things being equal, IMO this:

...looks a million times nicer than this:

Love the look of those old LPB P's...but, my 71 was a peach to look at but the day it left the house was a day to celebrate...I haven't missed it one little bit and it had the prettiest board and the deepest red torty plate, a lovely looking instrument etc and I waited years to get it......big disappointment really..

There is no doubt in my mind that vintage instruments are at the very least made using better materials, ie woods that were grown longer and metalwork that is substantial etc etc and I'm sure there are superb examples out there. 

I've owned a dead original 71 P bass and an original 77 Stingray and both were pretty crummy,  the P being the better of the two.

They were both very heavy and neither sounded particularly great but you could tell the materials were very good indeed especially the neck on the P which was totally stable and seemed to impart a hefty if somewhat dead tone to the bass...the Stingray just sounded meh what ever I tried to do to it and that was back when it was only a couple of yrs old....

Would I trade any of them back for my current Vintage Mod Squier P bass....nope.

6 minutes ago, Paul S said:

Alice?  Who the flip is Alice?

Sorry, wrong song.

Happy Christmas!

Don't know that one ha..have a good day! here ya go.