prowla

Boys II Meh

49 minutes ago, Quatschmacher said:

Could use the US spelling of “feces” though. 

Aren't we supposed to be boycotting US items?

Ultrapox

Stink

The Ho Ho's

Podgy

Rainbog (Bitchie Blankmore's)

The Ham

Fig Country

Jethro Dull

Rash

Rambow

(OK - it was two letters, but if you squint the "m" is similar to "in"...)

2 hours ago, paul_5 said:

Disappointed? I'd be mortified!

Wang dang!

1 hour ago, Bilbo said:

That's the difference between knowledge and wisdom. Knowing what basses Geddy used vs. knowing that, if you went out and got those instruments, and even if you used the EXACT SAME BASSES, you would still sound nothing like Geddy Lee.

 

There is a lovely story out there where Ted Nugent spoke of having Van Halen as a support band. Nugent loved EVH's sound and asked to try his guitar. Nugent didn't touch any of the controls on the guitar or amp and, upon playing the instrument, was disappointed to find that he sounded exactly like Ted Nugent.

That's a take on Geddy's comment from when he bought his first Ric.

Quote

When we signed our first record deal in 1974, I got my share of our small advance and the first thing I did was buy a Rickenbacker. I think I paid about $400 for it. Much to my dismay, when I plugged it in, it didn't sound like Chris Squire, ha ha!

13 hours ago, RAY AGAINST THE MACHINE said:

One thing i did gather from Geddy is that he really hated the steinberger .

My Geddy tribute - the Rickenberger.

Easy - another Rickenbacker.

Old thread but I was just listening to Spirit Of Radio and thought “that’s not a Ric, must be a Jazz” (or they’ve killed the eq.). 

I wonder if they've got a Taurus on the way as well, as Getty was bigging them up too.

Great musician is Gerry...

2 hours ago, GreeneKing said:

If anything gets to ignite a response from me it’s an opinion stated as fact 🙂

 

I’d agree that simply using a pickup and strings produces a tone that is broadly similar. 
 

Unadulterated Jazz, Precision and Rickenbackers are fairly similar especially if played in a ‘conventional’ mode and manner. 
 

But, many basses have active tone control onboard. I could play my P - Retro equipped Warmoth Precision in a mode that would leave no doubt in a back to back that it wasn’t a standard P bass. Yes I could be wrong, it’d be interesting to see. 
 

Likewise the Zoot ZB1000 in series mode with the active varitone set to one of two or three positions would begin to sound like a different instrument entirely. 
 

In the mix in a rock covers band? Yes it all becomes a bit redundant so long as the bass can actually be heard. 
 

All my opinion of course. 
 

Peter

And that's a fact!

3 hours ago, Jean-Luc Pickguard said:

The word "prescious" is an obsolete adjective meaning foreknowing or having foreknowledge, derived from the Latin "praescius". It's a word that is no longer in common use so I've removed it

That was quite prescient of you.

On 16/03/2025 at 13:57, Jean-Luc Pickguard said:

A lot of instruments have minor (or not so minor) quirks that may be a holdover from how things are done historically, but would benefit from an update.

 

What instrument's spec would you improve/change if given the power?

 

I've owned my Ric 4003 for a few months now, after many years of being put off buying one due to the previous versions' medieval bridge and the weird dual truss rods — both issues that are fixed in my 2024 model. I really like this bass, however:

 

1. The bridge is not as long as the previous design, so the gap in the binding is more obvious. Either the bridge should have the same length as the previous version, or the butt of the centre section should get binding.
2. The mute just doesn't seem like a good idea, the thumbscrews to adjust it are stiff making it difficult and time-consuming to adjust, and the strings are not muted evenly when it is raised. What's the point of it? It would be a lot more useful to be able to palm mute which would only be possible if the built-in mute was removed entitrely or it was removable as a sub-assembly.
3. The bass picks up a lot of noise. I shielded mine with copper slug tape. Surely something like this should be done at the factory?
4. The bass comes with a huge rectangular case with no option for a gigbag. I bought a thomann / music area SafeCase 80 padded gigbag for mine, and I would have much preferred if something like that had come with the bass instead of the case.
5. I bought a rickysounds acrylic thumbrest that fits across the top two screws of the pickguard, however I removed it after a while as it seemed too tall and got in the way. What might be useful though would be a similarly shaped thumbrest cut from the same material as the pickguard (i.e. factory offcuts) which would visually blend in better, and having a lower profile, not get in the way as much.
6. RIC should offer optional accessories to facilitate experimentation with ric-o-sound. I had to do a fair amount of research to find what adaptors would work best. I have a splitter cable for recording, and an OBNE split meld to split the output into two signals which I'm planning a pedalboard around. If I do build that board it I will probably also get a JHS summing amp pedal to recombine the effected signals as I'm unlikely to take two amps to a gig.

It's quite remarkable that they're still a favourite, given that essentially the same instrument has been in production since 1959; they have, however, have had gradual upgrades over the years.

Me, I don't have a particular issue with the bridge/tailpiece unit (set it up once and forget it) and I quite like the dual rods.

To your points:

1. I've just reverted a V2 bridge I put onto one of my 2010 basses: a. yes, it's too far from the end of the body and b. the action wouldn't go low enough. ((RIC did produce the 4004 with a Schaller 3D bridge.))
2. The mute is presumably intnded to be always on or always off, rather than switchable. I think that they may have thought about options but not come up with something they want to go with. I've got a synth pickup that fits in there for when/if I get another project one.
3. I agree regarding the noise; they are single-coil pickups. ((RIC did produce the 4004 with humbuckers.))
4. I guess the hardcase is for protection; standard gigbags work.
5. I don't like the thumbrests which sit on the pickguard. However, if you take off the Treble pickup cover you can get bezels to fit there with thumbrests/indentations.
6. RIC do (or did) sell the Rick-O-Sound splitter box, but it's stupidly expensive. You can split for a pedalboard using a GigRig CincoCinco (or make a Hack-O-Sound) and plug in an EBS Flat splitter cable.

Regarding  enhancements, I like to put a Hipshot drop-D eXtender on mine, but a. they don't fit all Rics and b. the RIc model is discontinued.

2 hours ago, NancyJohnson said:

 

I'm sorry, but no.

 

Forget the actual bass or guitar that you're using for a minute, here.  To get 'the Pink Floyd bass sound' (whatever that actually is), what is your signal chain?  And, Roger Waters or Guy Pratt?  

 

My point is (and always has been) that, by and large, the clean tone of the vast majority of basses is more or less the same.  In a effort to reinforce this, we did a blind test a few years back with over a dozen basses and the scores for identification were extremely low.  Members here couldn't hear/tell the difference between Jazz or Precision or Rickenbackers or whatever. 

 

A Precision Bass alone will simply not give you 'the Pink Floyd bass sound' any more than it will deliver 'the Phil Lynott, Bruce Foxton, Steve Harris (etc) tone' without certain characteristics in the signal path.  It's just a tool to facilitate it.  Any bass will do it.

 

I have to say in that test, I didn't identify my own vintage Rickenbacker (though actually I rarely played it through an amp and I think the horseshoe magnet may need re-magnetising), but I thought the other Ric might be it; I could say that there are some considerations which the test didn't cover and so I'd be wary of taking the results standalone:

• The riff @cetera was playing was restricted to the first 7 frets; a characteristic of a Ric is how its sound changes as you go up the neck (because of the Bass/neck pickup).
• The amp settings were the same, so a more powerful or active bass might have a more impressive sound.
• I don't know if the tone settings were flat, but that might not be what the various owners/afficionados might choose and so migh mask the "tells" of the various instruments.

I do agree and often say the instrument is the bass + the amp(s) + the speakers + the rest of the signal chain (+ the venue).

But the thing is though that you can optimise the signal chain to accentuate the features of the instrument; the most obvious example of that is splitting the pickups to different channels (Rick-O-Sound, Billy Sheehan, etc.), so that you can tune each idependently.

So, I don't agree that any bass will do.

Some other considerations:

• You can't ignore who is playing the instrument: Geddy Lee said that he bought a Ric thinking he'd sound like Chris Squire and found out he didn't.
• You can tune in to a particular instrument, for example Chris Squire said the Ric folks made a copy of his RM1999, but it sounded nothing like it.
• Geddy Lee used a Ric and a Jazz on Moving Pictures; the distorted sound on the lower 7 frets is remarkably similar, but if I play songs on a Ric and a Jazz I can catch the nuances.
• I have two 2010 Ric 4003 basses and they sound different.
• I was in a music store and heard a glorious double bass sound from the next room; I went there to check it out and was totally surprised to see it was someone playing a Ric through a Markbass amp (which is what i have).
• I once put a Seymour Duncan pickup on a Ric and could not get the Ric sound; I've had different pickups on Precisions and they do not sound the same.

I went to a guitar show on the weekend and played one bass there which had been custom built with a MM pickup (with series/parallel/single-coil) and a Precision one, plus active/passive; I would say that each option sounded distinctly different and certainly not just more or less the same.

As to Pink Floyd, I'd say the bass has a pretty nondescript sound.

My Status collection (the Frankenstein is now complete).

I would like a headless 5-string at some point...

2 hours ago, NancyJohnson said:

 

As an aside, I detest Spinal Tap as much as Schecter. 

 

It's not amusing in the slightest (come on, it never was) and this whole breaking of the fourth wall and treating them like a proper band in the real world is about as hilarious as eating soap.

 

 

Is Mr Grumpy in the house today? 🙂