MartinB

There are companies coming up with new ways to produce existing effects, e.g. Gamechanger Audio do a pedal that uses plasma discharge to generate distortion, and one that uses light to enhance reverb. And there are new ways to control existing effects, like Rainger FX's liquid-controlled overdrive, various gesture-based alternatives to expression pedals, etc. But genuinely new effects? I reckon we may have exhausted them all. What can you do to an audio wave? Change the frequency, amplitude, and phase - that's your pitchshifter, your tremolo/volume pedal/compressor and (almost) your phaser. You can add in some noise with harmonics and clipping to get your various flavours of dirt. You can introduce additional copies of the wave, to get delay/echo/flanger, and then phaser if you change the phase on the copy. Isn't everything else just some combination of these? EQ/filtering is just adjusting the amplitude of specific frequencies, instead of all frequencies. Add in the ability to apply that EQ differently based on the incoming signal amplitude, and you've got an envelope filter. An octave pedal is just a copy of the wave with the frequency halved. And so on. Once you move from analogue to digital and you're sampling the wave, you can do things like fiddle with the encoding to get a bit crusher effect. And some things probably just can't be implemented in an analogue circuit, like the harmonisers itu mentioned - you might be able to get a second signal at a different pitch, but I'm guessing not the smarts of having it change the interval based on the pitch of the input and the selected key. My hunch is there are still plenty of interesting things to be done with sound in the digital world, but it's all combinations of effects that already exist - just applied/combined/controlled in new ways. Things like shimmer and granular particle reverb feel "modern" to me, but even those have been around for donkey's years now. Well anyway that's my 2p. I am not an expert and could be talking out of my derrière!

Stiltskin didn't exist before the Levi's ad - the song was written for the ad, and the "band" put together to cash in on its success.

I'm speculating about the source - it's possible the OP has access to the original multi-tracks from the rights-holders, and permission to publish them. You're absolutely right that they don't give you the full picture. What you're hearing is not the raw performance straight from the bass, but potentially a mix of multiple mics on an amp, DI, compression, EQ at the desk, etc etc. Very interesting nonetheless! Makes you appreciate that what sounds like a nice clean tone in the mix is actually pretty weird on its own. Case in point, the bass tone on September sounds absolutely rubbish:

I've got no reason to doubt that's the original bass recording taken from the studio multi-track tape. All the little variations are in there. These tracks have been available for years thanks to the Guitar Hero/Rock Band video games, which contained individual stems for bass/drums/guitar/vocals/etc that could be extracted. It's cool that folks keep posting them on YouTube etc, as they inevitably get taken down for copyright before too long.

This is brilliant - I had no idea!

And not even a full song in their case - a sped-up sample of a remix that they tacked on to the beginning. An awful lot of people felt they'd been taken for a ride about 30 seconds into the single! 🤣 They did eventually release a remix-of-a-remix that was closer to what everyone expected:

Let's not get hung up on the word "wrong", eh? @Cliff Edge's goal was to play it like the original recording, but they accidentally played something else. That doesn't imply any judgement of folks who set out to play something different. Anyway. Can anyone think of any songs where the original bassline is so fundamental, simple, well-known etc. that you really couldn't stray from it without getting funny looks? Another One Bites The Dust maybe? Feels like it's so minimal that a drastic re-interpretation of the song would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

Wow, he was really attacking those strings!

The rest of that top ten: 6. THINKING OUT LOUD - ED SHEERAN 7. CHANDELIER - SIA 8. SOMEONE YOU LOVED - LEWIS CAPALDI 9. I GOTTA FEELING - BLACK EYED PEAS 10. RADIOACTIVE - IMAGINE DRAGONS https://www.officialcharts.com/chart-news/the-killers-mr-brightside-claims-record-breaking-260th-week-exactly-five-years-on-the-official-singles-chart-top-100__32800/

So the OP doesn't believe Larry Graham invented slap bass, and wants to find the true originator. I can only assume this is because they've invented a time machine, and are planning to go back and prevent slap from ever existing. I fully support them in their mission to create a future devoid of Level 42 👍

Yeah, GHS Brite Flats were the stock strings apparently. Those repeated notes on the bridge could be played on the 5th and 7th frets, so even careful fret-hand muting would probably still let those harmonics through! It's nice to be reminded that even the greats are only human... and that the mix hides a multitude of sins 😆

Oh, I agree 100% - that remix an absolute classic! 😎

The Mint Royale remix you mean? The original's pretty normal for them at that time (i.e. not as good as anything on the previous two albums 😆), but they'd had plenty of top-25 singles before then. Interesting to compare with the similarly-remixed Brimful Of Asha by Cornershop. The original struggled to number 60: Then Norman Cook worked his magic and gave them a number 1: They barely troubled the charts again after that.

The baritone Jazzmasters have got a bit trendy, and are selling for £700-1000 🤷‍♂️

Same bass as mine! Lovely necks on them. More info about them here: Squier Standard Series P Bass Special I don't think any amount of cleaning would make me want to touch that one though 🤢

They're perhaps a bit polite, but Khruangbin have some simple, tasteful basslines with lovely feel - great for a playalong.

It'd be interesting to compare the results with this one:

2x4 beams, you say? La Baye 2x4 😆

Given the apparent credulity of guitar buyers, I'm surprised manufacturers aren't already charging extra for connecting the electronics with "tonewire", attaching the scratchplate with "tonescrews", and so forth.

Even if it wasn't microtonal, I've a sneaking suspicion that'd still sound like tedious muso noodling 😏

Does that disqualify the thousands of ska revival bands with pun names like "The Ex-Ska-Vators"? 😆 This goes on a lot in the surf scene too.

The bridge section (around two minutes) always gives me trouble. In my head I know it's straightforward - two shapes moving between two strings. But my fingers refuse to cooperate! 😆

Time for a set of catgut strings

In addition to the Joyo American Sound already mentioned, the Joyo Ultimate Drive is a cheap-but-good Fulltone OCD clone. Also worth a look (and frequently on sale for ~£40), the TC Electronic MojoMojo:

Bear in mind that although a song may not go below E in its original key, your singer may sound better singing it in a different key. When I was doing covers, I think there was only one song we played that would have originally required a 5 string - but I still ended up using the Eb and D a lot on songs that we'd transposed down a bit. Though I will say that the low B, C and Db very rarely got any use!