FDC484950

Yes, a poorly-set up instrument often puts beginners off. it depends on the style(s) of music you intend to play, but the general guidance is that a well set-up bass shouldn't have any fret buzz when playing normally (assuming it's not the player, or a player whose style has fret buzz or "clank" and therefore a lower action). Everyone is different, but a good middling starting point should be 2mm between the top of the 12th fret and the bottom of the (highest) G string to about 3mm for the same gap between the top of the 12 fret to the bottom of the (lowest) E string. From here, heavy players may want to raise the action a bit, lighter players may want a lower action (if the bass can take it!)

If your bass action cannot be tweaked to at least this level without buzz then it needs a setup. As @itu says, as a beginner it's probably best to take it to a decent instrument repairer/shop to have it done for you - particularly if there are high frets that need attention, or the nut is too high or low, as if so, no amount of adjusting the bridge/truss rod will dial in a good setup.

I would imagine you might be locking your wrist and/or fingers and may not be as relaxed as you think, or in stretching your fingers apart you’re getting tension across the back of your hand. As you’re new you won’t have likely developed much of a stretch with the fingers, so generally the only way to hold the strings down is with tension rather than technique. Don’t play through any sharp pain as that’s not a good sign, but a slight ache from playing isn’t necessarily bad, especially when starting out.

I would practice fretting a single note, press the string down onto the fret less and less until the string buzzes, then just add a tiny bit more pressure to remove the buzz. That’s exactly how much pressure you need to fret, and it’s probably a lot less than you are using. Get control of each finger and the pressure you use to fret a note with each, and look at span separately. I don’t recommend playing one finger per fret constantly below the 5th fret unless the player has very large hands and/or plays a short scale bass (32” or less). I assume you’re playing a 4 string bass (correct me if I’m wrong), so for most players one finger per fret should be fine down to the 5th fret, maybe a little further, and fine for the odd line lower, but not for constant playing as it’s asking for tendon issues over time.

I find Mark very responsive, even out of hours. They’re not Amazon, but a one man band (plus the odd helper). Despite the higher commission than the Gallery they’ve sold all the basses I’ve sent on commission in a few weeks for far more than I’d get on here or eBay/Reverb with all the tyre kickers and lowball offers. It’s easy to forget there are very few dedicated bass shops in the UK, and I doubt any of us would do a better job for the profit margins on offer. They have a lot of very nice kit for sale, and post Br**it and the reduction of realistic buying options, have become more important.

I believe you have a fretless and play upright - if a fretless is in scope an Ibanez GWB35 is an excellent choice (one in Reverb at £500 at the mo).

13 hours ago, Hellzero said:

Try @leitnerjoe. 😉

Er, well… he owns a fretless Wal. I think I’ll leave it at that.

For me, despite a massive collection of all styles of music, for a purely bass perspective it has to be Oil On Canvas by Japan. The music is listenable but Mick Karn’s bass sound, style and phrasing remains as fresh as the day it was recorded. It’s very hard to copy or write down (and I’ve transcribed plenty of very hard music!) and I’ve never really heard anyone imitate his style or sound. It’s a shame he didn’t get more credit, have more of a career - and it’s an even bigger shame he’s no longer with us.

I always considered them a band that made music for people who don’t like music, but like some kind of noise (any kind, be it someone talking or someone warbling) to be on in the background.

Formulaic pop (for want of a better phrase) has been around since music has had an industry, but time and especially technology has enabled people to really hone that sound, like a slightly bitter lukewarm soup that leaves no aftertaste. Hard to dislike. In fact, hard to form any opinion about, really…

There’s a nice natural Stingray Classic 5 on eBay at the moment but it’s rather expensive (same model in black was up at £1399 in PMT a few months ago) and something about the listing rings alarm bells. Not that I have room for another bass

I’d love this. With 3 basses bought in the last 6 months and a custom order (unexpectedly) due next month I just don’t have the space. Shame, lovely looking bass (I believe It’s Ed Friedland’s go to bass, and he’s a far from shabby player). GLWTS

Withdrawn

On 17/12/2021 at 12:26, Bilbo said:

Roll off all the top and just thump away 'ambiguously'. I did a whole duo gig like this once because of a lunatic piano player. 

Usually the type of piano player that’s never heard of rootless voicings and spends the whole gig hammering away in the same range as the bass…

Warwick Black strap locks. New and unused. Price includes mainland UK delivery.

5 hours ago, Sparky Mark said:

Talking of bad habits; I sometimes "pat" the strings with my plucking hand in time with the rhythm which can result in a percussive click. Never a problem live but upset the drummer on a recent recording session where he wondered where the extra taps were coming from.

Lots of bass players do this. It can work but more often than not it’s one of the reasons a groove doesn’t feel as tight/good. Space is king. 
Sympathetic ringing is definitely a problem if you don’t damp open strings. The lower the string the worse it sounds. Way back when I wasn’t doing it properly (and on a paid session not long after I got my first 5 string) the engineer stopped the session because he couldn’t work out where the annoying off-key low rumble was coming from. I think I ended up shoving some foam under the B string. I had to learn to damp the strings properly pretty quickly after that…

What a lovely story - to have owned from new for pretty much his entire career. RIP Brian and I hope it goes to a good home 🙂

I’ve experienced both sides:

A bass that (Fender) didn’t play very well no matter what I tried, until I took the neck off and found a couple of shims - neck back on without them and all good.

3 (Fenders) I’ve bought (1 new, 2 used) had the saddles down to the bridge plate but still a ridiculous action, particularly 9th fret onwards. A small shim (edge of a plastic card) and on went the neck - problem solved. The basses played great with a low, consistent action. I had already checked relief, looked for high frets or poorly-seated frets but the neck was fine. There no way I would have even considered shaving the bridge saddles.
 

Strangely, no other brand of bass I’ve owned needed a shim. It’s almost as if their quality control is… oh well, never mind

It’s strange. I briefly owned an SR5 Special HH and although it was beautifully made, it had pretty major neck dive and I just couldn’t get on with the tone. I’m not sure whether it was the neodymium pickups or the new EQ, but it just sounded like there were no mids, even with the mid EQ on full boost. It sounded fine acoustically and had a great B string, so it must have been the electronics. I bought a US Sterling 5 HH not long afterward and love it. Maybe I prefer the more aggressive sound of the ceramic pickups wired in series - but then again my Big Al 5 has neodymium single coils and it sounds great…

I’ve got some bad news; there is no such thing as an accelerator when it comes to jazz. I recall an amusing quote from Mark Levine’s Jazz Theory Book when talking about standards - something like “if you want to play in New York you had better know most if not all of these tunes” - referring to several hundred standards.
I’d categorise jazz as “slow” learning - sure, you can learn scales, modes and chords, and learning some piano will definitely move you forward - but you need years of listening, transcribing (if you want to) and playing stuff you don’t know and can’t play. Improvisation is great fun but it can be a mountain to climb initially because there are so many possibilities. If I were looking for value I’d spend the money on buying a load of jazz albums - and wear them out. One more quote from the same book: “all the answers are in your record collection”.

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I had similar thoughts. I went with a Super P/J for my order as I didn’t want a bass with only the one tone available (yes, I know you can produce more than one sound, but a P is a P). The only difference to be aware of is the the tonestyler is only available with the super P - the PJ has the pickup selector switch.

On 24/11/2021 at 00:22, Woodinblack said:

 

I have never seen a chapman stick in an actual shop. I have only really seen one advertised in an actual shop and that was crazy money. 

I went into the Bass Centre in Wapping at some point in the late 80s/Early 90s and they had a selection! I think it was a pretty short-lived thing, probably driven by Tony Levin (not sure whether Nick Beggs was known for playing one back then). But as you say, since then it is direct from Stick Enterprises or private sale. I once bought a Rosewood model from a store in Texas, but the US is a bit different - more of every type of instrument available.

54 minutes ago, SteveXFR said:

I'm getting worried reading this. I got a new harley benton and the fretboard was super dry, to the point where it felt rough. I put on some lemon oil and half an hour later it felt better but still not great so I put some more on and now it feels super smooth but not oily at all. Could I have over done it and set up future problems?

No. I’ve done it a couple of times long ago when I didn’t know better. Slapped tons of the liquid all over the fingerboard and it stayed greasy for days no matter how much I wiped it down. I think it took months to dry out in the end. The other time was with a very dark fretless ebony board - even with just a few drops it just wouldn’t soak in because the grain was so tight. Again it just sat on the surface, but at least I could wipe it off.

Nothing wrong with fingerboard oil, as in a product designed for a specific purpose, rather than a generic oil, which may contain undesirable additives). And we’re talking about tiny quantities - 3-4 drops onto a paper towel at most for the whole board. It’s also not required regularly - properly aged and dried instrument wood with a stable and very low moisture content needs oiling no more than 1 or 2 times a year. On some basses I’ve never bothered as the board didn’t need it. I wouldn’t bother on an ebony as it has a very dense grain so doesn’t really absorb the oil (so as in the first post the oil could end up floating on top of the board and running into the glue under the frets), and it’s not recommended on maple boards as it could cause discolouration.

1 hour ago, SumOne said:

I stand corrected on the Dingwalls - I've never actually played anything other than the Combustion and NG and D-Roc so I'm clearly talking out of my a*se! I'd like to play one of the >£3k range as I couldn't really fault the ones that cost half that, it'd need to be a big improvement for me to spend another >£1,500 and not feel like a big chunk of the cost was paying for scarcity and Canadian vs Chinese wages.

 

Even if I was a millionaire I'd have ridiculously high expectations of this £10,500 Prima  for me to feel that's good value for money, but I guess the 'value' of things isn't the same for everyone as some will pay that and be happy about it.

There’s the flaw in your argument: it’s got nothing to do with value for money. It’s about scarcity, desirability, and individuality, and some of this comes directly from price and branding. It’s the same with any other consumer item. A basic Ford Focus will get you to your destination in exactly the same way as a Porsche 911. Is the Porsche value for money at 5 times the price? No, it really isn’t. But they still sell plenty, right

15 hours ago, SumOne said:

The Dingwall range demonstrate the limits to Bass diminishing returns for me:

 

The £1,700 Combustion is a very well made instrument that I think would be good enough for pretty much any discerning high-level professional player. It is a Dingwall design built to a high spec and high-level of quality control but via an efficient mass-produced process in China. That seems to be about the limit for high-end but mass-produced and efficiently made Basses, beyond that the diminishing returns graph of cost vs how 'good' the instrument starts to go almost flat because the increased cost seems to be largely for inefficient production. 

 

The Dingwall Z3 costs £6k + and is made by hand in Canada. I've heard nothing but praise for the Canadian made Dingwalls and I'm sure they are better but I find it hard to believe it's really worth £4,300 more, surely a big chunk of that is down to paying for an inefficient build process - paying people's wages for many hours of work in Canada vs an efficient mass-produced process in China paying lower wages for fewer hours, and it's partly paying for scarcity rather than actually the value of how good the instrument is. (Similar to Wal and Foderas and others).

To a degree you are right, but it’s clearer when you look at the range as a whole.

Combustion - £1700

ABZ £3,000+

AB1 £3,500+

ABII £4,500+

Z £5500+ 

Prima Artist £7500+

There is a massive difference between the Chinese Combustions and the ABZ. I owned an NG3 briefly and swapped it for an ABZ soon afterward as the difference in tone and feel, woods, finishing, construction etc. made it a no-brainer for me. There was nothing special about the NG - perfectly usable, but it didn’t have that special something. It felt like a mass produced instrument.

However, having tried the Z models at around double the price of an ABZ, I’d agree that the law of diminishing returns definitely applies - and even more so with the sky high prices of the Prima Artist. At this level you get more of everything (different woods on bass and treble side, more laminations, fancier finishing, different headstock profile, different bridge etc.) but IMHO it’s adds nothing of value and just ups the price massively. To me the elegant simplicity and perfect construction, finishing and tone from the ABZ justifies the cost. It’s also a similar price point to Fender custom shop of MM basses after recent price hikes. Not everyone has £3K to spend on a bass or can justify it, but that’s a very different discussion as everyone’s concept of value is different. Would I be happy with a £400 bass? No.

21 hours ago, Supernaut said:

If the bass is a looker it's a bonus. But you can't see what a bass looks like on a recording. 

I wonder how many people buy an instrument that sounds great but looks awful (to them)? Looks mean a lot more to many. 
 

Fundamentally a £300 Squier can sound identical to a £5,000 custom super J/P. It may even play the same. So what are you paying for? Quality of materials really boils down to fancier-looking woods that the manufacturer has been more choosy with, and a more time spent finishing and setting up the instrument (which doesn’t necessarily mean better playability).
 

I did see some industry figures years ago for large scale instrument production costs and although it’s out of date due to labour, material and shipping price hikes in recent years, it’s pretty clear that a painted bass with standard hardware manufactured at scale costs surprisingly little, once the cost of tooling is recouped. Companies like Fender tend not to spend a lot on R&D (although they must have done in the past when introducing models, with little success due to the very conservative buying public!) as they are effectively churning out the same instruments with colour and name changes and relatively minor tweaks (high mass bridge, lighter tuners, neck join profiling).
 

With the US models you are paying for a hard case instead of a gig bag, the higher labour rate (even if the proportion of the total cost is the same, the monetary amount is more), generally more attractive woods and marginally more expensive hardware and electronics - and the name and country of origin being the US - which is by far the largest reason for the huge price hike