Vibrating G String

[quote name='iconic' post='929366' date='Aug 19 2010, 12:57 AM']Maybe it's the name, Manta Ray would have sounded sexier, Sterling reminds me of old Rover 800's, pipes and slippers...[/quote] I hear the new names and I think of that old Abbot & Costello routine "Who's on Bass?" Hey, Abbott is that 1st bass player using a Sterling made by MusicMan? No it's a Sterling by Musicman. Didn't I just say that!!!! (cue laughter) I like the looks of the SBMM 5 strings more so I'm hoping they're just as good if not better.

[quote name='Wil' post='929584' date='Aug 19 2010, 03:36 AM']I seriously doubt these necks would be any better put together than the stunning quality of a Status neck.[/quote] That may depend on the particular neck. I was stunned at the quality of a Status I ordered. Returned it. I'm not the only one to do so either.

[quote name='EBS_freak' post='929313' date='Aug 18 2010, 11:29 PM']Must admit, I have liked all the Modulus I have seen... but I haven't seen a replacement neck on it's own. I am guessing that they are the same things that they use for thier VJ series...[/quote] Yeah, I've liked all the Modulus neck throughs I've played. The old Basstar line were Fender replacement necks from the mid '80's. IIRC they even sold complete Fender style knock offs. The VJ series has a few decades on the Basstars and should be much improved.

[quote name='Musicman20' post='929937' date='Aug 19 2010, 07:44 AM']What is their above the P bass from Fender apart from a custom maker?[/quote] I've played a few of the P Bass Specials from the '80's that were nice. You know the ones that came with one or two P pickups and the gold hardware and beefy bridge? I don't like the gold so much but the few I've played were quite nice. Here's one

[quote name='EBS_freak' post='928939' date='Aug 18 2010, 11:10 AM']True... but not heard the best reports about them.[/quote] The early Moses necks where a 1 inch bar of graphite inside a block of resin shaped like a neck. Never saw one that looked close to good and they were heavy and had air bubbles. The stuff they used to bring to NAMM was embarrassing. The new hollow ones are supposed to be much better but I haven't played one. Modulus from the mid '80's also made some real dogs and the old Basstar line was hit or miss. I've liked all the Zons I've played. Zon used Modulus for a year or so and then made their own after being unhappy with Modulus. All the Modulus I've seen in the last 20 years have been nice.

[quote name='tauzero' post='927574' date='Aug 17 2010, 06:13 AM']You could always ask on the EBMM forum.[/quote] I've enjoyed the SBMMs are just as good as a real one but nothing beats a real one logic spirals there. I have an OLP and a passive SUB, I can't see any reason to pay another thousand based on all the MM's I've played. SUBs are cheap and if you get an active one I think the only difference is the paint and the pickguard. And it's hundreds less than a used MM or a new SBMM. The OLP needed work but still came out much cheaper than a real one after changing all the hardware and doing a refret.

You could get a clear one and change daily [url="http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=83877"]http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=83877[/url]

[quote name='sweeneyjimbob' post='929255' date='Aug 18 2010, 04:02 PM']ive wondered about this a few times because a syou might have notice from below the band im in is called polo lounge, which is a chain of gay bars, which we didnt know about at the time, we got it when the singer seen it in the fear and loathing in las vegas book and thought it was cool. also we dont spell it as 2 words we spell it as one like POLOLOUNGE. (no idea why :s). think we might have problems?[/quote] Polo Lounge is a generic term like bus stop or shoe store. That is in your legal favor. Making it one word is too. But if a big company thinks you may be getting notice based on their reputation they can go after you for trade dress, as it's called in the US, and then it only needs to be similar enough for a reasonable person to make a connection. These laws are so vague and subjective I think it comes down to who has the most money. Disney for example will sue anything at all and they are case study when studying IP law. I would doubt a chain of gay bars has the same kind of legal team as disney. I would think you're OK with pololounge and that has to be true cause it's written on the internet.

Another thing to consider is if you do get some record company interest having an actionable name is going to work against you from their point of view and you may miss an opportunity without even knowing why you didn't get a call back. If they're deciding between 20 bands and they realize they're going to have to change your name and lose your momentum you become less desirable commercially. How about the Rolling Zepplin Beatles instead? Personally I try to pick something that when googled doesn't already bring up a million hits. Tool is a great example of a bad band name from this point of view. If you're trying to make it I think this kind of thinking is very important.

This is one of the more popular subjects on the internet and almost all of the advice is given by people who have no clue. So trying to figure out which advice has any legal basis is pretty tough Ignore anything that uses the word copywrite instead of copyright. Whether you have legal rights or not is not likely to come into play unless you make it big and the name you're using cares enough to fire up a lawyer. Also even if a company does not have the law on their side their lawyers can ruin your life if they want to, and they do want to. For fun you can read about he Nissan website and how a small shop is being attacked by a giant company according to the small shop. [url="http://www.digest.com/"]http://www.digest.com/[/url] If you are talking the name directly from another product that you know has already been used as a band name many times (it's been used in the US a bunch too) maybe it's not a great name. What do you do when the next band wants to use the same name? You have no recourse against them especially since you already know you're taking a previous band name.

I'm another fan of the white, a subtle mint is my favorite on a colored J or P. I know tort is very popular but I can only tolerate it on a sunburst. Like black shoes, a white PG goes with everything

[quote name='BB2000' post='674223' date='Dec 4 2009, 07:58 AM']Why do people comment on the £2000+ price tag of a Wal but nobody blinks an eye at a £2000 late 60's Fender? I know which one I'd rather (and do) have![/quote] I blink at $200 for an old Fender I've played a handful of Wals and even ordered one once. I find most of their magic in the electronics and nothing special in the woodwork. The pair of coils per string pickups and "filter" EQ seem to bring out some aggressive tones not found in more standard gear. But I think you can get a tone that would work just as well, though maybe not sound exactly like someone else, for a fraction of the money. Fun, worth the money, not needed IMHO.

[quote name='OldGit' post='903765' date='Jul 24 2010, 12:41 AM']"Laminate" when selling, "Plywood" when buying... [/quote]You have learned the secret. Add a few premiums and selects and you can write copy for Bass Player

[quote name='Crazykiwi' post='903727' date='Jul 23 2010, 07:08 PM']Useless fact: Jaco was on the verge of securing a Jaydee endorsement just before he died.[/quote] Was he going to dump Guild & Hartke?

[quote name='Davo-London' post='903066' date='Jul 23 2010, 04:20 AM']Similarly, if I want a Jaco tone then I'm better off buying a signature Jaco Jazz, because that's the only bass I have ever got that tone from.[/quote] I watched Jaco get it from a Jaydee right after he complained about not liking the tone of a Jaco fans clone bass.

[quote name='Adrenochrome' post='902952' date='Jul 23 2010, 03:04 AM']Of course the type of wood does have an influence on the sound (however small), and that may well be significant to a real serious player looking for those small differences.[/quote] An observation I've made over the years is that claims of night and day differences will get whittled down to subtle differences and nuances as I press for specifics on the tone difference. You can start with "nothing sounds like bubinga" and end up with "bubinga imparts a subtle yet noticeable warmth to the upper mids that will come through with a top end amplifier".

[quote name='hillbilly deluxe' post='902884' date='Jul 23 2010, 02:10 AM']If you took 3 identical basses,one left with the body completely unfinished you would hear a difference. This happened to me with a Jazz that Bass Doc built for me.I gigged it in its unfinished state for a couple of weeks,then had the body finished. Unfinished it had a vintage Jazz vibe to it,finished,it seemed brighter/more modern sounding.[/quote] In a lab setting humans are incapable of comparing tones with just a few minutes in between them let alone days. It's also well documented that we do hear with our eyes, what we see will change what we hear and our expectations will change our perceptions. This is why red guitars are louder. Try this experiment, play a recorded clip for a musician friend and tell them to pay attention to the tone as you're going to make mods and want their opinion. A week later play the same clip and tell them you put in a new pre amp that a friend is going to market that makes it sound fuller and more vibrant and resonant. Betting even money they will hear it will make you rich in a short time.

[quote name='Shambo' post='902751' date='Jul 22 2010, 08:26 PM']If we took one piece of wood and made two guitar bodies, one with a nitro finish and one with a poly finish, to suggest the nitro one sounds better fresh out of the box would be madness, but I don't think anyones claiming that.[/quote]That's pretty much the claim of everyone who sprays it. And one of the great vintage paradoxes that vintage guitars weren't special when they were new. (funny how all Fenders get better with age but that's not "true" for Ibanez) [quote]I've played old Fenders and new ones and the older ones are generally easier to pitch without amplification because you can feel the string vibration through the body.[/quote]So the claim is older guitars are better transmitters of vibration. That would mean they have less sustain. No vintage lover is going to take that rap [quote]I trust my own judgement to know that it's more than just a placebo effect created by a bit of 'mojo'.[/quote]Trusting your own judgment is the mechanism of the placebo effect. Without it it won't work. It defines the placebo effect. [quote]Anyone can grasp the differences between green timber and seasoned timber and I know which one I'd prefer for a solid bodied guitar.[/quote] No guitar builder ever has used green wood for production. Green wood has a very specific meaning and it is never in guitars. The specific water content in wood can be measured easily and aged wood does not have less if it was kiln dried. Kiln dried and sawn wood will stabilize or season within a year and remain stable for decades after that. If it didn't some necks wouldn't go back and forth with the seasons.

[quote name='essexbasscat' post='902431' date='Jul 22 2010, 02:21 PM']Not supporting any one aspect of this discussion, but I would like to present the difference in acoustic sound between a strat and a les paul as evidence M'Lud T[/quote] What is the difference? And can you be specific? It would be best if you can list frequencies and not vague terms like round or anything not clearly defined. How have you isolated the difference caused by different string scales and isolated just the woods influence? Can you tell the wood species of a guitar by listening to it un amplified and under what conditions can I test this?

[quote name='Adrenochrome' post='902213' date='Jul 22 2010, 11:04 AM']It's all smoke and mirrors. The tone of a bass guitar is almost entirely down to the length and type of string, the type of pickup and it's position along and proximity to the string. Everything else has [i]minimal[/i] effect.[/quote] Your statement differs from those magic woods stories in one important way. It's demonstrable. The others are taken on faith. Many vintage Fenders that have been touted as having magic breathing wood with nitro finishes weren't finished with nitro in the first place as not all Fender colors were nitro. Yet the faithful can hear the wood breathing solely because they believe it's nitro. I lump tone alchemists in the same group with psychics. Having watched the religion of tone evolve over 4 decades I've noticed that finish was once the holy grail of tone and is now dropping rapidly as many booteak builders don't use it. Wood species and company logos now seem to be the biggies. Funny that ash versus alder didn't use to be the tone decider that nitro versus poly used to be. A fun thing to do with nitro over poly believers is ask them if the color of the guitar has any effect on the tone. They will laugh at your silly idea and point out how ridiculous it is. They have no idea how different the pigments are and how much is in the finish. Where as someone who works with plastics would know that the color can have a dramatic effect on the porosity, hardness and density of the plastic. Just the sort of thing that's supposed to influence the tone.

Hmmm, seems like that last line contradicts what's above it. If the pickup is responsible for so much of the sound (which I subscribe too) then a bass wouldn't sound the same un amplified as it would amplified as a major part of the tone wouldn't influence the un amplified sound. What are some examples of voiced and non voiced pickups? I'm not sure what you mean here.

What he said!

So what do you do for a living?

Also had a set of Aero's once on a 5. Awesome authentic Fender tone right down to the single coil hum. [url="http://www.aeroinstrument.com/pickups.html"]http://www.aeroinstrument.com/pickups.html[/url] I have 7 5 strings at the moment, all budget players, and my favorite changes all the time. I could never pick a favorite tone While not passive the original EMG set works in a 5 and was the bees knees in the mid 1980's. Victor bailey was a big fan and Wooten uses the PJ version still.

[quote name='JTUK' post='890881' date='Jul 9 2010, 02:23 PM']Or talk to Aaron/Kent Armstrong...these pickup makers can pretty well do anything you want if you ask them[/quote] I've heard that more than once. And from what I've seen the prices are decent. Don't forget Status [url="http://www.status-graphite.com/status/frames/index_home.html"]http://www.status-graphite.com/status/frames/index_home.html[/url] And Dimarzio has a few 5 string J's, once the choice of Sadowsky