Musicman Stingray - Such a love/hate relationship

[horrorshowbass]

USA SUB incoming on Thursday.

Happy Christmas to me

[Vanheusen77]

The more I play my Stingray special the more I love it. It really can do it all.

Edited December 24, 2022 by Vanheusen77

[Eric.C.Lapton]

On 19/12/2022 at 07:06, Delberthot said:

I think I've said this at some point in the past - I love the sound of Stingrays but the only way that I can get the Stingray sound live is with a Sterling. I just can't get as much growl and punch with a regular Stingray unless it's a ceramic pickup SR5.

 

I bought this a few weeks ago - Sterling HH with matching headstock

 

 

The sterling is a monster,  I’ve slays preferred it’s sound to the stingray a HH must be marvellous 

[Patrick Francis]

It’s refreshing to see so many others frustrated with their Stingrays - I had 4 of them, along with a Sabre and a US Sterling, Back in the late 80’s and 90’s I had very little understanding of tone and gain stages. 87-91 I was using a Trace Elliott sold state amp,

(the one with the black light) I used a pick and a chorus pedal. I had terrible tone but I didn’t even know it. When warmer more organically produced rock music kicked in with the grunge stuff, I moved on to a precision and an SVT. 
 

I found the Stingray NEVER sounded good with a pick - unless I went for the over the top Cure, Simon Gallup, Disintegration pick tone.

They never took to drive as well as passive basses.

They had a thin ‘snock’ sound that didn’t fit in a mix.

They’re prohibitively heavy. I wasn’t aware of their weight in my 20’s, now I’m 64 it’s a deal breaker. The most recent Ray I had was over 12 pounds, I never picked it up. I have to admit the Sterling was a nice reprieve, fabulous sound, lovely weight, it just felt a little small on me.

 

[agoulding]

I'm joining in on this resurrection... I bought my first Stingray this year. Adore the bloody thing but sometimes struggle with the sound.

I had the weak G problem but it was massively improved by adjusting the poles in the pick up.

I have now settled in using flats on it, I just adore the vibe of it. Flats on the Stingray is wildly underrated if you ask me.

[Beedster]

6 hours ago, agoulding said:

I'm joining in on this resurrection... I bought my first Stingray this year. Adore the bloody thing but sometimes struggle with the sound.

I had the weak G problem but it was massively improved by adjusting the poles in the pick up.

I have now settled in using flats on it, I just adore the vibe of it. Flats on the Stingray is wildly underrated if you ask me.

Flats on a stingray are glorious 👍

 

But then flats on any decent bass are glorious 🙂

[HeadlessBassist]

12 hours ago, Patrick Francis said:

It’s refreshing to see so many others frustrated with their Stingrays - I had 4 of them, along with a Sabre and a US Sterling, Back in the late 80’s and 90’s I had very little understanding of tone and gain stages. 87-91 I was using a Trace Elliott sold state amp,

(the one with the black light) I used a pick and a chorus pedal. I had terrible tone but I didn’t even know it. When warmer more organically produced rock music kicked in with the grunge stuff, I moved on to a precision and an SVT. 
 

I found the Stingray NEVER sounded good with a pick - unless I went for the over the top Cure, Simon Gallup, Disintegration pick tone.

They never took to drive as well as passive basses.

They had a thin ‘snock’ sound that didn’t fit in a mix.

They’re prohibitively heavy. I wasn’t aware of their weight in my 20’s, now I’m 64 it’s a deal breaker. The most recent Ray I had was over 12 pounds, I never picked it up. I have to admit the Sterling was a nice reprieve, fabulous sound, lovely weight, it just felt a little small on me.

 

 

Like any mass produced instrument, there are always good and bad examples, but there is something odd about the Stingray sonically. You can tell it's definitely designed as an evolution to the Precision, as it's pickup placement fits into an almost perfect sonic space for the listener, but it's often a struggle for the player. If you're running a 'Ray balls-out like Flea, it rises magnificently to the occasion, but as an accompanying instrument it does tend to get sonically buried. It's almost as if the sound lacks the necessary body in a live situation. Even my fantastic sounding thirty year old 2eq model can seem to get a little lost [to my ears], but audience members regularly say it sounds fantastic, that they can clearly hear every single note. Maybe many of us have on-stage hearing difficulties and the Stingray is just fine? 

[miles'tone]

2 hours ago, HeadlessBassist said:

Maybe many of us have on-stage hearing difficulties and the Stingray is just fine? 

Maybe the heavy bass response of a Stingray needs to travel out into the room to make sense?

[martthebass]

20 hours ago, Patrick Francis said:

It’s refreshing to see so many others frustrated with their Stingrays - I had 4 of them, along with a Sabre and a US Sterling, Back in the late 80’s and 90’s I had very little understanding of tone and gain stages. 87-91 I was using a Trace Elliott sold state amp,

(the one with the black light) I used a pick and a chorus pedal. I had terrible tone but I didn’t even know it. When warmer more organically produced rock music kicked in with the grunge stuff, I moved on to a precision and an SVT. 
 

I found the Stingray NEVER sounded good with a pick - unless I went for the over the top Cure, Simon Gallup, Disintegration pick tone.

They never took to drive as well as passive basses.

They had a thin ‘snock’ sound that didn’t fit in a mix.

They’re prohibitively heavy. I wasn’t aware of their weight in my 20’s, now I’m 64 it’s a deal breaker. The most recent Ray I had was over 12 pounds, I never picked it up. I have to admit the Sterling was a nice reprieve, fabulous sound, lovely weight, it just felt a little small on me.

 

I agree with you on a fair amount of the above.

To me the game changer came with the introduction of the Specials and the Shorty.  I use a Darkray and an EBMM shorty on gigs, both have great tone and are 8.5 and 7.5lb respectively

[NJE]

It’s fascinating how we all perceive sound and decide what works for us.

 

In have been through multiple, precisions, jazzes, stingrays, Warwick’s, overwater etc and for the last 8 years i have settled on a stingray. It’s one of the few basses I can hear well in a big band, it cuts so well. I play it in a funk/soul band and a 90s pop/dance band and it just seems to work well for most things.

 

It’s one of the few basses where I have ever had compliments on the sound. I have a 3 band eq and run it flat with small boosts and cuts depending on the room. Adjusting the mids on the bass and amp seems to make the most impact for me in terms of flexibility. 
 

when I first got one I just boosted treble and bass which sounded great doing crappy flea impressions at home but struggled in a band situation.