mcnach

That recent visit to my luthier friend had some unanticipated results. I have been trying to push him towards the electric world, and since last time I saw him he has built two electric guitars! So... after a bit of a chat, I decided this year I'm getting a bass made. It's not going to be anything fancy with regards to woods, or strange shapes... and it will not have a million pickups with a fancy switching system... no, it's just going to be a bass that's, well, mine... but obviously it's got to be a little different from what I could just buy in a shop. No point getting him to replicate a Stingray, right? Very early days of the basic design, and he is checking what woods he can get, so that we can make a few decisions. So far, these are my ideas, but if you have some cool variation suggestions I would love to hear them! The neck... should be maple/maple. I really like maple fingerboards, so that's pretty much set. No fretmarkers, except *perhaps* some design at the 12th fret, which could be related to my band. Or not. There will be black dots on the side 'though. Headstock? That's an interesting one. I like the 3+1 configuration, so a Stingray style comes to mind... but I might want to alter it a bit so that it's not an obvious copy. Here is somewhere where I will look online for ideas... and would love to hear about any creative ideas. The neck dimensions will be based on my favourite 2003 MM SUB. It will be a bolt-on design. It makes things easier, and I like bolt-on instruments. The body... it will be some kind of double cutaway shape, with a top horn reaching the 12th fret or so, to ensure reasonable balance... The shape itself will likely be similar to a Precision/Stingray/L2000... I would like to come up with something a bit more distinct, but not outlandish... Wood? Probably ash, and finished in oil, natural. But we will look at what woods he has available and we will see. But the finish will be a simple oil finish and I'm not after tremendously figured tops or anything. Probably pickguard-less. Maybe not. Whatever I do, it will have a John East MMSR 3-band preamp on it. Pickups? Undecided. But it will be reasonably simple. I'm thinking mostly one of a) single P pickup, reverse configuration (DG coil on top), placed at the Stingray's pickup position. or two Jazz pickups, quite close together, at around the Stingray's pickup position... and in this case, I would probably hard wire both pickups in series and that's it... but I will try it for sound and if I found that having a pickup selector and/or a parallel/series switch was a good idea... then I would do that, but it has to be worth it, I don't care for lots of different tones from this bass, I just want a basic one that is good, and then use the preamp to modify it slightly if/when needed. Probably without a control plate... but I really like big chrome control plates... so I might explore that, if I found somewhere that could make me a single one and was not too expensive. Hopefully you get the idea of what I'm after... Choosing a body shape, wood, and headstock is quite complicated... trying to come up with something classy and different, but not too different! I wish I were any good at Photoshop!

[quote name='Hutton' timestamp='1361552868' post='1987495'] Yep. They are definitely limited soundwise. In fact, I'm going to fling out all the cds and dvds I have where the bass player is using a precision. That sound just doesn't cut it! [/quote] I think we should organise a bass-off some time. It will not mean anything at all, but it may be highly entertaining. FIGHT!

[quote name='xilddx' timestamp='1361541217' post='1987213'] I have the reverse P on my Streamer, it sounds like Godzilla. I also love quite a few trad Precision players who also sound like Godzilla. Theoretically the trad P pickup design and the reverse P should sound different from eachother, the trad having deep low strings and zingy tops, the reverse P having more evenly balanced output over the strings, but in REALITY, it don't mean sh*t. [/quote] Put it close to the bridge, and you will notice that in a non-reverse P the DG strings sound much thinner than the EA strings. It doesn't make it unusable, and some may even prefer that, but it is not negligible. However, the the usual P position, there's enough fatness to go around even in a non-reverse situation. The closer you get to the neck, the less it matters.

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1361540767' post='1987204'] It's a well known fact that P-Bass players only use the E and A strings on the first 5 frets, so it doesn't really matter which way around the pickup for the D and G strings is. :-) [/quote]

I'll see if I have time this weekend to record some clips. Liking that Vintage Overdrive pedal a lot... and £30??? I'll buy two and chain them if I want more gain!

[quote name='iceonaboy' timestamp='1361475148' post='1986380'] Bloody hell ! So many legends have been wrong for so long. Dump yer Fenders guys, they are now officially sh*t! .....I know one guy who ain't doin that ! [/quote] you guys love to polarise things eh? well, put me firmly in the grey camp

[quote name='richardjmorgan' timestamp='1361466821' post='1986175'] … are they kind of the wrong way round? I've just been doing a bit of rough recording with my Encore P, having not played it properly in aaaages, and the note definition on the bottom two strings, compared to the top two, is pretty awful (yeah, I know it's not a great piece of kit, but bear with me). In comparison, my Aria also has a split coil pickup, but with the coils reversed (i.e. the coil for the bottom 2 strings nearer the bridge). Given the tendency of the upper strings on basses to be a bit snappier in my experience, all things being equal, the latter ("wrong" way round) seems to make more sense, and give a more balanced attack across the four strings. So is this just me being weird in terms of personal preference, is there a valid reason for the "normal" way round, or did Leo just get it wrong to begin with and it stuck like that? Being more of a guitarist than a bassist, I'd be interested to hear some input from those more knowledgeable than me. [/quote] No, it's not just you. The closer the pickup is to the bridge, the more noticeable the imbalance is. At the usual P position it doesn't matter a huge deal, although I still thing that reverse P is better.

Thanks! Sure thing... Tomorrow is going to be a fun night We are doing two new songs with SBK, and adding three to our RATM repertoire, which helps keep things interesting for us too. I hope we have a darkened stage for SBK as I will use my black Jazz for that, with the new glow in the dark side dot markers

[quote name='dand666' timestamp='1361351819' post='1984814'] Personally the LED's imo look gimmicky and tacky. But hey, thats just me! [/quote] They only look as bright as that for a short time after charging. I'm talking about the photograph I posted, which is not LEDs but glow in the dark replacement side dot markers... Luminlay is a rod of glow in teh dark material, and you have to drill the old markers and glue and trim this other material... I let my luthier friend do it so that they look "factory installed". They only glow strongly like that for a few minutes after charging, but they are able to glow faintly for a LONG time, charged just by normal lights around. Even in a low light environment, the faint glow adds enough to the markers so that they are noticeably easier to see... but nobody else will really see them. It's a very cheap and non-obtrusive way to improve the visibility of your side dots, which look just like standard dots under bright lights and do not look weird in any way... I can see how a bright glow can look gimmicky to some, but it does not look like that unless you keep charging them (which is possible, it takes 5 seconds so you could do it from time to time between songs)... the faint residual glow is what it's about for me (can't photograph that 'though).

[quote name='Paul S' timestamp='1361358288' post='1984936'] Jose - those look nice. How long do they glow for? Did you charge them with a keyring light? and how much to buy/have fitted? I use the stickers but they do look a bit cheap. [/quote] They don't glow as bright as that for very long. These are the blue ones, the green ones are brighter and last noticeably longer, but I like the blue If I charge them with a blue led keyring torch (Luminlay supplies one with every order), just a quick pass, they fade within a few minutes, but they remain glowing for much longer. It's not the kind of glow you will notice outside in teh sun... but in a badly lit stage it would be more than enough. I went for the 3mm diameter ones, that was my main issue: getting bigger dots. The bigger dots alone are already a great improvement, and even the faint glow they get from being exposed to the normal lights is enough to make them noticeably easier to see: you don't need the full bright blue glow (it would be nice, but if you don't want leds, that's what you get). I'd recommend them. They look like normal dots (or bigger, if you wish) when there is enough light, and their ability to glow a little even in very low light situations is very useful. Yes, they will not be as bright as in the picture (that's only possible if you charge them with the led torch... which takes seconds and you could easily do a pass from time to time in between songs, if you really needed a bright glow), but the residual faint glow lasts a long time, and it makes the dots much easier to see in a dark stage. It cost me £20 to have them fitted. It is not complicated to do, but I preferred to let someone I trust would do a great job deal with it. The result is fantastic, you'd think they were factory fitted. The luminlay rod itself was... I don't recall... maybe £7? I think something like that. I'd love some leds, low intensity so that they are not obvious and visible just by me... but it's a costly proposition and the surgery is not trivial. Fretlights work, but I don't really like the strip on the side of the board and the cable at the headstock to connect to the battery box... This is not as good a solution, but it's pretty good, cheaper, and keeps the looks.

I bought the Ultimate Overdrive a while ago. I like it more on guitar than bass, but it can sound pretty good on bass. My "problem" with it was that the gain knob is very sensitive. A little adjustment means a big change in sound, and the level goes up a lotg as you turn the gain up... so great once you find the sound you want, but not great to make adjustments on the spot. Still, pretty good moderate to high gain sounds. Low gain is available and sounds good, but it's fiddly. Then I bought the Sweet Baby overdrive. This is purely low gain. It works very nicely! Turn the focus control lowish to keep it from getting harsh, and you get a nice low gain just starting to distort sound. The whole range deals with low gain sounds, so it's easy to get the sounds you are after, and turning gain up or down does not affect the volume that much. It's very useful to get a slightly overdriven sound that actually feels pretty clean in the mix, but sounds a bit fatter and with a nice midrange bump. Now, I was curious about the Vintage overdrive... I heard some lovely clips on guitar, so I got it too. For guitar is REALLY nice. This pedal is a jewel. And, on bass? Beautiful. This one has a lot more gain than the Sweet Baby, but it's more controlable than the Ultimate Overdrive. Changing the gain affects the volume only slightly, making adjustments on the spot easy. It can do the low gain barely distorted sound, but what it does better is adding just a bit of grit... the low gain sounds are great. There is only a slight low end loss, it's perfectly useable as it is, without blending clean signal. I have to say, this pedal is the better sounding of the three, and versatile too because although it does not do really high gain, it can get quite hairy if you want it to, but it's still controllable and you don't need to juggle between gain and level knobs to get the right balance. I think I may buy another, one for each pedalboard, and remove the Ultimate Overdrive, keeping it loose just for guitar! Cheap overdrive no longer needs to be nasty!

So I got the bass today. The new dots are substantially larger and easier to see... and in addition, they can shine a little in the right circumstances... looks cool

and it looks like this...

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1361303328' post='1984302'] Fair point. They sound just as bad as the kids who won't let the other kids use their football. Good job the sound guy lets all the bands use his PA system. [/quote] which is *prearranged* or don't you ask?

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1361302809' post='1984280'] I agree. It's never nice being taken for granted. But I've never come across such a thing in a multi-band gig. Discussion about gear has always happened beforehand so that everyone knows what's happening ahead of time. So, no surprises and no big deal. I've never known anyone to share an instrument though (apart from drums, and then never snares or cymbals). [/quote] Oh, I've seen it. Three bands. Right in town, awkward access, so it helps if we all share, right? We agree to the drum kit, and we need three guitar amps, two of which we are bringing and we will use another band's guitar amp. You'd think it's not much to ask for someone else to bring a bass amp... but there was no discussion. We asked, several times... nobody said anything. All we got is "I'll ask my bass player and we'll let you know"... then nothing. The other band never said anything. So, do you think I'm going to show up early to set up for them? Two bands' bassists went through the PA that night. I played dumb "oh, nobody replied so we assumed you guys were bringing your own stuff and not sharing, so I just brought my things and left them in the car so that it would not get too cluttered on stage... I'm sure you will sound just fine through the PA directly and the sound guy will give you enough bass on your monitor, oh yeah"

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1361294157' post='1984093'] Interesting comments. I can understand musicians getting all precious about their actual instruments but amps and cabs? They're just amps and cabs and not exactly delicate are they? And how difficult is it to remember a few eq settings anyway? Prima donnas might be a bit strong . . . but not by much. [/quote] you got it all wrong: the prima donna is the guy who shows up without having arranged anything, fully expecting to use somebody else's equipment that said somebody else had to carry to the venue and then back out again.

[quote name='skoze' timestamp='1361282317' post='1983823'] I'm definitely in the borrowing category at the minute, not out of choice but necessity. We're all students living in a town with no parking, so sorting anything big enough to fit a few rigs plus drums is just not gonna happen. We head up to shows in London a few times a month on the train, and while that's not too bad in itself it'd be physically impossible to carry a decent sized cab along with all the instruments, matey's guitar amp, a bunch of cymbals, snare etc between three of us. I do like to think i'm pretty well mannered with it though, even if i've heard the promoter mention an amp available i'll always chase it up with either the band lending it, or the venue whose in-house gear it is. Similarly, if i turn up and am greeted with something i've never used/ seen before i'll chat to whoever's it is and make sure i'm in no danger of messing with anything. My guitarist majorly pissed me off when we supported a pretty well-established band recently and he refused to lend out his amp, even though it was a local show and we were bringing our own gear anyway. I think that stemmed more from the promoter being like "yeah, they're using your gear alright mate?" rather than asking but still, much un-needed friction. As for anyone turning up expecting to borrow leads, straps, pedals or my entire f***ing set up bass included, without even contemplating mentioning it first, i think i'd laugh them out of the venue. If someone had some gear issues or snapped a string mid-set or something, though, i'd be the first to offer my bass to them. I guess it's just a matter of how you go about doing things. [/quote] Your last sentence just about sums it for me. I have to say I'd be like your guitarist if a "promoter" just "tells me" that he has given permission to others to use my amp. Again, it's about how people go about doing things.

[quote name='AnalogBomb' timestamp='1361276461' post='1983672'] This scenario is all too common to me.... I've lost count of the times that I have brought all of my gear to gigs (even when we're not headlining) to be asked 'ere mate, can I use your amp?' - this is when my face turns an ashen grey looking colour. [/quote] It annoys me when it's not prearranged. Certain BC member in this thread has played through my amp on one occasion. It was fine, we had previously discussed equipment details and I agreed to provide my amp. I didn't know him yet (well, it turned out he had bought a bass from me before, but I did not recognise him yet ) so I had no particular reason to be nice to him, but he was polite and nice, so I just approached him to ask whether he was familiar with the amp, asked him to please mute before plugging/unplugging (amazing how many people don't care) and to tweak things to will, just not touch a particular memory setting that I had selected for myself. That's fine. When they come up while setting up "oh, can I use your amp?" it really annoys me. Are you really that careless, or you thought "let's wait till another fool does the carrying and bring an amp I can use, and then I can piss off leaving him to tear it all down by himself"? I tend to think most are in the latter category, and I used to feel bad to say no, now I don't really care. I often play last, and my rig does not take ages to set... so when I suspect shenanigans (like, we have asked about amplification and nobody else says anything at all)... I just leave my amp in the car, and decide to set up when we play. I no longer go for those ridiculous early soundchecks 4 hours before your 50min slot... a line check is plenty now. So, if someone findes himself without an amp... tough. When we play before other bands, if arrangements had not been discussed and I agreed to provide my amp, I clearly state on the day that when my band is done, I am taking the amp away. I let other bands use my equipment hundreds of times... but if you are just lazy, or looks to me like you are just lazy, you are going to have to find somebody else. Fortunately these days I very rarely play multiband situations where I don't already know the other band(s), and things normally are pretty smooth. I often offer to bring my amp and let the other band use it because I know I get a good sound and I can hear myself well with my rig, and that's not always the case with others. Like the time I played an outdoor gig with a 30W 10" Gorilla practice amp I put it on a stack of boxes close to ear level... and most of the times I heard nothing... but out there it sounded huge

Well, I tried the Sweet Baby at rehearsal. I did not take my amp head today and... what do you know? I had to use the PA. So let's just say that I have sounded better But the pedal seems to be pretty good for what I wanted. I put it in a single loop on a LS-2, together with an OC-2... that way I can blend it with clean bass if I have to... but I did not bothered with that, I did not notice any substantial low end loss. I imagine if you like a very boomy sound you might notice it more... but I'm a bridge pickup kind of guy... and with the Jazz it sounded great. The Sweet Baby fattened up the sound nicely and it did not really feel overdriven unless you heard it by itself. I'm liking it!

[quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1361222299' post='1983161'] Great stuff! you should check out how chris commerford got his overdrive sound when in RATM. Although i couldn't blame anybody for not choosing to go down that route (unless you have money for 3 ampeg valve heads and cabs and a complex pedal board which switches and blends between the heads, set at different levels to give different amounts of drive). I just came back from a lesson where i was plugged in to the drive channel on my teachers preamp. I cranked the bass on my on-board preamp, and the thing just fuzzed up. It was cool. [/quote] Tim's methods are a bit... special He does get a great sound, 'though!

awesome!

[quote name='lettsguitars' timestamp='1361214073' post='1982960'] Stickers are for kids Just drill the holes and glue some glow in the dark acrylic rod in there. File them back and shazzam! Perfect dottage. [/quote] That's what the Luminlay is!

Thank you, that makes a lot of sense... although the theory about selecting better grain instruments for their own market.. well, mine is definitely not the pretties girl in the block edit: mine has much nicer grain on the back than on the front maybe they selected it from the back