drTStingray

I think you once told us the stamp was REDFE. But as @rodney72a said, fire engine red was the production colour - resurrected in around 2005 for a limited edition. Anyway I think the colour may be a little too red for "smacked derrière" although @Happy Jack may be able to advise as he used to have a smacking derrière for his profile pic until quite recently 😂 But a little to unorange for what's become colloquially known "The DJT flesh tone" 😬

When I took my pre EB to a music shop in Dudley to get then to look at, thinking I'd blown the pre amp up (in reality she who should be obeyed persuaded me to put a cheaper standard battery in rather than a Duracell so she could buy a pack of ciggies and it had failed extremely quickly - v embarrassing!!) the shop actually had a new red one in that colour. The first EB production Stingray was/is also in that colour. As you say, v nice colour. Have you got copies of those catalogues - if so extremely rare 👍

Congratulations on the new job 👍 They're both excellent basses but they're actually quite different from one another but here goes:- Stingray Classic Pretty much like a combination of a pre EB Ray and a very early 90s one 6 bolt neck joint Original style large bridge with through stringing, large holding down bolts, mute assembly - serial number on bridge Slab body almost always ash Some special colours not available on other models Original style 2 band EQ Highly figured maple neck (birds eye or flame) 80s style headstock logo and neck plate Chrome plated truss rod adjusting spoke wheel Weight around 9.5 lbs Neck radius 7.5" - lacquer finish Were available in 4 or 5 string versions Alnico 5 pick up poles, which follow the contour of the neck - 9 volt electronics Fretboard either rosewood or maple Standard nut Black or white pick up cover and pg (some pgs in tort) dependent on body colour Stingray Special 5 bolt neck joint and contoured neck heel Lightweight aluminium hardware Small bridge held down by screws (no large holding down bolts) Originally lightweight swamp ash body - now changed to other woods owing to ash shortage Revised body contours Neodimium pick ups with revised pole piece spacing enable strings to centre over them (most notable on HH neck pick up). Pole pieces flat to pick up cover 18 volt electronics with revoiced 3 band pre amp 11" radius neck; roasted maple neck; oil and wax finish Compensated nut Fretboard in roasted maple, ebony or rosewood dependent on body colour Black or chrome hardware dependent on body colour Weight around 8.5 lbs or less 4 or 5 string (original SR5 shape and pg) Large range of colours Broader range of sounds; more headroom on pre amp before compression.

Looks great - as with many EBMM basses from the late 80s/90s a nicely figured neck as well. Btw I'm pretty sure your previous Stingray was fire engine red (I think the stamp is RED FE or something similar - a colour used when EB first bought Musicman and started to produce Stingray basses.

The drummer problem is very real - quite a lot seem incapable of playing quietly (I remember years ago, I was visiting a mate who is a drummer, and his father came in from a gig - he was an elderly jazz musician and announced 'the gig was awful, drummer appeared to think he was building a shed!!! 😂)!! I have played a couple of quiet gigs with a loud drummer, with a noise limiter - in sound check he was the only one setting it off - he also, it has to be said, has a 60s Ludwig kit - the kit is loud itself and I recall other musicians commenting on how loud Ludwig kits are. Anyway he solved the problem by obtaining towels and putting them over the drum heads - the sound limiter did not go off in the gig and the drums were a very reasonable volume. You do come across drummers who can play intricately and quietly when required but many seemingly can't. Of course, back in the 80s many drummers got the sack from bands as drum machines were not only capable of a decent sound, the volume was capable of adjustment, there was more room on cramped club stages, and you didn't have to pay the machine!! As we've gone through the '60s revival' stuff and to an extent the 70s, I wonder whether, once again history will repeat itself and these, apparently all too frequent absurdly loud drummers will be replaced by drum machines!! However guitarists and bassists were often replaced by keyboards in that same era.......... 😦

@leschirons IIRC Tony Levin had a lot of input into the EQ on his signature OLP, so anyone who gets hold of one (they seem quite scarce) and knowing the propensity for the tinkerers and modders to butcher cheap basses, it's worth bearing in mind - they have a Tony Levin spec tweaked EQ 👍

Interesting how individual views differ @chris_b - a Lakland, along with Warwick Streamer Jazzman, Yamaha BB 2005 and Fender Precision Special - when it had a humbucker (it and the Marcus Jazz 5 had appallingly wide fretboards and less amenable neck profiles for me so were ruled out - it was hard enough trying to learn say, Teen Town or Sir Duke without having a 'fight' with the bass as well) were all in contention for me - only the Musicman did the Musicman sound properly (which I think has been in my head since the late 70s), a it also did the other sounds I was after - the Lakland came a close second but had a beautiful finish and flamed top IIRC.

+1 on the icon series - it will be very interesting to see what else appears in this - I can forsee myself being tempted at least once, if any of these appear - some examples:- Pino - 79 sunburst fretless Bernard Edwards - 77 natural Tim Commerford - 201* natural/ maple SR4HH Tony Levin - 89 SR5 alnico in peach Louis Johnson - pick from various including overwound pick up Stingrays; Sabres I also find it extraordinary that occassional people moan about this on the Internet, particularly with profits going to charity - but stranger things happen - I've heard it said that one world leader has been known to spread baseless rumour and fake news regularly via social media. Imagine if the Internet had been around in the days of some of the more flamboyant and appalling dictators (eg Messrs I Amen; A Hilter) 😧

Well I think they've engineered the process so that it works impeccably (see the rave reviews especially on Talkbass) - it's obviously possible to do DIY surgery and some people like doing that - no problem with that but modded would do well to remember some brands (including Musicman) can have their resale value if not also outright saleability on the used market severely compromised if but returned to factory spec ie keep the bits you take off - I see it on a par with tuning cars - there are firms that develop tuning packages for cars that take years to perfect and work extremely well - there's a massive market- there are DIY ers who bolt bits and parts on but haven't a clue what the combined effect is - in fact some combinations actually reduce performance - others find weaknesses and blow otherwise bullet proof engines and gearboxes. As I said many of us have moved on from the embryonic designs of the 50s!!! But even so with a bass guitar, modders will no doubt hear the nuances and improvements of their work - but that is personal to them and bass guitar sound is a notoriously fickle thing when it comes to comparative opinion and what people hear. Some will even tell you body wood and neck construction/ fingerboard wood type make no difference - I'm definitely not one of them - my rosewood board Stingrays sound quite different from the maple board ones!!! No doubt people can replicate the circuits Musicman has developed but that is basically copying someone's hard funded R and D to bring something to market - two totally different things - I don't have any strong views on people modifying things, just the cost and ease comparison with people who bring a package to market - it's not really a valid comparison in my view. Musicman have always had excellent passive circuits (eg Reflex and Big Al basses).

The passive Stingray is a bit more than a simple 70 yr old tone on it off and volume on or off design 😂 But seriously, I can't remember what the controls do but IIRC one of the knobs is for series/parallel/ single coil instead of humbucker, one is volume with a push/pull boost (in reality it is normally in cut mode and you can select for a boost, say in a solo (which some of us seem to be asked to do even if it is only for a few bars - even useful for those short breaks like in Zeppelin's Good Times, Bad Times). I think the other is a tone - but anyway it's a lot more than simply lifting the pre amp from a Special - I believe the whole electronics package was developed for the short scale but worked so well they've done this limited run at standard scale - I think that bass looks killer - as I said like a 76 pre production bass. I too like the SR5 without the pickguard but am more than happy with mine with them as well - PS I don't know what the flip on that blue is but it normally is only on one of the guitar models - the blue is nice enough - cue totally gratuitous SR5 photos..... SR5HHs - Changed pg to black (notice it still has the white selector switch - looks cool!!) i didn't care much for the SR5 pg back about 20 yrs ago but now really like it - my US Sub 5 has the standard Ray shaped pg, which suits it - sounds great btw - has a poplar body like Cliff Williams' original pre EB Ray 👍

https://www.music-man.com/bfr/december-2020 Interesting natural Stingray normal scale with the short scale passive electronics - looks very like the early 1976 pre production prototypes. Also an SR5H Special with no scratch plate and rear mounted electronics. Nice flip colour finish also. No doubt these will be too expensive for my pocket but these basses do look great. I noticed they only have 2 of the Cliff William's signature Stingray left on the Musicman US website.

I bought my first 5 string when I didn't have any other bass at the time - I tried out virtually everything available on the market at the time and the Stingray 5 got the job, as it were. I still have it and still use it, and actually since then I've got a further 3 variations on that theme. However, i'd echo what other people have said here and my curiosity for a 4 string (I'd always had 4 strings prior to the 5) got the better of me when a stunning limited edition model was issued by Musicman and I bought an SR4HH version of it - which I also still have and use - so don't sell 4 strings - you'll probably want them back. The string spacing on the MM 5 string suits a lot of people very well (including me) - whilst others prefer the 19 mm spacing of some models - I'm afraid I find them an awful handful on a 5 string - unnecessarily wide in profile and thus difficult to play and mute suitably - but that's just me. If you want a cheaper Stingray 5 the SBMM Sub 5 is excellent for those on a budget and you can even get it with two humbuckers I believe - if I was looking for a budget version I'd go for that rather than other budget copies - in the same way many would go for a Squier version of a Fender in the same way, rather than other makes - just my view though 👍

This is fabulous news - but wait. I was foolish enough to click on one of the pro Trump you tube blogs so I've suddenly received a number in my You Tube feed - I read one which had some recent Trump clips (the ones where he's at a little desk with a huge badge on it, and seemingly wearing, what the Americans call a diaper (adult nappy in English) under his suit. So here's the gen:- 1) Trump is taking personal credit for all vaccines wherever they come from 2) The democrats are all criminals who should be locked up 3) Joe Biden couldn't possibly have received so many votes - and some of them may be from illegal immigrants 😏 4) God (and lots of evangelists who may be considered certifiable in other countries) are on Trump's side 5) Any vote for the democrats is suspicious and may represent voting fraud (without any evidence but rhetoric and unsubstantiated allegation and the republicans couldn't possibly have received any corrupt or fraudulent votes) Any other view is fake news and a conspiracy (and there is no way Trump is trying to stage a coup d'etat as per the sort of corrupt dictators in some smaller countries have done in the past). So there is the source of all the vaccines proposed 👍😂

This bass looks great - massive attention to detail when you read through the specs and see the photos - also interesting this pre EB Ray is a three piece poplar body. However I still haven't found out the price. Anyone? This is on a par with the Pino CS P bass so I would expect it to be expensive - I'm also curious what else may be in this icon series as I can imagine myself being tempted more than once in the future.

Thanks for posting that @Silvia Bluejay and it all sounds very familiar to me. Takes me back to doing this at the end of the 70s - I also recall one reasonably famous band at one of the borders in Europe, who were in front of us in the queue having all their equipment removed from their quite large truck, presumably to check against their carnet (in case they were carrying any 'additional' items (eg expensive instruments, amps, or anything....). Interesting that the political Brexit people would have you believe this is all a myth and 'Project fear' - when in reality their own 'take back control' rhetoric seems to be amongst the hottest air or most powerful eyewash ever created!!! I will be very pleased to be proved wrong and discover some actual benefits to this process at some point in the future but I'm not going to hold my breath! There will be a number of inland border locations to get your goods checked (4 additional ones in Kent alone) so you may be able to choose where to queue for this process 😉 Unless they intend to have people book slots - if they're anything like my doctors surgery or coronavirus tests, you may have to wait days to actually get through if that's the case - very interesting times ahead (especially if you plan to or have to use the road network in Kent after January)!!

I've tried various types and settled on TIs on my Classic Ray and Cobalt Flats on my fretless. However, despite what anyone says I prefer worn roundwounds and using muting technique or even the onboard mutes. FWIW I didn't find hi tension flats to my liking on a Stingray, hence going with the ones mentioned but I guess there are others available. I understand the original Stingrays shipped with GHS flats before they changed to GHS roundwounds (early 78?).

This has been on Freeview since the channel reshuffle in early October - I watched back to back a Roger Waters band concert and a Pink Floyd one - they were both really good but great to hear the different approach to the same songs in many instances - Guy Pratt on bass with Pink Floyd. I watched the Who and it was extremely enjoyable - Entwhistle's tone and volume on that Alembic was, shall we say, unique and loud - what was really good to see was the clear interplay and exchange of smiles and laughter between Moon and Entwhistle - I particularly noticed it when Entwhistle played that run down the bass in Summertime Blues. Did anyone see the George Ezra before it? They played Shotgun last and the bass player used a fretless Lakland (looked like a 55-94) and was clearly having fun! The bass sounded monstrously fat compared with anything in the rest of the set (which was played either on a seafoam Precision or fiesta red Jazz).

Thanks for posting that again. It's very interesting and demonstrates how controls interact as well. I said in an earlier post that I sometimes boost one of the mids on the amp when using a 2 band Stingray - it's to compensate for that mid cut. Remember this bass was originally designed in 1976 - at that time everyone used a smiley face type EQ with Fender type basses - this bass put your sound into that direction straight out of the box and sounded more like a recorded bass sound. Its worth remembering the original hang tag manual for a Stingray bass suggested moving the controls back towards centre from full to enhance the mids. So none of this is new at all!! 👍 To answer earlier points on 2 band Stingray pre amps, you can see both the bass and treble controls can cut as well, although the treble more so than the bass. @ped mentioned the frequencies changed over the years - for the 2 band it's the same since 1979 (there were several iterations of the original pre EB preamp. Those charts also demonstrate the point of adding a mid range control to it, and high pass filter to cut some of those lower, muddier frequencies out. It's how you use the mid control which gets you close to the 2 band sound.

Yes things on there could, at one time, get lairy - there's a lot of history and to be fair to Big Poppa, there were some people who wound him up a lot and had axes to grind business or customer wise and he sometimes 'fed the troll' - haven't we all 😕 The book I have, below, is by no means a coffee table book but it does cover the start up, running, and end of the original company and contains some interesting info. This is the Kando Shokai letter I referred to reproduced in the book

Haha! Yes inter string volume is an off debated point!! The slab bodied Stingrays stopped when the original Musicman company went out of business - Musicman was bought by the Ernie Ball company in 1984 and amongst other changes, introduced contoured bodies. However the Musicman Sabre, introduced late 78/early 79 had a contoured body from the start. Charvel were contracted by Musicman to produce the bodies and necks after they stopped using CLF - CLF had produced hundreds of incorrectly manufactured necks, discovered early in 1980 when the Japanese distributor took one to pieces owing to not being able to adjust any truss rods from a whole batch. It cost Musicman large amounts in rectification (which didn't help their finances). An interesting exchange of letters is reproduced in a book I have. They, at that time, also invested in Modulus to produce the necks for the Cutlass basses. Yours must be one of the last pre EB basses - they closed at the end of 1983.

Yes a subject which divides opinion - however I use the onboard pre amp on the bass for minor adjustments between songs or even mid song - this usually entails a slight mid range bump for greater articulation, harmonics and prominence in the mix (where required by the song). I wouldn't want to do that on the amp although I might slightly up one of the mid controls if I feel the need - but that would stay for the set. I also change pick up settings mid song - a very good example of this is in Stomp by the Brothers Johnson - using a twin pick up Musicman, the humbucker is selected for most of the song but both humbuckers for the slap section (different - more scooped sound). The point I was really making was that it's possible to cut the bass control which would also influence the 40 hz - however all the controls interact on basses and in any case they affect adjacent frequencies. As well as the practical issue of not being able to change the amp EQ readily, by having the tone controls on the instrument, the interaction of the player and their playing style with the pick up, bass and tone controls is different from the effect of adjusting the amp, which is more remote in the chain. Just the same as passive bass tone controls v tone controls in the amp - in reality most of us use both to an extent. I guess it depends on your viewpoint and what sound you're seeking.

That's a reasonable weight for a pre EB - that one will be assembled from Charvel made body and neck. Glad you have found a good sound - I have found resting my thumb on the E string (like when playing a 5 string) reduces the possibility of hitting the pole pieces - the E side of the pick up should be set a bit lower than the G side and that might also help - but tape is a possibility. You should try the mutes if you want a really thumpy sound.

This shouldn't really come as a surprise - the bass control on an amp is often centred on 40. However there are other controls (in some cases another three) - they also CUT as well as boost - so you can cut those frequencies (eg 40 hz) if you want to.

Wow that's really nice - presumably 4 bolt neck attachment? Ive used 125-40 on my SR5 (though EB nickel strings) Stingrays sound great with that gauge. If you haven't had one before, a tip on the EQ settings, I tend to use my 2 bands with full bass and nearly full treble - move the controls back towards the centre to further boost the mids where/when you need to - and they are both boost and cut!! I also up the upper mids on the amp slightly to taste (and especially dependent on the room). Im sure it sounds great - like other wooden construction basses, they seem to improve as they get older, somehow. What sort of weight is it? The white does change to cream on all of these (the clearcoat is affected by UV) - those which have not seen as much UV tend to look whiter (eg those not in a case much when not in use). I've seen 10 yr old EBMM basses change towards cream - if you look under the pickguard you may see a difference 👍

Did they back in the early 80s? A spare battery is an essential part of the kit if you have an active bass - the batteries in my Stingrays last for year's (but I never leave them plugged in when not in use). I suppose I should recount a story of my long divorced she who should be obeyed persuading me to buy a cheapo battery for my Stingray back in about 1985 as I wanted a brand new battery as we were playing a prestigious gig with a massive PA and sound guys (the cheapskate approach was so she could buy some ciggies as well) - the net result was it started to fail mid gig - but i never twigged what was going on and neither did the PA guys - who thought there was something up with the PA channels - I took the bass to a shop later thinking it was f*cked whereupon the guy put a Duracell in and Bob's your uncle - perfect Pre EB Stingray again - moral - I've never since bought cheap replacement batteries 😏 When I went in the shop for the repair, for those Stingray officianados - they had a brand new EB one hung up in the shop in fire engine red - it was not far short of twice the amount of paid new for mine in 1979-80 😧