LeftyJ

I don't really care whether a bass is active or passive, as long as the neutral tone is good. I used to be a real knob fiddler (I'm sure I will come to regret this choice of words ) but over time I've come to appreciate simple controls that I need to touch as little as possible. I don't like having to tinker with controls to get the basic sound I'm after: I want my passive basses to sound good with everything wide open, and will only use the controls for small adjustments. Same goes for my active basses: I want them to sound good with everything set to neutral / flat, and will sometimes slightly boost the lows and cut the highs to taste, but I don't want to have to fiddle with knobs to find my go-to tone. It just has to be "there" without having to search for it. A filter preamp like what Alembic or ACG makes probably wouldn't be for me.

And make sure you know your titles I was in a band that wrote its own original music, but until the songs had a lyric and an actual title, we would number them. All good, until the singer made the setlists and only put titles on it. I was completely lost, after having worked on these songs for such a long time and only ever using the number to refer to them. I've since learned all titles by heart but we also kept putting both the number and the title on the list. Still, I'm sure there must also have been some fans who have been extremely puzzled when they took home a handwritten setlist that only said 17 - 24 - 21 - 5 - 23 in sharpie

Brian Bromberg is an interesting one. Basically, he appears to have trademarked "his" signature shape so he was able to take his signature bass model from one manufacturer to the next. Same thing happened with Eddie van Halen, who wasn't happy with Music Man when they continued producing the EVH signature guitar als the "Axis". So he trademarked the Peavey Wolfgang design including the headstock, and took it with him when he went to Fender who created the EVH brand for him. Peavey B-Quad (with a graphite Modulus neck I think?): Dean B2: Carvin / Kiesel B2:

Awesome find! I hope it's as good as you remember it I had a B2A for a short while, only sold it because a gear on one of the cam axles of my previous car broke, and I had to finance another car. It was a great bass, I liked the Select by EMG pickups a lot more than I expected I would and the preamp was super agressive. Lovely bass, very punchy. Weird ergonomics, I bet the Jack is even nicer playability-wise!

I have used them on all my basses except my Status headless basses (I use Status Hotwire double ball strings on those) for the last 15 years and love them. They feel really slick and smooth, and retain their brightness and clarity for a really long time. They don't sound overly bright when new. I love them. Only comparison I've had in the meantime were D'Addario nickels (on my Carvin LB75 - sounds fine, but the low B died real quickly -within three weeks of non-frequent use- and the rest followed suit after two months). Depending on how much use my basses get, my Elixirs last between one and two years. When I regularly gigged, and rehearsed weekly, they would last about 6 months before I found them lacking clarity and attack.

Lefty Peavey T40 (doesn't exist) Lefty Fender Mustang (rare as hen's teeth because Fender won't make new ones, and therefore ridiculously expensive) Lefty Kubicki ExFactor (only one known example, but it has a righty neck with the D-tuner at the bottom - and Philip Kubicki has sadly passed)

This, for me too. Nearly everything I currently own was bought used. My most expensive bass purchase was a brand new Rickenbacker 4003 in Mapleglo from Guitar Guitar, which cost me £1516 + £35 shipping back in 2009, but it was nowhere near my "best".

I've had several PJ basses, and didn't bond with some but loved others. Can't really put my finger on how or why to be honest, but I recon it must have something to do with experience. I've never been one to tweak knobs a lot and put a lot of effert into finding tones I like. I've always appreciated basses where I could just set the controls to neutral and max the volume and get a good base tone. If that didn't work for me, a bass was often quickly dismissed. Nowadays I do appreciate having to fine-tune the controls a little before getting a useful and good tone from a bass. 1987 Ibanez SR800LE with active pickups: sounded nothing like any Fender (obviously). Totally had its own thing going on, and it wasn't for little, inexperienced me back then - but I might like it now. Very clean, somewhat bright and a fantastic slap tone (I played a lot of RATM on that bass!); 1990s G&L SB2 with the most loudmouthed splitcoil I've ever experienced: MFD splitcoil + singlecoil, with just two volume controls and nothing more. Could do a traditional Fender P-bass tone when I kept the volume below 80%, but would eat woofers for breakfast with the volume maxed: really loud, high-output with very strong low mids. The bridge pickup was useless on its own to me, but worked great for using it as the "tone control" of the splitcoil. Wasn't for me, I'm a everything-at-10 kind of guy and that was too much on that beast. It was beautiful and played great, and I really wanted it to work out; 1981 Ibanez RS924: fantastic. Did a great P-bass tone and amazing slap tones. Only sold because in the end, I found that thinner and narrower necks suit me better; 1983 Ibanez MC924: fantastic. Will never sell that one! It's just one month younger than me, it looks like it went through a LOT but it plays and sounds fantastic; 2001 Warwick Streamer LX: only bought it because it was cheap and I wanted to try one. Quickly became my favourite 4-string ever! The active reverse P + J sounds bright and hifi but the on-board 2-band EQ is voiced very nicely and offers a huge range of tones. Won't do traditional Fender tones, and the J pickup is too weak to use on its own but I've really come to appreciate what this bass can do. Only the MC924 and the Streamer are still mine, I sold the others.

That thing frightens me I'm a huge fan of the Warwick bridge. The adjustability is great: - the saddles can be raised and lowered; - the intonation range is huge; - the string spacing can be adjusted (limited adjustment range, but it's there); - the bridge as a whole can be raised and lowered; - everything solidly locks into place. It has some downsides too though: - the stock bridge on Rockbass and most German basses is a cast metal job, and on 6-strings and Broadneck 5-strings has been known to bend under string tension. There is a version machined from solid brass, but it comes at a cost (scary money); - the separate tailpiece is picky about string gauge: too thick and you'll need to squeeze it flat with a pair of pliers first or it won't fit; - it's pretty big, and requires routing for both the bridge and the separate tailpiece.

My disappointment was immeasurable when I clicked the thread and it wasn't about Super Mario. I misread

I think that Torpedo bridge was a concept by an engineering student who did an internship at Aristides Guitars? Very cool and clean concept, I like it! I think the top picture shows an Aristides 050 as well?

Calm down now, nothing to lose your head over.

The emoticon won't show, so I'm not sure if you're trolling or being serious but literally no two are the same.

Ibanez just released a unique range of 50 one-of-a-kind custom shop guitars and basses to commemorate 50 years of Hoshino USA. Some are made in their LA custom shop, and some in their Japanese shop. Most are guitars, but there are some basses among them as well. They won't be available outside the US, and there's only one of each but I thought they were too beautiful not to share 😎 Each one of them has a story, and several detailed pictures. https://www.ibanez.com/usa/special/50th_Anniversary/50-guitars.html

My band used it in 2013 when we recorded an album. We recorded the guitars through a buffered splitter, with one channel straight into Cubase and one channel going through an AxeFX to have the feel of the amplified tone while recording. The guitars were then reamped through a Radial X-amp reamp DI (to solve any impedance issues when going from a line signal back to an instrument input) into an ENGL Powerball with a mic'ed ENGL 412 and a Mesa Mk IV with a dual-mic'ed Mesa Road King 412 cab (dual mics because one half of the cab is closed-back with V30's and one half is half-open back with Celestion Custom 90 and sounds very different). Worked a treat! We have the luxury of our own rehearsal space in a former cable factory, which we share with our sound engineer, who has built a brilliant studio in the same space with a well-insulated control room, and we did the re-amping at night when the building is empty so we didn't bother anyone with the volume.

Passive basses: all controls wide open. Active basses: volume wide open, EQ controls all at the center detent and ocassionally changed to taste when the song asks for a subtle boost or cut. Exception: my Status S2 Classics. They have a filter-based mid control that's finnicky, with a variable frequency sweep and fixed boost and cut. I don't touch it much as it can be a bit overwhelming, but I try to leave the filter knob in one position that just "works" for a solid low mid boost, and leave the switch in the center (off) position until I need said boost. I never use the cut setting because it comes with a significant volume drop. It's mostly a set-and-forget affair for me.

Antigua! Or 1961 Surf Burst.

LOL, never gets old huh?

This has been a very interesting thread so far, and I'm really curious how it will unfold. The issue at hand ("Help, my [Bass X] won't sound like a [Bass X]") is not an uncommon one, and I have experienced it with both guitars and basses alike with some of my instruments. Less than two weeks ago I picked up a used Ibanez guitar of which I've had 3 before, and I thought my latest one sounded much darker and woolier than I remembered. That is, until I gave it a proper setup! I lowered the action and checked pickup height (without changing the strings), and hey presto: it brightened up massively. @Tdw's and @shoulderpet's tips are very valid and useful ones, and I too would start there

I use an EBS HD350 head with an EBS ProLine 410 as my main amp for rehearsals, but I gig with a 19" preamp straight to the desk. In my rack are an Ampeg SVP-CL and an SVP-Pro, both brilliant tube preamps with the classic Ampeg tone. The CL is the preamp section of the SVT Classic in a 1HE housing, and the Pro is the preamp section of the SVT2 Pro in a 1HE space with the graphic EQ and a drive section. I also have an SWR Grand Prix (Prix / Pre, get it? ) which is very nice but which has some slight issues. I have barely used it since getting it, it needs some love and needs to get used more!

To be fair, my 01 and 03 LX's don't look too far off from that 2nd, most recent one - except for the body edges. The horns are not flat, but slightly concave as they have long been. The control area has this too, but it appears to be more pronounced on for example my LX5 below. You can still see it clearly from the lighting in the lower horn of that 5-string SS2. It's worse on some other models though: take a look at the Rob Trujillo model for example

I can safely say I get along with many types of basses too. However, there have been a few oddities in my collection that weren't for me: - Narrow string spacing at the bridge is fine on a 5-string, but somehow I hated it on 4-strings (Hohner B2A, Aria SB-1000); - Flat radius. I like a curved fingerboard or a compound radius; - Narrow bodies. I like something to rest my wrist or lower arm on (again, Hohner B2A was NOT for me); - Short (or absent) upper horns that place the upper strap button too close, and thereby move the nut too far away; - 35" scale length. I owned two Yamaha TRB5II's, and they were fantastic. But despite having large hands, I didn't like the stretch in the first few positions. Otherwise I guess most is fine with my. Gloss necks, satin necks, oiled necks, narrow nuts, wide nuts, longscale, shortscale, I really don't mind. Edit: Forgot to add I generally don't get along well with basses with only one pickup when it's moved too far from the neck! I'm not a big fan of the MM sound but it has its use, but closer to the bridge is a nono for me if there's no neck pickup to beefen it up.

Ha! Now you've got me Googling fiercely too. Looks like I got my order mixed up, and Spector weren't first: Steinberger introduced the L-series basses with the saddle lock in 1980, before Spector started using a derivative of that same bridge but without the tuning section. The Steinberger bridge needs the side lock, because it doesn't have intonation adjustment screws and the saddles would move freely if they weren't locked in place. So G&L and Steinberger indeed couldn't have been far apart!

Yep, Spector did it first around 1980. Ned Steinberger designed that bridge, and used a variation on that design on his own basses later. To me, the grand master of inventing solutions to problems that don't exist is Nobuaki Hayashi, better known as H. Noble. Formerly of Matsumoku fame, and now the mad scientist behind Atlansia Basses. His designs are often beautifully engineered, but overly complex and bulky. His wildest is probably this, with fine-tuners and a string bender: