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12 and 8 string basses


12stringbassist
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Those 8-string Biches will be forever Derek Smalls - fantastic: one of the few basses I'd have like a shot, though I'd probably never use in anger.

Actually, stuff that: if I had one, I'd use it for everything :)

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[quote name='Muzz' timestamp='1333827989' post='1607161']
Those 8-string Biches will be forever Derek Smalls - fantastic: one of the few basses I'd have like a shot, though I'd probably never use in anger.

Actually, stuff that: if I had one, I'd use it for everything :)
[/quote]

Yeah, thanks for bloody reminding me!!!!

I accidently found the very bass that was used in the Spinal Tap movie, and arranged for a friend of mine to buy it, I believed Chicago Music Exchange had the Spinal Tap bass, they told me they did, then 6 years later they threw theirs up for sale, I got the serial number of theirs and it was made 3 years after the film was released (they are still heavily hinting theirs is the Spinal Tap Bich)

This is the REAL Spinal Tap Bich bass
[IMG]http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u230/share6_album/BCDOUBLE025.jpg[/IMG]

The reason it has red necks now is that when Spinal Tap returned the instruments, they were all in a bad way and sat in my friend's office for over a year before they resprayed them and sold them on, he was the vice president of B.C.Rich

The designer of the Bich shape, Neal Moser, has compared the grain patterns and neck cut angles on the red bass to the stills from the film and has confirmed the bass I found is the Spinal Tap Bich, had I friggin' known that at the time, I would have sold a kid or two!!!!! :lol: :lol:

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A few of mine - A Carlo Robelli 12ver, Tennessee 12ver and Shine 8

[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC00805.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC00810.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC00809.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC00807.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC08817Large.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC08820Large.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC00845Small.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC00852Small.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad111/Delberthot/12versand8s/DSC00622.jpg[/IMG]

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I think I can proudly present this as the shonkiest example of an eight string on Basschat!
[attachment=104601:8 string 2 001.JPG]
It's a cheap p-bass copy modified with four guitar tuners, an alnico pickup of unknown origin and naff stick-on inlays. Surprisingly the neck has held up OK, but I do have light strings on (a 40-100 set plus .017, .025, .035 and .045" octave strings). The courses are reversed, Rickenbacker style, and it sounds unexpectedly good, though it would benefit from an eight saddle bridge.

Edited by Beer of the Bass
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[quote name='Lorne' timestamp='1333832803' post='1607249']


Yeah, thanks for bloody reminding me!!!!

I accidently found the very bass that was used in the Spinal Tap movie, and arranged for a friend of mine to buy it, I believed Chicago Music Exchange had the Spinal Tap bass, they told me they did, then 6 years later they threw theirs up for sale, I got the serial number of theirs and it was made 3 years after the film was released (they are still heavily hinting theirs is the Spinal Tap Bich)

This is the REAL Spinal Tap Bich bass
[IMG]http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u230/share6_album/BCDOUBLE025.jpg[/IMG]

The reason it has red necks now is that when Spinal Tap returned the instruments, they were all in a bad way and sat in my friend's office for over a year before they resprayed them and sold them on, he was the vice president of B.C.Rich

The designer of the Bich shape, Neal Moser, has compared the grain patterns and neck cut angles on the red bass to the stills from the film and has confirmed the bass I found is the Spinal Tap Bich, had I friggin' known that at the time, I would have sold a kid or two!!!!! :lol: :lol:
[/quote]

That is the best story ever! I'd love to own this :)

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[quote name='sprocket123' timestamp='1334704587' post='1620180']
He might some more hidden basses too !lol
[/quote]

He does, but as I found a lot of them, I know what they are, various B.C.Riches, I know he has a Rickenbacker as well

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  • 7 years later...

Here is my newly acquired Rybski 8 strings bass (octave), made in 2016 for the Wooten Bass Camp. It was originally a fretless bass that has been converted to a fretted bass.

Schaller 3D-8 bridge (19 mm strings spacing), Hipshot Ultralite tuners, 2 Bartolini's MM42CBJD3 (same pickups as early Lakland basses), ACG EQ01 5K preamp, parallel/single/series switch per pickup, rear/front coil switch per pickup, brass nut, gold hardware, Rotosound RS668 strings set.

Book matched walnut top and back, mahogany core, 5 pieces set neck made of rock maple + mahogany + 4 rosewood stripes, rosewood fretboard. Satin finish.

Low action going from 1.5 mm under the G strings to 2 mm under the E strings.

4.4 kilos, so very light for such a bass.

Perfectly balanced, absolutely no neck diving and such fun to play, even if you need a plane pilot licence to use the preamp and switches combinations !

And for once a lovely single cut design

372618710_Rybski8(1).thumb.jpg.2eddc909f9afdcd40c62346c6581dc82.jpg

608161640_Rybski8(2).thumb.jpg.c4fc1336fc713dcb1309b39b9c73e2af.jpg

64163461_Rybski8(3).thumb.jpg.d53840ddbc7223ecaa39eded0c3597ef.jpg

1180010424_Rybski8(4).thumb.jpg.f2b7e0a1888911eac41924eaabac12ef.jpg

2129604043_Rybski8(5).thumb.jpg.8d90ebf12ddf289e435a06804807d82f.jpg

1926338948_Rybski8(6).thumb.jpg.9185ffb7079f3ec63d4f94f55621644f.jpg

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  • 2 months later...
  • 1 month later...

I don't actually own any 8 string basses, but I do love the concept, and as I also have a big love for short scale basses, I would like at some point getting me an 8 string short scale bass.

The way I manage to get my current 4 string 28,6" scale Ibanez Mikro Bass, tuned in regular standard E tuning, and my 5 string Mikro Bass, tuned 2 half steps above standard E tuning, as in F#1 to D3, so they basically work as if they had pairs of bass and octave strings, just like an 8 strings bass, though do come with some advances, even if it might not sound exactly as the real thing, for one being easier to play with no double strings to fret, and secondly for making it possible to manipulate the octave up signal separately from the bass signal, and not even just in terms of volume balance if you run the octave signal in a parallel loop or signal chain. 

I have actually managed, by just using the standard stock polyphonic octave effect in my TC Electronic Sub'N'Up Mini octaver, and carefully adjusting the octave engine's input EQ, as well as the 1 octave up effect's output EQ, via the Toneprint editor, to get pretty close, at least making it sound about as close as you get a signal that artificially has been pitched up a whole octave to sound natural, without any strange digital artifacts left on the octave tone whatsoever. 

As far as goes for my 5 string tuned in F# standard it is actually an always on effect for me. 

The Sub'N'Up is really perfect for this purpose, it tracks as flawlessly well as the more expensive EHX POG pedals, and with as low, almost not audible detectable latency, but without the otave of the POG's slight organ or synth like quality (though I guess that will actual be a desired effect for some), the stock polyphonic octaver of the Sub'N'Up, already before edited to get even closer, sounding much more natural, relatively speaking at least for it being a digitally pitch shifted signal, and with the extra options for fine tuning your octave tone the Toneprint editor of the Sub'N'Up gives you, it is, as said, actually making it possible to get really close to the real thing.

At least I am not aware of any other solutions, at least not any that is also reasonable affordable, that would be able to do a better job emulating an 8, or 10 for that matter (remember they do exist too, even if being even more rare), string bass.

When that is said I feel I do have an obligation to point out that the octave down effect of the Sub'n'UP does a considerably worse job, for one, at least from what I experienced with my particular unit, having a longer latency, actually becoming quite noticeable, as well as my experiments on electric guitar with attempting to emulate a 12 string guitar reasonably realistically wasn't exactly a great success either, but I guess that is even more off topic than the rest of my post here for the subject of this thread.

Just wanted to point out a great and quite affordable alternative to the real thing. 

That doesn't change the fact that I at some point still very much would like to get me a real short scale 8 string bass, it just means that I am still able to get something close to one in the meantime, and that getting one is not something I really feel is all that much of a pressing matter.

Some day though I am quite certain I will actually get one.

I do have a very keen eye on the Hagstrom H8II Bass, and it might very likely be what I eventually will end up getting when the day finally arrives that I decide to do something serious about my infatuation for short scale 8 string basses:

3022509.jpg

Edited by Baloney Balderdash
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