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Nothing's Carved In Stone, for fans of growly bass.


Shockwave
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Hey guys.

For years I have been chasing a very growly cutting tone with little success. I have been aware of this band for a while, but the bass plaayer really is something else. He uses a variety of basses but seems to get a signature style growl that I absolutely adore.

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqIoZr8j9cU[/media]

This being my favorite one of all (Intro is fairly standard but wait til it gets into the song!). From the video it appears to be an Orange Valve stack, overdriven with a Lakland Jazz bass. Obviously whatever he recorded the track with could be different, however I reckon it was probably with some sort of valve amp with a J bass with a soloed neck pickup, anyone else care to chip in? Whatever it is, seems to be heavily compressed as his tone is very constant and present in the mix.

Scooped mids you think? Flats, rounds? 60's or 70's Jazz pup spacing?

Either way, great player and fantastic tone. Looks like the rest of the band are geared towards making him sound fantastic balance wise.

Here is another track that you may enjoy!

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8f7jGVaymY[/media]

Sounds more P bass to me, but hard to tell.

Current gear is a Fender P-J all maple P bass with Dimarzio Super Woofer and Ultra Jazz and a Gibson Grabber. VT Bass Deluxe, Ampeg PG-500, Barefaced S12T. Cant get anywhere near this tone! Ideas?

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Any decent vintage-style Jazz Bass with hot pickups on is going to get you into the right territory to emulate this guys tone . Your amp setup looks to be more than apt to get a grindy but vintage sound . I've never heard of this lot before - its a bit too energetic for me - but this guy is a nifty and obviously very capable player . A PJ bass will sound a bit different to his Jazz setup , but not neccesarilly in a negative way ; the extra honk of the P pickup could give you your own version of this gritty modern rock tone thay seems so fashionable nowadays . To me this kind of tone owes a debt to Geddy Lee , but that's no bad thing .

Just listened to some more - this fellow's a player ! Some very agile licks sneaking in in a very tasteful way . I can see why you would want him as a role model .

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Not heard this lot before, but I liked both of those - to me it sounded like a quitesentially overdriven jazz bass; though from what I remember of my old one, sounded like both pickups on full to me - could easily be wrong. Also, rounds; almost certainly.

Others with more knowledge of this pedal than me might want to chip in, but would a Fulltone Bass Drive be a goodd addition to get that sort of sound?

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I like. Very nice. Definitely my sort of thing.

SOund like his neck pickup soloed (maybe with a small amount of bridge blended in), with some OD on it. OD from amp or pedal - who knows. I would tend to say a pedal as he retains a lot of attack. 12AX7 OD played with fingers tends not to have quite a s much attack IME. Something like an EBS multidrive could certainly get very close. WOuldn't need extra compression as that much OD would give you that already. ROunds - yes. Defo not mid scooped. THe mids are nicely enhanced and sculpted - NOT a "metal" tone at all. Not too much brightness on top though.
DOn't be misled by his "soloed" tone which, I believe, has some sort on envolope filter and/or modulation on it, to hollow it out. Personally, I would have preferred if the the tone had not been "messed" with for those bits.
thanks for putting this vid up. Might learn a couple of their choons !

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  • 1 year later...

Have you tried nickel strings? I'm having a lot of fun with my Geddy Jazz, Genz Benz Shuttle + Focus 4x10. D'addario XLs, bass + treble noon, both mids at 3 o'clock. Neck pup on full, bridge pup 75%. Sounds like a pack of wild dogs. And dig in over the neck pup.

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