mangotango Posted March 2, 2019 Share Posted March 2, 2019 Well, as forecast in the original "Two Bass Hit" thread it's a double-NBD thread. When I got to the point whereby I'd decided that a Radial 'Bone pedal of whatever variety wasn't going to solve the problem, as I tend to go wireless, so didn't have two inputs between which to select (and that still didn't solve the issue of two basses with entirely different feel), then it was time to consider my options. So as I said, Mrs. Mango and I went hunting for basses and ended up in Bass Direct...and after a brief consultation walked away with these beauties..... Spector Legend 5 Custom (Fretted) and Spectorcore Fretless 5. I spent a while swapping back and forth between these two to be sure that I was happy with the comparative volume levels and feel of the two basses. Mark ran me through a Genzler rig that was the closest thing possible to my Genz Benz Streamliner head. I then proceeded in my usual way to murder several once-recognisable jazz and fusion bass-lines, just trying to be sure that these basses would sound the way that I wanted....and they do. They feel marvellous - and they look great. As you may have guessed, I'm rather happy with the result of all that searching. Thanks to all who contributed to the original thread. And a huge shout out to Mark at Bass Direct - I was very impressed by the care and effort put into sorting me out. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grahambythesea Posted March 2, 2019 Share Posted March 2, 2019 Great pair. Has your Spectorcore got thevBarts or the EMG? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigsmokebass Posted March 4, 2019 Share Posted March 4, 2019 Happy for you dude and nice to see a good review for Mark after hearing a few reviews and not having a good experience myself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cetera Posted March 4, 2019 Share Posted March 4, 2019 (edited) Result! Welcome to the (more than one) Spector club! 😎 Edited March 4, 2019 by cetera 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mangotango Posted March 4, 2019 Author Share Posted March 4, 2019 On 02/03/2019 at 22:12, Grahambythesea said: Great pair. Has your Spectorcore got thevBarts or the EMG? EMG, which pretty much matches up with the pups on the Legend, which in turn gets me closer to the "different basses but same feel & response/levels" concept. I think that what helped was being handed the Spectorcore to try first. Even before plugging it in, it felt resonant and responsive and had that singing fretless sound, and the neck is honestly the best of any 5'er that I've played. I guess that the chambered body helps - my guitars are semi-acoustic, so this suits me fine. Love that light, "airy" feeling to the sound. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mangotango Posted March 4, 2019 Author Share Posted March 4, 2019 8 hours ago, bigsmokebass said: Happy for you dude and nice to see a good review for Mark after hearing a few reviews and not having a good experience myself. Cheers feller. That's a shame about your Bass Direct experience - maybe I was just lucky. Or I had limited options. I didn't (couldn't!) go in there with a big budget and I was pretty specific about what I was looking for. It would have been a long journey for little result if these two hadn't been there. But...I rang Mark up beforehand to discuss what I wanted, and was not distracted by all the big-ticket items on the walls. Well.....only in passing. And not for all that long. Of course, having Mrs. Mango with me helped on that front 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigsmokebass Posted March 4, 2019 Share Posted March 4, 2019 Always wanted to try the spectorcore though, real nice bass? Maybe get a video up sometime 😉 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mangotango Posted March 4, 2019 Author Share Posted March 4, 2019 1 hour ago, bigsmokebass said: Always wanted to try the spectorcore though, real nice bass? Maybe get a video up sometime 😉 There's a great and very thorough video review in this thread by @Dood which was very influential on my eventual purchase - haven't thanked him yet!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mangotango Posted March 4, 2019 Author Share Posted March 4, 2019 13 hours ago, cetera said: Result! Welcome to the (more than one) Spector club! 😎 Thanks feller - Mr. @Stingray5 said you might be in touch........☺️ 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mangotango Posted March 12, 2019 Author Share Posted March 12, 2019 Well, I ended up having a bit of a moment with these, specifically the Spectorcore. Because I have some noise-sensitive neighbours , I tend to practice at home with a little Ashdown After Eight Combo. It sounds fine with the Bass Collection basses, the Fernandes and even the EUB, after a little judicious knob-twiddling to sort out EQ. Which meant that I had no problems with the idea of using it for running through some tunes on the Spectors ahead of a gig. Except......they didn’t sound all that great, particularly the SpectorCore fretless, which was dull-sounding and lifeless. They barely sounded even “ordinary” on that. So......I waited until things were all quiet on the Neighbour Front, and then set up my “little rig” (GB Streamliner/BF One10). Within a few moments, I was able to obtain great sounds from each bass with a minimum of messing about with controls. The Legend sounded solid as you like, with plenty of Gank when slapped and Thump when plucked. The fretless....just sang. Finding the sweet spot with the Middle control brought it to life. How could I ever have doubted? It just threw me off my stride that there was such a difference with an amp on which I’d previously relied heavily. Quite surprising, really. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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