One hundred years ago today

[Rich]

[quote name='skankdelvar' post='565834' date='Aug 11 2009, 12:32 PM']Sadly, the date seems to have passed Fender by. Couldn't find a mention on their web site[/quote]
No mention on the EBMM site either, or G&L. That is a disgrace.

[mrcrow]

happy century leo..erm...yesterday the 10th

if you were here today which 'fender' would you choose...G+L?

Edited August 11, 2009 by mrcrow

[Protium]

[quote name='The Bass Doc' post='565518' date='Aug 10 2009, 11:02 PM']No I don't believe Paul Tutmarc designed the first electric bass guitar that is still valid today - that's what I meant.[/quote]

So a guitar that looks roughly like a modern bass with a solid body, four strings, 42 inch overall length and an electric pickup with output to an amplifier is not valid today? It's essentially a modern short-scale bass

Not disputing Fender was the first to mass produce the electric bass but he certainly did not design the first.

[The Bass Doc]

Maybe the word valid was inappropriate - I should have said 'stood the test of time'.

You don't see many of the other guy's basses on E-bay

Edited August 11, 2009 by The Bass Doc

[Protium]

[quote name='The Bass Doc' post='566133' date='Aug 11 2009, 07:11 PM']Maybe the word valid was inappropriate - I should have said 'stood the test of time'.

You don't see many of the other guy's basses on E-bay[/quote]

True, who knows what we might be playing now if his ideas had taken off

[skankdelvar]

[quote name='Protium' post='566164' date='Aug 11 2009, 07:34 PM']True, who knows what we might be playing now if his ideas had taken off [/quote]

Tutmarks.

As in :"B*gger, I've got Tutmarks all over my new underpants".

[mrcrow]

say honey do you think this will take off?

only if you put some wings on it

whaaaaaaaaaaa like those funny rickenbacker things

shussshhh i think i see leo fender looking through the shades

yah boo sucks...he's a loser

[Count Bassy]

[quote name='BigRedX' post='565673' date='Aug 11 2009, 09:34 AM']If he had learnt how to play maybe he'd have created a better instrument, or at least understood how it need to develop as the music that it was being used for developed and progressed. I'm thankful that nowadays there are an abundance of bass guitar manufacturers and luthiers who have developed the instrument so those of us who require something more now have access to suitable instruments.[/quote]


I think you're being a little harsh on him. It surely has to be acknowledged that, as someone else has said, the P, J and Musicman, or derivatives of these, dominate the current bass market 50 years later. If they were so bad why are people still copying them today? and I include here many of the 'posh' builders (sadwoski etc), not only the cheap far eastern copies.

Also, anyone who is one of the first in a field can hardly be expected to come up with the ultimate development at the first go! That's a bit like criticising Carl Benz because his car wasn't a Mondeo, or a Maserati.

Isaac Newton said something along the lines of 'If I have seen further than others it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants'. If someone of his stature can acknowledge the work of his predecessors then surely we can all acknowledge the importance of Leo Fender.

[ahpook]

he invented the jazz bass

i'm eternally in his debt.

[Rich]

I think we all are, really.

[BigRedX]

[quote name='Count Bassy' post='566382' date='Aug 11 2009, 11:15 PM']I think you're being a little harsh on him. It surely has to be acknowledged that, as someone else has said, the P, J and Musicman, or derivatives of these, dominate the current bass market 50 years later. If they were so bad why are people still copying them today? and I include here many of the 'posh' builders (sadwoski etc), not only the cheap far eastern copies.

Also, anyone who is one of the first in a field can hardly be expected to come up with the ultimate development at the first go! That's a bit like criticising Carl Benz because his car wasn't a Mondeo, or a Maserati.

Isaac Newton said something along the lines of 'If I have seen further than others it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants'. If someone of his stature can acknowledge the work of his predecessors then surely we can all acknowledge the importance of Leo Fender.[/quote]

I see my response as balance for the over-glorification of Leo Fender. His bass was an adequate starting point for the music of its time. What depresses me is that over 50 years later on people are still putting up with and copying what should be long out-moded designs.

To use your car analogy, it's as if most people were still driving Model-Ts today.

The more I think about it, Leo Fender got lucky with the P and J designs. The Stingray was a small step forward in fixing some of the major design flaws, but considering it came 15 years later the amount of development is almost insignificant, and then IMO he took a step back with the G&L designs.

Leo Fender's contribution to the electric bass guitar should be seen in the same way as George Beauchamp's for the solid electric guitar. Yes he got there first, but times have moved on and we should all be thankful for all the development that others have put in during the last 50 years so that now we have great musical instruments to play. Unfortunately that doesn't really seem to have happened, and most bass players are trapped in a time-warp, and nearly all the innovative designs and developments are marginalised in expensive custom instruments instead of being in the mainstream where they rightly belong.

[Linus27]

[quote name='BigRedX' post='566559' date='Aug 12 2009, 10:09 AM']Unfortunately that doesn't really seem to have happened, and most bass players are trapped in a time-warp, and nearly all the innovative designs and developments are marginalised in expensive custom instruments instead of being in the mainstream where they rightly belong.[/quote]

Not sure I agree with you on that. I can have any bass I want. I had the opportunity to pick any bass I want when I got my first advance from the record company and the two I settled on were a Stingray and a 1977 Fender Precision because they suited me, my playing style and the tone. I tried tons of basses but these are the two I chose.

After an 8 year break, I found myself in the same situation and I settled on my Lakland DJ (Jazz copy), Stingray and ESP Jazz (62 Jazz copy) because they suited me. Plus, I am sure all the professional bass players around the world who choose Fender or the copies don't choose them because they are trapped in a time warp, but because they feel comfortable and are happy playing that bass. Just remember, Fender make a work horse type of bass, not an exotic instrument. You drink your dairly tea out of a mug, not out of a bone china cup and saucer everyday.

Edited August 12, 2009 by Linus27

[chris_b]

My life would have been significantly less interesting if Leo Fender had stuck to accountancy but I/we would still be playing solid body basses and guitars today, if he had. Several companies had plans for both at the time but were beaten to “world domination” by Fender.

We don’t really know what Leo "invented" because he never clarified his role. Paul Bigsby invented the in-line tuners and the fender headstock, for instance, but Leo was a practical man who was a genius at refining ideas and came up with the most practical iteration of solid body instruments, so much so that we are still using them today and pretty much in their original form! For me, that says more about the "team" at Fender Inc 60 years ago than the Leo myths that have circulated since.

He could also get things wrong. Because he didn’t believe it was worth the expense, he refused to put truss rods in the Broadcaster necks, until his designers were proved right when warped necks started to come back to the factory!

[Happy Jack]

Well I did stick to accountancy.

And my life was significantly less interesting.

[skankdelvar]

[quote name='BigRedX' post='566559' date='Aug 12 2009, 10:09 AM']I see my response as balance for the over-glorification of Leo Fender. His bass was an adequate starting point for the music of its time. What depresses me is that over 50 years later on people are still putting up with and copying what should be long out-moded designs. To use your car analogy, it's as if most people were still driving Model-Ts today.[/quote]

This is an issue worthy of its own thread.

There's a general, possibly faulty, assumption that time [i]should[/i] bring significant, beneficial changes. It's also often assumed that, by virtue of its antiquity, whatever went before must be outmoded. In this instance, the products seem [i]not [/i]to be outmoded, as evidenced by the current, market-leading positions of Leo's designs. Markets are driven by demand, and if the bass guitar is stuck in a time-warp, we have only ourselves to blame.

That said, I agree that one might reasonably expect greater changes than have occurred. That they haven't suggests that - for this particular approach to delivering low-frequency notes - Leo got it more or less right first time. Also, given that he got out of the mainstream in 1965, I think we'd agree that he can't be blamed for the failure of others to carry forward the torch of innovation on a mass basis. Or for the bass-playing community's general failure to embrace innovative approaches.

Thinking more broadly, I suppose one could draw an analogy with the hammer. Subject to variations for specialist use, the basic form of the hammer hasn't changed much in the last few hundred years, because it does the job more or less right. Where innovations have occurred, they've rendered the classic form of the hammer obsolete for particular tasks - e.g. the nail-gun.

Perhaps the plucked string approach is obsolete. Maybe we need to rethink the means by which we deliver low frequency notes - such as sensor pads woven into our clothing or embedded in the palms of our hands. Or neurally-wired.

Edited August 12, 2009 by skankdelvar

[BigRedX]

Actually Bigsby didn't invent the in-line tuners or the shape of the Fender headstock. Martin guitars had been using this design since the mid-1800s and they appropriated from Johann Stauffer.

[skankdelvar]

Actually, the real genius is the 60,000+ year old hunter who invented the bow, then realised it made a nice sound if you plucked it.



Then the b*stard invented Jazz and spoiled it all for the rest of us.