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Guitar talk: acoustic, bass, classical, twelve string? You name it! Pt III

You are after one of the holy grails that folks spend a fortune on trying to get via expensive basses and amps. I think you can partially get there with equipment but I think it is really down to the player. One of my hero’s was Japan’s Mick Karn and his amazing fretless sounds on a Wal bass. I have a friend who met him and watched him play on a junker Squirer fretted and he still sounded like Mick Karn!

That said, if I were you, I would lose the active Warwick and Ashdown and buy a nice Fender J bass copy into a Ampeg or similar. Try to get a valve head or even just a valve stage. Both the Warwick and Ashdown have a very clean sound with that modern punchy active vibe, not really old fashioned blues IMO.

Also stick with the heavier strings and dig into the bass a little, your tone will change as you stress the strings and bass. Don’t try to wind up too much treble, it will get lost anyway unless you are super high in the mix, the mid and bass will cut through best.Try to get a trusted friend to listen in the crowd for your sound and tweak accordingly.

A Stingray is a fab thing and well worth getting, would sound lovely but they do seem to have got expensive recently.

Thanks for the insights. I'm planning to get rid of a lot of "stuff" soon. Kind of simplify things. I doubt I'll be in any more bands and my kids show no interest in the piles of music gear lying around. Stuff that I would have killed for at their age. My old Peavey T-40, keyboards, Les Paul, amps, PA stuff and whatever.
I'm just enjoying my acoustic bass guitar, which hangs on the wall near my chair and can be played whenever the mood takes me. I'll re-visit the "growl" research on the electric gear though, maybe try some thicker strings and using the bass passive. Or put some new strings on the T-40 and play around with that.
 
I'll re-visit the "growl" research on the electric gear though, maybe try some thicker strings and using the bass passive. Or put some new strings on the T-40 and play around with that.

Have you got a compressor, either a pedal or on the amp? Thinking about it that might be a fair chunk of what you seek as it levels out the volume allowing you to get tonal variation from how you hit the strings without deafening everyone. ‘Growl’ is an awkward term to interpret without a specific example to analyse. What I can say is the overwhelming majority of ‘classic’ rock, jazz and blues electric bass sounds recorded before the early ‘70s are almost always flat-wound strings on a Fender Precision or Jazz through a cranked valve amp. That is the ‘fat crunch’ thing. The bright, clean twangy thing came far later with solid state and round-wound strings, and most modern amps seem to exist primarily in this domain.

I’ve never owned a good bass amp, never got a bass sound I’m truly happy with. Back in the 80s I had a cheap Carlsbro solid state head and a 4x12” I’d put together out of other people’s left-overs, IIRC it was a HiWatt cabinet, though lacking all its original tolex and grille (I sprayed it matt black and nailed some chicken-wire to the front as a grille. Four entirely different speakers. That one was the best I’ve owned. The others more recently were a Trace Elliot combo, which was exactly the sound I didn’t want, I really did not like that thing and even its graphic EQ couldn’t sort it out, and more recently a Roland CB100, which just wasn’t convincing at the household levels I could play it. It was actually less satisfying than just plugging into a little guitar amp. I am convinced a lot of what I want is actually speaker breakup. More recently when I had the fake Krautrock band we used to “practice” at least once a year in a rehearsal room in Liverpool and I just hired a bass rig there. It was different every time, but the common denominator was if I turned it up until it started to crap-out I started to get the sound I wanted! As such I suspect the best approach is to play and potentially damage someone else’s amp!

PS I’ve never been capable of playing heavy strings. Even less so now as I play guitar far more than bass, plus I’m obviously a lot older. If you decide to try flat-wounds bare in mind they tend to be higher tension for a given gauge, so I definitely wouldn’t go flat and heavier at the same time. FWIW I’ve come to the conclusion that for me on a fretted bass old round-wounds are what I like, i.e. after they’ve been on a good while and have dulled down. I’d definitely dig the T-40 out, I suspect I’d far prefer that to the Warwick! I always remember them being rather good. It’s a proper vintage bass now!
 
Have you got a compressor, either a pedal or on the amp? Thinking about it that might be a fair chunk of what you seek as it levels out the volume allowing you to get tonal variation from how you hit the strings without deafening everyone. ‘Growl’ is an awkward term to interpret without a specific example to analyse. What I can say is the overwhelming majority of ‘classic’ rock, jazz and blues electric bass sounds recorded before the early ‘70s are almost always flat-wound strings on a Fender Precision or Jazz through a cranked valve amp. That is the ‘fat crunch’ thing. The bright, clean twangy thing came far later with solid state and round-wound strings, and most modern amps seem to exist primarily in this domain.

Funnily enough I was listening closely to some "growly" bass yesterday and started to wonder about compression. It did have that sound. I think you are right, that's a big part of it.

I don't have a compressor, Although it would probably have been a good thing for gigs, to fatten up the sound. Yes, it's probably also in the fingers and how much you dig in. And pushing the tools to the limit. I'm too quiet and polite now. Wasn't the Stranglers' bass sound "discovered" by JJ Burnell using a burst speaker cone?

The tone or quality I'm thinking of can be heard in the low root note on Danny Thomson's bass playing on John Martyn's "Solid Air". Or the intro to "Cherry Pie" by Sade. (Although, hearing these now, side by side, they have very different timbres). Maybe the trick is to just play everything below the 3rd fret on the E and A strings only and dig deep.
 
The tone or quality I'm thinking of can be heard in the low root note on Danny Thomson's bass playing on John Martyn's "Solid Air". Or the intro to "Cherry Pie" by Sade. (Although, hearing these now, side by side, they have very different timbres).

Interesting. My guess from a quick listen on YouTube to Solid Air (I don’t have it, just listening via iPad speakers) is that is actually an upright double bass! The Sade (which I do have) is almost certainly a Musicman Stingray (I remember the bassist always having one in videos etc) and listening to that particular track again it may actually be a fretless. The sound is very fretless, though no cues in the playing, but really good players can just do that and nail pitch every time. Bastards. Certainly a fair bit of compression on the Sade track, it is a really nice bass sound IMO. I’d certainly recommend trying a compressor anyway. It will likely get you a lot closer.
 

Bob & Ramon having a deep-dive into a simply amazing vintage guitar collection. No idea who’s it is (they have some absolutely amazing guitars themselves, but this is someone else’s stash).
 
Interesting. My guess from a quick listen on YouTube to Solid Air (I don’t have it, just listening via iPad speakers) is that is actually an upright double bass! The Sade (which I do have) is almost certainly a Musicman Stingray (I remember the bassist always having one in videos etc) and listening to that particular track again it may actually be a fretless. The sound is very fretless, though no cues in the playing, but really good players can just do that and nail pitch every time. Bastards. Certainly a fair bit of compression on the Sade track, it is a really nice bass sound IMO. I’d certainly recommend trying a compressor anyway. It will likely get you a lot closer.

Oh yeah, definitely upright double bass on Solid Air. But both have the "growl" sound I was referring too.
 
Bob & Ramon having a deep-dive into a simply amazing vintage guitar collection. No idea who’s it is (they have some absolutely amazing guitars themselves, but this is someone else’s stash).

Part II up now for those who prefer a Gibson. What boggles my mind is that channel has a handful of subs and views but if Bonnamassa or Norm were showing these guitars if would be off the charts.

My favourite was the 52 blackguard Tele early in part I.

 
I assume Science & Industry Museum will have a fair bit too given the current Factory exhibition (link). I’ve not seen it yet, but certainly intend to when I’m back volunteering there.

The nearest I have (other than a load of lovely original vinyl) is the Peter Saville No Music On A Dead Planet t-shirt.

PS That Unknown Pleasures artwork is now pretty much at the stage of Ramones t-shirts from Asda (which do exist!). I bet many people wearing them wouldn’t be able to name a Joy Division or Ramones track.
 
PS That Unknown Pleasures artwork is now pretty much at the stage of Ramones t-shirts from Asda (which do exist!). I bet many people wearing them wouldn’t be able to name a Joy Division or Ramones track.

The number who know who Bridget Riley is must be down to "People who admire George Galloway" levels.
 
Are you playing much atm?

Guitar, yes! As I am now effectively retired, I have been trying to practice every day.

Really enjoying my Telecaster Deluxe which has the Creamery wide range pickups so I am officially going to say it's now my #1 over my Strat. The Tele into my Morgan amp sounds just beautiful. Also this autumn I am moving back up north and will be living in a detached house so I will get to turn it up on a regular basis.

Also have been watching this guy for lessons and practice ideas. He kept appearing in my YouTube recommends but I avoided him for ages as obviously I am way too cool to have a teacher with hair that bad and I don't like his playing. But his lessons are full of stuff that I find useful and a number of them have blown my mind in a "why didn;t someone explain this 10 years ago" sort of way. Like this one on the Circle of Fifths:


How about you? Still loving the Les Paul?
 
Sitting on the couch plunking around and couldn’t remember if I’ve shared pics of this one yet. Mid-60s Airline Bighorn in somewhat rare single pickup configuration. Impulse purchase. I had the frets done and it’s just a lot of fun. Weighs nothing, holds tune, sounds mellower and moodier than you’d think, with a bit of honk if you push things.
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