What's your preferred bass string construction?
- Thread starter line6man
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I've almost exclusively used rounds in the 18 years that I play now for no particular reason other than I wasn't used to anything else. So I don't feel qualified to vote.
My Squier Jazz did come with flats. I replaced them soon but I'm seriously considering to give it another shot.
My Squier Jazz did come with flats. I replaced them soon but I'm seriously considering to give it another shot.
I made a decision a long time ago that if I was going to keep playing bass, it had to be as interesting as possible - in other words, FRETLESS - so I have to go with D-Addario flatwound Chromes. These are the strings that some bass players keep on for ten years a set. No, they're not Flea, or Victor Wooten or Stanley Clarke. They play BASS PARTS... you want I should subject a gorgeous Warmoth ebony or pau ferro fretboard to ROTOSOUNDS?!?! There was a time back there, right after the era of Stanley and Jaco and Chris Squire, where if you wanted a job as a bass player all you had to do was promise to stay below the seventh fret all night and you were hired! :laughing3: :laughing11: :laughing7: :laughing11:
WACKITY-TWACKITYBAPBAPBZZT
"Excuse me, sir - were there any fricking NOTES in there?" :hello2:
WACKITY-TWACKITYBAPBAPBZZT
"Excuse me, sir - were there any fricking NOTES in there?" :hello2:
SkuttleFunk
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nickel rounds of various brands on most basses
flats on one or two fretted 4-strings (you just gotsta love a P or L1K with flats!)
Elixers on my fretless basses (hence the 'other' vote)
TI's on my Azola EUB
all the best,
R
flats on one or two fretted 4-strings (you just gotsta love a P or L1K with flats!)
Elixers on my fretless basses (hence the 'other' vote)
TI's on my Azola EUB
all the best,
R
SkuttleFunk
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Elixers are rounds that have a super thin flexible coating on them, and as such are different than a true round which has naked wire. IMO/IME they're the perfect string for electric fretless
Elixers ain't cheap ... but a set I installed on my 6-string fretless have all the brightness and detail they did when first installed, and are still going strong 10+ years later
all the best,
R
Elixers ain't cheap ... but a set I installed on my 6-string fretless have all the brightness and detail they did when first installed, and are still going strong 10+ years later
all the best,
R
line6man
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SkuttleFunk said:
Then they are still rounds.
10 years? I don't think I could get a set to last that long, even if they still sounded good. I take my strings on and off frequently enough that it weakens them. Amongst other reasons, this is why I HATE any set of strings with silk wrap. They are not as durable, structurally, as sets that are wound normally all the way to the end. Do Elixers have silk, or not?
I've been thinking about this lately because I've only played rounds. What are the differences between them, especially sound-wise? I think I would like flats better just because I like a smooth feel on strings (big fan of coated guitar strings, and I use string conditioner so they feel even slicker), but I would like to know the differences.
They sound... Mellower, having said that I have had a few sets that still sounded bright. They don't have that raw sounding "awww" when you play them. They do feel really smooth and are fantastic for Jazz. Comparing the two, rounds have a much more aggressive sounding high-end and sound rough..blah blah I'm sure you know rounds well enough to know what I mean, Flats are different in that they are mellower and have a much less high-end attack while being really smooth to the touch. They are fantastic for Jazz and don't really like being pounded like you would play Van Halen for instance.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y38C30bleOI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y38C30bleOI
SkuttleFunk
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I'll see if I can throw something together this afternoon - a simple clip of my P with well aged rounds, and a Wunkay with flats. same riff. same amp settings. same Korg digi recorder settings.
I'd do it now, but family on the other side of the wall have been sick this ween and are still sleeping
all the best,
R
I'd do it now, but family on the other side of the wall have been sick this ween and are still sleeping
all the best,
R
I consider myself more a musician who has probably got paid more to play bass than anything else. And the reason is because I have a good idea of what the bass player is supposed to do in a band, where they sit in the mix... there have been occasional bands where the bass player was out front with good success - the Who, of course, and in my opinion the only thing that held the Red Hot Chili Peppers' sound together was Flea, the rest of the band were sloppy, out of tune, perhaps even... high on drugs! Gasp! When Stanley Clarke, a brilliant technician, left Return to Forever and went out on his own star turn, his band had to hire a bass player to play the bass parts because Stanley was out front, playing his "piccolo bass" - a four-string instrument tuned an octave higher, you figure it out. Obviously, bass players are going to like something like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3tLLzSGd2o&feature=related
But if you played that on another instrument it would sound like nonsense, as it isn't very good music. A good bass player can do more to make a band sound good than the soloists, really - you get to push the beat around, as does the drummer. But a bass player who grew up thinking that Pastorius and Clarke were the bomb is going to be a pain in the ass.
SkuttleFunk
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I consistently get hired to play bass NOT because I play Jaco/Clarke/Wooten/etc ... lines all over the band, but because I know what my instrument's foundational role in music is. I'm not the soloist out front running over the top of everybody and then wanking out my last note while I'm frantically looking for 'one' so I can get back into time. I'm not the one who's role is to "cut thru the mix" so that every note is so defined it makes the cymbols sound muddy.
I get hired because I understand the most simple thing: my role is to join the drums (percussion) to the melodic instrumens and to get all the booty shakin on the floor. to accomplish this I need to rumble the low end while providing sonic space for the vocals and other instruments. my role is not to fill the mids with bass bliss, it's to fill the bottom with booty shakin' goodness. my role is to make everybody else in the band look brilliantly stellar
this is what wins the adoration from my bandmates and gets me called back gig after gig after gig after gig after ...
funny, but most of the bassist I know who are trying to be the next Jaco/Wooten/Clarke are all frustrated all the time. they don't like their house mix. they don't get to solo enough. they never have the right gear on any given night, and would have played better if they had a different amp/bass/whatever that night
me? I can wow my bandmates with my Azola just as well as a boutique electric bass as well as a beat-up old P-bass. and I can do this because I KNOW my role and do it well
to all the Jaco wannabe's out there ... thanks for getting me the gig last night :icon_thumright:
all the best,
R
I get hired because I understand the most simple thing: my role is to join the drums (percussion) to the melodic instrumens and to get all the booty shakin on the floor. to accomplish this I need to rumble the low end while providing sonic space for the vocals and other instruments. my role is not to fill the mids with bass bliss, it's to fill the bottom with booty shakin' goodness. my role is to make everybody else in the band look brilliantly stellar
this is what wins the adoration from my bandmates and gets me called back gig after gig after gig after gig after ...
funny, but most of the bassist I know who are trying to be the next Jaco/Wooten/Clarke are all frustrated all the time. they don't like their house mix. they don't get to solo enough. they never have the right gear on any given night, and would have played better if they had a different amp/bass/whatever that night
me? I can wow my bandmates with my Azola just as well as a boutique electric bass as well as a beat-up old P-bass. and I can do this because I KNOW my role and do it well
to all the Jaco wannabe's out there ... thanks for getting me the gig last night :icon_thumright:
all the best,
R
