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Originally Posted by craig.p  I'm almost positive that wasn't a bass cab. Back when I had hair, I was in a funk band with a guitar player who had a pair of them. They were basically all mids and treble. I think the flare (if that's what you call it) is the giveaway. |
It's a horn-loaded cabinet. You know, I think some people actually used to call the wave guides "flare," so you're dead-on. I don't know that horn-loading is better or worse for guitar or bass. Really, it's all about efficiently directing the sound where you want it to go, which used to be a much bigger deal than it is now. Now most of those problems are solved via brute force, but back in the heyday of horns it was a way to make a 15-watt amp fill a movie theater.
Entwistle's sound was usually a mix of low-frequency drivers (which, back when he was using the Sunn stuff were folded-horn 18" drivers) with what were essentially distorted guitar cabinets riding on top. He used those 412LH cabinets as what I've come to refer to as "Entwistle modules" for distortion, delay and any other effect he might want to run. That way he could keep his solid bass tone running underneath all the time, but he could mix it up with what was coming out of the 12" drivers and that's really the key to getting his tones, IMO.
So yeah, those cabs are pretty horrible for full-range bass, but sitting on top of an 18" cab (see below) they do a pretty nice job of Entwistle-izing your rig.
Not the most glamorous setting... | Flickr - Photo Sharing! 
