help me with the terminology: bright? warm? mellow?

hanx · #1 05-23-2010, 08:02 AM

reading reviews and stuff of different strings they all try to describe the sound, but i'm not really sure what they mean, i'm more a visual arts person... i'm not used to the terminology of sound. Some of the terms i can fathom a guess, like "mellow", others i have no idea, like "bright", or "warm". Can you help me out a bit?

ehque · #2 05-23-2010, 08:25 AM

To me, Bright generally means highs heavy. Warm generally means low mids heavy.

raymondl3 · #3 05-23-2010, 08:31 AM

"Mellow" = dead out of the box. Think nickle strings.

hanx · #4 05-23-2010, 09:52 AM

hrmmm... trying some phospher bronzed (copper coloured), which have a reputation for being "warm" on a couple of acoustics, they sounded a lot more trebley than the steel or nickel ones on the acoustic i ended up buying, but that was on different basses, so not a very controlled experiment.

what about "bright"? by heavy highs does that mean it has kind of treble over-tones to it? the only flatwounds anyone stocks in town (D'Addario - Bass Strings Chromes Stainless Steel Flat Wound) seem to be listed as "bright" in most reviews. But i definitely want the main note to be quite distinct, without too much twang etc.

raymondl3 · #5 05-23-2010, 12:31 PM

Is this for an acoustic bass guitar? I'm not sure you want to use anything but bronze, but then I'm strictly and electric player.

hanx · #6 05-24-2010, 08:36 AM

nah it's for a fretless electric.

For what i want to do with this instrument i think i want a sound that's quite "pure", i want the main frequency of the note to stand out with not too much twang above and not too much rumble below, and not too blurry (whatever the musical term for blurry is).

what sort of terminology should i look for? I think maybe "brite" is bad? is "mellow" good?

or can anyone recommend some not-too-expensive flatwounds to give this kind of sound?

(I have an acoustic but it's strung with nickel rounds, i think they sound better than the bronze, less finger noise, but i only tried bronze on much lower quality instruments so not a fare comparison.)

raymondl3 · #7 05-24-2010, 08:58 AM

I like "brighter" strings because most of the twang will we gone after a week. I've been playing fretless for 13 years. I can't use anything but GHS progressives on fretless. As for cheaper flats, check out GHS and D'Addario.

hanx · #8 05-24-2010, 09:08 AM

so what does "brite" mean? i can't quite get a handle on what it's trying to describe?

have you tried the ones sold as GHS Brite Flats?

I have only heard GHS precision recommended, but so far i can only find brites for sale in Australia. For some reason most of the international stores i've found so far won't ship to Australia, and the only one that does ship this far wants nearly the price of the strings in postage.