Sting and his string choice

[dfinnegan71]

So in the past couple of weeks since the Grammy's, after watching Sting perform with Bruno Mars I have a new appreciation for Sting and his work. Well, really what happened is my wife said, "Sting is my new favorite bass player." I have a P-bass and want that Sting tone. Does he use flats?Rounds? or those half rounds? Anyone know?

[JTE]

Rounds. He's endorsed DR for over ten years, and the earliest ads said he used Sunbeams. Recent posts on TB indicate he's using Hi-Beams.

John

[SLaPiNFuNK]

From what I hear from DR - Sting uses LH-40 which are Lo-Riders Stainless Steel .040 .060 .080 .100

But that was a few months ago...

[Root 5]

I've always been a Sting fan. I knew that he's been using DR for the last number of years.

But I don't know what strings he was using in the 80s & 90s. Roto??

[michael_t]

I've also read somewhere Sting uses DR Lo-Rider 40-100.

[GK Growl]

In the 80's and 90's, Sting was a Rotosound endorser. I believe he used the Pressure wound and Swing Bass sets in light gauges.

[Nashrakh]

Playing a single coil P with your thumb helps a lot I guess.

[funkyebk]

I saw a Premier Guitar video where his tech said DR lo rider 40's

It stuck out cause that's what I've been playing for a few years as well.

[JJansen]

Sting definitely uses Lo Riders, .40-.100. His main bass is a 57 P sans the pickgaurd. And a rarely used 55 P as a backup.( as of the last 20 years or so, he has played hammer, ibanez, and Spector basses in the past, along with a jazz bass and a fretless P) They both have basslines single coil stack pickups.To produce the wide dynamic range Sting has a rig using multiple crossovers. From the basses, Shure U1-UA wireless UHF transmitters are routed through a switching/muting system built by Pete Cornish. From the switcher, the signal goes to an Alembic F1-X preamp and then into a Court Acoustics GE60 i-octave equalizer and a Urei 7110 compressor/limiter before going to an Electro-Voice XEQ-3 crossover and on to the amplification. Bass signals to the front of house come from two direct outs: one from the Shure wireless and a second from the Alembic preamp with the preamp out located after the EQ. The outputs of the crossover go to two Carver 2.0 amps that have been modified by Clair Brothers Audio. The 1,200 watt low-end monoblock amp goes to two Clair Brothers ML-18 1x18 cabinets. Danny says that the ML-18 cabinets supply the “full sound and deep low end” of Sting’s live tone. The top-end amp (about 750 watts a side) goes to two Clair Brothers 12 AM-7 cabinets, each containing a 12" Electro-Voice speaker and a 2550 JBL horn. Sting did use 2 Ampeg 8x10s with Ampeg Svt Vr heads on The Police reunion tour, but they were just for stage amplification, as his main rig provided the sound to the FOH. That should help you