What's on your New Standard?

[bassame]

After I got my NS Cleveland home, I took off the Spirocores and put on some Gamut Lyon Lights along with the E,A from a Labella Red Label set I tried. This was a very beautiful combination: great volume, clarity even in thumb position, surprising sustain for gut strings. Then, with all the talk of Dominants I bought a set of Solos and put them on a few days ago. In sound, these remind me of Velvet Animas: great volume, and an interesting tone which seems like it emphasizes the low and high end, as if you were getting a scooped mid as some electric bass amps give you. They are thin, like Spirocore Weichs but don't have the same mids. The volume seems to envelope the player, but it does not seem to carry as far as the Spiros or the guts [I did some informal testing with my family in other rooms of the apartment and the guts were more audible in distant rooms]. I think I will probably go back to the gut combination, but the Dominants are great fun to play.

[jmpiwonka]

my gamut lyon g light+ is louder than the flexocor regular G string that was on it, i like this gut string...i'm contemplating ordering the d too and then searchign for an A and E that will closer match the tone for arco (i have flexocor '92 now and they are just too smooth and airy sounding for arco to match the gut)..i'm not really a sweious arco player though so.....

[Uncletoad]

Originally Posted by bassame

Then, with all the talk of Dominants I bought a set of Solos and put them on a few days ago. In sound, these remind me of Velvet Animas: great volume, and an interesting tone which seems like it emphasizes the low and high end, as if you were getting a scooped mid as some electric bass amps give you. They are thin, like Spirocore Weichs but don't have the same mids. The volume seems to envelope the player, but it does not seem to carry as far as the Spiros or the guts [I did some informal testing with my family in other rooms of the apartment and the guts were more audible in distant rooms]. I think I will probably go back to the gut combination, but the Dominants are great fun to play.

I'm sure that is true for solo Dominant strings. Regular Orchestra Dominants are not like that. They are way louder than any guts and have plenty of mids. They were louder than the Animas on my Cleveland.

[M Ramsey]

Originally Posted by Uncletoad

I'm sure that is true for solo Dominant strings. Regular Orchestra Dominants are not like that. They are way louder than any guts and have plenty of mids. They were louder than the Animas on my Cleveland.

Afternoon all,

I have 2 American Standards, #731 and #2753. On #731 (older bass maybe late 30's-early 40's) I had Garbos and I liked the sound of them until I bought #2753 (mid-to-late 50's bass) and put a set of Garbos on it. These strings were 2 years old and I had a repaired A string (broken at the joint of winding and tailpeice).

The #2753 bass blew the doors down when compared to #731. These were 2 year old strings on a 20 year newer bass. The strings on the #731 were about 4 months old, they WERE Garbos, with a new neck set (April 05).

At Christmas, I put on a G and D of Goldentone (nylon wrapped gut core) and an E and A of NOS Red O Ray strings. Then, the doors were blown off of #2753 by #731 with guts.

So, I obtained a set of guts (Lenzers) and placed them on #2753. It was good, but not as good as Garbos. So, I switched #2753 BACK to Animas and it's thumping now.

Here's what I plan to do. When I have an indoor gig with a stable environment, I'll take #731 and play Guts. When I'm outdoors at a festival (like next month for 4 days at the 4th of July, here in my hometown) I'll play #2753 with the Animas so as to decrease my problems due to heat and humidity.

Both these basses sound far superior in tone and volume with Animas or Garbos or Guts as opposed to steel strings installed on either one. I've used Spirocores, Helicores, Ropecores and nothing sounds or plays as good TO ME as guts or Garbos/Animas.

[Aleph5]

Since I last posted on this thread, I replaced my Spiros/Helicore hybrid mix w/ a new set of Obligatos. As I posted under another thread, I love the Oblis on my Cleveland laminate. I no longer want to lower my action, er--I mean "string height" , and there's a much more organic sound as well as feel. The Spiro metallic sound is now seen for what it is and not missed (though some of that Spiro "mwah" and sustain is occasionally missed, but not too often).

I won't go on, since there's been so much discussion about Oblis around here; apparently people either love them or they really don't. Some have a love fest for a while and then lose interest. A fling-type string, I guess. For me, the thrill is still there after several months. No real QC issues with them either, though to the latter two points, I admit I'm not a gigger, so the strings don't get the wear that some put to theirs.