Probably not the first time that this has been tried, but if you've had the trouble I've had recently, trying to track down sound reasonable quality, uncluttered, un-EQ'd bass guitar soundclips, you'll understand why I'm trying to get this thread off the ground
.
So, here's the proposal:
What if we use this thread as a place to post soundclips of "natural, un-amplified, un-EQ'd, un-effected (is that a word
)
and un-cluttered" bass guitar recordings ?
The idea is to have a basic "reference tone" to "describe" the sound of certain basses (or pickups even) to those of us who aren't sure of how that instrument sounds, or how a particular model of bass, pickup or string can affect the tone (in the case of A/B comparisions).
Ideally, the soundclips should feature either solo bass, bass with a drum part, or even a non-intrusive musical accompaniment. The main thing is that the tone of the bass should be
distinct in the mix and not buried under thundering drums, shredding guitars or screaming banshee wailing
.
Also, as most of you will know
, this little disclaimer nearly always appears wherever soundclips occur on TB: "
Sorry for the poor playing"
. I
really hope that we can just take it as read that
all that matters here is how well we can hear the tone of the bass and that we can just leave out any unpleasant opinions about other people's playing
(which is not likely to be fairly represented in such basic soundclips anyway
). OK, enough said ...
The
other important element of posts in this thread, is that you must supply sufficient details of the instrument in question to allow your fellow TBers to know exactly what it is they're hearing
. This should include (but is not limited to) things like;
the make and model (and year, if vintage, or if age is significant) of the bass,
the construction materials, THE STRING TYPE, any modifications to the instrument, the tone settings on the bass and finally, the technique/style of playing used on the recording (if not immediatlely obvious).
For obvious reasons, it would be better if you could post
your own recordings, but if you have (permitted
) access to other peolpe's recordings AND know enough of the details of the recording to give your fellow TBers some idea of exactly what they're listening to, then feel free to post any other soundclips that you feel are relevant.
Finally, if there's enough interest in this thread, it
may be "stickied" and become a regular resource for us all (according to a certain source
), so let's give it a shot, shall we
?
.................................................. .................................................. ...
Here's a few "starters" for you
. It's basically just a load of major chord arpeggios, played in quarter notes, finger-style on three different basses and recorded direct to the PC's soundcard).
1.
Fender Custom Shop 61 P Bass (alder body, r/w 'board, Lindy Fralin p/up, Fender nickel strings. Vol and tone on full).
http://www.zshare.net/audio/12215652392315b4/
2.
Fender '76 Jazz Bass (ash body, maple 'board, DR Marcus Miller s/s strings. All controls on full).
http://www.zshare.net/audio/12215816d8bf3499/
3.
MusicMan StingRay '77 (ash body, maple 'board, DR nickel Sunbeams. Vol and treble on full, bass at 80%).
http://www.zshare.net/audio/1221623585e09f1d/
4.
All 3 basses at once 
!!! Yeah, this is why I recorded such a simple pattern
, so that I could mix them all on top of each other at the end
. Now you know what a
Fender JazzisionRay would have sounded like, had Leo ever made one
.
http://www.zshare.net/audio/122160933d7328af/
OK, your turn
...........
Will, I couldn't access your link 
