Hey all!
I don't know if this is the appropriate spot or not but seeing how I'm introducing myself, and I am a bassist sort of, I guess this counts.
Anyway my name is Chris, and I live in San Diego, California. I've been primarily a "guitard" for the last 25+ years, but I've also been noodling on a bass for about 20 years. I hesitate to call myself a bassist since I've never held that spot in a gigging band, which to me is where you earn your stripes. I also play keys and drums, and occasionally contribute some vocal noises that might be deemed to be singing by the truly generous.
I'm recently getting back into the gigging side of things after an extended break from it, and it looks like I may get my chance to become a bass player after all. A former roommate, friend, and band member of mine is putting together his second CD and I'll be playing bass for his live shows. Its a cool coffee shop vibe with some Dave Matthews, Seal, Eric Johnson, Rush, and all kinds of cool influences in it. I can't wait to get this rollin'! As such I am building up my bass rig, my first real bass rig which leads us to the next part of the story....
I know you guys love gear so here it goes:
My bass playing started with an old Squier II (anyone remember those?) that was black with a maple neck/fb and no pickguard. I later upgraded to a Squier P bass special that was all black with a tortoise shell pickguard. That bass went away and was replaced by an Ibanez Soundgear 506. That was my bass for a looooooong time. I had a Crate B80XL for most of this time frame. Remember, not my main gig here.
More recently I picked up my first "Nice bass" which is a Carvin LB76 in DTS blueburst over quilt, with dual MM style humbuckers and 5 piece hog/maple neck. I LOVE this bass even though it weighs a ton. It has been dubbed the "Blue Beast" but man is this thing nice. It can definitely handle the low down groove and quick single note runs fly across the board. Two handed chordal stuff is well balanced but I have to say the slap techniques are a bit hard to pull off with the narrow string spacing. The tone and attack is there, just miss the full size string spacing for pop/slap stuff.
On the amp side of the house I'm using a mid 90's Fender Bassman 60w 1x12 to run a Carvin BRX 10.4 Neo 4x10 and believe it or not it sounds HUGE! I never would have guessed but this thing rattles the windows big time yet is still very articulate. It even keeps up with my very hard hitting metal drummer roommate.
I want to add the Carvin (if it ain't broke...) BX1500 bi-ampable bass head to go with the rest of the rig. I'm also jonesin' for a P-Bass Special for those other days when the extra strings are well..... extra.
So there ya have it. A Carvin geek "guitard" going bass player for a time at least.
Gotta have pics right?
