Valenti 5 string Jazz Bass (aka Geddy Vee)
Specs:
ash body
maple neck w/ black blocks and matching headstock
Nordstrand Big Single pickups
Aguilar obp-2 preamp
tone control, active/passive
weight: 9lbs
build time (deposit to receipt): just under 4 months
After seeing / playing Nino's Geddy Vee at the NY GTG last September, it was love at first sight
I placed a deposit within a day or two of that, and received this bass in mid January just before going on vacation. Didn't have any gigs between then and last Friday, hence long time between receipt and review. As we all know, something that sounds great at home doesn't always sound great live.
I'd played a few of Nino's basses before so I was expecting a quality, well put together instrument. That's exactly what I got. Nino was fastidious in his setup work, and delayed delivery for a day or two while he sorted out an errant piece of fretwork. Wiring in the cavity is incredibly neat. The only real piece of work I did was to slightly raise the neck pickup, Nino typically plays with both pickups on full while I favor the bridge pickup slightly so I wanted to get some more of the neck sound in there. The bass came with Sadowsky strings, which I don't really like so I swapped them out (it's currently strung with Ken Smith Rock Masters - .040 to .125, Taper B). I also replaced the Schaller straplocks with Duncans.
The neck is very comfy and easy to play. Being ash, it's a naturally sounding bright bass. The tone control comes in very handy here for taming that high end. I debated whether to go for 3 band mid control instead of bass/treble/tone, but I think in the end I made the right decision. In the past, I used to use a lot of house rigs so I appreciated having onboard mid available. But these days I'm mainly using my own rig so I can set my sound on my amp and adjust necessary on the bass. As with all Aguilar onboard preamps, a little goes a long way with the bass boost - it's like it goes from 0/10 to 4/10, with nothing in between - it would be nice for it to be a bit more granular in it's control. But that's nothing to do with Nino's work.
I used the bass for 2 out of 3 sets this prior Friday night. We were playing in a pretty awkward space in a bar / restaurant in Larchmont, NY. I was playing through my Thunderfunk amp into Epifani UL-112. The sound was just about everything I was looking for - fat low end, but articulate over full frequency range. I left the preamp flat pretty much all the time, using the tone control and pickup blend control to go between my chosen pick/fingerstyle/slap sounds. I had a bassist friend in the audience, he said the bass sound projected really nicely and was prominent in the mix without being dominating. At times I did wish for a little bit more in the mids, but that was easy to dial in with the amp.
Overall: I was looking for a reasonable cost, high quality instrument that I could take on bar gigs and get a great sound without being paranoid about maybe getting a ding or two in it. That's what I got
I've attached some hastily recorded clip samples, playing quality not as good as could be
Recording setup: bass->Tascam US-122 interface -> Cubasis
All clips were recorded with preamp flat, each lick is played in first half with tone on full and then in second half with tone rolled off a little
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Linear Mode
