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I started on a fingerboard using a length of hardwood flooring timber from the local hardware shop. It's not that hard. I used a Stanley no.6 handplane to get a straight reference. 3 flat sections, one in the centre and two either side as a start to the curved finger board. Once you get these sections flat use a scraper to work in the scoop. Cut 4 notches at the nut end and 4 at the wide end to hold a strong thick bit of cotton about the line the strings will take. A weight on the end of the cotton allows you to check quickly between scrapes. If you want say 2mm of scoop overall you can use the fact that the clearance under a straight edge reduces as the square of its length. IE if the finger board is 840mm long you will expect 0.5 of a mm under a 420mm straight edge. At any position if you want even scoop. I used shorter straight edges than that even. Shine a lamp on a white background to see the gap. You can get a feeler gauge from the auto spares shop. You aim for the same gap as you move up and down the finger board. Plenty of youtubes on how to tune a handplane and how to sharpen and burnish the edge of a scraper.

I made the finger board just over 20mm thick, the same as my reference double bass, a Stentor 1950. I've got just under 2mm of scoop measured at the 7th fret E string, the Stentor is just over 2mm. Just under 1mm under the G string, the Stentor is also 2mm here. (I'd read somewhere you need less scoop under the lighter strings).

Then I needed somewhere to test it. Edgar Russ Violin maker of Distinction has a youtube video on timbers for violin family instruments. Violins need to be made from Spruce from the north side of trees from a certain altitude in the mountains of Cremorne. He said it becomes less critical as you go up in size. "By the time you get to double bass you can make them out of anything". So I built a double-bass-shaped object out of plywood. I suspect he is right. I've set the height of strings at the 7th fret to 5mm E string and 4 mm G string. a bit of buzz with any less, and they sound better with a bit more height. Strings make all the difference, D'Addario helicore pizzicato. I recycled the old ones from the Stentor. They say double bass strings are expensive but they last. No they don't. One and a half years on the Stentor, what a difference new strings make!

Jakeman said:

Beyond your current budget, but when you inevitably take the next step, check out:

Blackhawk
Lefa
Noise Space Audio
Dunwich/Magic
Electrofoods

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I'd add Black Arts Toneworks to the list! And the Swollen Pickle is a classic if you have the patience for tweaking.

Crackle said:

Rotosound Jazz Bass 77

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I was expecting to see only James Jamerson, Bob Babbitt, "Duck" Dunn, Carol Kaye, and other old school R&B bassists on this thread. But you're speaking my language as a metalhead! As much as I personally don't like Roto 77s, there's no denying that Steve Harris played all of Iron Maiden's bass lines on a P Bass with flats.

Here are my picks:
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CrimsonGhost said:

It's that sub low hit that's so addicting.

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y’all are convincing me more n more

Version 5 has just been released, featuring a new stem separation algorithm, a new audio-to-MIDI conversion engine, and a new MIDI editor that allow you to transcribe entire songs in a matter of minutes. I wish this tool had existed 20 years ago.

A quick review / tutorial (in Spanish, with English subtitles):
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What do you do when you come face to face with an old nemesis?​

“I make this face”…

drumrtommy said:

Il”missing bottom end” I would whole heartedly agree with that actually, just doesn’t sound or feel “full”

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I have a Burner 6. But that one has tons of lows. I never put the bass knob past 50%. Also don’t think it’s hifi sounding. But the 6 has humbuckers instead of single coils. Not sure if the Burner 4 sounds that much different from the Burner 6?

carmst42 said:

Just bought an Ibanez mode 1606 and I love the bass, but I'm not a huge fan of the pickups and preamp. I am a big fan of the sound of Aguilar amps as well as players I've seen playing Aguilar pickups. From what I have read, the Aguilar 6 string hum cancelling jazz pickups look like exactly what I want. It looks like they may have been discontinued and I can't seem to find them anywhere.

Does anyone know if there is somewhere that I can still find them or are there any good alternatives that you guys would recommend? I want more low end and less growl with good clarity but still a good focus on the fundamental if that makes sense. I will be using this bass playing jazz for the most part.

Thanks In advance!

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or

What sort of support do you have underneath? Foam, springs, etc? Need to pull the pickups for a looksey and repair.

Riis

All that matters is the sound that comes out of the speakers. Well, and if it's not built like a total piece of junk.

That being said my favorite dirt pedals for bass are in the "boutique" category. Do I care that they are? No, I was looking for a sound and I probably have been through well over 200 dirt pedals at this point.

It's hard to find things I like now, and if I do they really have to offer something I've never seen/heard before.

But I respect Jakeman's opinion as well. It is nice to support the small guy but the reason I look for what I do is purely for sound. I just wound up with those pedals. And the builders are usually pretty damn cool and receptive to what you are looking for

Bruce Johnson said:

I strongly recommend that you buy your ebony fingerboard from a supplier who specifically sells ebony fingerboard blanks for musical instruments. Ebony is difficult to get dried out, thoroughly and evenly. Suppliers who sell fingerboard blanks have worked out the process, sawing and milling the boards down to close to the final thickness, while drying it slowly. This is really important.

If you buy a larger, thicker ebony board from someone, and then ask your Luthier to saw it and plane it into a fingerboard blank, there is a high chance that the ebony will crack or split. Sometimes months after the bass is finished. I know this from painful personal experience.

This isn't a big problem with other fingerboard woods, just ebony.

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Appreciate the tip!

Here's a couple of weeks worth of pics. I'm slow, building two basses, and don't spend all that much time in the workshop each session so it isn't tonnes of progress.



Shaving back the face plate




Smoothing down any bumps from the neck carve




That flame should come up nice with a bit of clear coat




Side dots


managed to stuff up and put a pilot in the centre line of the 12th fret




Not sure if I'll put a third dot (maybe a different colour), or try to patch it up. So I've left it be for the minute.


Shaping out the end of the fret board. It seems really easy till I start the other side and try to make it symmetrical.

Interesting to me that my bass with the XJ frets went from being a backup which wasn't my favorite to play (because I was not used to XJ frets and preferred the smaller fretwire of my then-main bass) has now become my #1 because I learned to "walk the rice paper" by refining my fretting hand technique with a lighter, more nuanced touch. Press down too hard, and the notes go plop.

Now I'm at the point where if I'm playing a bass with small frets, I don't have that same "glide" I do with my XJ frets. With smaller frets, I touch the fretboard when I press down, whereas with XJ frets I don't touch the fretboard at all (which you don't want to do with frets that big, or the notes plop out).

But that's just because I got used to the XJ frets and now they feel more natural to me because I've been to hell and back with that bass and my hands know it intimately. I really had to grow into that bass.

ESP/LTD seems to like putting XJ frets on the majority of their instruments. My main is a modded LTD (by ESP).

I wanted to just follow up and say that not only did I not sell that P bass, but I rediscovered it as the best sounding bass I own, funny how the mind play tricks on you. That would’ve been a critical mistake that I may have not recovered from, seeing that it took me like seven years to find that bass as my best P bass.

robert_stuart said:

Lol, no, it was me. I needed to just pause the video and then talk. And either work the mic better (an SM58) or get a lapel mic.

Thanks for the feedback!

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Hey, I feel like I'm learning each time I try and record something, whether video or audio! I'm actually thinking of getting a new (wireless) mic so that I can do more "talking" videos. It's all part of the journey! Gonna watch more of your videos.

I learned to solve tone issues by reducing rather than adding. But I also learned to avoid subtle tweaks: crank the knobs and hear what the real impact of the gear is, then dial back to what you like. Preamp into cab sim into plugin is not unheard of. Generally overkill for my tastes, but I'm also very satisfied with my pure and simple bass->amp sound.

None of it sounds particularly bad to me, and they could each work great in the right situation. No rule against stacking a ludicrous amount of processing. Grab a Mackie 1202 and stick a different unit on each fader, make a FX organ, why not? I love Chris Wolstenholme, his rig/signal path rundown is insanity. Just keep in mind how much complexity you are willing to repeat when it's time to gig with that sound.

Tony’s the man

Hello again

as per the title, I am having a custom build starting fairly soon and I'm sorting out the specs/wish list to ask him for

and I am collecting up the electronics and pickups and associated components ready to send to the builder... I decided
to get a darkglass tone capsule to start with. and despite this being a 5 string multiscale fretless tuned to a e a d g I also
decided to go slightly left field with the pickup choices..........
I know usually for this application a pair of soapbar shaped humbuckers or mm style with a 3 way series/parralel/single coil
switch is the more conventional way for most metal bass players.... BUT I have usually played a jazz style bass, usually with
the series switch and sometimes even with switchable caps values on the tone control....
so....
after a good few hours reading trawling yt demos and trying to remember which basses i played in the past that i enjoyed the tones from.....
I ended up a couple of days ago ordering a pair of bartolini 57cbjd I think the model is
But then I thought why not add a p style pickup on its own volume?
thus by just having a regular jazz setup but with a series switch and the switchable caps on the tone
and then a p bass style pickup with its own volume and this should allow me to vaguely approximate
1] jazz bass
2] p bass
3] pj
4] jazz in series
5] jazz in series WITH the p [i imagine in parrallel obviously]
solo either of the jazz pickups all of this by using that one series switch and the individual knobs for each pickup...........
so question is
is this a stupid stupid idea? i wont have the funds or opportunity to ever have another instrument like this built hence trying
to get as many tones as I reasonably can without going too crazy and risking the builder just blocking me LOL!
the models of the pickups are
57cbjd1
and
58cpb
into a darkglass
on a 5 string multiscale fretless playing metal and hopefully in a slightly leftfield way
obviously the 2 jazz pickups would have to be shifted a tiny bit further apart so neck pickup move a tiny bit towards the neck
more and the bridge pickup would have to move towards the bridge slightly to get hte p in the center
BUT should still be usefull enough?
also would a tone control with selectable caps be worth adding?
I know I probably should have gone with soapbars with the usual series parallel coil split switches but I dunno I saw the sets of
barts liked the idea and ordered them LOL!
but all the yt demos I have seen seem to suggest they are very nice sounding pickups its the control layout that im unsure of
and the wiring side but also is there anything else i am missing on this one?
not sure whether to go 9 or 18v on the tone capsule either.
could get a dual stacked pot for the two jazz pickups volume and a push pull for the p bass pickups volume and when you use
the push pull that's what puts the two jazzers into series.........
not sure on the tone with switchable caps either could probably do that externally i guess
any thoughts on this probably stupid idea that's just an excuse to buy two sets of not cheap pickups? LOL!
also trying to talk myself out of getting the piezo version of the bridge we are going to be using as it isnt that expensive
and bartolini do a nice looking simple piezo buffer/preamp
could get a second jack socket put into the bass and have a piezo rig with independent output i could use for parallel processing or to simulate an acoustic bass..........

sorry for the wall of text im absolutely useless at putting paragraphs together due to my autism, I am trying to make myself understandable as best I can
thanks again in advance for any thoughts on this idea

RonSound said:

Maybe I could add something underneath to make a wider radius on the bend

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Didn’t Birdsong do a pass-thru with a countersunk anchor on the backside?

dougjwray said:

I've mentioned this before, probably ad nauseum, but I was at the early show on 3/13/71. The songs from that set which made it onto the album were "Statesboro Blues", "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed" and the first half of "You Don't Love Me" (Tom Dowd spliced together two performances for the album). Also, the "Eat a Peach" "Trouble No More" was from that set.
My father brought me. I remember thinking, "There's nothing this band can't do." They combined blues, jazz, Western swing, rock and even a little prog, fusion and classical. All of the influences were fully integrated and honest. And there was absolutely no show biz nonsense like bloated macho posturing (Led Zep) or costumes and characters (Bowie). It was music!
I always think it's a shame when people group them with Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Marshall Tucker Band as "southern rock", because they were truly unique.

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They have been with me since I was 15, a lifelong favorite band that was always great, not just the album that came out when I was 15. I looked at them like Art Blakey:s Jazz Messengers, always.able to plug in a great player to interpret and expand their musical book.
That almost 60 year ethos carries over to the Tedeschi/Trucks and Warren Haynes musical orbits, the music is always first.

I just got one of these in brown as well as a brown TH350, it’s a surprisingly good sounding little rig, more than enough oomph to practice with my cover band. With any of my 8 ohm Genz Benz cabs it is a completely gig worthy stack. I have used a Tonehammer 350 and the pedals in the past and I was always happy with the tone, very glad to have this one back in the fold.

I need to practice transcribing. Let's start easy.

I have some Cirrus basses from the same period. All of my Millennium preamps (I changed them all out for the sweepable midrange control) have been rock solid. I wouldn’t worry about the preamp.

Kim

Indeed, the pedal on "Green Dolphin Street" is even written into the Real Book lead sheet.

I play mostly jazz, but also spend some time accompanying fiddlers. I find a pedal tone useful in a number of ways.

Sometimes, when I'm not sure what the changes are supposed to be. I can pedal through the entire melody while listening, and pick up changes that I can use the next time around.

A pedal can provide a "blank slate" for letting the melody stand on its own, without completely dropping out. You can go even further with this by playing the pedal as a long drone with the bow.

In some older tunes, especially from Nordic traditions, it's not clear to me that any harmonic motion is really appropriate, in which case a pedal avoids pushing the melody in direction that doesn't really work.

It's a pity pickups don't come with markings. My CS62 had no discernible identification other than the packaging and the metal backing plate which the Squier pickup didn't have.