Club Alleva Coppolo (Part 11!)

[badbassist]

I'm gonna' respectfully disagree... but in a qualified way. In short, I think lines are ok for beginners and on lower end basses to get started with, but longer term on nicer instruments, not. And on the intonation note, you can have lines and use them, and still not have good enough intonation. You have to use your ears for that part... especially up higher on the neck where even rolling your finger a little bit in the same spot can make or break you.

All the pro fretless players I've seen either don't have them, or they have them but don't use them. I NEED to have the ability to play my instruments without looking at my hands.

IMHO, once you get truly proficient at playing fretless, the lines actually do more harm than good if you try to use them. All you should need is side dots as a "quick guide" for long jumps... and really... eventually... not even those.

I used to play a lot of fretless electric and even upright back in the 80's when jazz was a much bigger part of my life, and if I had to look at my hands much in those days, I'd have been booted from the combo and big band. And song memorization is not a 100% reliable option. You just never know when the director is gonna' toss out a chart you haven't played in a while. Not only that, but what about the darker orchestra pits? Lines don't do you any good if you can't see those... especially since your eyes are adjusted to the music stand light which only goes as far as your chart if they do it right to avoid light pollution in the show.

It's all about muscle memory and your ears. I'd get a low end fretless with lines just to get started, but I'd never spend big money on a lined fretless, because IMHO(!!) by the time you're ready to truly justify that, you shouldn't be needing the lines anymore.

Again, just MHO, and I have a pretty strong one on this topic as you can tell.

I have to agree my first fretless was a EB Stingryay 5 I used that to cut my teeth on (I Miss that bass). Later on I became good friends With Mike Tobias and he made me a 535-24 Lined fretless I had it for a couple of months and sold it because all I did was look at the lines. Plus I needed the money Thats when it came to get my fretless from Jimmy I did the Blank board again sorry I don't have any home pic's yet!!!!

 

[Bassist30]

Grooving a Grover Washington groove with a lil GO-GO swing. I got lazy fingers on my thump/slap. So be gentle guys.

Never saw a rosewood fingerboard on a LM. But it sounds great. Nice playing and have fun with it.

 

[Bassist30]

And Im glad that i listened to you too... I dub you Yoda,,

That bass is one of a kind. I heard other p basses but that is one of a kind in sound looks and weight. Even if you did not like a P bass, that one you have is amazing as far as P basses go and that alone means don't do anything to that bass.
Im not kidding I never heard a better sounding P bass yet than the one you have. Its one of a kind. Did I say its a one of a kind bass? You told me you changed the pickups. I hope they are a jimmy PU.

 

[biggreddbass]

I bet that black LM4 weighed in at around 11lbs?

I was gonna say 12

 

[jonno1707]

The best ones are tanks...

 

[Brad Johnson]

As opposed to a Bebensee that is unhinged?

Dan K

Play nice.

 

[svtb15]

Just new prototypes that jimmy has me listening to..
So far its very cool... just been experimenting with different formulas on wire types , wire gauges and different wind patterns. It amazing at what a wind pattern will do to the overall response and feel....

And a 3rd gen P5 Pickup is coming too.. I have my original that is very focused and pointy as well as a vintage 65 style which i like now.. But he is conjuring up a new thing in a few different configs to record and demo out here.. Cant wait to try that one out...

That bass is one of a kind. I heard other p basses but that is one of a kind in sound looks and weight. Even if you did not like a P bass, that one you have is amazing as far as P basses go and that alone means don't do anything to that bass.
Im not kidding I never heard a better sounding P bass yet than the one you have. Its one of a kind. Did I say its a one of a kind bass? You told me you changed the pickups. I hope they are a jimmy PU.

 

[KJung]

Grooving a Grover Washington groove with a lil GO-GO swing. I got lazy fingers on my thump/slap. So be gentle guys.

Dig it!

 

[Vic]

Grooving a Grover Washington groove with a lil GO-GO swing. I got lazy fingers on my thump/slap. So be gentle guys.

Yeah, this is why I hate to do clips. Like you, I'm never satisfied with the results, but really, it sounds great and your playing is very groovy. Thanks for posting.

In particular, I was interested to hear how a rw board'd LM would sound, and I bet VERY few of those will be made just mainly because that's the kind of thing that blurs product lines, which is often hard to convince a builder to do.

I must say, even though I personally don't feel there's such a thing as a bad sounding AC, I really like this one. That rw board seems to sweeten up the high end in a really nice way. It of course especially comes out when you slap, but I also like its effect for fingerstyle. I know it kinda' reduces the "70's factor" a little, at least in the purest sense, but again, I REALLY dug it!!

So now, the next step would be comparing an RA to your custom LM just to see what the diffs might be. Now, I'm not expecting that to happen any time soon, and maybe even never, just because it would be almost impossible to get done, but it sure would be cool if it ever did happen.

 

[jij04002]

I must say, even though I personally don't feel there's such a thing as a bad sounding AC, I really like this one. That rw board seems to sweeten up the high end in a really nice way. It of course especially comes out when you slap, but I also like its effect for fingerstyle. I know it kinda' reduces the "70's factor" a little, at least in the purest sense, but again, I REALLY dug it!!

Yup, +1...The RW board definitely reduces a little bit of the sizzle that you would get with the Maple board, but I really like the way it sounds. You still get that aggresiveness and grind with the ash/70's pup placement, but the "sweetness" of the highs balance out the grind of the low and mids IMO. It just sounds oh so smooth!

Also, very nice clip Diglo . One of these days I will get a clip of my LM5 up...one of these days

 

[KJung]

Yup, +1...The RW board definitely reduces a little bit of the sizzle that you would get with the Maple board, but I really like the way it sounds. You still get that aggresiveness and grind with the ash/70's pup placement, but the "sweetness" of the highs balance out the grind of the low and mids IMO. It just sounds oh so smooth!

Also, very nice clip Diglo . One of these days I will get a clip of my LM5 up...one of these days

+1 Much closer to a full LM tone than the RA to my ears. Something about the alder/maple combination with 70's placement that really 'changes things' to my ear.

 

[YCBass]

So now, the next step would be comparing an RA to your custom LM just to see what the diffs might be. Now, I'm not expecting that to happen any time soon, and maybe even never, just because it would be almost impossible to get done, but it sure would be cool if it ever did happen.

I'll be able to do this in June or so when my LM5-RW is done. I'm down to do a clip but probably not a video. It will be a cool comparison since both will have BAV's, be played through the same amp, even have similar neck shapes. So all else will really be equal except woods and neck finish (satin vs. gloss).

 

[jij04002]

+1 Much closer to a full LM tone than the RA to my ears. Something about the alder/maple combination with 70's placement that really 'changes things' to my ear.

Yeah, it's an interesting comparison...Too bad you didn't get to do any famous youtube clips with the RA

 

[MDFreeze]

All you need to know about KJung's (ex) RA is that it rocks. I gig with it consistantly and it is the most versatile 5 I've ever played. Beautiful Too.

 

[peterpalmieri]

While I totally agree with the last few comments, I would like to add that I've heard many clips of LG5s (which is my primary bass), and also LMs. Different players with different playing styles, different boosts on Jimmy's pre, their strings, rig and method of recording has created a wide range of what these basses can sound like.

While I totally dig DigLo's clip as well as MikeX, KJung and others I have a hard time being convinced that what we are hearing is the fret board, pickup spacing, strings or something different entirely. DigLos bass is unique so it's hard to pin point and both Ken and Mike's LG clips were more agressive then I have associate with the final product of my LG.

I am not saying that these details don't matter just that their impact is highly dependent on so many factors with the end product being the clip we hear. I find it interesting how so many of these basses that have substantially similar specs sound so different. Reconciling the unique rosewood LM sound is kind of wierd and I do wonder if I didn't know what it was, what I would have thought it was....If that makes any sense.

In any case that's probably why I've spent so much money on these basses I just need to hear and feel it for myself to really understand what's happening.

 

[KJung]

Yeah, it's an interesting comparison...Too bad you didn't get to do any famous youtube clips with the RA

There is a reasonably 'apples to apples' comparison of my LM and RA on my iComposition home page (listed as my homepage in my profile).

You can really hear (IMO) the 'bigness down low and upper mid grind' of the LM, versus the more warm, mellow growl and more compressed low end and smoother top end of the LG, versus the 'smooth pure low end and upper treble zing with very little grind or growl' of the RA from those clips. All sound great to me for what they are.

 

[peterpalmieri]

There is a reasonably 'apples to apples' comparison of my LM and RA on my iComposition home page (listed as my homepage in my profile).

You can really hear (IMO) the 'bigness down low and upper mid grind' of the LM, versus the more warm, mellow growl and more compressed low end and smoother top end of the LG, versus the 'smooth pure low end and upper treble zing with very little grind or growl' of the RA from those clips. All sound great to me for what they are.

This type of listening is more helpful from an educational point. Apples to Apples comparison then comparing one persons LM with maple to anothers with rosewood.

 

[KJung]

While I totally agree with the last few comments, I would like to add that I've heard many clips of LG5s (which is my primary bass), and also LMs. Different players with different playing styles, different boosts on Jimmy's pre, their strings, rig and method of recording has created a wide range of what these basses can sound like.

While I totally dig DigLo's clip as well as MikeX, KJung and others I have a hard time being convinced that what we are hearing is the fret board, pickup spacing, strings or something different entirely. DigLos bass is unique so it's hard to pin point and both Ken and Mike's LG clips were more agressive then I have associate with the final product of my LG.

I am not saying that these details don't matter just that their impact is highly dependent on so many factors with the end product being the clip we hear. I find it interesting how so many of these basses that have substantially similar specs sound so different. Reconciling the unique rosewood LM sound is kind of wierd and I do wonder if I didn't know what it was, what I would have thought it was....If that makes any sense.

In any case that's probably why I've spent so much money on these basses I just need to hear and feel it for myself to really understand what's happening.

+1 Lot's of each individual player, strings and rig in all these clips. That's why I try to post both 'apples to apples' comparisons, holding the player, string age and type and rig constant across basses, and also mixing and matching basses and rigs, so the listener can at least start to parse the impact of the bass spec's from all the other stuff going on.

That being said, I hear the LG's sounding like LG's and LM's sounding like LM's in all these different clips.

 

[peterpalmieri]

+1 Lot's of each individual player, strings and rig in all these clips. That's why I try to post both 'apples to apples' comparisons, holding the player, string age and type and rig constant across basses, and also mixing and matching basses and rigs, so the listener can at least start to parse the impact of the bass spec's from all the other stuff going on.

That being said, I hear the LG's sounding like LG's and LM's sounding like LM's in all these different clips.

+1 I am pretty comfortable with the traditional specs of the LGs and LMs tonally. However the RA and LM with rosewood along with the Sadowsky Ash/maple 60s spacing all kind of fall in the middle somewhere. While I appreciate listening to them and would guess they can all be great basses they don't fit neatly into a tonal category in my brain.

 

[jij04002]

There is a reasonably 'apples to apples' comparison of my LM and RA on my iComposition home page (listed as my homepage in my profile).

You can really hear (IMO) the 'bigness down low and upper mid grind' of the LM, versus the more warm, mellow growl and more compressed low end and smoother top end of the LG, versus the 'smooth pure low end and upper treble zing with very little grind or growl' of the RA from those clips. All sound great to me for what they are.

Thanks for the reminder! I totally forgot about the iComposition clips. You can definitely hear the differences between all three of the combinations (LM, LG, and RA), and it certainly helps that you had the same "test" setups when recording each of the basses. You can sort of pick up on the nuances and sometimes subtle differences in each basses tone.

It's pretty interesting that the LM and RA can sound significantly (IMO) different with the same specs sans body wood type. I mean we all know that body wood (type, weight, etc) plays a big part on the road to tone, but it's cool to hear side by side so to speak. I definitely dig the way the RA sounds as well.