That’s a beauty too. Do you have audio clips for that?? Inquiring minds want to know!
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Dingwall Owners Club
- Thread starter FroggyOne2
- Start date
- Dec 21, 2007
- 15,222
- 45,018
- Disclosures
- Lark in the Morning Instructional Videos; Audix Microphones
Don't want to bust anyone's bubble, but the song was about a prevalent adult entertainment in San Francisco (probably elsewhere). Naked woman behind a glass window. You pay your dollar, the curtain goes up for a minute (or whatever). Comes back down and you have to put in another buck... The whole "step right up" thing was the barkers out front hustling guys in.
Good idea. Those are past due, sorry about that. I just picked it up to take those photos, then had to plug it in. Then suddenly a bunch of time magically passed (oops!), and I realized I had better get myself back down out of sonic heaven and put it away and get back to work! I will endeavor to make a recording this weekend. I will say that I think the Glock plus fretless makes for a really fantastic combination, but yet even if were passive only I would still not feel it was lacking anything. It's just icing on the cake to have the extra flexibility of being able to boost the mids on the bridge pickup solo'd - I love that tone for soloing. But for laying down a groove, man, it's tough to beat positions 2 or 3 with everything set pretty close to flat.That’s a beauty too. Do you have audio clips for that?? Inquiring minds want to know!
Electronics:
-FD3s pick ups. I went for clean articulation vs the added “girth” of the FDVs. I think I made the right choice as this bass has a huge amount of presence in passive alone.
-Darkglass tone capsule. I was originally thinking that with all the mid control this would be an incredible pre to have on a fretless and honestly, I’m just not quite sure yet. That said, in the past, for my liking it’s always taken me a bit to “learn” how to dial in the DGTC to my liking and then fall in love with it. I assume this won’t be different and I cannot jump to any initial conclusions. I am very tempted to swap the glockenklang out of my other one. I’ve loved the glockenklang 3 band for along time and think it would do incredible things for a fretless. Ala Damien Rocca esq.
- ordered with D bird switch but arrived with 3x. Easy fix. The 6 position that every one talks about sure is tempting.
Some first impressions....... but with reservation:
- it was a very long day yesterday BEFORE I got to retrieve this thing. I was quite tired and honestly as level as I felt after a 715 day wait there was definitely some anxiousness and a bit more Adrenalin pumping then I realized.
I pulled the bass out of its case at L and M as Ranjit was equally excited to bear witness to this new creation. When I gave it an initial lift I was surpirised how light it was. I thought “man, this thing might be under 9lbs!”....... that was Adrenalin super strength...
It got heavier as the night progressed to a respectable bathroom scale 9.9lbs.
This is more what I expected it to be. Lol. That one fact alone explained to me how significant of an Adrenalin rush I was actually on without knowing.
- I have no side dot markers. I did this as I did not want them in between the fret lines but instead located on the fret lines which was not an option from Dingwall. I figured by opting for none it left my options open to find a luthier that could perhaps help and in the meantime if need be put stickers on... even like the infamous Rasta just mark the 5 and 12 on top. Of course this, when looking down the the top of the fretboard can be a bit confusing BUT, this is quite big for me, when not looking down the neck feels very familiar and natural to me. My positioning is quite strong already on this bass and it feels incredibly natural. My hand seems to find 5,7,8,12 without hesitation.... to start with.
- I pulled off the roundwounds after 5 min of playing with them. I had to try them and hear what they sounded like but I’ve had a set of Payson(@Blues Cat ) flats sitting on standby for about 8 months.
The nickel rounds almost made this bass so comparatively close sounding to a fretted bass was my first impression and had a built in over drive quality. It could be fun to explore them again in the future.
The Payson flats feel awesome. Truly.
-Tone. I was definitely not in a position mentally last night to know where to even go with this. Not having played a freltess in a very long time and never a significant amount this is were the learning curve begins.
-I have to work with the DGTC to further understand its addition to the sound of this bass.
-I did lower the pick ups last night. The action is so crazy low and the pick ups were so incredibly tight to it that I found that they needed a bit of space from the flats (and rounds) to enhance the tone and cut the boomy aggression. I added about 3/32” to 1/8” gap which really cleaned things up. I feel that perhaps a slight amount more might enhance the tone a bit yet but I’m going to hold off on further adjustment until I feel out the action some more.
-Action. With the flats and the current set up the strings feel almost invisible. An incredibly light touch is all that is required. Tapping feels incredibly fast but getting into the upper register( towards 12 on the D G C ) the bass snarl is significant and I’m not sure if I want to remove a bit of that snarl yet. I think this could be down with a slight adjustment to the action. It sounds really Phuc’n good. No question but now that I’m truly entering fretless land I don’t even know neccessarily what sound I’m primarily going for. It’s very exciting though to be embarking on a whole new tonescape exploration. I’d say the sound of this instrument may not be one of a kind but it is definitely has a very unique tone print which I’m incredibly happy to claim and mould.
In closing, this instrument definitely looks like a daunting endeavour to undertake but as I’ve seen Sheldon write, it’s not. Not really at least.
It’s a very natural transition for a long scale Dingwall player IMO. LeaRning to be a fretless player is more daunting then learning this instrument is my first impression.
Thanks for all the great feedback fellow Dingwall addicts. I’ll be sure to have some more progress with it by the end of the weekend.
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You're not mishearing it, but maybe misinterpreting it. Its probably a reference to the old-timey traveling shows, where you could see the "wonders of the world", like the Bearded lady or a wolf man, but it would "cost you a dollar". Something that jack@$$, PT Barnum, would do, charge folks a buck to "step into another world".
I got the reference and I love that tune...
Edit: Yeah, what @kesslari said...lol!
These are standard gauge Dingwall nickel strings tuned down to low A. Sounds okay to me!
IMO it’s absolutely fine. I used to run the Stainless strings in A standard on my 37” 5 string. The Payson stainless also worked great for this tuning.
Here is the first of two videos, with the mid-range frequency band selector set on the low frequencies:That’s a beauty too. Do you have audio clips for that?? Inquiring minds want to know!
And the second of two, with the mid-range frequency band selector set on the high frequencies:
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Excellent vids John.
Great playing and man what tone on that bass. Love it!
Oh. And it’s about damn time. I been asking you for that since you got it. Remember.... pay backs a bit............*%.
Ok. So nicks rounds your thinking. Monster difference between them and these flats.
I need to hear proof. A recording is worth a thousand words.
I need to hear proof. A recording is worth a thousand words.
so how long have you had yours now?
AWESOME!!!! Thanks so much! I want one!!! Surprise surprise! Nice playing agreed, and love the punchiness on the jazz setting. Thanks for taking the time sir.
