Well now I’m coming back around on the aged pearl. Lol. I’ll just buy all the colors and swap them out every other week.
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EBMM StingRay Special Club
- Thread starter MultiScaleMale
- Start date
I like black and tort best. I think I actually like the tort slightly more on your bass.
Brandon Shea
Commercial User
Not bad, actually! White pearl is an interesting one, and it goes oddly well with pretty much anything. All four of my basses have white pearl pickguards (two aged, two regular) at the moment.
I like the white. It really pops and you already have a dark pickguard now. I'd go for the change. White pearl could be nice as well.
Hey all, its new bass day for me after long awaiting. I posted a seperate thread going over some of the background on how i ended up with a second, but long story short i loved my first one so much i decided it would be better to get another than do a build / try something else haha. So i order this back in January, and im not sure if I caught them when they were doing thier 2026 builds - but i just recieved it today which was a bit surprising to me since most peoples CDE's took only a few months - worth the wait though.
The color on this thing is crazy, im so happy with it and its hard to even get a proper picture of how it actually looks, theres alot of depth and its just a really dark royal purple, its great. The fretjob and fit and finish are great too. Whats interesting is I got a 4HH this time around to justify to myself that im not just re-buying the exact same bass in purple. I was expected to like Position 1 and Position 2 (Jazz bass basicallly) the most with the others being meh, and so far im actually digging Position 4 (outer coils) by far the most even more than just the classic MM bridge bucker soloed. I need to wait for band practice to play with it in the mix but everything else sounds usable but just 1 and 4 to me sound the best all around.
I went with an SLO neck since i normally play Jazz basses prior to 2 years ago when i got my first SRS, and although its comfortable and still good, i was definately expecting it to be closer to my laklands or Fender J necks, but its still a pretty chonky boy - thats on me for buying a neck carve blind, and as stated it still feels great i was just expecting a thinner profile as you went down the neck.
A small nitpick, there is alot of mineral streaking in my neck and headstock, im going to be honest, im not a fan lol, i thought it was a bunch of grain filler at first. I know its part of wood and it gets amplified when its torrified during roasting but for an instrument this price im surprised its as prominent as it is for the quality of wood that is supposed to be used. That said, i barely see it, it doesnt affect feel or tone, and im over the moon on the rest of the bass asthetically and playability wise that i wouldn't send it back even if i wanted to be a bit of a Karen.
One last thing i wanted to comment on, which ive commented on here quite a bit over the past few years.. i don't know whats going on in the EBMM spraying rooms, but man.... I got super lucky and i actually prefer the fact that mine is very very dark purple, but this is the 2nd bass i got from them where the finish doesn't match whats on their site or sent out for stock photos to music stores. The stock photo is a mettalic darkish purple quickly fading to a pale pearly purple. While looking up other Grape Crush rays in anticipation of receiving mine ive seen some that look Blue on the border to purple, purple border into almost pink, and mine is basically almost all Dark purple, it barely even looks like it gradients - especially in person. As stated, i actually love this and prefer it to the stock images, but from the stories about bad neck pockets, seeing the variation of finish online made me almost as anxious as excited to open this up - gladly the neckpocket is solid, no shim needed and i got lucky that i prefer the offspec paint. This also happened to my frost green pearl where it was supposed to be very dark green/turqoise fading to a pearly green in the middle, and the one i received and many others later in the run ended up with basically a black border into a pearly green - i kept it because it still looked nice and played and sounded great!
Anyways super pumped to get this to practice next week and play with all the tones on it!
The color on this thing is crazy, im so happy with it and its hard to even get a proper picture of how it actually looks, theres alot of depth and its just a really dark royal purple, its great. The fretjob and fit and finish are great too. Whats interesting is I got a 4HH this time around to justify to myself that im not just re-buying the exact same bass in purple. I was expected to like Position 1 and Position 2 (Jazz bass basicallly) the most with the others being meh, and so far im actually digging Position 4 (outer coils) by far the most even more than just the classic MM bridge bucker soloed. I need to wait for band practice to play with it in the mix but everything else sounds usable but just 1 and 4 to me sound the best all around.
I went with an SLO neck since i normally play Jazz basses prior to 2 years ago when i got my first SRS, and although its comfortable and still good, i was definately expecting it to be closer to my laklands or Fender J necks, but its still a pretty chonky boy - thats on me for buying a neck carve blind, and as stated it still feels great i was just expecting a thinner profile as you went down the neck.
A small nitpick, there is alot of mineral streaking in my neck and headstock, im going to be honest, im not a fan lol, i thought it was a bunch of grain filler at first. I know its part of wood and it gets amplified when its torrified during roasting but for an instrument this price im surprised its as prominent as it is for the quality of wood that is supposed to be used. That said, i barely see it, it doesnt affect feel or tone, and im over the moon on the rest of the bass asthetically and playability wise that i wouldn't send it back even if i wanted to be a bit of a Karen.
One last thing i wanted to comment on, which ive commented on here quite a bit over the past few years.. i don't know whats going on in the EBMM spraying rooms, but man.... I got super lucky and i actually prefer the fact that mine is very very dark purple, but this is the 2nd bass i got from them where the finish doesn't match whats on their site or sent out for stock photos to music stores. The stock photo is a mettalic darkish purple quickly fading to a pale pearly purple. While looking up other Grape Crush rays in anticipation of receiving mine ive seen some that look Blue on the border to purple, purple border into almost pink, and mine is basically almost all Dark purple, it barely even looks like it gradients - especially in person. As stated, i actually love this and prefer it to the stock images, but from the stories about bad neck pockets, seeing the variation of finish online made me almost as anxious as excited to open this up - gladly the neckpocket is solid, no shim needed and i got lucky that i prefer the offspec paint. This also happened to my frost green pearl where it was supposed to be very dark green/turqoise fading to a pearly green in the middle, and the one i received and many others later in the run ended up with basically a black border into a pearly green - i kept it because it still looked nice and played and sounded great!
Anyways super pumped to get this to practice next week and play with all the tones on it!
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First off, congrats on a beautiful bass! Secondly you have great taste in both basses and colors. I love your Lakland and Warwick too.
I'm not surprised your digging position 4, that's the only position I really like on the HH (besides classic stingray position 1)
There’s a lot to be said. The Classic is like a regular 4 H ray from the 2010s era that’s sort of formed into an older style Stingray with the 2-band and mutes, but with some modern, luxurious touches to make it more elegant and flashy. That’s not a bad thing.4.23kgs, not too far from my Special 4HH (ash body, too - 4.04kgs). Had another Classic that was around that weight, but sounded a little worse (2-3 dead spots on the E string) - with a slightly thinner neck, I think. This one is a beast.
And never got the chance to try a Retro 70s, I'd be curious to own one...in order to compare them allHow do you compare the Retro to the Classic?
The Retro 70s is just a recreated 70s ray, plain and simple. The build quality of the one I have feels a lot like a Fender Custom Shop. It doesn’t feel at all like the Classic, it’s different. This isn’t always a good thing either. The first sunburst one I owned was a total dog. But the black one I have now leaves my speechless. Just did a week vacation in Hawaii and couldn’t stop thinking about getting back to play it.
Both my Classic and current Retro are absolutely elite examples, but for some reason I just like the feel of the Retro a little more. It’s like having a real 70s Cadillac that some old lady only drove for 300 miles. The Classic is more like a restomod Cadillac. Both are awesome.
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Did those 2010's Classics have long pole pickups? I think they might have been short pole, which would be a pretty interesting difference from the Retro 70's which uses long pole. I'd be curious to hear about that difference in sound. I guess I would expect the Retro 70's to have more mids and less treble? Does it struggle more with magnet pull warbling above the 12th fret?
Yea yours is much darker and better looking than the Google images of that color. I think it looks way better than having a more obvious gradient. Almost like it's a solid color with just a little interest added.
Please recommend some tone settings to help tame the growl of my stingray special 5H. I love the way the bass feels and plays, but I would like to soften the tone a bit. I’ve been messing with knobs and moving the switch around, lol, but I’m struggling to find a tone that just sits nicely in the mix and doesn’t growl like a junkyard pitbull. Ok, I know that’s the stingray “thing” but I keep reading that these specials can dial that back. Am I missing something?
I don't have a 5 string but whenever we cover sublime or country songs where the bass is like basically just a subwoofer i just crank the bass knob to 100% and it sounds woofy and full and you can barely hear the attack you just feel the notes. Im normally at 10% Treble boost, 0% Mids and 15% bass.a
You mentioned you already played with the knobs but cutting the treble and mids should also help it be less agressive, althought even without cutting the highs and boosting bass i usually get a pretty full and mellow tone. If thats still not working your amp or pre has knobs
Yup I’ve definitely played around with knobs and switches, lol. I’m just hoping someone just puts something out there that I hadn’t thought of yet. I definitely haven’t really boosted the bass like you suggested. I’ll try it.I don't have a 5 string but whenever we cover sublime or country songs where the bass is like basically just a subwoofer i just crank the bass knob to 100% and it sounds woofy and full and you can barely hear the attack you just feel the notes. Im normally at 10% Treble boost, 0% Mids and 15% bass.a
You mentioned you already played with the knobs but cutting the treble and mids should also help it be less agressive, althought even without cutting the highs and boosting bass i usually get a pretty full and mellow tone. If thats still not working your amp or pre has knobs
What strings do you use? Go with nickel if you want to tame it a bit. I find putting it in series and rolling off treble all the way gets it pretty mellow. I still would leave bass and mids slightly boosted
I’m all over the place with strings. Ive tried a little bit of everything. I’ve currently got Cobalt Flats on there right now, and while those tame the treble, they sound a bit growly and nasally. If I drop the onboard mid control down a little under center detent, it sounds great by itself but gets swallowed my the band mix.
I’ve liked DR Pure Blues on this bass in the past and may just go back to those. I’m actually waiting on a set of black beauties to be delivered and curious what a coated string will do for this bass.
You got some advice on preamp settings. Strings are another thing you can look at. Stingrays are quite reactive to string choices. I usually play with stainless steel strings. Upping the bass and reducing the mids and treble can help it mellow out when needed. Even just dropping the mids reduces aggression. Switching to nickel rounds or flats changes the sound and give you a mellower tone.
Another option is pickup height. You can play with that as well.
Hmm good idea with pickup height. I haven’t touched that yet.
The thing I found is that once I make it sound super smooth practicing solo, it drops all of the stuff that makes it intelligible live. So I just boost the lows some on-board, and I'll cut a bit around 400Hz on my head.
Edit: For context, I'm also using the cobalt flats on a 5HH.
Pure Blues sound great on the Specials. I never got along with any of the Cobalt strings so didn't use them long enough to give advice there.
I agree that rolling off mids is usually a bad idea in regards to being heard in a mix. Depends on context of course, as well as mid frequency. If you have multiple mid freqs on your amp or preamp you can experiment with rolling off some of the higher mids and boosting some of the regular to low mids. High mids often give some growl to the sound
