Elites Player Series: nickel-plated rounds

[Ricky Rioli]

I get the impression that once upon a time, The Bass Centre in London was quite an institution. These days, they sell their own range of basses, eg



and their Elites strings. For no particular reason, I've been curious about their Stadium and Player series for ages, without being able to find out anything much about them. Aside from the fact that they do a Peter Hook Signature set of the steel rounds: 60-65-85-105 (seriously)

I've finally had enough of wondering, and have just ordered a custom 50-65-85-110 set of the nickel-plated Players, which I'll try on a bass normally strung with Roto Bass 50-70-90-110.

The blurb says "Versatile and smooth, Player Series strings feature a nickel alloy with less high-end attack and a pronounced mid-range definition, reducing finger noise and delivering a warm, rich, full tone." Which might reasonably be applied to most the nickel-plated strings available, no?

There's a rumour atm that the strings are made by GHS, which gives me hope that if nothing else the strings are decent quality.

 

[Ricky Rioli]

A couple of days ago, I cut the forefinger on my left hand, so no real playing atm. But I have been able to put these strings on my SB-1

Since the trussrod is maxed out, I had hoped that replacing the 50-70-90-110 Roto Bass with these 50-65-85-110 Elites Players would take a bit of tension off the neck, but it doesn't seem to have made any difference at all.

Judging by the feel, the 50 G is keeping the total high – it feels much stiffer than the rest, stiffer than the Pro Steel 50 G on my LB-100. I guess I'll buy a 45 and 105 play around.

I'll save talking about tone for when I'm able to play properly, but signs are encouraging.

There are no silks. I've never removed the silks from a string to see how they differ from uncovered strings. Presumably something like these:

Along with the paper sleeves, this gives the impression of unnecessary expense being avoided!