- Dec 28, 2009
- 2,053
- 1,380
- Disclosures
- Endorsed by K.B. Guitars, Nordstrand Audio Pickups, Von York Strings and Gallien-Krueger Amps.
I have a huge Nordstrand Audio fan of literally everything they currently make, and have made in the past. Carey, and everyone at Nordstrand Audio has treated me incredibly well over the years and even if I did not have a sponsorship deal with them, Nordstrand Audio pickups and pre-amps would still be the only pickups and pre-amps that I would use in my basses and guitars.
With short scale basses, I currently do not own any of them right now but if I ever did decide to buy one, you can bet that it would definitely be a Nordstrand Acinonyx short scale bass. I actually do plan on buying at least 2 of those basses one day and will definitely own them at some point in the near future but at the moment, I am still thinning out the heard of other guitars and basses that I simply don’t really ever play anymore. Once I do that and have some extra spending cash to buy more/other gear with, one of the first basses that I plan on buying will be a Nordstrand Acinonyx short scale bass.
The reason why I’ll have 2 is because I always buy my basses in pairs as far as make, models, number of strings and matching electronics goes. Many years ago, when I was just starting out in the mid to late 80’s, I had the opportunity to meet Billy Sheehan at a free bass clinic that he was putting on at a local music store in my home town of El Cajon, California which is in the East County of San Diego, California.
At the free bass clinic that Mr. Sheehan put on, I learned so many things from him, at just that 1 single bass clinic that was only a few hours long, and are things that I still do and practice to this day, over 30 years later.
The 3 biggest things that I remember him teaching was the technique and warm up exercises as well as the cool down exercises that he would do every single day, before, during and after he would get done playing, in regards to his finger style of playing. It would be because of that free bass clinic that Mr. Sheehan did, that would make me switch over to playing bass more finger style predominantly, a majority of the time as opposed to just playing bass using a pic. I still do use a pic on occasion for certain things but for the most part, probably at least 90% of the time, I play my basses using more finger style techniques that he taught me and many others that day.
The next thing that he taught and shared his opinion on was playing on just 1 style of bass because so much muscle memory as well as more consistent and higher quality of playing will develop because a persons playing will be a lot more totally automatic because your used to the type of tone wood used, weight, balance points, ergonomics, length and width of the neck and fretboard, number of strings, as well as pickup position and kind of pickups that are inside the bass, in addition to an almost identical tone and sound of the piece being played. Mastering just that 1 single type of instrument will make that musician so much better on that 1 single instrument as opposed to if they had a variety of basses. Obviously any musician can play any make and model of whatever instruments that they know how to play but on that 1 specific instrument, that musician will be a much better player when using it or another instrument that is identical to that main specific one that they’ve got and play all the time.
The last thing that Mr. Sheehan taught me and all of the other people at this free bass clinic that he had put on, and what also had really stuck out to me as well, in addition to also, somewhat tying into the last thing that I just mentioned in my previous paragraph, was to buy your instruments in pairs, in literally, every single manner possible, except for maybe the color and/or finish of the instruments, to try and own at the very minimum, of at least 3 instruments of those that are identical in every way so you can have a main and a backup instrument, as well as a back up to your back up should 1 or more of the instruments you are playing with either in rehearsal, the recording studio and/or live at a show, have an issue and/or have something break on it. Of course, if you then have a set list with different songs using different tuning, and/or requiring some songs to be played on a 5 and/or 6 string bass, whereas other songs may only require a standard 4 string bass, in order for all of the different songs to be played. Having to then buy at least 3 of every one of those basses could get real expensive and in a hurry too.
