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Feels like FLATS sounds like ROUNDS?

#41
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I haven't tried the white Tapewounds yet but the regular black tapes were a little brighter than a broken in set of Chromes. It takes a while for the Chromes to settle in but they do lose a fair amount of their high end after a couple of months of playing whereas the tapes just keep chugging along unchanged.
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Ok, fair enough.
True, that's the beauty of tapewounds, there's nowhere for the gunk to accumulate!

As I've eluded to previously, by my experience you do need to be very thorough with cleaning Chromes if you want them to stay bright.
 
#42
GBassNorth said:
La Bella Tapewounds are about as middle of the road between rounds and flats as I have found.
Very very smooth on slides and fretting, zero finger noise, relatively low tension unlike most flats I've tried, not thuddy at all, not overly bright but much brighter than Chrome flats I've tried. Overall a very unique string in feel and sound.
I use them on all my Jazz basses, they last forever and ever with no change in tone. Going on year 8 with one of my sets and they still sound the same as day one.
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Surprised that there's not more love for the LaBella tape wounds in this thread. I was first exposed to them when I bought my second Rick Turner with a set of black tape wounds installed. Since then, I've explored a bit more, and the white tape wounds seem to me to be as close to a round wound sound as you can get while eliminating the string noise at the same time.
 
#43
mimaz said:
Surprised that there's not more love for the LaBella tape wounds in this thread. I was first exposed to them when I bought my second Rick Turner with a set of black tape wounds installed. Since then, I've explored a bit more, and the white tape wounds seem to me to be as close to a round wound sound as you can get while eliminating the string noise at the same time.
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I'm kinda surprised as well. The OP was looking for something that feels like flats - the La Bella tapes nail that one. And sound like rounds - the La Bella's are probably 80% to 90% there as well. I haven't tried the whites but I'm told they are a bit brighter than the black tapes, if that's true it might get even closer to what the OP is looking for.
 
#45
mimaz said:
Surprised that there's not more love for the LaBella tape wounds in this thread ... white tape wounds seem to me to be as close to a round wound sound as you can get while eliminating the string noise at the same time.
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Seriously? I'm surprised. I've never played on tape wounds, but I had the impression they were even thuddier than flats. Shows what I know. :hmm:

Now if only they weren't twice the price of other strings, I might give them a shot.
 
#47
ulynch said:
Seriously? I'm surprised. I've never played on tape wounds, but I had the impression they were even thuddier than flats. Shows what I know. :hmm:

Now if only they weren't twice the price of other strings, I might give them a shot.
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3234718 said:
The black labella tapes are fairly thuddy. The white tapes are very bright.

This is a pretty good demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNdiB2gAUSA
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From what I have experienced so far, going from "thud" to "bright", the order would be like this:

Flats
Black Tape
White Tape
Roundwound

Obviously, that's a fairly simple explanation, as different brands and models of the flats and rounds have their individual characteristics, but just meant to be a generalization.
 
#48
mimaz said:
From what I have experienced so far, going from "thud" to "bright", the order would be like this:

Flats
Black Tape
White Tape
Roundwound

Obviously, that's a fairly simple explanation, as different brands and models of the flats and rounds have their individual characteristics, but just meant to be a generalization.
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A massive generalization but I agree with it.
I also find the La Bella tapes to be the most round wound sounding of all the tapes I've tried and the Roto tapes to be the most flat wound sounding of all the tapes I've tried. The Fender tapes were somewhere in the middle of the two. And from the sound of it the La Bella white tapes may even be right in the same sonic spot with many nickel rounds or maybe even an older set of stainless rounds.
I'm gonna give the white tape light gauge strings a try on my next string purchase. I say light gage only because I found the regular gauge required the nut on my bass to be regrooved to allow the strings to sit properly.
 

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