Fender Japan Elemental Series Bass

[bronislas]

Congrats!

Regarding the "boomy" tone, may I ask how you have the EQ set on the bass?

You may already know/understand this, so my apologies in advance, and I mean no offense. The Elemental has a bit of an odd setup in that the high and low eq are boost-ONLY. That means that "flat" is all the way "back" or fully counter-clockwise. If both EQ knobs are rolled midway up, or all the way up (fully clockwise) then the highs and lows are boosted significantly, which consequentially buries the mids that are so important to note definition and clarity. Notice that on the EQ knobs' rotation, there is no "center detent" to indicate "flat."

I played mine in a rock band setting over the weekend and just today got to listen to some GoPro recordings our guitar player took. I played the bass itself with both pickups on full with the EQs on the bass completely flat, and at the ToneHammer 500 I added just a little low and low mids, and cut some treble. Sounded great, and I didn't have to crank the volume to be present in the mix. Just level-matching and G2G.

You are right that it can have a massive low end, though! With the lows boosted, a pro-level friend of mine commented "Wow, that sounds a lot like some old Ken Smith action right there! So thick and meaty!" But with the lows flat/off, that side of things doesn't really come out too much for me.

Thank you for the insight but the EQ knobs were already set to flat. It is not a problem though, it means that it is a bass with its own sound signature, very different from my Blacktop Jazz Bass and my Ltd AP-4 that, in my opinion, already have a lot of personality.

I mainly use my basses to record music with a lot of synths, guitars, drum machines, effects, so the mixes can get very busy. I prefer to record the bass directly in a DI box, so I don't use amps any more, but I have a Tech21 VT Bass that can tame the low and bring more mids, and I still have the possibility to use a VST plugin to sculpt the sound.

More importantly it is an instrument that inspires me to play more or different things. It's difficult to explain but it is so ergonomic, so easy to play that I concentrate on what I play currently.

 

[2fngrdeathpunch]

It's here, and it's awesome!

I've had it for a week or so now, got a bit delayed, and it's by far the best bass I've owned, and probably played also. I haven't found any faults, and believe me, I've looked.

I've had quite a few basses by now, from Squier to am Fender, Lakland, Sandberg, and there's always something bugging me about them, but not with this, it's perfectly made.

I don't know if the neck is plek'ed, but the fretwork is simply perfect, and the neck it self a piece of art.

The bridge is the same as on my Pro II precision, where I had trouble getting the action low enough before it bottomed out, on this the bridge is countersunk, no problem.

And I find the sound to have quite a bit of character actually, and not as scooped with both pickups on as singlecoils.
I was worried that the boost only EQ would bother me, but not so far, I just tweaked my presets to have some treble headroom.

Tried it out on rehearsal yesterday, and with the last dual humbucker bass I had, a G&L l2000, I struggled to have it sit in the mix, but this just worked great. Even level all over the neck, and I could hear every note, works great with distortion.

Couldn't be happier with it, I will wear this one down I think. And it's so beautiful, and unique looking too, the best looking bass I've had according the rest of the band. And most importantly, it makes me want to play!

So thank you James for GASing me up for this one, I certainly don't regret it!

Cheers
Espen

 

[Max Marchini]

I just had mine and I can confirm all the impressions written by our friends here. Me too haven't had much time to play it yet, but it's really beautifully crafted, full of the attention to details one expects from japs. The sound is totally different from a traditional jazz bass. It's very mellow and fat, but has a peculiar, original voice. Very happy so far.

 

[MisterMagician]

Why does Japan get all the cool stuff?View attachment 4906176

Try this:
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[musicman556]

View attachment 5267157

It's here, and it's awesome!

I've had it for a week or so now, got a bit delayed, and it's by far the best bass I've owned, and probably played also. I haven't found any faults, and believe me, I've looked.

I've had quite a few basses by now, from Squier to am Fender, Lakland, Sandberg, and there's always something bugging me about them, but not with this, it's perfectly made.

I don't know if the neck is plek'ed, but the fretwork is simply perfect, and the neck it self a piece of art.

The bridge is the same as on my Pro II precision, where I had trouble getting the action low enough before it bottomed out, on this the bridge is countersunk, no problem.

And I find the sound to have quite a bit of character actually, and not as scooped with both pickups on as singlecoils.
I was worried that the boost only EQ would bother me, but not so far, I just tweaked my presets to have some treble headroom.

Tried it out on rehearsal yesterday, and with the last dual humbucker bass I had, a G&L l2000, I struggled to have it sit in the mix, but this just worked great. Even level all over the neck, and I could hear every note, works great with distortion.

Couldn't be happier with it, I will wear this one down I think. And it's so beautiful, and unique looking too, the best looking bass I've had according the rest of the band. And most importantly, it makes me want to play!

So thank you James for GASing me up for this one, I certainly don't regret it!

Cheers
Espen

AWESOME! I am so happy for you! Funny enough, I had a crazy busy week of playing last week, along with a new pedalboard that I was dialing in. What bass did I use ALL WEEKEND? The Elemental! It was still just as spectacular as the day I got it.

The new pedalboard - main 3 "always on" pedals are 1) Broughton HPF/LPF 2) Universal Audio 1176 and 3) Aguilar Tone Hammer preamp. These have been PERFECT in helping me work around my mild-dissatisfaction with the boost-only EQ on the bass. The Broughton is just AWESOME. I can just trim off the top end at the pedal, as well as cut out the fat/mud at the bottom. Right now I've got the HPF set about 40hz, and what's awesome is that it allows me to really add in some bass/lows on the Tone Hammer without it turning into a wooly mess. It further enhances the "thick" character of the bass!

Here's a link queued up to a part the service where you can hear the bass pretty well, if you want.

I just had mine and I can confirm all the impressions written by our friends here. Me too haven't had much time to play it yet, but it's really beautifully crafted, full of the attention to details one expects from japs. The sound is totally different from a traditional jazz bass. It's very mellow and fat, but has a peculiar, original voice. Very happy so far.

Congrats Max! I hope you love it more and more as you get time to play it!

Just for funsies, here's a pic of my gig rig. You may notice that both of these basses are Japanese, haha!