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Double Bass Good old Gut sound

#61
Brent Nussey said:
I think we can both agree it's one of the finest bass sounds ever recorded, and I'd also add that I agree with you that it's not like his later metal sound, and really much closer to his gut sound at the time. Probably he was still using basically the same setup and technique as with gut, and also I don't think those are Spirocores, maybe something else. Not to mention he was still hearing the sound the same way at that point, I would imagine.
Click to expand...

John Clayton has that bass now and of course has it set up his way with Obligatos, but you can hear some of that quality in it.

If the sound is a combination of;

Bass
Strings
Setup
Hands
Recording

Then, I'd say it has 2 of the 5 still with it. Same bass and John's got a lot of Mr. Brown's hands in him. I would like to think that I would have recognized that bass from the sound, but I recognized it visually when he took it out of the case. It's distinct, beautiful instrument.

And yes, that record is a clinic on great walking bass lines.

Troy
 
#62
Brent Nussey said:
I think we can both agree it's one of the finest bass sounds ever recorded, and I'd also add that I agree with you that it's not like his later metal sound, and really much closer to his gut sound at the time. Probably he was still using basically the same setup and technique as with gut, and also I don't think those are Spirocores, maybe something else. Not to mention he was still hearing the sound the same way at that point, I would imagine.
Brent
Click to expand...
After using gut strings and before switching to the Spirocores, Ray was an endorser for the Lycos steel strings (from Denmark; they disappeared in the mid-sixties). There's a thread about these Lycon strings already.
However, I love this recording, too. I have played along these tunes very often, and tried to catch some of Ray's gimmicks. His use of double stops is great.
 
#63
Unbelievable. Last year, Talkbass was the home of the die-hard steel players and Rockabillybass.com was the place to go to talk about guts. Now it seems the situation has reversed. There are a lot more steel slappers on RABB.com now, and a lot more gut players here. Yet, I try to convince my wife that steel vs. gut is why I need two basses and she's not buying it.
 
#65
I have only been playing upright about a month, but I stumbled upon this thread and if the sound on Roy's bass was gut strings (plus great hands of course,) then I really want to try gut.



I only have one upright though and although most of the time I would be playing it at indoor gigs, I would love to take it to bluegrass festivals and the Kerrville Folk Festival.

I have Spirocore Weichs on right now and I am just learning to do a single and double slap and working on Simandl and major and minor scales in the safety zone of half and first position. I like the Spirocore, but I keep reading about the gut tone and the video of Roy playing clinched it.

How far and how often do the gut strings slip outside with temperature and humidity changes? Are we talking about having to retune all four strings after every song or every 20 minutes or what?

If anyone knows exactly what kind of strings Roy Jr. used, please let me know.

By the way, I can't stop playing this thing!! I have been playing Pbass for 35 years and it is nowhere near as fun to play as the upright. It is humbling, but I am getting there slowly...... first stop, beginner bluegrass jams.....

Thanks,
bilco
Bill Colbert
 
#66
I only play outside occasionally but I've honestly found with the Gamuts that the tuning problem is not a really big deal. I do recall back when I used Olivs and Eudoxas that I found them to be more unstable. At least that's what I recall. This would all tend to suggest to me that the higher quality guts are more stable but it's only a theory. I actually also wonder whether wound gut strings (like the Olivs and Eudoxas) are more likely to go out of tune than the unwound guts (like the Gamut G and D) because of the two different materials present in the string.
 
#67
I had a little gig last night for some of our friends that wanted us to play, we said yeah sure. there was 3 bands including us, the 2 other bass players asked to used my bass, because the sound post fell off the other bass. I have an upton Es9 with a wrapped Lenzer Gut E and clef gut A D G, all 4 strings stayed in tune just fine, but I noticed they started to pickup the moisture in the air. They started to get kinda soggy and sticky. I kept trying to wipe them down with my sweater to soak up as much moisture as possible and started to get a little worried because I didnt want a broken set of guts. well as soon as the last band played I put the bass back in my upton bag and put the bass in the house.

My question is... should I be worrying about anything??? did I just take a whole bunch of life out of my strings?

I have a 2 gigs tonight both outside I'm going to be taking the guts of my es9, and either putting the superflexibles or the innovation supersilver slaps, not sure yet, because my upton shen is at world of strings getting a magnetic pickup installed.

Thanks
Art
 
#72
Man I forgot about this thread.
I now think Oscar Peterson's "We Get Requests" has Ray Brown playing steel strings. But sometimes I still swear I can hear a gut sound coming off of them.....it's so close to his sound on "Night Train".
The thing with Ray Brown is that he didn't get a gut sound like P.C. or Mingus; Ray would make gut strings sound like steel.
Either way, both albums have some of the greatest bass playing in history.
 
#73
musicman5string said:
Man I forgot about this thread.
I now think Oscar Peterson's "We Get Requests" has Ray Brown playing steel strings. But sometimes I still swear I can hear a gut sound coming off of them.....it's so close to his sound on "Night Train".
The thing with Ray Brown is that he didn't get a gut sound like P.C. or Mingus; Ray would make gut strings sound like steel.
Either way, both albums have some of the greatest bass playing in history.
Click to expand...
Or maybe he made steels sound like gut!
:)
 
#74
Well, what we know are definitely steel string recordings of his have a certain chatacter that are different from what we know as guts. "Night Train" I think we all can agree, was recorded with guts. Compare that with "We Get Requests" which is in contention and you'll see what I mean. So close. But fast forward to any of the Ray Brown Trio stuff and it's Spirocores all the way.
Then again, I will admit that "Killer Joe" has a certain tone that while certainly steels, was recorded old school style that masks the brightness of steels.
 
#76
At the risk of starting yet another firestorm of "what was HE playing on THAT tune?", I sort of accidentally started listening to some Mingus- and I noticed on the CD case, it looked like he was playing gut strings. Plain G and D and silver- maybe silver wound A and E. So I "image Googled" Mingus and, in every photo I found, it looked like he had guts on his bass. Not a comprehensive or scientific study by any means, but it seems like he never switched..... Any replies?
 
#78
That is exactly right, Francois. I remember an interveiw he gave in an old Downbeat from about 1975-6. It was an all-bass edition of the magazine and I still remember that he said he used gut strings and that as far as he knew the only other person that was doing the same was {in his words} "that little kid who plays with Ornette" (Charlie Haden)
Later on I saw him at a jazz club in Boulder CO and he had metal strings and a Polytone PU. He hardly touched the bass during the performance as he was quite sick and was using a walker. Instad he leaned up against the piano and directed the band............but when he did play it was POWERFUL.
 
#79
How do Labella Strings rank in the Gut world these days. I heard that they are no longer making them in house and are importing them in from Europe.[/QUOTE] from Ken Smith post.

Some thirty years ago I used Artone Gut strings on my D and G strings. When they wore out I tried the La Bellas and was extremely dissapointed. About then years ago, I tried them again and they hadn't become any better.
Maybe it's better if they are farming them out to someone else now.
 
#80
I have two basses. One has steels (thin spiro weichs) and the other, my main performing bass, has all Barefoot larry's hillbilly slap strings. They are basically weedwhackers, cost 20 bucks for the whole set, feel better then guts (because they are smooth) almost never go out of tune, and after having them for a few months, they really started to settle in. I have had them for about 3 years now. I started with guts, but becuase I live in an area with high humidity changes, guts won't work without me anticipating dry santa ana winds, and detuning the bass all the time.
 

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