Identify the SX vs. Fender in the mix thread

[Darkstrike]

And a modded Fender wouldn't be pointed out in a test like this?

Uh huh.

Yeah, but it would still be a Fender, just a modded one.

Rather than "since you changed the pickup, its not an SX anymore"


I changed the pickups, and bridge in my Fender fretless, believe it or not, its still a Fender.

 

[mongo2]

So far I've seen nothing that negates the basic fact in this thread:

An SX with a Lollar pickup performed as well as a Pre-CBS Fender.

 

[Surly]

I also think a good P-bass sounds like a good P-bass. I use my Squier 60's P along with my American. The "real" Fender just feels better to my hands on most days.

 

[stingray69]

The fact that the basses are not standing out (soloed) and are instead obscured in the mix seems to be okay with people who want the SX to be equal. It is clearly not much of a test to anyone with an ounce of objectivity unless they're trying to prove that either bass sits in a mix like this.

I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts on all the previous failed attempts in A/B threads that were more to your "liking" i.e., the ones without backing tracks, & stock pickups in the recording.

But it's not just about recorded sound.

At least for some. For example, there are basses that can record fine and disappear in a live mix without a lot of work. If you're someone who doesn't want to do a lot of work to stand out in a live mix...

I'm not sure how the stock P or Lollar P pickups are, but SX's ceramic jazz pu's are some of the hottest out there - more so than many purported "hot" Alnico aftermarket pickups I've used (Nordstrands, DiMarzio's, SCN's, Tesla's, etc). They are noticeably louder than MIA's stock pickups - not overwhelming so, but entirely noticeable. In fact, in another thread (TB'er Chunger) sent back a set of Nordstrands requesting an overwind to be able to compete volume-wise with the stock SX pickups that were pulled out of it. I've never been remotely close to being buried in a live mix with guitars, hard hitting drums, keys, etc., if you're trying to correlate that notion to SX basses, I'm not buying it. Real world experience states otherwise. I don't imagine the SX P-basses are a wild exception to the J's. I highly doubt Savit's P-bass is gonna be lost in a mix anytime soon, replacement pu or not.

 

[Brad Johnson]

Yeah, but it would still be a Fender, just a modded one.

Rather than "since you changed the pickup, its not an SX anymore"


I changed the pickups, and bridge in my Fender fretless, believe it or not, its still a Fender.

So it would be noted. Not a stock Fender, a modded one. Which is the same thing people are saying about a modded SX not being a stock one. Maybe you think they are saying it's no longer an SX, period.

 

[Brad Johnson]

So far I've seen nothing that negates the basic fact in this thread:

An SX with a Lollar pickup performed as well as a Pre-CBS Fender.

Of coure you don't.

 

[Eublet]

These threads are so tiresome. I have an SX that I bought for my son. I had a couple of students who had SX jazz basses. I have played them, along with a few others that folks have bought based on my recommendation alone. Budget was always the concern. They are good basses for the money.

I dig that some folks want to buy them and mod them. All good!

I get so tired of folks wanting to compare them to the real thing though and try to make their case for why they are just as good. I know some folks who do that around here say they've owned a lot of nice instruments, but I really have to wonder if that's true. All the SX's I've owned or played and felt like cheap basses. They sounded fine in a mix. Big deal. They still felt and played like a Walmart bass to me. If some folks are cool with that, or if they want to spend a lot of time and/or money getting the thing to play and feel better, then that's all good to. Yeah, most folks won't be able to tell it's not a Fender by listening to it. Big deal.

 

[Brad Johnson]

I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts on all the previous failed attempts in A/B threads that were more to your "liking" i.e., the ones without backing tracks, & stock pickups in the recording.

Sure. In a nutshell I think they by and large suck. For all the reasons I've already mentioned. I think they are largely useless and a waste of time. Yet people happily indulge in them.


Here's a real life example of my basic point: my friends and I sometimes hang at a local music store (Atomic Music). We play instruments and basically shoot the breeze. More times than I can count someone has stood on the periphery and waited until one of us had put a bass back on the wall and then took it to the cash register and bought it... based on what they heard one of us do with the bass. Quite often the bass will end up back in the store, acording to the salespeople, because it no longer sounded like they thought it did.

It sounded like it did largely because of who was playing it. and you could've handed it to any of a dozen of us and gotten a completely different idea of what the bass sounded like.

And that's just a small part of what a bass can or can't do. Playing in the store or at home can tell you next to nothing nothing about how it'll do live in the mix or elsewhere. And as I've mentioned a ton of times here on TB, I know guys who can make anything sound like crap. So does that make the instrument or gear they're playing crap? Nope. I know guys who can make damn near anything sound great... the same question applies.

And that's only addressing the sound aspect... what about feel and playability. What about the entire ergonomic picture of the instrument?

I'm not sure how the stock P or Lollar P pickups are, but SX's ceramic jazz pu's are some of the hottest out there - more so than many purported "hot" Alnico aftermarket pickups I've used (Nordstrands, DiMarzio's, SCN's, Tesla's, etc). They are noticeably louder than MIA's stock pickups - not overwhelming so, but entirely noticeable. In fact, in another thread (TB'er Chunger) sent back a set of Nordstrands requesting an overwind to be able to compete volume-wise with the stock SX pickups that were pulled out of it. I've never been remotely close to being buried in a live mix with guitars, hard hitting drums, keys, etc., if you're trying to correlate that notion to SX basses, I'm not buying it. Real world experience states otherwise. I don't imagine the SX P-basses are a wild exception to the J's. I highly doubt Savit's P-bass is gonna be lost in a mix anytime soon, replacement pu or not.

What on Earth would make you think I'm correlating being buried in the mix to SX basses? Sorry, that sounds defensive. I clearly wrote "there are basses..." not "SX's". I've mentione no issue I have with SX's, I'd hope that would be clear by now.

You like your bass, if you were truly confident in it you'd know you don't have to prove anything to anybody about it, including me. It appears that many of you aren't that confident. So how good do you really think it is? Just an observation.

 

[Brad Johnson]

These threads are so tiresome. I have an SX that I bought for my son. I had a couple of students who had SX jazz basses. I have played them, along with a few others that folks have bought based on my recommendation alone. Budget was always the concern. They are good basses for the money.

I dig that some folks want to buy them and mod them. All good!

I get so tired of folks wanting to compare them to the real thing though and try to make their case for why they are just as good. I know some folks who do that around here say they've owned a lot of nice instruments, but I really have to wonder if that's true. All the SX's I've owned or played and felt like cheap basses. They sounded fine in a mix. Big deal. They still felt and played like a Walmart bass to me. If some folks are cool with that, or if they want to spend a lot of time and/or money getting the thing to play and feel better, then that's all good to. Yeah, most folks won't be able to tell it's not a Fender by listening to it. Big deal.

Bingo.

 

[Brad Johnson]

This is more fun than maple vs. rosewood in the mix

I call my strap Gerta. i don't know why.

 

[Darkstrike]

So it would be noted. Not a stock Fender, a modded one. Which is the same thing people are saying about a modded SX not being a stock one. Maybe you think they are saying it's no longer an SX, period.

Plenty of people have said its literally no longer an SX in this thread, Jaquo's repeatedly said it, for example.

The SX is no longer a SX with a Lollar pickup in it

Unless you know of another way to read this?


I'm in the camp that couldn't give a damn, as I see it at a few hundred bucks, to get something strikingly similar to something not only worth thousands, but increacingly rare.

 

[stingray69]

You like your bass, if you were truly confident in it you'd know you don't have to prove anything to anybody about it, including me. It appears that many of you aren't that confident. So how good do you really think it is? Just an observation.

Good question. It is not my confidence in my bass or its ability, the fact I play it reflects that. I've got 30yrs experience & the prosperity of my band at stake - I wouldn't waste my time on a bass I wasn't absolutely confident in.

How good do I think it is? I've lost count how many times I've stated exactly that.

Truth be told, when I log off TB after a rather "spirited" discussion about SX basses I chuckle sometimes at how many people try to prove to me that I can't gig with my bass or lay it down & sound just as good or better as if I had done it on my MIA Fender. All I can say is they are dead wrong. Whether they choose to believe me or not is their hang-up, not mine. No one's talking boutique hand-made basses, but a simple CNC'd bass is not exactly rocket science to replicate, yet I am amazed at the sheer volume of people who cannot believe that. Maybe that's a pill too bitter for them to take. Again, someone else's hang-up not mine. So as I said, I'm not out to prove anything, but I love to dispel BS every chance I get.

 

[Brad Johnson]

Plenty of people have said its literally no longer an SX in this thread, Jaquo's repeatedly said it, for example.

And you actually think he's saying the bass is no longer in any way shape or form an SX?

Okay. I didn't think the inference was anything less than obvious. It is no longer stock, as you would buy new.

Unless you know of another way to read this?

Yes I do. But I understand if some things need to be spelled out. Just for the sake of clarity, Jaquo, did you mean that the modded bass is no longer the brand that it is?

I'm in the camp that couldn't give a damn, as I see it at a few hundred bucks, to get something strikingly similar to something not only worth thousands, but increacingly rare.

I don't see it that way at all. It's an affordable bass. The recording just scratches the surface. Kind of like what I've been doing in this thread.

 

[mongo2]

Of coure you don't.

Look who's talking.

 

[Brad Johnson]

Good question. It is not my confidence in my bass or it's ability, the fact I play it reflects that. I've got 30yrs experience & the prosperity of my band at stake - I wouldn't waste my time on a bass I wasn't absolutely confident in.

How good do I think it is? I've lost count how many times I've stated exactly that.

Truth be told, when I log off TB after a rather "spirited" discussion about SX basses I chuckle sometimes at how many people try to prove to me that I can't gig with my bass or lay it down & sound just as good or better as if I had done it on my MIA Fender. All I can say is they are dead wrong. Whether they choose to believe me or not is their hang-up, not mine. No one's talking boutique hand-made basses, but a simple CNC'd bass is not exactly rocket science to replicate, yet I am amazed at the sheer volume of people who cannot believe that. Maybe that's a pill too bitter for them to take. Again, someone else's hang-up not mine. So as I said, I'm not out to prove anything, but I love to dispel BS every chance I get.

I wouldn't sweat what ignorant people say. People sya genuinely dumb stuff all the time. IME you can gig with anything that will hold tune and put out a signal you like. The fact that you like your bass is all that should matter. People who rag on basses simply because they don't like them are basically lame. there's no reason to do it... they can better spend their time playing or dreaming about playing whatever they like. But nooo...


I've never said anything bad about SX's because frankly I've never seen anything abou them to rag on. So ragging on them would be pretty childish IMO. Nice build at a ridiculous price. What's not to like? In the meantime I play what I like so they're not really on my purchasing radar.

Congrats. Finding something you like and will playis what it's about. Not convincing the obstinate... besides, that leaves more for you.


By the same token, I find the idea of trying to convince others that SX's are the overall equal of XXX basses based on the narrow parameters of a thread like this to be just about as silly as the bashers.

 

[Brad Johnson]

Look who's talking.

I agreed with you wholeheartedly. YOU see this as proving that an SX with a Lollar pickup performed as well as a Pre-CBS Fender. Which brand did you give the edge as far as playability? That's a part of performing for many musicians. Right?

 

[mongo2]

I agreed with you wholeheartedly. YOU see this as proving that an SX with a Lollar pickup performed as well as a Pre-CBS Fender. Which brand did you give the edge as far as playability? That's a part of performing for many musicians. Right?

I can't comment on the basses in this thread since I've never touched them, but both of my SX J basses with stock pickups and hardware trump my AVS '75 J, '98 MIA J and my DIY Warmoth Js as far as output and eveness of response. The SXs match the others in playability with no more work than I would put into the others as far as setup. So I already knew about the plability of SX being part of "where it counts" before this thread.

For shizzle and grins I tried Bartolini 9Js and Fender '62 RI J pickups in the SXs and the Barts were quiet but sounded modern, the Fender RI J pickups make them sound like a Fender. I went back to the OEM SX pickups since they sound punchier and I get more dynamic range from the SX pickups.

As a result of all that my AVS '75 RI is up for consignment and the other non-SX Js will follow. Except for the '98 MIA J since my son wants it. He likes the transparent white color and the tortoise guard.

 

[JimmyM]

98 was a fantastic year for american jazz basses...wish i never sold my 98. just got too heavy for me and i needed the money for other stuff.

anyway, here's the deal...in the hands of a good player, the bass is immaterial. if you can get it done on a $100 sx, you're still getting it done. if you can't but you can get it done on your more expensive bass, you're still getting it done. the only one who truly matters is you.

 

[Brad Johnson]

I can't comment on the basses in this thread since I've never touched them, but both of my SX J basses with stock pickups and hardware trump my AVS '75 J, '98 MIA J and my DIY Warmoth Js as far as output and eveness of response. The SXs match the others in playability with no more work than I would put into the others as far as setup. So I already knew about the plability of SX being part of "where it counts" before this thread.

For shizzle and grins I tried Bartolini 9Js and Fender '62 RI J pickups in the SXs and the Barts were quiet but sounded modern, the Fender RI J pickups make them sound like a Fender. I went back to the OEM SX pickups since they sound punchier and I get more dynamic range from the SX pickups.

As a result of all that my AVS '75 RI is up for consignment and the other non-SX Js will follow. Except for the '98 MIA J since my son wants it. He likes the transparent white color and the tortoise guard.

This thread didn't prove any of that.

Glad you're happy with your gear.

 

[Brad Johnson]

98 was a fantastic year for american jazz basses...wish i never sold my 98. just got too heavy for me and i needed the money for other stuff.

anyway, here's the deal...in the hands of a good player, the bass is immaterial. if you can get it done on a $100 sx, you're still getting it done. if you can't but you can get it done on your more expensive bass, you're still getting it done. the only one who truly matters is you.

Exactly... so don't worry about what others think of your gear. It's your gear not theirs.