Loud "back side harmonics" thing goin' on.

[Flux Jetson]

Mornin' to yer faces folks.

I have a Y2K Cort A4, in the event you need to see it to help with my question, here it is.

Construction details:

The bass weighs 13 pounds 0 ounces strung without a strap weighed on a US Postal scale. The nut is solid brass, and the two-piece bridge/tailstop are both solid brass as well. The bridge itself is simply huge. It is countersunk fairly deep into the solid maple body so it's more massive than it appears to be. The full length lamination strips may be walnut, may be wenge, I really don't know. Frets are original and appear to be standard fare nickle/bronze/alloy of some sort. Fingerboard appears to be rosewood. It's one of the earliest A4s, without the toggle switch to bypass the active EQ and that hyper-cool two piece non-string-through bridge rig (that bridge is also a certified MOFO to set up due to it's mechanical design). Licensed Bartolini "Mk1" electronics and pickups. I bought this bass new in 2000 at my local Ma-n-Pa small town music store called Noah's Music. $675 w/a very nice heavily padded soft case.

Enough data, here's the reason I posted:

When I play it agressively (slapping/tapping or just plain laying into it) I can really hear the harmonics that are created on the nut-side of whatever note I have fretted. It adds a TON of harmonic ~ring~ and resonance to the tone, which can be quite useful and pleasent at times (if the environment suits that tone). So I guess I'm not really complaining about it, moreso just curious as to what is going on and what causes it to occur.

Lacking comparitive references:

I've owned over two dozen basses since 1990 when I first took the instrument up (been playing music, mostly keyboards, since 1977). It's been about 10 or so years since I owned/played any other bass so I can't remember if my playing style made ~that sound~ come from other basses or not. This Cort was the 2nd bass I ever bought and it survived the two-dozen-bass purchase orgy I went through for about five years. All of the others went away, but this Cort has stayed around.

Is it crap technique?:

Anyhow, what's up with that "backside harmonic" thing going on? Does my technique suck that much that I'm somehow causing it? It doesn't do it so noticably if I fret less aggressively. I am left handed but play right handed. So when I'm really going at it, I tend to hammer the frets. I play somewhat like Entwistle in the regard that I use hammered fretting and resort to open/fretted/open/fretted riffs a lot in the same way he did. Not purposely cloning his ways, I just happened to notice that I play like he does about a month ago when watching a video of him playing with Keith Emerson. I noticed his tone also has that backside harmonic thang happenin' too when he does that same open/fretted/open/fretted riffing.

Salty Dog syndrome:

I played in live/gigging bands for two decades. Played all over the southwestern USA from Vegas to LA to Phoenix to Mexico. But there's a funny thing about experience. One may say "I have twenty years of experience" .. when in actuality the truth is closer to "I have one year of experience repeated twenty times over".

Sometimes we learn bad habits early on and spend decades perfecting our crap. Is this the case here? Have I simply spent twenty years polishing a turd?

Thanks for the help.

 

[Flux Jetson]

I have several brands and types of strings around here. Everything from Ernie Ball 6-string long scale Slinky Bass strings, to Elixer 5 and 6 string sets, to DR Lo-Rider six string sets. Not being able to remember what I last strung the Cort with I figured if I measured them it might help identify what I have on it. So I got out the dial caliper. This ought to induce a chuckle or two. Look what I found out....

E= .082
A= .066
D= .047
G= .032

All round wounds.

Do you see what I did there?

A while ago (two/three years perhaps?) I was trying an experiment. I installed the smallest four strings from a six-string set and tuned the bass to A-D-G-C just to try it out. I was trying to create more of a baritone guitar with it. Well, health issues, the Veteran's Administration screwing around with me trying experimental pain management meds, the resulting depression, and ~life~ dictated that I not even pick the bass up for nearly three years. In January of this year I dumped the VA (and their unwillingness to treat my spinal injury with anything other than ~more narcotic dope~) and have reawakened my interest in music very seruiously as I "came back to the world". I obviously had forgotten about my restringing efforts. I knew that I had retuned it, but forgot that I had strung it all goofy. So I left the strings alone and simply just retuned it to E-A-D-G and went along my merry way.

So, for the past three months I've been playing this bass guitar with the strings I listed above but at standard Concert E tuning.

HA! Can you beleedatpoopie?

I think I'll have to post that in a separate thread to get that in front of everyone. I don't want to take them strings off just to compare what a set of ~normal~ guaged strings would compare like. It actually sounds pretty cool.

I've been wondering why it seemed to sound somewhat "fatter" when using an EQ setting that I didn't remember ever using with any previous success before. I think I may know why now! I was wondering why the E string seemed to be a bit short on low/low end. Haahaa! It seemed easier on the fingers as well ... not as hard to fret it. I guess the smaller strings tuned at those notes have less tension than a proper guage-set. I mean an .080 tuned down to E has to be looser than a .105 tuned to E, right? Or do I have that mixed up?

Anyhow, do you think this monumental blow-it has anything to do with the backside harmonics issue?

(Geez... this has to be one for the "Idiot Move of the Year" awards).

Thanks ...

 

[KeithAlanK]

I read your other thread on this first.

Seems to me that those little strings rolling around freely in those big old nut slots is at least part of the reason for what you're hearing.

The string can be vibrating against the sides of the slot, and beyond.
If you stick with ultralights in the future, consider having a new nut made.

Beautiful bass, BTW.
I've been very impressed by the Corts I've played.

 

[Flux Jetson]

I read your other thread on this first.

Seems to me that those little strings rolling around freely in those big old nut slots is at least part of the reason for what you're hearing.

The string can be vibrating against the sides of the slot, and beyond.
If you stick with ultralights in the future, consider having a new nut made.

Beautiful bass, BTW.
I've been very impressed by the Corts I've played.

Nice! This is something I'd not considered. It would be easy enough to do ... that nut has been unattached since about a week after I brought it home. When I take the strings off the nut just falls off. It's solid brass, and I'm a metalworker .. so maybe I could get a blank brass nut, or even just some good brass stock and make my own.

Even if I don't stay with the ultralights since the nut isn't attached/glued in I could make one anyhow and simply change nuts if I change string guages.

Btw, the loose nut doesn't seem to affect sustain at all. That Cort has SICK amounts of sustain. Especially on open notes.

Thanks for the suggestion .. and thanks for enduring my verbous postings. I'm not infected with Twitteritus so my brain hasn't shrunk to 140 character thoughts yet. To be quite truthful I hope it never does. IMO I think it's part of the dumbing down of modern society.

The smaller our minds become the smaller the ideas that spring forth from it.

 

[zackthompson]

Buy a hair scrunchee, put it around the neck. When you play a technique that causes those harmonics (slapping/tapping) life the scrunchee over the strings to mute the "back harmonics". Slide it back past the nut hen youre done.

 

[Flux Jetson]

I saw a video of a guy that had a bunch of crap wrapped around the strings between the nut and the tuners. It wasn't just fashionable "look at me" crap, it looked somewhat functional. It was basically an elastic bungee cord with the two metal hooks on the ends, all wrapped around the head, around the tuners and strings. But none of it was on the playing side of the nut though.

Was that something else he had going on (I mean .. "who knows?" .. right?) or did that have some sortof damping function of some sort?

 

[KeithAlanK]

"That Cort has SICK amounts of sustain".

First thing I noticed about the T-74 I tried and almost bought.

And yes, hair scrunchys, bungees, duct tape and bar napkins--I've seen all kinds of homemade solutions to the problem of ringing strings beyond the nut.

 

[nukes_da_bass]

+1 on the hair tie to dampen harmonics on what I'd describe as your "left hand tapping technique". Tapping on the fretboard with either hand causes harmonics- hair tie or
Bandanna mutes it out a little.

Also- drop up to $75 on a PRO SETUP.

That price should include strings. A pro tech will match your string gauge with a nut and your action with your playing style.

 

[Flux Jetson]

HA! "Pro setup" ... that's a laugh where I live. Dude .. I AM the "pro" here! (city of 150k population in the exteme southwest desert).

About four or five years ago we had a little shop here in town that had an old timer that everyone raved about how ~good~ he was at doing setups and such. The 60+ year old guy owned the little place, it had been open for a couple of decades. Every axe I took to the guy he all but WRECKED. I'd pay him $$$ for "pro setups" and I'd end up having to do it all over again myself.

I took a MIM P that I actually bought new from him. He was soooooo proud of his Fender dealership, going on and on about how only people that really know what they're doing are awarded Fender dealerships. So I asked him to put a Badass bridge on the P. I get it back and the bridge is visibly crooked. I removed the mounting screws and I see that the screw holes don't line up .. at all. So I write to Leo Quan, whining and bitching about how crappy the fitup was on this "stock replacment fit" that the bridge was advertized as being. I told him the model number and he writes back telling me that it was THE WRONG BRIDGE. He told me which bridge I needed and told me that the ~ahem~ "Luthier" that did the work didn't know what the heck he was doing. I go back to the little shop, tell him what Leo said ... he tells me "yea, I saw that the mounting holes didn't line up very well but I just thought that's how Leo's bridges fit". The bridge had about a 20 degree slant and was visibly crooked. Two of the screws were all cockeyed and had gone in at angles.

So he gets the right bridge in (five weeks) and installs it. Golden. Except the action was at least 1/2 inch above the fretboard at fret 20. A half a friggin inch+. He tells me "that's the way old school blues bass players use a bass .. learn how to play son." Every time I'd fret a note it would pitchbend like nearly a half step. I took the bass neck off and found two layers of a friggin Cocopuffs box cut up and installed in the neck pocket. I removed his "neck wedge" and reinstalled the neck. I ended up getting a good setup out of the bass myself.

Now, with the neck set up better, and the CORRECT BA bridge in it ... the bass was great. But I lost $150 worth of local "pro setup" labor.

Every single guitar I ever took to that guy came back a trainwreck. He just kept telling me that they were "old school blues setups" and that it was my fault because I didn't know how to properly play stringed instruments "in old school blues fashion. You modern guys don't have a clue about what tone is".

I started taking my instruments to "the other" guitar shop around here. I took him a Mapleglo Ric 4001 that a local person was trying to sell me for $600. The neck had a horrible helical twist (but the dang thing still played .. oddest thing). I asked their old "luthier" in there if it was salvageable. He told me it "most definitely is correctable, I know what I'm doing" and to pick it up the next day. I did so, it was returned with a broken truss rod because he overtightened it (in tension no less) in an attempt to straighten out the twist and snapped the truss rod right near the adjusting nut. He said he wasn't going to replace the rod he broke because "old Rics are well known for having defective necks and weak truss rods, they're just designed bad ... everybody knows that". I was charged $45 to have a truss rod broken. I told the Ric's seller what had happened, and he ended up in a big catfight over the damages with that shop. I have no idea about the outcome. I did not buy the Ric.

So I'm afraid I am on my own around here. I know of several other players that have been forced into learning how to perform their own setups due to the idiots we have as "pros" around here. Strings? We get charged $105 for a set of Elixers, and $48 for DR LoRiders. I buy picks and the occassional cord locally. Otherwise it's a 450 mile round trip to a city with anyone that knows anything about how to set up a stringed instrument.

I've built eleven Warmoths so far. Working on #12 presently. I admittedly have a lot to learn though.

There's my story for this Monday morning.

 

[Qlanq]

Nice bass. I'm not quite sure if your technique has your fretting fingers fretting the string just before you pluck the string with your right hand. I used to be a bugger for that. Had to sit down and go through what my fingers were actually doing. Only really noticed when I got an acoustic bass.

 

[Flux Jetson]

Nice bass. I'm not quite sure if your technique has your fretting fingers fretting the string just before you pluck the string with your right hand. I used to be a bugger for that. Had to sit down and go through what my fingers were actually doing. Only really noticed when I got an acoustic bass.

Yea, I've been thinking it's a "me" thing. I'm kinda thinking I need to sharpen up a bit. I'll work on my technique and see if some of that is reduced, or at least more under my control.

It's actually kinda pleasent sounding most of the time ... very "grand piano like".