To begin with I am a long time Stingray player. For over 20 years, my third (and only bass at the time) was a '79 Stingray. Fast forward about 30-odd years, and that bass just became too heavy for me to play (5 back surgeries since 2013). Through a few trades, I was able to parlay the '79 for a 2020 BFR Stingray Special fretless 5 string. I loved everything about it except the tone. Plus it only weighed 7.4 pounds, over two pounds lighter than the '79! What I expected (foolishly I suppose) was a 5 string version of my '79. I just didn't care for the sound of the neo pickup or the 3-band EQ.
I found out why. After I removed the pickup and preamp, I sent the preamp to a friend who did an RTA (real time analysis) on it and found the reasons I didn't like it - there was WAY too much interaction between the 3 bands to the point they were stealing gain from each other. If that was not bad enough, the treble sounded harsh and strident to me.
For years, I have been upgrading Sterling Ray4s and 5s with a pickup wound to late 70s specs, and a clone of the original late 70s preamp. So, I asked Nordstrand to make me a special pickup to fit (as the 2020 had no pickguard) and paired it with a late 70s preamp (I make and sell them as well, but that's not the point of this post). NOW, I had the sound I was hoping to have.
I have been a huge fan of the Darkglass Tone Capsule for a long time. I tend to use it in upgrades of single pickup basses other than Stingray-style ones. For that reason, the Darkray interested me a lot, not so much for the built-in effects, but because of their work matching a custom 2-band preamp to the characteristics of the Stingray Special's Neo pickup.
So, regarding the DarkRay 5 string: First, the pairing of the Neo pickup (no doubt the same one in the Stingray Special) with the Darkglass preamp creates a much different tone than the stock Special, and much better range of tones in my opinion. In this case, I was NOT looking for a duplicate of what I already had with the fretless BFR, so my expectations were that it would sound good, but different to the Special, and I got what I wanted.
What I wanted was a bass that sounded great, did not require any mods to sound great, and a bass that sounded different to the fretless Stingray I already owned. Most (probably 95% of the time) I will never use the distortion or fuzz, those to me are just an extra plus. It's a great bass with great tone, and I got the color I wanted, a weight I could handle (my rep at Sweetwater cherry-picked one and got me one that only weighed a bit over 8 pounds, also very light for a 5 string) and interest free financing with up to four years to pay off. To me, that was just too good to pass up.
I love the range of tones I can get using just the two-band EQ and see no reason to modify the bass in any way, other than to install a set of Straploks.
This is one fantastic bass. If you look at it as a tone monster with a great neo pickup/preamp combination with a couple of special effects thrown in, that's probably the best way to consider it. To each their own, that's for sure. Here's a couple of pictures.
I found out why. After I removed the pickup and preamp, I sent the preamp to a friend who did an RTA (real time analysis) on it and found the reasons I didn't like it - there was WAY too much interaction between the 3 bands to the point they were stealing gain from each other. If that was not bad enough, the treble sounded harsh and strident to me.
For years, I have been upgrading Sterling Ray4s and 5s with a pickup wound to late 70s specs, and a clone of the original late 70s preamp. So, I asked Nordstrand to make me a special pickup to fit (as the 2020 had no pickguard) and paired it with a late 70s preamp (I make and sell them as well, but that's not the point of this post). NOW, I had the sound I was hoping to have.
I have been a huge fan of the Darkglass Tone Capsule for a long time. I tend to use it in upgrades of single pickup basses other than Stingray-style ones. For that reason, the Darkray interested me a lot, not so much for the built-in effects, but because of their work matching a custom 2-band preamp to the characteristics of the Stingray Special's Neo pickup.
So, regarding the DarkRay 5 string: First, the pairing of the Neo pickup (no doubt the same one in the Stingray Special) with the Darkglass preamp creates a much different tone than the stock Special, and much better range of tones in my opinion. In this case, I was NOT looking for a duplicate of what I already had with the fretless BFR, so my expectations were that it would sound good, but different to the Special, and I got what I wanted.
What I wanted was a bass that sounded great, did not require any mods to sound great, and a bass that sounded different to the fretless Stingray I already owned. Most (probably 95% of the time) I will never use the distortion or fuzz, those to me are just an extra plus. It's a great bass with great tone, and I got the color I wanted, a weight I could handle (my rep at Sweetwater cherry-picked one and got me one that only weighed a bit over 8 pounds, also very light for a 5 string) and interest free financing with up to four years to pay off. To me, that was just too good to pass up.
I love the range of tones I can get using just the two-band EQ and see no reason to modify the bass in any way, other than to install a set of Straploks.
This is one fantastic bass. If you look at it as a tone monster with a great neo pickup/preamp combination with a couple of special effects thrown in, that's probably the best way to consider it. To each their own, that's for sure. Here's a couple of pictures.
!!!!
