If it were me (and it’s not) I would find and buy a Tacoma Thunderchief. You may need to sell a few things you don’t use often, but those things augmenting the $500 you already have should get you one.
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
Need Advice about ACOUSTIC Bass
- Thread starter bogie1519
- Start date
Yeah, you've obviously played the wrong acoustic basses.
Last edited:
Forgive me...the Martin you wanted is the B-15E. And in general Martin ABGs are very fine, as long as you evade the smaller bodies.
I'm a Martin player, I know! Bass is upper right.
Tapes will give you a great sound if you have a good pickup. Paging @kesslari please. Mr Kesslari to the desk, please, and bring your Phoenix.
- Dec 21, 2007
- 15,220
- 45,000
- Disclosures
- Lark in the Morning Instructional Videos; Audix Microphones
You rang?
I did not bond with my first ABG (a Michael Kelly). I just got another (years later) and am bonding with it. In fact it is a different instrument (to me) than then the electric - speaks and sings differently. I'm still getting to know it.
Mine originally came with bronze (pressurewound) strings. The sound came alive to me when I put black tapewounds on it.
Video - really a quick and dirty thing, not a lot of prep or polish on the presentation. The bass unamplified, recorded as an iPhone video. FWIW.
For your budget, you might consider a ubass. They have a 20 inch neck and use really big nylon strings on a baritone uke body that deliver a big up right-sh tone. Kala is the original, but there are others such as Oscar Shmidt, Hadean, and others. Many can be had for under $400. I also use the 4 string version of the Duke's
fretless Carvin ABG. Mine has Fender tapes on it. Really well made with a sound that is a mix of fretless bass and a dog house. Good luck with your search.
fretless Carvin ABG. Mine has Fender tapes on it. Really well made with a sound that is a mix of fretless bass and a dog house. Good luck with your search.
Thanks for the advice. Never thought about practicing on the couch!!
I had a Hohner “acoustic.” The piezo’s tone was horrible but it was great unplugged - of course too quiet to play with other instruments. I put a Jazz pickup in the sound hole and regretted it and it sounded great. It had some issues with the upper fingerboard and of course some single coil hum.
Next I tried a Breedlove, also fretless. It sounded great but I didn’t bond with the unlined fingerboard, it was huge, and still too quiet to play with others unplugged.
I now have a Hadean Uke bass which is much more portable. The upper register is not great but it does sound good plugged in. It was cheap and fun to bring on overnight trips.
Next I tried a Breedlove, also fretless. It sounded great but I didn’t bond with the unlined fingerboard, it was huge, and still too quiet to play with others unplugged.
I now have a Hadean Uke bass which is much more portable. The upper register is not great but it does sound good plugged in. It was cheap and fun to bring on overnight trips.
Some would say it isn’t really practice. Noodling is still valuable.
Grab and go if you have an idea you want to play through or if there is something in a song that is stumping you. I use mine quite often for that.
And you can get great new sounds in recording or live. There’s no reason not to get one.
I think there is a huge separation between what's possible with the ABG and what's expected from it.
A proper Double Bass is the only "acoustic" bass that seemed to sound "right" to me. I feel like it needs that big body. That's not to say there aren't great ABGs out there, just that the expectations some have when trying them out can be a bit ambitious.
A proper Double Bass is the only "acoustic" bass that seemed to sound "right" to me. I feel like it needs that big body. That's not to say there aren't great ABGs out there, just that the expectations some have when trying them out can be a bit ambitious.
I’m liking the idea more and more. Especially using it to hash out parts I’m working on. I’m working on Whipping Post now. I don’t have to stay hooked to an amp anymore
Thanks
Personally, I would do a hollowbody electric instead of an acoustic. I've owned several acoustics over the years at varying price points and found that they took up a lot of room, were extremely limited in their use and just sounded awful (to me). I never had occasion to use it in a pure acoustic situation like playing around a campfire with just acoustic guitars. Nowadays, if I wanted something to practice un-amplified, I'd grab something like a used hollow/semi hollow bass. If I needed to play around a campfire, I'd buy a little battery powered amp.
For a variety of health reasons I started playing an ABG exclusively about 1+ years ago. I’m a retired professional bassist that still plays 75-100 gigs a year, so I’m a bit picky about what kind of instrument I play. And this ABG is unlike anything else I’ve ever used.
I have found out that I’m, apparently, a non-typical acoustic bassist. I only perform plugged in, I use heavy tension LaBella flats, I play through a Radial BassBone DI into a powered PA speaker, my bass is a Breedlove Solo Jumbo 34” scale big-bodied bass, and I’ve never, ever played sitting around a campfire (it seems to be a right-of-passage in order to play acoustic bass). So take my suggestions with a grain of salt.
Breedlove basses with a CE designation are MIC, therefore relatively cheap compared to many other instruments. Due to my use of heavy gauge flat wound strings I don’t have a lot of unamplified volume, but it’s more than sufficient when playing alone at home. I understand the bronze strings give more volume, but I personally dislike the tone of them. The piezo in the Breedlove is fine, but I’m eq’ing it through the BassBone, can’t offer a lot of opinion on the value of it without the EQ.
For me, the full scale, big body version of an ABG makes complete sense, YMMV. And Breedlove is an excellent compromise between the expensive “cadillac” ABG’s and the super low-end stuff ….
I have found out that I’m, apparently, a non-typical acoustic bassist. I only perform plugged in, I use heavy tension LaBella flats, I play through a Radial BassBone DI into a powered PA speaker, my bass is a Breedlove Solo Jumbo 34” scale big-bodied bass, and I’ve never, ever played sitting around a campfire (it seems to be a right-of-passage in order to play acoustic bass). So take my suggestions with a grain of salt.
Breedlove basses with a CE designation are MIC, therefore relatively cheap compared to many other instruments. Due to my use of heavy gauge flat wound strings I don’t have a lot of unamplified volume, but it’s more than sufficient when playing alone at home. I understand the bronze strings give more volume, but I personally dislike the tone of them. The piezo in the Breedlove is fine, but I’m eq’ing it through the BassBone, can’t offer a lot of opinion on the value of it without the EQ.
For me, the full scale, big body version of an ABG makes complete sense, YMMV. And Breedlove is an excellent compromise between the expensive “cadillac” ABG’s and the super low-end stuff ….
I own quite a few and they're all different.
Short scale, Medium scale , Long scale, fretless, 4 string, 5 string, different woods, different preamps, solid wood, laminated wood, different body width, body depth, body length, different neck shapes, different finger boards, etc. Gotta try 'em
Last edited:
Always nice to see someone who gets it!
Last edited:
The problems that I had with the large bodies and long scales of my acoustic bass guitars was the ergonomics. Try some sitting down and decide if you want to develope a totally different feel from your solid body bass.
Today I would agree with some of the suggestions to try the thin line electric hollow bodies. You can still hear them and it would be closer to the feel you have now.
Today I would agree with some of the suggestions to try the thin line electric hollow bodies. You can still hear them and it would be closer to the feel you have now.
I had TIAs on my old G series Takamine many years ago, although it was before I pulled the frets. I wore notches in the D/G in two months. In fairness, it could have been the frets and not a comment on the frailty of the strings. I'm thinking no issue on a blank plank.
They sounded very nice and worked well with the piezo as far as I remember. However, be warned, they're very light gauge and very low tension. You'll more than likely sacrifice a good deal of unplugged volume. They just don't allow for the aggressive pizz technique that's required to get the most volume out of an ABG. IMO of course.
And it has been 15+ years or so.
Last edited:
