It's not one or the other.
This is TB where everything is argued, but my own personal experience has been that I've never heard someone with a good, solid groove and bad tone. To me, part of the groove is a great tone.
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Nobody cares about your tone....
- Thread starter JSandbloom
- Start date
This is TB where everything is argued, but my own personal experience has been that I've never heard someone with a good, solid groove and bad tone. To me, part of the groove is a great tone.
Tone matters.
Where and who would Marcus Miller be without THAT TONE?
Same is true for many others including my personal bass pope Gary Willis.
Where and who would Marcus Miller be without THAT TONE?
Same is true for many others including my personal bass pope Gary Willis.
Tone matters.
Where and who would Marcus Miller be without THAT TONE?
Same is true for many others including my personal bass pope Gary Willis.
So I think good tone is relative. Duck Dunn has good tone, Marcus Miller had good tone. Would Marcus Miller be who is he with Ducks Flats and PBass tone, or would you say he had bad tone? I think Duck could have gotten away with Marcus's tone though. All in all, relative.
That's my point, would the crowd in a mix hear anything between an SVT or a Peavey TNT 150 when its ran thru the FOH. ( Cant believe I compared these two :-|)
If tone matters to you as a player, surely that's enough?
Reminds me of an old story about - I think - Greta Garbo, who insisted on a full set of silk underwear for her costume in a movie. When her budget-conscious director demanded to know why such an extravagance was necessary for something the moviegoers wouldn't even see, she replied: "But I will know that it's silk, and I will walk differently".
Reminds me of an old story about - I think - Greta Garbo, who insisted on a full set of silk underwear for her costume in a movie. When her budget-conscious director demanded to know why such an extravagance was necessary for something the moviegoers wouldn't even see, she replied: "But I will know that it's silk, and I will walk differently".
That's a thumbs up for a pantie reference in a tone thread!
It's not the audiences job to care, it's yours
Smooth_bass88
vaxx!
- Oct 31, 2006
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Perhaps. However, tone is the topic here. Besides...it's like pair of sneakers. You can't have one without the other!!
My tone is smooth as silk panties.........er.... uh ..............so I've been told 
I hope we are talking about clean tone. The minute somebody says "fuzz pedal" I am outta here... 
I don't really care what the audience thinks about my tone as long as they are happy.
Getting "my" tone makes playing WAY more fun than playing with a tone I don't like.
I never understand the whole "the audience doesn't care" argument. I makes no sense. Why would you not care about your sound at all? It's what music is. Sound...
Getting "my" tone makes playing WAY more fun than playing with a tone I don't like.
I never understand the whole "the audience doesn't care" argument. I makes no sense. Why would you not care about your sound at all? It's what music is. Sound...
good pickup makers care about your tone, they want you to sound irritating and harsh in your house while present and complimentary in a band
I hope we are talking about clean tone. The minute somebody says "fuzz pedal" I am outta here...
I hear ya. However, Zac Browns new single has a meaty overdriven bass tone on it. Holy crap!
Its not a question of caring. Its a question of good enough tone for reasonable price vs. good tone for outlandish money.
I never got compliments on how good my tone was until I realized what I was striving for, worked at it and put years into refining it (I'm still working on it), so all of that obviously counted for something, no matter how small and it's been from cats whose opinions I really respect. Even if I worked as hard at it for all those years and one random audience member or musician paid me the compliment, it would have been worth it.
I mean those are apples and oranges. They'll sure hear a difference if its a/b'd, and I've heard people comment my gear sounds better than guy before or after me and its mostly that people can hear a difference but have no reference point. The bad soundguys of America union also doesn't make our job easy
mark beem
Wait, how does this song start again??
Tone matters.......... But in the big scheme of things, probably not as much as we like to think.
I fuss over my gear.. If we're being completely honest I buy more / nicer / more expensive gear than I need... I'm just as guilty as everyone else when it comes to this:
But at the end of the day, I love the bass guitar. I love everything about them. I don't care whether the audience can tell the difference between 60's & 70's pickup spacing.. I don't care whether or not the audience appreciated ash + maple / alder + rosewood combinations. I play what I want and that's all that matters.
I fuss over my gear.. If we're being completely honest I buy more / nicer / more expensive gear than I need... I'm just as guilty as everyone else when it comes to this:
But at the end of the day, I love the bass guitar. I love everything about them. I don't care whether the audience can tell the difference between 60's & 70's pickup spacing.. I don't care whether or not the audience appreciated ash + maple / alder + rosewood combinations. I play what I want and that's all that matters.
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