Double Bass Old School Gear Sounds Great. Meh.

[Wilbyman]

So, in the past few days I have done gigs (or rehearsals) using the crappiest of gear. I have been plugging my Underwood into either an old Peavey combo with a 15" or a Polytone combo (vinyl) with a 15". The Polytone had a "bright/dark" three position switch. I have to say, they all sounded great and deliciously old school with my Underwood. My AI/Bergantino setup sounds great but there is just something about the gnarly push of a shallow 15" cab...plenty of highs with the Underwood as well.

I think I am in search of old school now. Is there a modern day Polytone or do they still make them that way?

Will

 

[matthewbrown]

I don't know, but if you have a bass pod, you can fake it -- it's on the list. I owned a minibrute III and it sounds fairly close.

 

[bass dan]

i bought a acoustic image contra combo amp when i first got my upright it was until recently the only amp i had run my rev II pickup into. it has worked out really well for me and am very happy with the sound i get.
i have a ampeg ba115 lower end amp that i had let a friend borrow for the past year or so because i was mainly playing upright and when i wasnt i ran my electric thru the contra with a wizzy m-line extention cab. really happy with that sound too.
my friend returned my ampeg recently and for kicks i decided to run my upright thru it. sounded really good, the sound was definatly "colored" but in a good way. i do play bluegrass music and it works well for that, maybe not for another genere but for blugrass it sounded really good. it has 5 different filtered sounds programmed in with 1 being dirty and 5 being cleaner, 3 thru 5 sounded fine, 1 and 2 were a bit too dirty.
i have not tried it on a gig yet mainly because the contra is way lighter, but plan on trying it soon. who would have thunk it?

 

[bassist1962]

I used the Mini Brute several years ago as my main amp for BG gigs, as my dad had quit playing upright, and the amp was collecting dust. It had a great tight sound to it that I liked. It wasn't until I started using an Ampeg BA115 several years ago that I found a sound I really cared for. When I started playing DB again, I ran an SM57 thru the Ampeg, and It sounded fantastic.