That's funny, one of the few 'musts' that have actually remained for me is an easily accessible truss rod adjustment.
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Overhyped Features You Just Had to Have
- Thread starter Dr. Cheese
- Start date
Mine was also a German Corvette. I traded in an SVT 8x10 (that I paid $90 from a want-ad digest posting) toward it which I still regret. It sounded good and I recorded with it but couldn't get use to the radius. I traded that Corvette in toward my first P bass.
Yeah, but they're way harder to set up if you're not happy with them. I've considered a brass nut here and there, but never convinced myself they were worth the hassle.
Agreed! I did away with my upright because I couldn't justify the space it was taking up and maintenance (I'm not a real upright player, just occasional oldtime/bluegrass jams/gigs), and a fretless Thunderchief with nylon tapes and mutes totally does the job with a fiddle, fingerstyle guitar and clawhammer banjo, or a full-tilt bluegrass band through a battery powered amp. They're unobtainium now, so I think I'll have to settle for the Boulder Creek...if you would like to see it used, please send to me. I will send weekly videos of it being played.
Isn't it the greatest?! I swear, that's the most brilliant yet idiot-simple piece of engineering on my Music Man. Every bolt-on should have one in my opinion.
I have a few overhyped things that I craved (or believed) but found didn't live up to the dream;
But I also have a list of things that I really craved that have become absolutes for me;
- Active electronics
- Acoustic bass guitars
- Blank fretboard (no markers)
- "Avoid Fender"
- "Never use flatwound strings".
But I also have a list of things that I really craved that have become absolutes for me;
- 1.5" nut width
- Passive
- Hum-cancelling pickups
- Light weight
- No neck dive
- No dead spots
I'm really not sure where to start so I'll use my latest example:
Quad coil pickups with 3 way switching- I thought I'd get "three basses in one" but just leave the selector in the mid position which provides the fullest signal.
(note that these are Delano pickups with a narrow aperture and a P/reverse P/quad setting- it would probably sound AMAZING if the pickups were 4 inches wide)
I'm absolutely certain that I can't, though I must admit they're sturdier and the saddles won't shift around if you handle the thing like an ape.
I couldn't agree more. If you're a collector, or just appreciate how cool rare old stuff is, I fully understand the desire for it. If you're going to claim that old Fenders are superior to new instruments machined to .005" tolerances with 50+ years of experience regarding electronics, shielding, fit/finish, structural evolution, etc... You're dreaming. Hell yeah, they're cool, but the fact is you can buy a better instrument than nearly all the old Fenders (and Gibsons, Rics, whatever) for like 3 or 4 bills, upgrade the electronics and hardware for another couple, and have 10 times the instrument that a 10,000 dollar vintage axe is.
Amen. I've never heard one that didn't sound cheesy and ridiculous, plus all that pain in the ass microphonic stuff makes them pretty well worthless in my eyes.
I'm still a holdout on the idea that a 12AX7 = SVT sound.
Which reminds me... modeling.
These are what I got hung up on and how I feel about them now.
A known and respected headstock logo, now as long as it does what I need it to I don't care what brand it is or isn't.
EMG electronics, not just active, just EMG as a brand. Not totally against them, but not crazy about them.
Coated strings, huge waste of money for me.
Colored strings, also a waste in that the color wears off fast.
Monster cables, ruin all your jacks right now!
Aftermarket high mass bridges, once thought they were really necessary for good tone. Now I realize they only serve to make the bass heavier in weight, not sound.
Just my thought on the topic.
As per TB rules, the above is all IMHO, YMMV.
A known and respected headstock logo, now as long as it does what I need it to I don't care what brand it is or isn't.
EMG electronics, not just active, just EMG as a brand. Not totally against them, but not crazy about them.
Coated strings, huge waste of money for me.
Colored strings, also a waste in that the color wears off fast.
Monster cables, ruin all your jacks right now!
Aftermarket high mass bridges, once thought they were really necessary for good tone. Now I realize they only serve to make the bass heavier in weight, not sound.
Just my thought on the topic.
As per TB rules, the above is all IMHO, YMMV.
I, thankfully, didn't get too gear-obsessed until after I'd been playing long enough to have a REASONABLE handle on what worked and didn't work for me. I can remember just desperately needing one of those 3-button SansAmps because I was in a rock band and used a standard-tuned bass, a 1-step-down bass, and an acoustic in our sets, and it would theoretically let me set up all the eq and levels and stuff and swap out lightning-fast. From what I understand, it would've done just that had I learned how to use it, but I never did because I'm a neanderthal, got frustrated, and gave it to a guitar player buddy of mine who had joined a band as a bass player.
I've never been much on effects (I've always had and continue to have some assortment of an overdrive, an envelope filter mostly just for fun, and a compressor), but I became convinced I had to have one of those big multi-effects processors. Predictably, it was way too confusing to use and I dumped it almost immediately.
The dumbest and most expensive thing I ever erroneously decided I had to have was a big dumbass tour ready rig (granted, the band I was in did go on a brief section of a tour with some other folks we know, but it was small-ish shows and it was totally unecessary), so I wasted a king's ransom on a huge rack case with a fancy power conditioner, rack tuner, POD (our drummer knew how to use it and insisted I have one, silly to me), 2 Hartke HA5500s, and a big drawer to house all the cables and paraphernalia needed to run it all through 2 410XLs, and 2 115XLs. I must say, if I hadn't switched to combos, those 410XLs are tough to beat to my ears, but that was WAY more stuff than I could've ever needed. Oh, and the obligatory wireless rig, which sucked and got used like twice. Now I have 2 basses, 4 pedals (one a tuner), 2 combos and a power strip, and it's more than enough for anything I'll ever do with it.
I've never been much on effects (I've always had and continue to have some assortment of an overdrive, an envelope filter mostly just for fun, and a compressor), but I became convinced I had to have one of those big multi-effects processors. Predictably, it was way too confusing to use and I dumped it almost immediately.
The dumbest and most expensive thing I ever erroneously decided I had to have was a big dumbass tour ready rig (granted, the band I was in did go on a brief section of a tour with some other folks we know, but it was small-ish shows and it was totally unecessary), so I wasted a king's ransom on a huge rack case with a fancy power conditioner, rack tuner, POD (our drummer knew how to use it and insisted I have one, silly to me), 2 Hartke HA5500s, and a big drawer to house all the cables and paraphernalia needed to run it all through 2 410XLs, and 2 115XLs. I must say, if I hadn't switched to combos, those 410XLs are tough to beat to my ears, but that was WAY more stuff than I could've ever needed. Oh, and the obligatory wireless rig, which sucked and got used like twice. Now I have 2 basses, 4 pedals (one a tuner), 2 combos and a power strip, and it's more than enough for anything I'll ever do with it.
Back in my "I wanna be Chris Squire" days, I of course had to have a Rickenbacker. Just kinda of the wrong bass for a Urban Contemporary church, 'nam sayin? Then when I went to a 5 string, I had to have a cabinet that could handle the fundamentals of my low B. I still have my Acme B210, but it mostly serves as the sub for my home theater system. My GK MB 210 is SO much easier to carry, though I gotta be careful, the bass boost and the Meatbox WILL make it fart out. I still want something that sounds/feels like Squire's Taurus foot pedals. Whether that would be useful or not....
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Bass players tend to be a skeptical bunch; and I don't really recall any bass related gear being truly hyped, except maybe by over zealous manufacturers here and there. We do certainly get more what I would refer to as Buzz going on; and, yes, I recall some of that over things like neck through construction, graphite necks, etc etc. Most of that stuff has followed a pretty Darwinian path, where stuff that doesn't really work just tends to go away. The bass guitar is still a relatively new instrument. But, I am starting to feel like a lot of the problems have been solved.
As far as gear making the player better, I think @Dr. Cheese said it best:
As far as gear making the player better, I think @Dr. Cheese said it best:
The player makes the instrument, not the other way around. All a cat needs is a solid player instrument and 12 hours in the shed every day. The fancy gear is fun and all; but, it's kind of like dessert. The meat of the deal is the dedication, study, and work.
