Roscoe Club

[Skip Chucker]

Thanks! I wanted to ask here before bothering the shop, but will certainly make contact if needed. I'm doing the same as you, I want to make sure I could completely replace the bass with a new build with the same options if something ha

I finally get to join this club!!

So the full story is thus:
Bass Emporium in Austin, TX carried Roscoe, and just about everything else. I loved that place. Practically lived there.
And I enjoyed most ever Roscoe that I played, but never had the cash, and every one I played was ~80% of the way perfect for me.
Then one day a Roscoe came in with Nordstrand Big Singles and the normal Roscoe Bart pre, and it was magical.
Still couldn't afford it.

Then, Roscoe launched the Century Standard line. The Black Onyx finish with maple neck was the sexiest thing i'd ever seen.
Still couldn't afford it, though.

So 3 weeks ago i stumbled upon a Century Standard on Reverb with Nordy Big Singles installed, and a decent price. Still couldn't afford it, though.
The next week, the seller dropped it by a couple hundred, making it harder to resist.
Then, last week, the seller dropped it to a price where it was NOT going to sit for very long.
So I made an offer and got it!!

UPS tells me it should be here today.
Here's the original ad:
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Join me in jumping up and down in pure ecstasy!

Damn, that's a nice looking Roscoe and at a great price! Welcome to the club!

 

[SteveC]

I would argue in the reach. I tried a century and an SKB side by side and there was a difference. The strap pin at the 12th instead of the 14th fret made a difference - to me.

 

[TrevorOfDoom]

So it showed up (and I'll post pics shortly), but after a couple hours of plunking around on it, I've got some thoughts.

1. This is easily the nicest bass I've ever owned. It feels so solid and well designed, yet super lightweight. And sounds
2.It's VERY different from everything else I own, or have owned for the last decade.
Everything I have is much more Fender-like. Wider nuts, wider string spacing, and passive.
So it'll take a little getting used it. But that's a challenge I look forward to!

 

[scubaduba]

I would argue in the reach. I tried a century and an SKB side by side and there was a difference. The strap pin at the 12th instead of the 14th fret made a difference - to me.

+1

Century is immediately easier to reach first fret. SKB is somewhat in the middle with the LG far behind in the ergonomics category. For me anyway. Sitting down it is not as noticeable but standing up the differences between the LG and Century are very obvious to me.

 

[Skip Chucker]

Sweet, more LG's for me then!

 

[staccatogrowl]

Sweet, more LG's for me then!

No kidding. My LG3005 is the most gorgeous bass I have ever played and laid eyes on. FOH producers at a venue where I play often prefer its sound to any bass that I have played for them. An excellent drummer in another venue where I recently played the same LG said, "Now that's how a bass is supposed to sound."

Spending all of my performance time standing, I began using 4" straps many years ago with a relatively heavy Pedulla Pentabuzz that was my main player. I continue to use this strap width today. It is a great equalizer for reach and weight for any bass I have played.

And, specifically addressing reach?" Roscoe's design, with bridges anchored near lower body edge, make reach better than many 34" scale XYZ basses. I notice no appreciable difference in reach in LG, SKB, or Century bodies. Maybe it's because my body is of the flat-belly variety, so all of the Roscoe styles hang near to my heart, and easily within my reach.

Here's the LG with voice of gold:

 

[Drkwdsman]

I have nothing but LGs (3) and it made me switch to all 35” necks because they were comfortable. (Roscoes and Laklands).

I did have a Century 6 for a while and thought it was just fine.

 

[Bassworship1]

I can set my LG and SKB Roscoe's side by side and the 1st fret lines up exactly with each other. Now the way some bodies hang may be a preference but all in all I still say there isn't a difference in reach on the Roscoe's I've owned. I've owned 2 Centuries, 4 SKB and 1 LG and all felt the exact same playability wise. Now my personal Preference made me like the SKB best but all 3 played the exact same IMO.

 

[JOME77]

So it showed up (and I'll post pics shortly), but after a couple hours of plunking around on it, I've got some thoughts.

1. This is easily the nicest bass I've ever owned. It feels so solid and well designed, yet super lightweight. And sounds
2.It's VERY different from everything else I own, or have owned for the last decade.
Everything I have is much more Fender-like. Wider nuts, wider string spacing, and passive.
So it'll take a little getting used it. But that's a challenge I look forward to!

I'm a long time Roscoe user having played only 5 and 6 string basses over the last 25+ years. Over the last year or so I started really getting back into jamming locally doing R&B and classic rock and really got back into 4 strings basses. For me my Fender necks feel really narrow and comfortable. The difference in my perspective is that I'm coming from playing wider 5 and 6 string necks to playing 4 string necks and it's really given my hands a welcomed break. The slightly wider Fender style string spacing (19mm) feels great to me on the 4 strings. I've owned a couple of Roscoe 5 and 6 string basses with the 19mm string spacing and it was just to wide for my hands. I much prefer the Roscoe's with 18mm spacing.
I can see where coming from Fender style 4 strings to a Roscoe 4 string might feel a bit strange. Give it some time. IMO it'll give you a totally different pallet of tones to chose from. I've also found that the differences in the basses (Fender vs. Roscoe) tend to each bring out different playing inspiration in me.
Helps to keep things fresh and exciting!

Congrats and welcome to the world of Roscoe!

 

[KaseOfBass]

The Century 3005 JJ has gig number one under its belt and it went great! I'm really liking it and the 60s jazz pup configuration. I tinkered some with the OBP-1, but ended up keeping it set passive for 95% of the night, using pickup blend and hand position to vary my tone as needed. Looking forward to Friday and Saturday with this bass! Didn't get a shot of my rig/bass, but got a pic of the room from my side of the stage.

Edit: Regarding the jazz tone vs. what I remember about my other Roscoes with soapbars and typical Roscoe pickup spacing:

The Aguiar 5J-HC are quite impressive to me as someone that likes single coil jazz pickups. The other HC jazz pickups I've had experience with have sounded a bit scooped, with some of the grind I associate with single coils missing. The Aguilars do well here and have plenty of grind and snarl to them if you want that. For just regular playing, I tend to favor rolling the blend to favor the bridge pickup slightly. It just introduces a bit of bite, but doesn't get into that burpy territory that the normal Roscoe spacing/soapbars get into. You can roll it to just the bridge pickup, but the jazz pickups sound much more nasally to me than say a Bart soapbar in the typical Roscoe bridge position. This particular Century seems to nail the typical jazz bass tone as you'd expect from the pup/pre combo, with the benefit of the exceptional build quality and aesthetics that a Roscoe has to offer. It's definitely a completely different flavor from the normal Roscoe soapbar pickup basses. For what it's worth, I've never particularly cared for any of the Bart pickups I've tried, and the Roscoe-spec Barts were not my favorite. Barts in general, at least the ones I've been around, have been too dark sounding for my tastes. The Roscoe Bart soapbars were too compressed and not open enough for me. I really enjoyed the Big Singles that I put in one of them as it was like lifting a blanket off the tone on that bass. Maybe that's why I'm liking the jazz config of this Century.

Sorry, one more edit: Though I haven't messed it much, like on Sadowsky basses, I like the benefit of having a passive tone AND the active treble. It opens up some different doors when you start boosting the treble, but rolling off the tone a bit.

 

[RocketMusic]

The Century 3005 JJ has gig number one under its belt and it went great! I'm really liking it and the 60s jazz pup configuration. I tinkered some with the OBP-1, but ended up keeping it set passive for 95% of the night, using pickup blend and hand position to vary my tone as needed. Looking forward to Friday and Saturday with this bass! Didn't get a shot of my rig/bass, but got a pic of the room from my side of the stage.

Edit: Regarding the jazz tone vs. what I remember about my other Roscoes with soapbars and typical Roscoe pickup spacing:

The Aguiar 5J-HC are quite impressive to me as someone that likes single coil jazz pickups. The other HC jazz pickups I've had experience with have sounded a bit scooped, with some of the grind I associate with single coils missing. The Aguilars do well here and have plenty of grind and snarl to them if you want that. For just regular playing, I tend to favor rolling the blend to favor the bridge pickup slightly. It just introduces a bit of bite, but doesn't get into that burpy territory that the normal Roscoe spacing/soapbars get into. You can roll it to just the bridge pickup, but the jazz pickups sound much more nasally to me than say a Bart soapbar in the typical Roscoe bridge position. This particular Century seems to nail the typical jazz bass tone as you'd expect from the pup/pre combo, with the benefit of the exceptional build quality and aesthetics that a Roscoe has to offer. It's definitely a completely different flavor from the normal Roscoe soapbar pickup basses. For what it's worth, I've never particularly cared for any of the Bart pickups I've tried, and the Roscoe-spec Barts were not my favorite. Barts in general, at least the ones I've been around, have been too dark sounding for my tastes. The Roscoe Bart soapbars were too compressed and not open enough for me. I really enjoyed the Big Singles that I put in one of them as it was like lifting a blanket off the tone on that bass. Maybe that's why I'm liking the jazz config of this Century.

Sorry, one more edit: Though I haven't messed it much, like on Sadowsky basses, I like the benefit of having a passive tone AND the active treble. It opens up some different doors when you start boosting the treble, but rolling off the tone a bit.

That's great to hear, glad you're digging it.

Lots of folks turn their noses up at the OBP-1, but I LOVE that preamp. Of course, I'm a passive sort of guy these days, and that preamp pretty much sounds passive when you don't have either gain knob dialed up. Just having it in the circuit with no gain opens up the top end a little bit compared to when the preamp is bypassed, but the inherent character of everything upstream of the preamp passes through unmolested. Then you can goose the bass or treble as needed.

 

[KaseOfBass]

That's great to hear, glad you're digging it.

Lots of folks turn their noses up at the OBP-1, but I LOVE that preamp. Of course, I'm a passive sort of guy these days, and that preamp pretty much sounds passive when you don't have either gain knob dialed up. Just having it in the circuit with no gain opens up the top end a little bit compared to when the preamp is bypassed, but the inherent character of everything upstream of the preamp passes through unmolested. Then you can goose the bass or treble as needed.

It's the first OBP-1 I've had, but I'm familiar with the style from the Sadowsky basses I've had. It's very versatile in a fantastically simple kind of way. Lots and lots of tone tweaking possibilities or set and forget...great sound and Roscoe playability however you cook it up. Thanks again, Greg!

 

[JOME77]

That's great to hear, glad you're digging it.

Lots of folks turn their noses up at the OBP-1, but I LOVE that preamp. Of course, I'm a passive sort of guy these days, and that preamp pretty much sounds passive when you don't have either gain knob dialed up. Just having it in the circuit with no gain opens up the top end a little bit compared to when the preamp is bypassed, but the inherent character of everything upstream of the preamp passes through unmolested. Then you can goose the bass or treble as needed.

+1 on going "passive" these days.
The only bass that I play now where I go active is the Roscoe and that's because it doesn't have a passive mode.
I'm actually thinking about swapping out the Bart pre for a Pope Flex core or East. They both sound great in Roscoe's, have a nice sounding passive tone control (when active) and also have a great sounding passive mode.

 

[MattLplaysBass]

+1 one of going "passive" these days.
The only bass that I play now where I go active is the Roscoe and that's because it doesn't have a passive mode.
I'm actually thinking about swapping out the Bart pre for a Pope Flex core or East. They both sound great in Roscoe's, have a nice sounding passive tone control (when active) and also have a great sounding passive mode.

It's very easy to add a active/passive switch to the Bartolini NTMB preamp. One of my Mike Lull/XYZ M5V's also has a passive tone wired in to the NTMB as well- it's a nice option to have.

 

[MattLplaysBass]

but doesn't get into that burpy territory that the normal Roscoe spacing/soapbars get into. You can roll it to just the bridge pickup, but the jazz pickups sound much more nasally to me than say a Bart soapbar in the typical Roscoe bridge position.

Now I’m not as sad I didn’t buy this bass. It’s a beauty, don’t get me wrong, but I’m set for 5 string jazzes (and I have an F-bass BN5/XYZ on order )... i LOVE the sound with the bart 3 band pre (and neck) of my SKB 5, just not 100% on the SKB body...

 

[KaseOfBass]

Now I’m not as sad I didn’t buy this bass. It’s a beauty, don’t get me wrong, but I’m set for 5 string jazzes (and I have an F-bass BN5/XYZ on order )... i LOVE the sound with the bart 3 band pre (and neck) of my SKB 5, just not 100% on the SKB body...
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That bass is gorgeous!! I still like the SKB body style, but think the Century is the way to go for me.

Don’t get me wrong, this bass can get a great bridge pickup Jaco style tone, but there’s just something about having the soap bars and their different placement that gets you a different flavor.

 

[MattLplaysBass]

That bass is gorgeous!! I still like the SKB body style, but think the Century is the way to go for me.

Don’t get me wrong, this bass can get a great bridge pickup Jaco style tone, but there’s just something about having the soap bars and their different placement that gets you a different flavor.

Thanks. And I hear ya’- not dissing your bass, I’m just wanting that “Roscoe sound” that this bass has, just maybe with a little better physical balance. Although probably if I lost some weight (and didn’t have such a round surface to rest on ) that might improve things... but buying a new bass is so much more fun...

 

[Quadzilla]

If anyone is looking for a very clean LG3005, I'm a very motivated seller and willing to let her go for well below market value. She's in the TB classifieds right now with a lot of pics and details. Feel free to contact me and make me an offer!

 

[Freddy-G.]

If anyone is looking for a very clean LG3005, I'm a very motivated seller and willing to let her go for well below market value. She's in the TB classifieds right now with a lot of pics and details. Feel free to contact me and make me an offer!

View attachment 3474260 View attachment 3474263

Do you have a link? Ain't nobody got time to look for it! Man, where were you before I placed my custom order?

Edit: just playin' with ya Quad. Give me that link and I'll not only look at it, I might make you an offer. You've got a hungry shark on your line!

 

[Freddy-G.]

Concerning my custom order after 12 weeks in: just got an email from Keith. I feel like I'm at the top of the roller coaster (the Scream Machine at Six Flags), ready for the ride down. I'm fine with the time schedule so far. (Note: I just thought I'd give someone thinking of placing an order an idea of the work situation at the Roscoe shop. Not bad at all, really.)