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So what would you bring to my sessions...

#61
Well, Lee Sklar... there's my other favorite. What did he play before he got gray - back in the day? I notice lots of these players play boutique basses now, but my wife and I watched all of the first 5 years of SNL over the past year or so. Almost every musical guest bass player played a Fender. In fact I should go find the JT and Jackson Browne episodes and check out the bass players.

I'm hopeless on the hair, but I do have a beard. :D

Those are pretty basses in the pics, but I already suffer from guitar acquisition syndrome and am starting to have a thing for microphones. I gotta stick to ONLY ONE BASS! :help:
 
#66
flagstaffcharli said:
So what would you bring to my session if I hired you to play bass on my record and you could only bring one bass that was going to be recorded direct? I do a singer/songwriter thing a la Jackson Browne/James Taylor ranging from acoustic up to full rock band.

Thanks for your thoughts!
Click to expand...

By now you've noticed that it's just not guitarists who have minds festering with strange and explicable myths and old wives tales. The main one around here is that there really are only TWO bass guitars: A fender Jazz and a Fender P-bass. They only have 4 strings. And anything else is a poser unsuitable for recording (well, in SPECIAL circumstances a Stingray might do, but only because Leo invented that one too.)

Well, I'm sorry, I don't even OWN a P bass. I don't play the few 4 stringers I have anymore, and the main bass I'd choose to fit your singer/songwriter music (I'd be thinking more acoustic than rock) Would NOT be my Fender. I do NOT agree with the widespread opinion of late that somehow a Fender is a great fit to any "unplugged" session. It's becoming another myth!

What I'd show up with (you ready for this?) would be my Carvin Semi-hollow body 5 string fretless with nylon wrapped strings. It can fit just about any acoustic thing you want. The fretless allows it to be much more expressive if needed. The semi-hollow body gives it acoustic tone from a guitar-like sound to an almost upright thump. In short it can be made to really fit your music (he says without actually hearing any of your songs).

The catch here is you've sprung a range that includes full rock. And that means I'm going to have spring two basses on you! And no, my second bass will not be my Fender jazz V either! Given you want RANGE, I'd pack my G&L L-2500 5 string with the SIT rounds and single coil mod. And that should just about cover it. Well, except for the fact that I didn't bring a Fender and I'd be asked to leave.

That said, let me say that I am NOT recommending you buy a Carvin AC50 to play on your recordings. You asked what *I* would play. I think it might take a guitarist bass-playing noob, a bit of time to get to the point where you can make the Carvin do your will, especially fretless! My recommendation for YOU would be to pick up a nice used G&L L-2500 Tribute. Good price. Super versatile. Nice recording sound. Hard to go wrong.
 
#67
I did not read the whole of the thread, so please forgive me if I repeat what other fellow TBers have said before me (and probably they have versed it much better than me)

If I were hired to play the bass, I'd bring a Dingwall bass (Villex NVT-loaded) and I'd deliver the desired tones in a huge and passive way.

But if one wants to own a bass for others to play and still be able to cover most of the ground, a PJ bass would do the trick
 
#68
I haven't done a whole lot of recording, but my "go to" bass type is a Jazz with good noiseless pickups. I use Fralins in my Fender, and DiMarzio Area J in my G&L JB. If you're on a budget, get a good MIM Fender or G&L JB-2 Tribute, and a DiMarzio Area J set if you want to go noiseless. I love P-basses and recognize their excellence in the studio, but IMO the Jazz is slightly more versatile. It just always works.

That said, bassbenj makes a good point about moving beyond the standard P or J to match your material. If it ranges from acoustic singer/songwriter up through classic rock, a hollow or semi-hollow might be a good fit. For a few years, I had a DiPinto Belvedere semi-hollow that was phenomenal for recording. It was a good match for acoustic material, and yet was also great for classic heavy rock. The Ibanez Artcores are good, as is the Epiphone Jack Cassady. The Epi might be a great choice for you. I also love the Lakland Skyline Hollowbody.
 
#70
Although I don't own a P/J at this point (even though I recommended one), I was going on a recommendation for a guitarist who wanted to buy a bass for his home studio to do Singer/Songwriter material that sometimes Rocks pretty hard.
A passive P/J configuration should sound good, sit well in most tracks and give you some tonal versatility. If you're a guitar player it's the bottom 4 strings of your guitar so there's not B string learning curve.
This is not what I typically will bring to a session-my minimum is 2 basses (fretted and fretless) and in most cases I'll bring 6 including DB and/or EUB (see equipment list).
But, if I were advising a guitarist who's adding a meat and potatoes bass to his home studio I think that's the direction I'd go. I'd probably recommend the Squier VM Jaguar with stacked volume/tone controls because it's not too terribly expensive and seems to sound good for Americana stuff. At the risk of being heretical, I'd put a good set of nickel roundwounds on it-probably D'Addario instead of flats. With foam mutes, palm mutes and the additional tone controls you can get the "Old School" tone pretty easily.
If I didn't spend the money for an American-made Lakland or Fender or the like I'd take the additional money from my bass budget and buy an Avalon TU-5. That improves any basses sound dramatically IME (along with all your other instruments).
 
#71
One more for the Precision...

I'm not a total Fender fanboi, but an engineer has to try really hard not to be able to get a decent usable sound out of a Precision. And if you're not playing P or J, and he/she is having trouble getting the Bass track happening, guess whose fault it is (even if it isn't)...
 
#72
Roy Vogt said:
.
If I didn't spend the money for an American-made Lakland or Fender or the like I'd take the additional money from my bass budget and buy an Avalon TU-5. That improves any basses sound dramatically IME (along with all your other instruments).
Click to expand...

Oh gee...thanks Roy....more gear I have to research and eventually go buy. LOL!

My Lakland is not a US model, but my G&L is, do they cancel each other out? :D
 
#74
For a guitarist's home studio, I'd go with a Fender P strung for starters with nickle round-wound strings. It couldn't possibly be any simpler, it's super easy to dial into a quick demo mix, and it works for almost any style of music. For a more aggressive edge, switch your strings to stainless steel rounds, or for a mellower thump pick up a set of flatwounds. Keep them all in your drawer and switch them out as you see fit.

For me personally, if I were to attend a singer-songwriter recording session, I would definitely bring a Precision of some kind, probably strung with rounds because that's what I'm used to, and possibly fretless, depending on the music.
 

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