Wal sound

[Toolmybass]

My Schedua sound more fendery this way than my maple faced.

Really?...my Australian Lacewood MK1 and my American Walnut MKII sound identical (with a small pick up height adjustment) and their manufacturing dates are 21 years apart!

 

[Pj,Rj,Hj]

I find its not a problem getting in the PBass territory on my Wenge Mk1 with the neck pickup isolated. The girth is there, it fits sonically but ain't the same (not worse).

Never been satisfied trying to cop a Jazz Bass tone on the Wal, but don't own the Wal for such a role.

 

[marcos_epm]

Thanks guys.

Really not interested in turning a Wal into a Fender. Just want it to sound like a Wal and sometimes get something close to Moving pictures GL tones.

Geddy Lee didn't need to take his Rick to the shows during the time he used Wals because he didn't need to cover himself...

My band mates are a little bit picky...let's see what's gonna happen.

She's coming! I'll post some pics asap.

Thanks again

Marcos

 

[AndroWal]

Really?...my Australian Lacewood MK1 and my American Walnut MKII sound identical (with a small pick up height adjustment) and their manufacturing dates are 21 years apart!

They truly sound different...both of course the Wal sound, but different. One is an early 90s Mark II with maple facings and the other is a mid 90s Mark III with the Schedua. The maple is brighter, a bit clearer/more open. The Schedua is a bit darker, with a bit more warmth.

 

[Stick_Player]

It's not so simple. Maybe I didn't explain my purposes.

I bought a Wal because a want a Wal tone. However, I may need a different sound, and I want to know if a Wal can deliver it.

If you did a 2 hr gig with rush covers, would you bring another bass to cover the old stuff? Or all you need is your Wal?

In other words, how versatile is this bass?

And also, a Ferrari is not just for racing...you can use it to take your girlfriend for a nice dinner....

Need? No one will care. Just play well.

 

[Toolmybass]

They truly sound different...both of course the Wal sound, but different. One is an early 90s Mark II with maple facings and the other is a mid 90s Mark III with the Schedua. The maple is brighter, a bit clearer/more open. The Schedua is a bit darker, with a bit more warmth.

My woods have NO effect on my sound whatsoever. I could record both basses with the same gear and a Woodsmith would not be able to tell the difference. Yours may be a different story, but not mine. Do you do your own set-ups on your basses?. I have never played an MKIII so that could be your difference in sound...in combination with the set-ups that are present on each bass.

The Lacewood is no brighter than the Walnut

I have taken an audio engineering course, so i do have an ear for these things. I have also done some in-depth recording on both of these basses
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[mikezimmerman]

My woods have NO effect on my sound whatsoever. I could record both basses with the same gear and a Woodsmith would not be able to tell the difference. Yours may be a different story, but not mine.

The Lacewood is no brighter than the Walnut

With the Wals I've owned, there were definitely differences in tone from one to the other, and since the electronics were all the same I can only attribute the differences to woods.

However, it wasn't necessarily just the facings, I don't think. Fretboard wood seemed to make a difference, as did the heavier vs. lighter body core and the glossy vs. satin finish. At least, the ones that sounded best to me--deeper lows and clearer highs--have all had ebony boards, gloss finishes, and relatively heavy bodies.

Still, lacewood isn't generally a particularly hard, bright wood the way maple is, so I'm not surprised if it doesn't sound noticeably different from the walnut. It looks really cool, though!

 

[Toolmybass]

With the Wals I've owned, there were definitely differences in tone from one to the other, and since the electronics were all the same I can only attribute the differences to woods.

However, it wasn't necessarily just the facings, I don't think. Fretboard wood seemed to make a difference, as did the heavier vs. lighter body core and the glossy vs. satin finish. At least, the ones that sounded best to me--deeper lows and clearer highs--have all had ebony boards, gloss finishes, and relatively heavy bodies.

Still, lacewood isn't generally a particularly hard, bright wood the way maple is, so I'm not surprised if it doesn't sound noticeably different from the walnut. It looks really cool, though!

I also may have just gotten lucky with the way i set one up as opposed to the other to get the same sound out of both of them. lol Well i was also a/b'ing them and tinkering for a whole day too

Tonally you could have identical Wal's (even cutting from same blocks of wood) set them up the same, so that they sound the same, and it takes very little to tweak one of them and they sound VERY different. So that should be taken into account as well. Just raising and lowering the pick-ups can make a giant difference on the lows and highs.

The reason why i went through all of that....i was in a Tool Tribute band and was using the Lacewood as the back-up and wanted them to sound the same.

 

[tk4207]

I've never played a Wal, but I find this recipe gives a good classic Geddy tone on most basses: Roundwounds, very low action, slightly boosted mids, a touch of overdrive, and you have to pound the hell out of your strings when you play (this is probably the most important part).

 

[mikeswals]

I really love my Jazz Basses, but the Wal while being able to do extremely gritty, is very different. But really, no one is going to care as long as you really pull-off the Geddy basslines.

the only people who will notice are the other talkbass members in the audience. Your standard bassist won't even know,

True! I was kinda worried gigging it. But luckily 99.8% of folks have no idea what it is...not even the dude wearing a Tool shirt in the front row standing on my side of the stage!. I think I've only had two people come up. Sound guys usually ask me "is that some sort of 70's bass?".

 

[mikezimmerman]

I also may have just gotten lucky with the way i set one up as opposed to the other to get the same sound out of both of them. lol Well i was also a/b'ing them and tinkering for a whole day too

Tonally you could have identical Wal's (even cutting from same blocks of wood) set them up the same, so that they sound the same, and it takes very little to tweak one of them and they sound VERY different. So that should be taken into account as well. Just raising and lowering the pick-ups can make a giant difference on the lows and highs.

The reason why i went through all of that....i was in a Tool Tribute band and was using the Lacewood as the back-up and wanted them to sound the same.

Good point--though my general preference in setup is fairly consistent, I wasn't really comparing the setup and pickup heights closely. And I didn't have a whole lot of chance to A/B one against the other except when I had 4- and 5-string MkIIIs at the same time. There have just been some whose tone I liked much better than others!

But anyway, back to the OP's question... Like some others, in my experience the Jazz Bass tone doesn't really come all that naturally to the Wal. I think the pickup construction and especially the pickup locations are just too different. But it wasn't to hard to get in the P-bass ballpark by panning to just the neck pickup and rolling off a bit of the highs.

 

[Toolmybass]

Jazz Bass tone doesn't really come all that naturally to the Wal. I think the pickup construction and especially the pickup locations are just too different. But it wasn't to hard to get in the P-bass ballpark by panning to just the neck pickup and rolling off a bit of the highs.

+1

 

[sturoc]

as for the wood argument, C'mon now.
Of course different woods react differently to physical and sonic vibrations.