Warwick $$ (Double Buck) A Hit (A Complete Dissection)

I had the opportunity to play the latest addition to the Warwick family tonight: the Double Buck 4-string. I'll start by saying that theres no tone this monster can't produce. We'll break it down from here.

I played it through two amps: Mesa Boogie M-Pulse 600 and Mesa Boogie Buster Bass.

Compared this bass with a StingRay 4.

Sweet spot indeed. Warwick says they cover it entirely and they deffinitely do. I was never really a fan of MEC pickups and electronics, but this bass is the exception. The bass does everything Warwick says it does on the site.

I started off by using only the bridge pickup and with everything flat (including the semi-parametric on the M-Pulse; I turned the bass, mid, and treble knob up to 2:00). The bass sounded very good and coil tapping to the bottom coil provided the expected upper midrange. I messed around with the controls a bit and concluded that the bridge pickup sounded like a drier version of a StringRay, also with a little added upper midrange.

I then moved to only the neck pickup. It had a lot more warmth and deep end. I did the same thing for this pickup. Coil tapping to the upper coil only provided very strong low end, though not at all muddy. I messed around with the controls for a while and concluded that this pickup sounded like a StingRay with noticeably less spark.

Both pickups together produced a thunderous StingRay-esque type sound with a lot more deep end punch. Also sounded a bit more focused and tighter than a StingRay, with emphasis on low mids.

I then experimented with coil-tapping and slightly off-centered the pickup balance more toward the neck pickup.
What I came up with: I tapped the neck pickup into the upper coil and the same with the bridge pickup, which put the bass into Ultimate Slap Tone mode.

Words cannot describe what I heard. Whatever Ultimate Slap Tone means to me, I'm positive that the slightest adjustment of what I have just described will get U.S.T. for you. Like I said, the bass is capable of anything. The sound of this bass is very far from "Warwick standard" and even non-Warwick lovers will like this bass. It is very easy to work with, and in my opinion, gives a better tone than the Thumb and the Jazzman (and also a StingRay). Very jazzy.

As far as comfort goes, the neck is very well shaped and fits easily into your hand. Quite the opposite of say, a Cort. Correct form is effortless. As I was writing this I realized I forgot to do the neck-dive test, but if I remember right, it seemed fairly well balanced. You should also know that the StingRay I compared it with had an Alder body...they didn't have any Rays with the translucent on Ash finish. The Double Buck is an Ash body.

As for the Buster Bass, I thoroughly enjoyed playing this bass through it. Lots of string definition and the warmth from that amp is just addicting. Very well-suited to this bass. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to try it through any of the 60s Bassmans they had. I soooo wanted to though.

In conclusion, this bass is most definitely worth the $1700 price tag.
If theres anything left out, I will update it when it comes to me. If there are any questions, fire away!

 

What amp/cab did you play through?