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what bass is better for playing blues

what Bass is best for blues

  • Fender

    Votes: 185 95.4%

  • Warwick

    Votes: 9 4.6%
  • Total voters
    194
  • Poll closed .
#24
lonote said:
I have used Fender Precisions, Jazzes, Hamer CruiseBasses, Hagstroms, Yamahas, Peaveys, Squiers and they all work. The best bass for anything is the one YOU like best!
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I agree with the above. It is what feels and sounds good
to you. I love blues, hense my name, I love twelve bar
blues. I use my Yamaha BBg5s. I have more expensive
basses but my Yamaha just feels and sounds right.
It has a great C string. I have played it longer. I have
held the neck of that Yamaha many more hours than I
have held my wifes hand. It is the one that goes with me
every night when I try to earn a living.
Play what you like, pratice get better. A good musician
will make an average bass sound great. A poor musician on
the most expensive bass will still sound poor...
 
#25
funkythumb said:
I think the best I've ever felt while playing the blues was with a G&L L2500. Not necessarily a bass that first comes to mind as a blues bass but it worked for me!!!!
Go play a bunch of basses and find what sounds best to you. Best to play in a band setting.
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+1 on the G&L L2500.

I own two of them, and like you I hadn't thought of it as a blues bass. And then I went to a local blues jam and the host band bass player was using one. I was AMAZED at the sound. It takes a bit of string choice and dialing-in to get it just right, but once you do the thing simply kills. Now they are one of my Blues go-to basses.

Of course, my Fender J is a sure thing and will not draw any heat from Blues Nazis, but I give the G&Ls the edge over that.
 
#26
bassbenj said:
+1 on the G&L L2500.

I own two of them, and like you I hadn't thought of it as a blues bass. And then I went to a local blues jam and the host band bass player was using one. I was AMAZED at the sound. It takes a bit of string choice and dialing-in to get it just right, but once you do the thing simply kills. Now they are one of my Blues go-to basses.

Of course, my Fender J is a sure thing and will not draw any heat from Blues Nazis, but I give the G&Ls the edge over that.
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Yup, yup and double yup. I bought a couple G&L's for a tv show and church gig I did for 3 years. They killed. After both gigs were canceled, I got complaints about them in other bands. There's a lid for every pot. I ended up selling both. Sorry, that was neither here nor there. I did a blues thing at a gig one time and happened to have the G&L. It was a great fit. Punchy and very tone appropriate.
If I ever end up in long-term blues gig, I'll definitely consider buying that bass back.
 
#31
CapnSev said:
You can play anything you want on any bass; however, die-hard blues guys don't seem to think so.
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If I were auditioning for a blues gig, I'd bring a traditional-looking Fender-style bass. I no longer own Fender, so I'd bring my Sadowsky or Benavente P-basses.

That said: style (feel, note choices) is in the player, not the bass. I've played blues/country gigs with Warwick, MTD, and Modulus basses. I sometimes tame the high end for a more traditional sound, but in a familiar situation where I know I won't be fired :ninja: I'll experiment with modern tones. What's the big deal? I've heard blues/country recordings that had modern bass tones.
 
#33
I think people might be merging steady blues gigs, blues jams, and pick-up gigs all together into one situation in this thread (me included).

I think showing up to a blues jam or pick-up gig with a Fender automatically makes the other blues musicians comfortable. Your fellow musicians in a steady gigging blues band probably don't care what you're playing.
 
#34
funkythumb said:
Yup, yup and double yup. I bought a couple G&L's for a tv show and church gig I did for 3 years. They killed. After both gigs were canceled, I got complaints about them in other bands. There's a lid for every pot. I ended up selling both. Sorry, that was neither here nor there. I did a blues thing at a gig one time and happened to have the G&L. It was a great fit. Punchy and very tone appropriate.
If I ever end up in long-term blues gig, I'll definitely consider buying that bass back.
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I would never sell any of my G&Ls because of some douchebags in a band. Plus, to get a more conventional sound from an L2K, bypass the active circuit and turn down the passive bass control so it sounds more like other basses.

As for blues, I also agree that the big MFD humbuckers have that fat bottom that sounds so good with blues. Personally, I like my semihollow fretless ASAT (same electronics) a little better--at least for older blues--because there's more of a swell and bloom to the sound like an upright.
 
#35
When you guys talk about brands that you need for a gig and the completely absurd idea some people have about, not only the brand of bass but the number of strings, I just go bonkers and get so upset. It reminds me of an incident that happened a couple of weeks ago.
Sorry for venting here but I need to share this story because of the old-school mentality that plagues even some pro, non-bass playing musicians.
Without dragging this story out too long, a guitar player I know shook the hand of a bass player who showed up to sub in his church band, saying that he admired him for showing up with a four string bass. From everything this guitar player said, he came across like some bigoted, dinosaur saying that 4 string bass is REAL bass and that other strings are irrelevant!!!!
***!!!! I just feel that I live in a totally different universe than some of these traditionalists. Who CARES what you bring to the gig as long as you can PLAY!?!?!?!
When everyone was playing a Fender, Jack Bruce decided to go against the norm and play a Gibson. He still made it big regardless of what label was on his bass!! Les Claypool didn't play a Fender. He choose the path less traveled with a relatively unknown bass and he still made it big. Steve Swallow hasn't played Fenders since the 70's and he's done pretty damn well. These are all different examples from different styles of music demonstrating the validity of independent thought and choice. Personally, I'm sick of seeing all these look-alike bands on late night tv. Yea, they sound pretty good but they seem like clones of each other with bass players having the mandatory Fender and SVT rig. Would the world come to a stand still if they swapped out an SVT with an AGGIE cab???
Time to chill.........deep breath :)
 
#36
^ I'm with you man.

I play pick-up gigs with a local blues guy every now and then who a bass gear nazi like that. He wouldn't let me play anything but a 4 string P bass. Now he's loosened up a little and he's cool with my 5 string P bass. ;)
 
#39
Honestly, this is like asking what kind of bass is best for Country, or for Jazz or any genre. Blues can be played many ways. Nathan East can play some fantastic Blues lines with a six-string, very modern Yamaha. Willie Dixon used an upright. Willie Weeks has used a P-Bass most of the time I've seen him play.

Also, consider that both Fender and Warwick have several models of basses, so your question seems too general to me, anyway.
 

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