When did "Short Scale Shaming" become 'a thing'???

[petrus61]

The only people dumb enough to even notice or care that a bass is shortscale or not are other bassists...and guitarists. What does that tell you about the significance of this ponderance? In the grand scheme of things, it’s meaningless and the only people that do care don’t matter anyway.

 

[SactoBass]

Oh the shame of it all! Tom Scholz should have known better than to use a Gibson short scale bass on those first couple of Boston albums. It's no wonder nobody bought any of his records. If Tom would have used a 34" scale bass, he wouldn't be having to rummage through the discount bins at Walmart every weekend to make ends meet.

 

[JRA]

it's not the scale length that matters... it's how you use it.

 

[SactoBass]

it's not the scale length that matters... it's how you use it.

^^^THIS!

 

[Old Blastard]

We don't do shame anymore. Look at politics. So I feel great putting Mustard and ketchup with relish on my short scale while wearing board shorts and sandals with a Hawaiian shirt.

 

[Old Garage-Bander]

This was inspired by an earlier post, asking if it is "wrong" to play a short-scale...
Why would anyone be made to feel that way???

Well, that was posted by a guitar player who described himself as being small.
Someone served up the Kool-Aid and he drank of it.
But there is hope for him. He came here and asked questions.

 

[adivin]

Since the beginning.

 

[adivin]

We don't do shame anymore. Look at politics. So I feel great putting Mustard and ketchup with relish on my short scale while wearing board shorts and sandals with a Hawaiian shirt.

I’m going to my safe space for this micro aggression.

 

[fauxtoe]

Shaming? Wow...not once!

I’ve been looking more into short scale basses than ever. Don’t get me wrong, I love my long scale stuff, but I tend to play different on a shorter neck. Les Claypool discovered the same thing with his first Carl Thompson piccolo bass. He also “wrastles” with a 36” scale fretless. Use what works for you!

 

[Slevage]

It is?

 

[fauxtoe]

play whatever you want. A shorty isn’t a good option for my main project because of the amount of low b work. I love all basses though. It’s that one mans trash is another mans treasure type thing. Sure some “classic” albums were recorded on shorties. But “classic” to one person is just “old” to another. I’m sure with TB being dominated by 40-70 year olds who play on 60s,70s, and 80s cover bands that there’s a lot more people on this site who like shorties than hate them.

Check out Birdsong basses. They figured out how to get a long scale low B string on a short scale bass and make it sound really good.

 

[Basshappi]

But, what's the best short-scale for METAL???!??

C# metallic diminished

 

[MattZilla]

Ooh! Kool-aid?! Pickemup twuckth?! People who feel thoroughly besmirched, belittled, and degraded for having been caught posting a poorly composed sentence?! Somebody call a bird lawyer! Dear me, oh my! Great thread!



I have been on here way, waaaaay too much the last few years and have seen lots of talk about dead spots on 34" bolt-ons (or not?), neck dive being solved by Velcro-ing the bass to one's shirt, lots about hevvvvey basses, yet have not seen any of the SS shaming mentioned by a few posters in this one.

 

[InhumanResource]

Jack Bruce,
Felix Pappalardi,
Paul Mc Cartney,
Bill Wyman,
Ron Wood.

Of the top of my head, I can think of these electric bass guitar pioneers, their solid and often very melodic lines, and the fact that their instrument of choice was a short-scale bass.

When did it become a 'problem' to play short-scale?

Just throwing it out there for discussion...

Diego

I think it was a little bit after dead-torting started to become a real problem.

 

[InhumanResource]

don't go there...

Well yeah, that goes without saying.

 

[Snakeman1066]

probably a product of the same crowd that constantly says, "If you knew how to play you wouldn't need all those pedals." and "Jaco only need 4 strings"...

 

[nostatic]

I’m going to my safe space for this micro aggression.

I think the Hawaiian shirt pushes it into macro territory...

 

[thunderfish]

What about playing a short scale with a pick, with this speaker cabinet. Now that’s something to ponder.

 

[Nephilymbass]

Check out Birdsong basses. They figured out how to get a long scale low B string on a short scale bass and make it sound really good.

THanks for the tip, I’ll check them out

 

[packhowitzer]

It's not a thing. In fact there's no such thing as a thing. Nothing is a thing.