Bass heads, what are you playing?

[cdwillis]

What're yall playing?

I've been getting back into playing long guitars. Sold off my Squier Jazz that I never played and picked up this Fender Precision. It's Olympic white. My phone camera isn't showing off the color very accurately.



The bridge was gummed up from someone spilling something on it and not cleaning it up. I went to adjust the E saddle height and it snapped my hex key. Replaced the entire bridge with Fender's Badass II clone bridge. I read online that you can't get the action as low as the stock bridge because the base is thicker, but it's low enough for me after adjusting the saddles and my truss rod.

I also pulled the stock ceramic pickup. It measured around 4.6k IRRC. I replaced it with a 70s style p pickup with alnico 5 magnets and wound to about 11k with heavy formvar wiring. I'd love to say it sounds better, but I don't notice that much of a difference. Maybe when I play with some distortion I'll notice a little more oomph.

I put some La Bella Deep Talkin Flats on it and I love them. These strings are so smooth. It's incredible. I really can't say enough about how much I love these strings. They're the 43-105 light gauge set and don't feel any higher tension than the nickel wrapped Rotosound roundwounds I had on it.

Anybody got any PedalPCB boards they've built for their bass? I have a MXR Studio Bass Compressor, EHX Micro Q Tron, and a Russian muff I built off a PedalPCB board so far. Don't really care for the muff with it to be honest. That was kind of a let down.

 

[Mentaltossflycoon]

I'm forgetting some things, of course. Here's some goodness of the top of my head. I'm also using a p with labella flats. Tasty tasty.

Curds and whey (when it hits the store)
Viib
Xc
Equinox
Unicab
Cream pie
Gnat (elka dizzy tone)
Poison apple
Lowballer
Frequency interchange
Octarock
Ocelot
Captain bit
Thumbsucker
Lowtide
Kliche (chuck d bones)
Roboto
Chop shop

My most frequently used string instruments. Left to right: 74 p bass w flats, 5 string fretless a friend made in highschool - the maple came from an old broken door in shop class, upright electric of my making, and a 27" Baritone that was my first scratch build.

 

[KR Sound]

I bought my American Std P-Bass new in 1997 back when Musician’s Friend let anyone pay 4 equal payments. Never had a single issue with it gigging every other weekend for 15 years.

I always played it straight in to an Ampeg combo of some sort. Sold those and got a Rumble 500. I did build the Bass Klon and it sounds awesome. I’ve also been using the Origin Effects Cali76 compressor which is bad-ass.

 

[bhcarpenter]

I’m rocking a p-bass as well with D’addario flatwounds. Running direct with a Noble preamp/DI.

Current Pedals:
Snuffy fuzz
Creamery
MBP Edgelord
Unison

Planning to add some sort of an EQ and an SVT-ish overdrive as well.

 

[Passinwind]

These are my two main squeezes:



Crescent Moon fretless with LeCompte Triple Threat single coils, and Marco Bass MV4 with custom Marco neo sidewinders, and epoxy infused purpleheart board. Both have custom DIY preamps as well. I have three homemade amps, 700, 500 Class D jobs, and an in-progress 100watt tube one. The little combo at left is a friend’s DIY 110 cab build with a Traynor SB200 head I installed which kills for the bluegrass and Americana jam I play weekly. The big cab is an AudioKinesis TC118AF, with my DIY 700 watt PW8B amp on top.

And then I have a Marco singlecut fiver with a homemade filter preamp and a BSX electric upright. Working on a few pedals of my own, like so:






then hopefully on to some PPCB builds, probably mostly time based EFX and maybe the Equilux and a noise toy or three for my slide bass schtick.

 

[Nostradoomus]

G&L L2000



On my current live board I’m running an MAE Neck Brace, pitchblack tuner, bass Klon a la Chuck, Black Russian big box muff, OCD, Meris Enzo, DL-4 MKII, Afterneath and an Ibanez weeping demon. All goes into a Darkglass Microtubes 900v2.

 

[Nostradoomus]

Just got a sweet deal on an old Ibanez BP-10 so add that now

 

[Coda]

I have a Hofner that my wife got a bunch of people to pitch in with as a present when I finished grad school. It is strung with Labella Beatle Flats. I have an old Rumble 100 that I use as a loudener. I sometimes will use my Catalinbread DLS in Super Bass mode as a preamp. I also have the Byrdhouse Compressor, toggled to bass mode. My favorite bass pedal is the Brassmaster…

 

[Diynot]

Squier vintage modified 70’s jazz with concentric pots (not a particularly useful mod btw) and series/parallel switch

Sterling by MM Ray34 modded with a Delano pup (not sure which) with a mojotone 2 band MM pre with presence control and series/split/parallel switch.

Recent addition played mainly by my son, but I like to noodle on it.
My amp is a 90’s Crate BX-160 POS. I have had it since high school. I don’t play out and I’m cheap (as evidenced by my bass choices) so have no need to upgrade until it’s full dead.
Pedals:
Obsidious
Stomp under foot Rhinosuar
Lowballer
MiniMu
OC-2
Abyss
FilterFx
3leaf audio octabvre
Have the junk trunk and gas tank on order so will be trying those. I will try just ab any pedal with bass, but those are the most likely candidates

 

[peccary]

Here's a really terrible photo of my basses. I've got a terrible crick in my neck right now and this is as good as it gets from my couch

On the left is my 2003 American Precision. The "American Precision" is kind of a weird one: they only existed a short time, a year or so, and then they started making the "American Standard Precision" afterwards. As far as I can tell the only difference is that the one I have has the bridge from the American Deluxe model, which came out when the Standards came out, I believe.

The middle is a Music Man SUB Stingray. I got this for a song from GC years back because it has a big chunk of wood missing from where someone obviously dropped it.

The hidden one is a Warmtoth build: 60's placement pickup Jazz body with a Precision neck, Bassline Quarter Pound pickups. This actually started as an SX fretless that was modded to death and reborn as a Warmtoth.

The upright is a laminated bass from Lemur. My bass instructor picked it out and loved the sound of it (for a laminate, of course). I took lessons on it about seven years ago, for about a year, but had to stop when my wife lost her job at the time. I'd love to get back to it one day. And yeah, that's a German bow... So what!?




Edit to add my main rig, AKA, "The Backbreaker"

It's loud and mean and sounds objectively incredible

 

[Mentaltossflycoon]

2 p's in a pod, eh?

 

[dawson]

@peccary I can take a way worse photo than that:

Left: Squire 'Vista Series' short-scale MUSICMASTER BASS
*Got this one on CraigsList from a landlord who found it in a rental- turns out this 'Vista Series' is sort-of collectible but it's also begging for a new pickup and paint-job..

Middle: Squire Classic Vibe Bass VI with Staytrem bridge
*These are just really cool.

Right: Epiphone Embassy full-scale Bass
*Lightweight, versatile and affordable!

David Eden WT-600
*Got this for an absolute $teal the day the original owner was moving out of state. My band and I had no idea how much low-end we were missing until I got this- it makes the walls shake!

 

[peccary]

@peccary I can take a way worse photo than that:

Left: Japanese Squire 'Vista Series' short-scale MUSICMASTER BASS
*Got this one on CraigsList from a landlord who found it in a rental- turns out this 'Vista Series' is sort-of collectible but it's also begging for a new pickup and paint-job..

Middle: Squire Classic Vibe Bass VI with Staytrem bridge
*These are just really cool.

Right: Epiphone Embassy full-scale Bass
*Lightweight, versatile and affordable!

David Eden WT-600
*Got this for an absolute $teal the day the original owner was moving out of state. My band and I had no idea how much low-end we were missing until I got this- it makes the walls shake!

At least you can actually see all the basses in your photo!

And that Eden rig is

 

[dawson]

At least you can actually see all the basses in your photo!

And that Eden rig is

Thanks!
I could say the same about "The Backbreaker!"

 

[Harry Klippton]

Old pic, first time I played bass in a band. All I had was this Washburn xb100 that my buddy gave me, a mki GK 400rb, and a metal zone. I didn't own a cab until much later. Later, my wife played bass in a band with me and she had an early 90s peavey dyna, my GK, the green Russian big muff I made for her, and a late 60s ampeg 2x15 that I still have. Now I've got an ampeg VT-22, which is a 2x12 combo of a V4 and that makes an excellent bass amp
Edit: back when I had the super sexy skullet

 

[Mentaltossflycoon]

Old pic, first time I played bass in a band. All I had was this Washburn xb100 that my buddy gave me, a mki GK 400rb, and a metal zone. I didn't own a cab until much later. Later, my wife played bass in a band with me and she had an early 90s peavey dyna, my GK, the green Russian big muff I made for her, and a late 60s ampeg 2x15 that I still have. Now I've got an ampeg VT-22, which is a 2x12 combo of a V4 and that makes an excellent bass amp
Edit: back when I had the super sexy skullet
View attachment 45475

There's so little clothing in this picture, it's hard to tell if it's like... 1993 or yesterday. Dude in the sleeveless is feeeeling it though.

 

[Harry Klippton]

There's so little clothing in this picture, it's hard to tell if it's like... 1993 or yesterday. Dude in the sleeveless is feeeeling it though.

It was 2008. I was in that band for about 3 years and never wore a shirt once when we played

 

[Betty Wont]

I play an Epiphone Allen Woody through an Orange Tiny Terror with a homemade 1x15 cab with a Jenson Mod speaker. If I use pedals I only use high gain pedals with live bass. Right now it’s the Sushi Box Black Eye and my version of the Devi Ever Cherry Pop.

 

[Feral Feline]

I'll try to scrounge up some newer pics, but the laundry list ...


Shen carved top (still in Hong Kong), photos of which have graced the forum already. Never got to put Evah strings on, still hurtin' hands with Hellcore
Carved, fully, by local HK violin luthier (broken, gifted to friend in HK, so not really mine anymore), Obligatos then Evah Solos
CCB plywood with Underwood pup, Supernils — main bass
31/32 AlCoA — polished but in pieces as no luthier will touch it. Evah Slaps on it eventually when I get up the guts to reassemble it myself.
Yu Bass, a U-bass clone a friend had made, white rubber bands
Squier Jag — PJ style 34"-scale puttin on the Cobalt flats
Squier Jag — Musicman-style pup 34"-scale Fender?-roundwound strings that came on it
Warwick Rock Streamer 'cause it was too good a deal to pass up albeit not my cuppa, unknown roundwounds

EA Micro 300

Wizzy 10 cab​

​

Roland Microcube bass (solder-bench duty, & general practice)

Store-bought pedals (old pic):

DIY pedals... an embarrassing two in the old pic.

Purple Zoom MFX is on semi-permanent loan to a friend 'til he figures out what he wants/needs.


I'm sure there's more crap I'm forgetting.


PS:

 

[andare]

What're yall playing?

I've been getting back into playing long guitars. Sold off my Squier Jazz that I never played and picked up this Fender Precision. It's Olympic white. My phone camera isn't showing off the color very accurately.

View attachment 45408

The bridge was gummed up from someone spilling something on it and not cleaning it up. I went to adjust the E saddle height and it snapped my hex key. Replaced the entire bridge with Fender's Badass II clone bridge. I read online that you can't get the action as low as the stock bridge because the base is thicker, but it's low enough for me after adjusting the saddles and my truss rod.

I also pulled the stock ceramic pickup. It measured around 4.6k IRRC. I replaced it with a 70s style p pickup with alnico 5 magnets and wound to about 11k with heavy formvar wiring. I'd love to say it sounds better, but I don't notice that much of a difference. Maybe when I play with some distortion I'll notice a little more oomph.

I put some La Bella Deep Talkin Flats on it and I love them. These strings are so smooth. It's incredible. I really can't say enough about how much I love these strings. They're the 43-105 light gauge set and don't feel any higher tension than the nickel wrapped Rotosound roundwounds I had on it.

Anybody got any PedalPCB boards they've built for their bass? I have a MXR Studio Bass Compressor, EHX Micro Q Tron, and a Russian muff I built off a PedalPCB board so far. Don't really care for the muff with it to be honest. That was kind of a let down.

Shim the neck to get the action low with a badass bridge. Or use a regular bent plate bridge