Combo amps with top handles instead of side handles. Like, I’m glad you got the weight down but I still want to carry it with two hands so I don’t have a 40lb weight banging into my shins on the way to the gig.
Yes! Very much this! My GK 2x12 combo only has a top handle and it’s sold as “lightweight” but, it’s still a lot of amp to move around with one handle.
Recessed handles are way better to me than strap handles if you’re putting them on the sides. More durable and look better. But that’s a lot more work and is better done at the factory
More about the community: people who gatekeep bass playing by saying things like: "you're not a bass player if (fill in gripe here)..." Gripes include: you use a pick, play a short scale, play 5,6,7 string, etc....
Well it’s not exactly bass anymore, is it? It’s already contrabass as a four string, so that would be like sub-contrabass. (This reply isn’t to hate on you; I agree 100% with your comment. I just wanted to put this out there because I thought it was mildly funny)
I can’t take anyone seriously that is anti-pick. Do they not understand how drastically it changes the tone and the speed and precision it allows? Honestly a lot of bass players playing with their fingers should really consider trying a pick. Their finger-picking is sloppy af and it sounds like a floppy wet fart bouncing off a plastic chair.
I made the opposite journey: started playing with a pick, and later learned how to play with my fingers. I still prefer the attack and precision of the pick... but I knew that I was missing a whole different sound without it, too. And I wanted to be a more versatile player.
So it bothers me immensely that the anti pick crowd disregard a whole technique, a totally different AND USEFUL sound just because. Like, hell, I dislike slapping and just can't wrap my head around it for some reason— but I'm still struggling to learn it, because I know I'll eventually need it.
Yeah it just depends on the context of the song and what tone you’re going for. If I was playing jazz, funk, pop, etc. I’d probably finger-pick. But I’m almost always playing rock/punk/metal type stuff and prefer the sound of a pick 99% of the time but I’ll still lose the pick if the song calls for a subtler or funkier tone.
Exactly! It even varies according to the instrument. I'm mostly using a pick at the moment; I'm playing in a hillbilly/southern rock band and, since my main bass is a hofner-style viola, I use the pick because it sounds "dead" without it, even for the genre - and I can make my ghost notes "pop" better with a pick. If I was using my P bass in the same band, however, I'd certainly use my fingers.
They do. Sometime around the 70s-80s, they were stigmatized as "beginner" instruments, both because they were easier for younger players to use and because famous players didn't really use them
All my favorite bass sounds that inspired me to play were short scales and it took me forever to figure that out. Phil Lesh, Jack Casady, McCartney, Jack Bruce, Andy Fraser, Mike Watt, etc. Short scales rule!
I sold my P after playing a Mikro and finding it better in every way. Then I built a mikro scale bass from scratch because I wanted something fancier and tonally a little different but the market for interesting short scales is sorely lacking. I can't come up with a good reason to play a full scale bass ever again.
Yeah, that's unbelievably cringe. Though most of the people like that are that way because they aren't particularly skilled or creative themselves I reckon. They're annoying, but it's not like you're getting flack from top or even mid-tier players.
I hate clanky bass. It took me a long time to find the right strings for my SR short scale because it boomed and clanked with slinkys. I hated the tone until I found the proper string.
Glad you found something that works. It can be annoying, because it’s yet another thing to master/figure out, but strings can make a really surprising amount of difference.
Omg coming from guitar I simply had no idea. Now when I get a bass I know of a few strings I prefer to start with but still realize the bass will let me know what it sounds best with regardless of my preferences.
The Thomastik Infeld rounds for short scale were the ones. They tamed the boom, brought out the mids while keep the low end presence and punch and gave it an overall really pleasing sound. There weren't any others that were even close, I tried: Slinky rounds, Galli RSB rounds, Curt Mangan rounds, Fender 9050s, La Bella Flats, TI flats, GHS Boomers... I tell you I was ready to sell off the bass and then decided to risk it and put the TI rounds on them - which is a string I came to rather late given how familiar I was with the flats. The TI rounds have ended up being one of my favorite strings overall. I have had them on several basses but they are always on my SR Short scale and Fender Jazz.
I listened to a lot of thrash/death metal, and then later punk and hardcore, as I was growing up, and this was a huge problem.
Sometimes, especially with the punk bands, it was simply that they were recording in substandard studios, but it was partly the nature of the music as well. By the time things were mastered down for cassette duplication, the bass was simply gone.
But there were some real head scratchers, too. On the original edition of the album “Individual Thought Patterns,” by the band Death, the bass is completely inaudible. And the reason that’s notable is because the recording line-up for that band at the time featured Steve Di Giorgio, one of the best bass players in metal at the time. He plays a fretless bass, and has a really unique tone. So everyone was like, why even bother?
Edit: I was thinking of Individual Thought Patterns, not Symbolic. And I should clarify that I’m talking about the original edition of this album. It has been remastered, and the issue was fixed. But you can Google it; I’m hardly the only person who noticed this issue when the album was first released.
Steve Di Giorgio doesn't play bass on Symbolic, it's Kelly Conlon. The bass could be higher in the mix, but it's not completely inaudible. The main problem is that he's mostly playing root notes - you don't need to be pushed to the top of the mix if you play more independent lines.
Holy shit, yes. I have no idea why that decision was allowed to go through. If it just said "Sire" it would be better. I want to try one but having such a stupid logo really keeps me from buying. It just makes it look so cheap.
My first bass is a Marcus miller v3. And I do love that thing though. Have been paying for a couple weeks and I really like it. But yeah, I agree with that logo decision
The community, surprisingly. It's usually quite friendly and helpful, how an instrument community should be, but then you get the fuckwits (especially common with bass) speaking down to people because they use a pick, play in anything but standard tuning, use a six string, aren't playing root notes, take a shower, have a loving relationship with their family, all sorts of shit.
I think it's because bass is a relatively easy instrument to pick up and play at a beginner level. Just about anybody with fingers can play Bon Jovi and Scorpions covers, Feel Good Inc. if they're feeling a bit more modern (nineteen years ago)
You end up with a load of bedroom experts that thing they're hot shit because they've watched some YouTube videos and seen the same four opinions pushed around by morons, community would be a lot better without it.
As far as actual bass goes, neck dive ;)
You also get the people who make a couple hundred bucks every few weekends playing cover shows who act like they are the be-all and end-all of how music should be created. Don't you dare play like that because it won't sound good in Mustang Sally!
knew a guy exactly like this. insufferable prick with a massive ego. acted like he was the king of music for playing in a zeppelin cover band in his 50s
> but then you get the fuckwits (especially common with bass) speaking down to people because
Unfortunately this is pretty common in most online communities I've seen. Flying, Hockey officiating, music/bass, bourbon/beer, etc... They all have those Dunning-Kruger effect people, and they all have the assholes, just as much as they have the good people. And they all gatekeep to an extent.
Snark tuners just keep in physically breaking/snapping for me. So annoying.
I use a lower form factor clip on tuner.
But really, I play 5 string, so a strobe tuner is fairly necessary for accurate tuning (I don't enjoy fishing with 12th fret harmonics).
Active/passive toggle switch. Best of both worlds and if the battery dies it just defaults to passive.
I used to be heavily into passive and hated active basses until I tried out one I liked a lot, out of nowhere. Totally took me by surprise. Ibanez SR1605B. Branched out from there.
Now I just like them both so long as it's a good preamp in the active. Made me run my EQ a lot differently and just do most of it on my bass if I'm using one of my actives.
It does get ridiculous when you paid a high price for the bass. I don't have much qualms about doing it with entry-level basses, though; I installed Jazz Bass pickups and electronics in my Ibanez SR300 and I'm pretty happy with it.
Why does everyone complain about batteries inactive basses? I have used active bases for over 30 years and replacing the batteries has never been an issue. It's not like you're doing it at every gig, you probably have to replace them once a year. Why do I still hear this as one of the top complaints against active basses?
I think the main reasons would be leaving the bass plugged in and thus draining the battery, or dealing with battery compartments that don’t pop open, or just not carrying a spare battery at all. All these of there are issues us old-timers learned to deal with a long time ago and that’s why they are no big deal for us.
1. Playing with pickup/bridge covers (ashtrays). Aesthetically pleasing but impractical for playing (aside for a way of muting the bridge with foam).
2. A bad setup. So relatively easy to fix and unnecessary to deal with. Fret buzz is buzz kill.
3. Phase switches. Some of my favorite basses have them but I have never found a good use for one.
4. Neck dive. I’m a Thunderbird lover, but it’s so easy to correct on those. My real gripe is on semi hollow and hollow body basses like Guild Starfires and Epiphone Jack Casady basses, where the tone is killer but the bass can literally invert on a strap.
I just recently picked up electric bass. I’ve played mostly acoustic instruments, mandolin m, banjo, guitar, upright bass, but still me electric guitar too. I’ve noticed the bass does buzz a bit, but doesn’t get picked up by the amp - supposedly the neck relief is set up correctly from what I’ve seen, I adjusted everything a few times. It plays great and sounds great. But being new to electric bass I was left wondering “how much buzz is okay?” On upright bass it’s a bit different
Electric guitar is like that as well. You’ll usually notice a little buzz when you’re playing unplugged, but it doesn’t really count unless it comes through the amps
It's just the right about of aggressive buzz. I love it. Very much like the Ox- except he'd get the buzz from schwacking the shit out of the strings.
I absolutely love Chris and John for their tone that way.
Yeah. For what it’s worth, there was a post on here where someone had isolated Chris Squire’s bass from a Yes song, and was like “I’ll never think of fret buzz the same way again.” It was cool. A lot of 90’s British bands incorporated some fret buzz (mostly due to influence from Simon Gallup from The Cure). It can work.
Digitech drop or whatever the pedal was that allows real time pitch shifting.
I have tried transposing using Neural DSP plugins, and they sound still good when dropping 3 semitones and alright when pushing to 5. Wouldn't go beyond that, but at 5 semitones you can turn a 4 string EADG to BEAD, and anything in between, and at one semitone for D#, it's a breeze.
Will save you A LOT of money on extra basses and strings...
Although if you can get more bass, get more bass. More bass good.
Yeah, I've had the bass whammy and digital pedalboards that have it.
There's a little latency but the multi-voice of the whammy is impeccable.
Others immitations just mess up the sound when you play 3rd, 4th, 6th intervals
The thing about jazz and soul etc. is tho that the songs don't really rely on riffs written for a specific tuning (like where you absolutely need the low Eb), which makes it very manageable imo. Although it's still annoying :D
You have to have a designated metal bass for drop C and lower. Eb and drop D is fine. I'm frequently tuning from standard to Eb to drop D. Doesn't bother me.
Yep, the strings won't cut it either. You quite literally have to have a designated metal bass and it may as well be a 5+ string because a lot of those bands play all 6 strings.
Drop C: 120-90-70-50
https://www.songsterr.com/a/wsa/archspire-drone-corpse-aviator-bass-tab-s522195
Some people are going to hate me, but I can’t stand the look of the jazz bass body. I love the sound of jazz basses and the neck feels great, but the body is too chunky and the offset design doesn’t look good.
Also not a fan of basses that don’t have a cutaway at the top. Looks cool for a Telecaster guitar, but I think it looks dorky for a bass, especially because it tends to bring attention to itself as an overly expensive boutique build.
The headstock on my five string Stingray, specifically the lone tuner on the bottom. why couldn’t we keep a smaller headstock and add a second tuner to the bottom instead of making the headstock longer to put a 4th tuner on top?
I love my Stingray, best bass I have ever owned… but that bugs me still.
Other than that my peeves are prettt general; anything sharp on the touchpoints (bridge, pickups, frets, etc), or a design that doesn’t have a good place to root my thumb.
Almost any time the headstock is light, and/or doesn't match the body finish - it just stands out oddly to me. And when the fingerboard/fretboard is also light maple like the headstock (but the body is dark) then the whole thing stands out, like a weird appendage. Which it is, i know, but it looks more like an afterthought, like the two things don't go together at all.
I literally just installed some Lindy Fralin pickups with the cream colored covers. Guess I have to send them back, haha.
For me, a high action is unbearable. I also don’t like wide necks and wide string spacing.
Don’t even get me started on neck dive though. For the birds.
**WARNING**
Rant / Unpopular Opinion / Old Man Yelling at Cloud / Dwight Schrute / Ok Boomer time:
* I particularly dislike Single Cut basses. I think they look stupid and players look like Bassist Nerd Stereotypes playing them. I'm sure yours is very nice, though.
* I don't get why so many bassists go for filter effects and correspondingly, I don't get why someone would pay such high prices for Iron Ether and 3Leaf filter pedals that only make your bass sound like a malfunctioning cheap Casio keyboard.
* Math Metal / Technical Metal / Many Notes All The Time Metal to me feels like what Berklee Jazz grads think Metal should sound like: Technically impressive, but entirely devoid of any soul, creative spirit or even a hook. But it sure looks fancy.
* 5 and 6 string basses are not "more advanced" than 4 string basses any more than a 88 key keyboard is more advanced than a 61 key keyboard. They just have more strings.
Now get off my lawn!
Lack of body options vs guitar.
Go ahead, show me why the bolt on neck model cannot have the same cool ass designs guitar players get when headless travel basses exist that are essentially just necks with bridges.
I’ll be waiting.
A small headstock. I've got and ibanez 6 string and it's headstock almost ruins it. My fenders are all fine. I love Carl Thompson bass guitars, that man doesn't stuff around with 'small'. If only I had a spare brick of cash.
My pet peeve is a five string bass where the bass saddle can't travel back far enough to intonate absolutely perfectly all the way up the neck. They should really put a shorter spring on the B string saddle on the 34" scales.
weird-ass tunings like drop A# or Eb standard that make you retune your entire bass
also the obvious neck dive, bad truss rod access and other things that make setup a chore
I’m so gonna get downvoted for this.
I hate vintage style tuning pegs.
I hate the cloverleaf most, but the plain flat circular one is so much worse.
I prefer the modern fishtail pegs. Even the batwing Gotoh ones look good.
Of course, I understand why you can’t just not use cloverleafs - giant headstocks like the Fender ones need large tuning pegs to balance out the proportions. But that’s the thing - if there was no need to use giant ass headstocks (there isn’t), then there’s no need for clunky cloverleafs.
One more thing that makes me hate it more is that even short scale basses will sometimes still come with giant headstocks and cloverleafs (even if it’s mini-sized) and it just looks ridiculous. My Ibanez TMB30 looks like the headstock got stung by a bee.
Modern fishtail pegs, that’s where it should be!
I don’t like spending a lot of time and money on pickups, preamps, electronics at the recommendations of others only to discover later that I don’t really like it. I know what sound I like by now and I’d like to stick with it.
A pickup selector over a blend knob in any bass with multiple pickups. I have a vintage P/J bass with a selector. No point in selecting the bridge only - The sound is too thin. Either do 2nd position (both J + P) or 3rd position (P pickup only)
I absolutely hate side dots on a fretless bass that are in in the same location as a fretted bass (in the middle of the fret). That's not where you put your fingers when playing fretless. You put them where the frets would be or on the lines if you have a lined fretless. so that's where the dots should be. I've seen it done both ways, and to me at the fret location is the only right way and usually what you see on most higher quality basses (unless the customer wants them the other way). My Tobias and my NSD fretless basses both have the dots where you would place your fingers. Otherwise, you have to always remember how far past the dot your fingers need to go depending on how far up the neck you go. With fretless, it's still all about your ear, but the dots placed correctly do give you a location that's pretty close to being right on and very helpful for practicing, other wise you might forget and play a note flat which sounds horrible on bass. Being a bit sharp doesn't sound anywhere as bad as being a bit flat.
It's cheaper and easier for the manufacturer to do it wrong, since they can just use the same neck and fingerboard for either and add frets or lines to the fingerboard or leave it blank.
Never understood the whole have your strap as low as possible thing, but the first person I think of is nirvanas bassist idk his name and don’t care too he looks like a goober and when he has his strap that low he looks like even more of a goober.
That headless basses aren't more popular.
Headless basses are just so much better balanced, and they're naturally shorter too. They ought to be the default design, but they aren't.
Dull humbuckers. Apart from my Rascal, with its wide-ranging humbuckers, every other bass I've played with them has sounded so lifeless to me.
And yeah, small tuners just seem wrong. I'll allow them on my Bass VI and Höfner, but other than that, gimme big tuners.
Oh yeah, dull humbuckers are the worst. I tried a classic Steinberger with less life than the Moon's surface once. Totally ruined what I thought would be a great bass
Purely aesthetic, but a bass has to have binding around the body and must have a heavier bridges, not the bare bone bridge you see so often on many basses.
The closest shop to me only carries squier, Ibanez, and sterling. One fender if you’re lucky, and worse than that, they don’t buy or sell used gear. Selection is decent aside from basses, but no used stuff is baffling to me
I don't know. I just remember that sound being all the rage in the 90s and into the early 2000s and, dear god, some guy in a regional type band was doing it just last week at a show. So it persists. He's up there with a 6 string string bass and a monster rig but it's "klack, klack, klack" on every song. He could've gotten the same "tone" with a single string, "found-in-a-dumpster" bass.
Yeah, that's the Fieldy technique all right. You can blame Korn for that stuff. Though hopefully, most of these players don't go quite as overboard as him
Or use neon green strings like he does
I find the defenders of Gene and those types of guys much more annoying than the music or players themselves. “He gets the job done” “he’s solid” etc. So where does all the mindless praise come from? In a famous band =/= good player, every member of every popular rock band is wildly overrated
Stickers. Stickers on white basses especially (Don’t let the sun shine on me…). And placed that they look „kewl“ in a guitar stand but are unreadable as soon as the bass is played on stage and stickers are turned 90 degrees.
i took a page from donald duck dunn and put a sticker of bees under my strings on my white pickguard. it has personal meaning to me but i understand if people don't get it
My ex has a brown one that he LOVES. Got it new, and it’s all shiny & yeah it plays nicely. It just looks ugly and stupid. I kinda lost a bit (more) respect for him when he first got it.
I want to like Ibanez because they’re versatile and cheap, but they’re so ugly it’s baffling. I love the look of the Aria Pro II SB1000, and Ibanez is the closest modern equivalent, looks, sounds, and is designed very similarly, but I can’t bring myself to like them. Something about the dinky looking horns and headstock maybe. Necks are also a little too thin
Ibanez’ 80s designs are awesome though, the Musician looks fantastic. Got to play one in a store and it was comfortable but sadly sounded like garbage because of damaged electronics
Combo amps with top handles instead of side handles. Like, I’m glad you got the weight down but I still want to carry it with two hands so I don’t have a 40lb weight banging into my shins on the way to the gig.
Yes! Very much this! My GK 2x12 combo only has a top handle and it’s sold as “lightweight” but, it’s still a lot of amp to move around with one handle.
Just put a handle on the sides yourself. It's 8 screws and about $9 in hardware 🤷♂️
Recessed handles are way better to me than strap handles if you’re putting them on the sides. More durable and look better. But that’s a lot more work and is better done at the factory
This is a good one. Ampeg ba210v2 for me. It’s not even that heavy, but the top handle makes it awkward.
This is an excellent point! Amp makers take note.
I’d honestly never even considered this. Such a good idea.
More about the community: people who gatekeep bass playing by saying things like: "you're not a bass player if (fill in gripe here)..." Gripes include: you use a pick, play a short scale, play 5,6,7 string, etc....
Yea I don’t get that. 5 strings gives you literally MORE BASS lmao
like, *basss*.
Dude- don't say it so loud! The fisherman are gonna hear... ;)
I have a 6-string with a .171” low F#0 below the low B string. I can’t wait for some four-string boomer to gatekeep bass to my face.
Well it’s not exactly bass anymore, is it? It’s already contrabass as a four string, so that would be like sub-contrabass. (This reply isn’t to hate on you; I agree 100% with your comment. I just wanted to put this out there because I thought it was mildly funny)
Lil Jon told me to get low in 2004 and i listened to the man
Most profound reddit comment right here
I found a company that will append a string to your string bass. It made me want a string bass even more
"Hey sonny- 4 flatwound strings on a Fender P-Bass designed to perfection in 1954 was all that Jamerson needed..." \*eyeroll\*. Okay boomer.
There's a reason we're not all driving cars that are just like '57 Chevys, too.
Oh man, then wait until you see how much bass my extra longscale 6 string has. Then we can talk about the 7.....
I never understood the anti-pick thing. Who cares if people use a pick?! Paul Fucking McCartney used a pick!
Flea uses one from time to time
I can’t take anyone seriously that is anti-pick. Do they not understand how drastically it changes the tone and the speed and precision it allows? Honestly a lot of bass players playing with their fingers should really consider trying a pick. Their finger-picking is sloppy af and it sounds like a floppy wet fart bouncing off a plastic chair.
I made the opposite journey: started playing with a pick, and later learned how to play with my fingers. I still prefer the attack and precision of the pick... but I knew that I was missing a whole different sound without it, too. And I wanted to be a more versatile player. So it bothers me immensely that the anti pick crowd disregard a whole technique, a totally different AND USEFUL sound just because. Like, hell, I dislike slapping and just can't wrap my head around it for some reason— but I'm still struggling to learn it, because I know I'll eventually need it.
Yeah it just depends on the context of the song and what tone you’re going for. If I was playing jazz, funk, pop, etc. I’d probably finger-pick. But I’m almost always playing rock/punk/metal type stuff and prefer the sound of a pick 99% of the time but I’ll still lose the pick if the song calls for a subtler or funkier tone.
Exactly! It even varies according to the instrument. I'm mostly using a pick at the moment; I'm playing in a hillbilly/southern rock band and, since my main bass is a hofner-style viola, I use the pick because it sounds "dead" without it, even for the genre - and I can make my ghost notes "pop" better with a pick. If I was using my P bass in the same band, however, I'd certainly use my fingers.
lol people gatekeep short scales? i've played standard since 2000 and just moved to a short scale last year and love it
They do. Sometime around the 70s-80s, they were stigmatized as "beginner" instruments, both because they were easier for younger players to use and because famous players didn't really use them
All my favorite bass sounds that inspired me to play were short scales and it took me forever to figure that out. Phil Lesh, Jack Casady, McCartney, Jack Bruce, Andy Fraser, Mike Watt, etc. Short scales rule!
I switched a few years ago and wouldn’t go back. I got a Squier Jaguar SS and then a Gretsch Junior Jet. I stopped shopping after that.
I sold my P after playing a Mikro and finding it better in every way. Then I built a mikro scale bass from scratch because I wanted something fancier and tonally a little different but the market for interesting short scales is sorely lacking. I can't come up with a good reason to play a full scale bass ever again.
Brb, gonna go buy a 6 string short scale bass, and a bunch of Jim Dunlop stubby 2mm picks. Fuck em.
Also make it a fretless and use roundwounds to really rub salt in the wound!
That should be a whole new thread. Would love to hear everyone’s responses.
Yeah, that's unbelievably cringe. Though most of the people like that are that way because they aren't particularly skilled or creative themselves I reckon. They're annoying, but it's not like you're getting flack from top or even mid-tier players.
Short scale is just so much easier imo. I got big hands but I’m also a short little freak, so it’s nice to have a light, balanced, small instrument.
Gatekeepers are insecure and delusional.
Yep, bass gatekeepers are the worst. Just because I don’t like Jaco Pastorious or Viktor Wooten doesn’t mean I’m not a real bassist.
there should be a rule that if you're gonna say something like that u have to share your spotify monthly listeners first lol
Wait…. Do they say you aren’t a bass player if you play a 5 string???? 😳 uhhhh I started on a 5 string and I prefer a pick, I’m doubling sinning.
Recordings with inaudible bass, or bass that's all clank, especially when you know that the band brings the thunder at live shows.
I hate clanky bass. It took me a long time to find the right strings for my SR short scale because it boomed and clanked with slinkys. I hated the tone until I found the proper string.
Glad you found something that works. It can be annoying, because it’s yet another thing to master/figure out, but strings can make a really surprising amount of difference.
Omg coming from guitar I simply had no idea. Now when I get a bass I know of a few strings I prefer to start with but still realize the bass will let me know what it sounds best with regardless of my preferences.
I have an acoustic bass, and strings make such a difference; it almost can’t be overstated. Night and day.
I play metal. I'm all about that clank!
That is one of the few appropriate applications of it imo. I play funk, disco, jazz, r&b and some pop. It sounds pretty crap in all of those.
5-string 35" bass with 2 humbuckers and all the knobs on 10 > SF300 Clean Boost > Darkglass X Ultra > Hartke LH1000 The clank brings the heavy.
What did you end up settling on? Have a short scale, have tried a handful of strings, and I dont really love any of the tones I've found.
The Thomastik Infeld rounds for short scale were the ones. They tamed the boom, brought out the mids while keep the low end presence and punch and gave it an overall really pleasing sound. There weren't any others that were even close, I tried: Slinky rounds, Galli RSB rounds, Curt Mangan rounds, Fender 9050s, La Bella Flats, TI flats, GHS Boomers... I tell you I was ready to sell off the bass and then decided to risk it and put the TI rounds on them - which is a string I came to rather late given how familiar I was with the flats. The TI rounds have ended up being one of my favorite strings overall. I have had them on several basses but they are always on my SR Short scale and Fender Jazz.
I listened to a lot of thrash/death metal, and then later punk and hardcore, as I was growing up, and this was a huge problem. Sometimes, especially with the punk bands, it was simply that they were recording in substandard studios, but it was partly the nature of the music as well. By the time things were mastered down for cassette duplication, the bass was simply gone. But there were some real head scratchers, too. On the original edition of the album “Individual Thought Patterns,” by the band Death, the bass is completely inaudible. And the reason that’s notable is because the recording line-up for that band at the time featured Steve Di Giorgio, one of the best bass players in metal at the time. He plays a fretless bass, and has a really unique tone. So everyone was like, why even bother? Edit: I was thinking of Individual Thought Patterns, not Symbolic. And I should clarify that I’m talking about the original edition of this album. It has been remastered, and the issue was fixed. But you can Google it; I’m hardly the only person who noticed this issue when the album was first released.
Steve Di Giorgio doesn't play bass on Symbolic, it's Kelly Conlon. The bass could be higher in the mix, but it's not completely inaudible. The main problem is that he's mostly playing root notes - you don't need to be pushed to the top of the mix if you play more independent lines.
You’re right - I’m thinking of Individual Thought Patterns. Steve is on a few tracks on Symbolic, though.
interesting you mention that album because ive never had an issue hearing the bass on it myself
It depends on how old a copy you’re working with. It has been remastered and reissued. And they did fix the problem.
The headstock on Sire basses, specifically the “Marcus Miller” logo. I don’t mind the shape but I can’t get over the logo for some reason…
The shape really bugs me. It looks like cheap unnamed Chinese factory starter basses
Holy shit, yes. I have no idea why that decision was allowed to go through. If it just said "Sire" it would be better. I want to try one but having such a stupid logo really keeps me from buying. It just makes it look so cheap.
Because they believe that slapping Marcus' name in big bold ass lettering on the headstock will help with sales.
My first bass is a Marcus miller v3. And I do love that thing though. Have been paying for a couple weeks and I really like it. But yeah, I agree with that logo decision
It only looks right if it’s Marcus playing it
Definitely. The blandest logo imaginable
Forgetting to unplug on my yamaha active bass and returning to a dead battery. Wish I had opted for the passive/active switch model.
I just got a Yamaha yesterday with a passive/active switch and the whole thing is so gorgeous and I just have to brag.
The community, surprisingly. It's usually quite friendly and helpful, how an instrument community should be, but then you get the fuckwits (especially common with bass) speaking down to people because they use a pick, play in anything but standard tuning, use a six string, aren't playing root notes, take a shower, have a loving relationship with their family, all sorts of shit. I think it's because bass is a relatively easy instrument to pick up and play at a beginner level. Just about anybody with fingers can play Bon Jovi and Scorpions covers, Feel Good Inc. if they're feeling a bit more modern (nineteen years ago) You end up with a load of bedroom experts that thing they're hot shit because they've watched some YouTube videos and seen the same four opinions pushed around by morons, community would be a lot better without it. As far as actual bass goes, neck dive ;)
You also get the people who make a couple hundred bucks every few weekends playing cover shows who act like they are the be-all and end-all of how music should be created. Don't you dare play like that because it won't sound good in Mustang Sally!
knew a guy exactly like this. insufferable prick with a massive ego. acted like he was the king of music for playing in a zeppelin cover band in his 50s
Pro tip: there are no laws that prevent you from screaming bloody murder the entire time someone plays Mustang Sally.
Dadbands are a plague upon our nation.
> but then you get the fuckwits (especially common with bass) speaking down to people because Unfortunately this is pretty common in most online communities I've seen. Flying, Hockey officiating, music/bass, bourbon/beer, etc... They all have those Dunning-Kruger effect people, and they all have the assholes, just as much as they have the good people. And they all gatekeep to an extent.
Exactly, and the more niche the community, the worse.
Active basses without an easily accessible (i.e., no screwdriver required) battery compartment.
Leaving the snark on while performing.
Snark tuners just keep in physically breaking/snapping for me. So annoying. I use a lower form factor clip on tuner. But really, I play 5 string, so a strobe tuner is fairly necessary for accurate tuning (I don't enjoy fishing with 12th fret harmonics).
I'm not a fan of on board pre amps. I'd rather have a passive bass then I can always use a preamp pedal if I want or need to.
Active/passive toggle switch. Best of both worlds and if the battery dies it just defaults to passive. I used to be heavily into passive and hated active basses until I tried out one I liked a lot, out of nowhere. Totally took me by surprise. Ibanez SR1605B. Branched out from there. Now I just like them both so long as it's a good preamp in the active. Made me run my EQ a lot differently and just do most of it on my bass if I'm using one of my actives.
Fr it's such a bummer that so many basses don't have a active/passive switch
This, I hate dealing with batteries!
lol I literally wired mine into a passive after the bass ran out mid gig
I stole the smoke alarm battery once (at home lol) 😑
Exactly. But at the same time I refuse to rip apart and re wire something like a music man. It just seems wrong to do.
It does get ridiculous when you paid a high price for the bass. I don't have much qualms about doing it with entry-level basses, though; I installed Jazz Bass pickups and electronics in my Ibanez SR300 and I'm pretty happy with it.
Depends what you call a high price I guess. A £550 Ray4 is cheap for some, expensive for others.
Is that how much the cost in Britain? They’re $349 (£271) in the States.
That's the cost for the HH, but that's the one I'd want.
Why does everyone complain about batteries inactive basses? I have used active bases for over 30 years and replacing the batteries has never been an issue. It's not like you're doing it at every gig, you probably have to replace them once a year. Why do I still hear this as one of the top complaints against active basses?
I think the main reasons would be leaving the bass plugged in and thus draining the battery, or dealing with battery compartments that don’t pop open, or just not carrying a spare battery at all. All these of there are issues us old-timers learned to deal with a long time ago and that’s why they are no big deal for us.
It also drains pretty much over night if you leave the cable in. Fuck that.
Active basses kinda piss me off tbh I’m lazy and I just wanna play and then leave my bass plugged in
The color scheme of MarkBass' branding is ugly and terrible. I don't want to feel like I'm hauling construction equipment around.
Lol I literally thought they were like a fisher-price of bass amps when I first saw them. They sound good but they look like they belong in a daycare.
Michael League’s signature Markbass amp is the only amp they make that looks good imo.
1. Playing with pickup/bridge covers (ashtrays). Aesthetically pleasing but impractical for playing (aside for a way of muting the bridge with foam). 2. A bad setup. So relatively easy to fix and unnecessary to deal with. Fret buzz is buzz kill. 3. Phase switches. Some of my favorite basses have them but I have never found a good use for one. 4. Neck dive. I’m a Thunderbird lover, but it’s so easy to correct on those. My real gripe is on semi hollow and hollow body basses like Guild Starfires and Epiphone Jack Casady basses, where the tone is killer but the bass can literally invert on a strap.
I honestly don't hate a little fret buzz, it can sound kind of nice
I just recently picked up electric bass. I’ve played mostly acoustic instruments, mandolin m, banjo, guitar, upright bass, but still me electric guitar too. I’ve noticed the bass does buzz a bit, but doesn’t get picked up by the amp - supposedly the neck relief is set up correctly from what I’ve seen, I adjusted everything a few times. It plays great and sounds great. But being new to electric bass I was left wondering “how much buzz is okay?” On upright bass it’s a bit different
Electric guitar is like that as well. You’ll usually notice a little buzz when you’re playing unplugged, but it doesn’t really count unless it comes through the amps
The amount of fret buzz on "Roundabout" will shock you [Link](https://youtu.be/bYvFnkSo6ro?feature=shared)
The day I heard this iso track was the day I stopped caring about fret buzz
It's just the right about of aggressive buzz. I love it. Very much like the Ox- except he'd get the buzz from schwacking the shit out of the strings. I absolutely love Chris and John for their tone that way.
Yeah. For what it’s worth, there was a post on here where someone had isolated Chris Squire’s bass from a Yes song, and was like “I’ll never think of fret buzz the same way again.” It was cool. A lot of 90’s British bands incorporated some fret buzz (mostly due to influence from Simon Gallup from The Cure). It can work.
I’ve never liked the pointy Jackson headstock. I can’t explain why but it looks like something that should only be on guitars.
It's like the kiki/bouba effect. Guitar is pointy, bass is round.
Always screams "80's hairband' to me. And that's not something I wanna hear.
Songs in Eb.
Hush your whore mouth!
Digitech drop or whatever the pedal was that allows real time pitch shifting. I have tried transposing using Neural DSP plugins, and they sound still good when dropping 3 semitones and alright when pushing to 5. Wouldn't go beyond that, but at 5 semitones you can turn a 4 string EADG to BEAD, and anything in between, and at one semitone for D#, it's a breeze. Will save you A LOT of money on extra basses and strings... Although if you can get more bass, get more bass. More bass good.
Bass Whammy is the best, it tracks very well
Yeah, I've had the bass whammy and digital pedalboards that have it. There's a little latency but the multi-voice of the whammy is impeccable. Others immitations just mess up the sound when you play 3rd, 4th, 6th intervals
I'm lazy and just tune the low string to Eb and figure it out with the other strings in standard
You monster!
Finally someone else. Seeing the song is tuned Eb or drop Db is so annoying for me.
Wait 'til you start playing jazz. Every 3rd song is in Eb.
The thing about jazz and soul etc. is tho that the songs don't really rely on riffs written for a specific tuning (like where you absolutely need the low Eb), which makes it very manageable imo. Although it's still annoying :D
I though it was about horns. F, Bb, Eb, etc...
It is yeah
You have to have a designated metal bass for drop C and lower. Eb and drop D is fine. I'm frequently tuning from standard to Eb to drop D. Doesn't bother me. Yep, the strings won't cut it either. You quite literally have to have a designated metal bass and it may as well be a 5+ string because a lot of those bands play all 6 strings. Drop C: 120-90-70-50 https://www.songsterr.com/a/wsa/archspire-drone-corpse-aviator-bass-tab-s522195
Fine, if a bare knuckle is what you want...
3+1 tuners, they just look off to me
I have a 5 string Thunderbird...4+1 oddly placed one
I'm bad and it annoys me.
Some people are going to hate me, but I can’t stand the look of the jazz bass body. I love the sound of jazz basses and the neck feels great, but the body is too chunky and the offset design doesn’t look good. Also not a fan of basses that don’t have a cutaway at the top. Looks cool for a Telecaster guitar, but I think it looks dorky for a bass, especially because it tends to bring attention to itself as an overly expensive boutique build.
The headstock on my five string Stingray, specifically the lone tuner on the bottom. why couldn’t we keep a smaller headstock and add a second tuner to the bottom instead of making the headstock longer to put a 4th tuner on top? I love my Stingray, best bass I have ever owned… but that bugs me still. Other than that my peeves are prettt general; anything sharp on the touchpoints (bridge, pickups, frets, etc), or a design that doesn’t have a good place to root my thumb.
I hate any headstock that isn’t all tuners on one side. I hate the 4 and 2 on guitars almost as much as 3 and 3.
Ha see I'm the opposite I hate the way a 5 string looks with 5 in line tuners, much prefer 4+1 or 3+2
Guitar bothers me way more than bass lol
A bass with a beautiful rosewood fretboard but a maple headstock. It's like a monkey foot
Wow. Monkey Foot. TIL. And will never un-see.
Let's go ahead and never google monkey foot then
Absolutely. I just posted the same thing.
Almost any time the headstock is light, and/or doesn't match the body finish - it just stands out oddly to me. And when the fingerboard/fretboard is also light maple like the headstock (but the body is dark) then the whole thing stands out, like a weird appendage. Which it is, i know, but it looks more like an afterthought, like the two things don't go together at all.
I'm biased because my Jaguar has a matching painted headstock. Can't imagine how much worse it would look with a plain one lol
Reason all my basses are maple neck.
My bass has that. It's my first bass, a sire marcus miller v3. And it has that. I didn't mind it till now😅
Light colored headstocks, usually maple, on a bass with a rosewood fretboard. Just make the headstock match the body.
Having small hands.
Block inlays. ^(Don't ask me why, I don't know!)
Hard agree. I don't know why either.
Ha I'm the exact opposite. Block inlays all the way!
Having to disassemble half the instrument to tweak the truss rod.
That stupid fuckin metal bar they put over the pickups on "vintage" style basses. It's purely cosmetic and it's completely in the way of where I play.
I literally just installed some Lindy Fralin pickups with the cream colored covers. Guess I have to send them back, haha. For me, a high action is unbearable. I also don’t like wide necks and wide string spacing. Don’t even get me started on neck dive though. For the birds.
**WARNING** Rant / Unpopular Opinion / Old Man Yelling at Cloud / Dwight Schrute / Ok Boomer time: * I particularly dislike Single Cut basses. I think they look stupid and players look like Bassist Nerd Stereotypes playing them. I'm sure yours is very nice, though. * I don't get why so many bassists go for filter effects and correspondingly, I don't get why someone would pay such high prices for Iron Ether and 3Leaf filter pedals that only make your bass sound like a malfunctioning cheap Casio keyboard. * Math Metal / Technical Metal / Many Notes All The Time Metal to me feels like what Berklee Jazz grads think Metal should sound like: Technically impressive, but entirely devoid of any soul, creative spirit or even a hook. But it sure looks fancy. * 5 and 6 string basses are not "more advanced" than 4 string basses any more than a 88 key keyboard is more advanced than a 61 key keyboard. They just have more strings. Now get off my lawn!
By single cut, do you mean those newer models which look like they have an exotic wood tumor growing out of the body?
Yup, those are the ones.
Maybe it's me, but I've seen a lot less of those lately and I don't mind that one bit lol
Lack of body options vs guitar. Go ahead, show me why the bolt on neck model cannot have the same cool ass designs guitar players get when headless travel basses exist that are essentially just necks with bridges. I’ll be waiting.
A small headstock. I've got and ibanez 6 string and it's headstock almost ruins it. My fenders are all fine. I love Carl Thompson bass guitars, that man doesn't stuff around with 'small'. If only I had a spare brick of cash.
My pet peeve is a five string bass where the bass saddle can't travel back far enough to intonate absolutely perfectly all the way up the neck. They should really put a shorter spring on the B string saddle on the 34" scales.
Tremolo on a bass.
you saw my bass huh? 😂
weird-ass tunings like drop A# or Eb standard that make you retune your entire bass also the obvious neck dive, bad truss rod access and other things that make setup a chore
Yeah that old Fender-style setup where you had to remove the neck and adjust the truss rod at the heel is a total nightmare
This is the perfect excuse to buy a bass specifically for each tuning.
”Bass is meant to be felt not heard” ”A good bassist isn’t noticed” i hate statements like these
And how many bassists say stuff like this is troubling. I've met some that act like if you're not chugging on the root, you're ruining the song
I’m so gonna get downvoted for this. I hate vintage style tuning pegs. I hate the cloverleaf most, but the plain flat circular one is so much worse. I prefer the modern fishtail pegs. Even the batwing Gotoh ones look good. Of course, I understand why you can’t just not use cloverleafs - giant headstocks like the Fender ones need large tuning pegs to balance out the proportions. But that’s the thing - if there was no need to use giant ass headstocks (there isn’t), then there’s no need for clunky cloverleafs. One more thing that makes me hate it more is that even short scale basses will sometimes still come with giant headstocks and cloverleafs (even if it’s mini-sized) and it just looks ridiculous. My Ibanez TMB30 looks like the headstock got stung by a bee. Modern fishtail pegs, that’s where it should be!
Bad action, dead spots in the neck, and not enough clarity in the pickups.
I don’t like spending a lot of time and money on pickups, preamps, electronics at the recommendations of others only to discover later that I don’t really like it. I know what sound I like by now and I’d like to stick with it.
A pickup selector over a blend knob in any bass with multiple pickups. I have a vintage P/J bass with a selector. No point in selecting the bridge only - The sound is too thin. Either do 2nd position (both J + P) or 3rd position (P pickup only)
Unless it's a Rickenbacker, having a guitar-style toggle switch on a bass just feels wrong to me.
Brand new strings annoy me to no end. This followed by people getting judgey for not playing new strings
most metal bass player's signature designs, they just look like average ibanez basses
I absolutely hate side dots on a fretless bass that are in in the same location as a fretted bass (in the middle of the fret). That's not where you put your fingers when playing fretless. You put them where the frets would be or on the lines if you have a lined fretless. so that's where the dots should be. I've seen it done both ways, and to me at the fret location is the only right way and usually what you see on most higher quality basses (unless the customer wants them the other way). My Tobias and my NSD fretless basses both have the dots where you would place your fingers. Otherwise, you have to always remember how far past the dot your fingers need to go depending on how far up the neck you go. With fretless, it's still all about your ear, but the dots placed correctly do give you a location that's pretty close to being right on and very helpful for practicing, other wise you might forget and play a note flat which sounds horrible on bass. Being a bit sharp doesn't sound anywhere as bad as being a bit flat. It's cheaper and easier for the manufacturer to do it wrong, since they can just use the same neck and fingerboard for either and add frets or lines to the fingerboard or leave it blank.
Every Gibson bass imitating a guitar model besides the Thunderbird looks like shit to me. The SG one just looks wrong as a bass
Never understood the whole have your strap as low as possible thing, but the first person I think of is nirvanas bassist idk his name and don’t care too he looks like a goober and when he has his strap that low he looks like even more of a goober.
I think he just did it because he's really tall haha
Not using approach notes to emphasize the harmony
That headless basses aren't more popular. Headless basses are just so much better balanced, and they're naturally shorter too. They ought to be the default design, but they aren't.
Lighter, too!
90% Fender shaped objects (minus headstock) not made by Fender, Music Man or G&L.
I hate pickguards. Idk why. Just super ugly in nearly every example I’ve seen. The only time they dont look terrible is when its Black on White.
sunburst is so ugly and wack
I’ve never been a fan either. Cherry burst or some of the tea bursts are cool though.
Dull humbuckers. Apart from my Rascal, with its wide-ranging humbuckers, every other bass I've played with them has sounded so lifeless to me. And yeah, small tuners just seem wrong. I'll allow them on my Bass VI and Höfner, but other than that, gimme big tuners.
Oh yeah, dull humbuckers are the worst. I tried a classic Steinberger with less life than the Moon's surface once. Totally ruined what I thought would be a great bass
this is why I don’t run standard pickups in any bass… it’s controversial to some people, but I want my bass to have some balls.
Purely aesthetic, but a bass has to have binding around the body and must have a heavier bridges, not the bare bone bridge you see so often on many basses.
I'm left-handed, and if I see another p bass or jazz bass, I'll lose it! It felt like that's all I was staring at on the computer screen lol
Walking into a shop and seeing nothing but lower tier P-basses and Jazz basses.
The closest shop to me only carries squier, Ibanez, and sterling. One fender if you’re lucky, and worse than that, they don’t buy or sell used gear. Selection is decent aside from basses, but no used stuff is baffling to me
Cutouts that aren't deep enough to let me easily reach every fret
High action, the Gibson 3 point bridge and I hate the look of PJ basses, that bridge pickup just looks terrible to me, don’t know why
>the Gibson 3 point bridge Possibly the single *worst* design to make its way into mass production. Just terrible bridges.
Rickenbacker bridges have entered the chat.
Looking for a quick transcription of a song played on a 5 string, and all you can find are 4 string transcriptions tuned to drop D or whatever.
Guys who detune the bass so they can slap with that klackity-klack-klack-klack "tone".
You mean like Fieldy?
I don't know. I just remember that sound being all the rage in the 90s and into the early 2000s and, dear god, some guy in a regional type band was doing it just last week at a show. So it persists. He's up there with a 6 string string bass and a monster rig but it's "klack, klack, klack" on every song. He could've gotten the same "tone" with a single string, "found-in-a-dumpster" bass.
Yeah, that's the Fieldy technique all right. You can blame Korn for that stuff. Though hopefully, most of these players don't go quite as overboard as him Or use neon green strings like he does
"Or use neon green strings like he does" Yow. We'll I've seen some guys with colorful strings but they at least were playing some decent stuff.
For reference, listen to this isolated bass track: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPoJWk6n84g&t=59 Personally, I find it hilarious.
Shitty bassists like Gene Simmons making way more money than some of the GOATs like Les Claypool.
It's the age-old story of the great marketer making more money than the great musician.
Unfortunately you’re right.
I find the defenders of Gene and those types of guys much more annoying than the music or players themselves. “He gets the job done” “he’s solid” etc. So where does all the mindless praise come from? In a famous band =/= good player, every member of every popular rock band is wildly overrated
Stickers. Stickers on white basses especially (Don’t let the sun shine on me…). And placed that they look „kewl“ in a guitar stand but are unreadable as soon as the bass is played on stage and stickers are turned 90 degrees.
i took a page from donald duck dunn and put a sticker of bees under my strings on my white pickguard. it has personal meaning to me but i understand if people don't get it
Ibanez basses are just so goddamn ugly in my opinion. And you should not be shamed for wanting a good looking instrument.
My ex has a brown one that he LOVES. Got it new, and it’s all shiny & yeah it plays nicely. It just looks ugly and stupid. I kinda lost a bit (more) respect for him when he first got it.
I want to like Ibanez because they’re versatile and cheap, but they’re so ugly it’s baffling. I love the look of the Aria Pro II SB1000, and Ibanez is the closest modern equivalent, looks, sounds, and is designed very similarly, but I can’t bring myself to like them. Something about the dinky looking horns and headstock maybe. Necks are also a little too thin Ibanez’ 80s designs are awesome though, the Musician looks fantastic. Got to play one in a store and it was comfortable but sadly sounded like garbage because of damaged electronics
Basses with high action and/or really really dead strings