I've had 4strings, 5strings, fretless, active and passive but I can honestly say I've never seen an 8 string. Very interested in this!
I've had 4strings, 5strings, fretless, active and passive but I can honestly say I've never seen an 8 string. Very interested in this!
In reply to 2Girlsracing :
I'll either post links to some sound clips or vids when it's done.
The neck plate & screws arrived Saturday, so I got it screwed into place. I'd post a pic, but there's nothing really new to see there.
However I also screwed in the strap locks which allowed me to put on the bass & check the ergonomics & balance. It fits nice & doesn't have any neck-dive. I think the bridge should pretty much counterweight the tuners, so I don't anticipate a noticeable change in balance once it's all together.
I received notice today that the bridge is shipped & due Wednesday. Hopefully the strings ship soon, or they may be the last thing I'm waiting on.
I'm heading over to Ryan's Repair tonight to check out his selection of pickup screws, but if he doesn't have any long enough I'm just going to glue some wood blocks into the pickup cavities.
Cool project, in to see more.
I too enjoy modding my own basses. Lately I've been adding musicman pickups to P basses with non fender style necks:
In reply to Mykk :
Ooh nice! Those MM pickups always have such a fat sound!
I picked up the longer pickup screws from Ryan last night.
Unfortunately they're still not quite long enough.
The pickup was pretty wobbly too, and I'm really not confident threading them into the body since there only seems to be 1/4" or less of wood between the bottom of the cavity & back of the bass. So in a rare moment of not allowing bad judgment to cloud my decision making, I decided to make a wood "pad" to go under each pickup.
I gave them a quick coat of black spray paint to help disguise them under the pickups & epoxied them into place. I chose epoxy vs. wood glue since there's a pretty thick finish inside the holes.
The epoxy should have setup overnight, so I'll check this evening & possibly be able to get the pickups installed.
In reply to Pete Gossett :
When i saw the screws my first thought was i hope they don't go all the way through! Good work on adding the extra wood.
Pickups are in. They're still a bit wobbly, but I think the solution will be some denser foam for underneath them.
With that done I started on the wiring.
So much for being pre-wired... The top pot is in the first hole, my fingers are under the other 2, and my thumb is where the output jack goes. Rewiring them will be a project for tomorrow.
So, one thing I've noticed as I've started playing bass more and more over the years, is that as I play along to song recordings, I've noticed a huge disparity in tunings. I enjoy playing along to many song by Tears for Fears, usually using Spotify as the method of playback, and I've noticed that tunings on songs often range from 432Hz up to 444Hz. Now, I know the mastering process back in those days often lead to songs being slightly sped up or slowed down, impacting the tuning by a fraction of a step. In fact, many of Alice Cooper's songs are slightly sharp, up at 448Hz.
The difference in pitch is far more noticeable to me on bass than it is on guitar, and it drives me nuts to be slightly flat or sharp as my ears seem to be able to pick up the slightest variation in pitch, even as low as 4 cents, which is basically the difference between 440Hz and 441Hz.
A current song I've started jamming along to is "Time is Right" by Fiction Factory, a nice song with a simple bassline to just zone out with that's not cheesy like "Feels like Heaven" (not that it's a bad song). In the standard concert tuning of A440 that we're all familiar with now, you'll notice you are slightly flat, and that tuning to 444Hz matches the recording far better. If anyone wants to validate this, give it a shot. Otherwise I may be a loony and it may be time to commit myself to the nearest institution.
Someone tell me I'm not crazy and not the only one struggling with this!
In reply to Azryael :
I don't play along with music that often, but I've definitely noticed it. The one recent one I can think of offhand is "Hey Now" by Crowded House.
I got the electronics finished up, but not without a fight. The output jack hole on the body was routed for the new smaller(typically plastic) output jacks, while the one with the EMGs is the old-school style. I could have ordered the correct one, but I really don't like them as much as the old style.
The problem is I needed to enlarge the inside of the hole, not the end on the outside of the body, but there's not enough room to get any tools into the cavity to enlarge it...wow I need to get my mind out of the gutter after all that.
Anyway, my solution:
I went through 2 of those sanding rings & made a whole lot of smoke in the process, but everything is wired, soldered & mounted in place.
I left the wires long since I'm not exactly sure where the battery box will go.
The bridge also arrived today. It seems well-made, though it doesn't have the mass I expected. I don't think that'll be a problem though.
Here it is set approximately into position.
I think I'll work on the cavity cover next. The battery box should arrive tomorrow, so that would allow me to hopefully finish up the back. Then I'll probably get the bridge mounted. My set of strings hasn't shipped yet, but I have a 4-string set I can use to get the tuner positions laid out.
That bridge is the chunky.
I don't have anyone to really jam with besides myself, and I don't have a nice music room set up where I can set up my drumset and record my own stuff, so playing along with tracks I enjoy keeps me in the groove of playing for now.
I've found myself dealing with grounding issues because of improperly installed or poorly grounded jacks... That Schecter of mine was one of the biggest offenders.
In reply to Azryael :
You're in San Antonio? Surely there must be musicians around looking to jam?
In reply to Azryael :
If you want a neat bass line to play, Listen to "Q-U" by They Might be Giants. Yeah, it's a kid's song but it's got a cool bass riff.
Bass is looking sweet Pete!
Recon1342 said:In reply to Azryael :
If you want a neat bass line to play, Listen to "Q-U" by They Might be Giants. Yeah, it's a kid's song but it's got a cool bass riff.
Born Under a Bad Sign by Cream and How Many More Times by Zeppelin are the 2 I like to play on when I rarely play bass
I'm familiar with that song by TMBG, I had actually just started High School when it came out, and I recall baby sitting a kid who loved that song. I've not actually heard it since. Just gave it a listen again, and it is a simple, but catchy bass line.
I think I've heard Born Under a Bad Sign maybe once, but I can't even begin to count how many times I've listen to How Many More Times (poorly constructed pun intended). John Paul Jones is a genius, and Bonzo himself is my idol for my drum playing. My girl just bought me the Paiste 2002 Cymbal pack that I'm itching to jam on.
As for being in SA, I've lived here for close to 11 years now. Dad retired out of the Army here, and after I did my own thing, decided to hang around nearby too. Maybe it's having been an Army-brat growing up and having my lifelong friends scattered around the globe, but I've found it difficult to make friends here. It's hard to find people with common interest around here. Maybe I'm just weird, who knows.
More progress, more frustration.
I got the rear cover cut out & painted just in time for the battery box to arrive, so I cut a hole in the cover & glued in the battery box.
With that done it was time to flip the bass over & work on pinpointing the bridge location. However, the first thing I noticed was the the bridge wobbling & not setting flat. I flipped it upside down to discover this.
Those are the screws that fix each of the 8 saddles into position, protruding down(the bridge is upside down in the pic) below the bridge. <facepalm>
Fortunately I'm a hoarder, and in a box of old screws I'd remember from computers I found 8 countersink machine screws that were the right diameter, pitch, and length. They're plated, not powedercoated black, and the heads are slightly larger, but they fit & work.
With that mess fixed it was time to pinpoint its correct location.
I'll be using a .090 E-string, which is the same gauge(though different brand) that I use on my 30" 6-string bass. On it, the distance between the nut & saddle is 30.25" exactly, so for this bass I wanted to make sure I had at least a little bit longer adjustment available.
On the opposite edge of the neck, the A-octave string will still be wound, so it's length should be slightly longer than 30", but to keep plenty of adjustment range, I wanted it's minimum string length to be slightly under 30".
Unfortunately this bridge doesn't have much adjustment range, so I could barely meet both those goals. Here's where I ended up.
That's about 30-11/16" on the E-string
And on the A-octave it's at 29-15/16".
I taped off the area around the bridge, marked the location for the 4 mounting screw holes, and did some light sanding around the original mounting holes & ground wire hole - the finish was very slightly ridged around each of them, so I wanted to level them a bit.
Tomorrow I hope to get the mounting holes drilled & the bridge attached, then I can turn my attention to the headstock & locating the tuning keys.
Azryael said:I'm familiar with that song by TMBG, I had actually just started High School when it came out, and I recall baby sitting a kid who loved that song. I've not actually heard it since. Just gave it a listen again, and it is a simple, but catchy bass line.
I think I've heard Born Under a Bad Sign maybe once, but I can't even begin to count how many times I've listen to How Many More Times (poorly constructed pun intended). John Paul Jones is a genius, and Bonzo himself is my idol for my drum playing. My girl just bought me the Paiste 2002 Cymbal pack that I'm itching to jam on.
As for being in SA, I've lived here for close to 11 years now. Dad retired out of the Army here, and after I did my own thing, decided to hang around nearby too. Maybe it's having been an Army-brat growing up and having my lifelong friends scattered around the globe, but I've found it difficult to make friends here. It's hard to find people with common interest around here. Maybe I'm just weird, who knows.
Oh man, you gotta listen to the Cream catalog if you've only heard that song once. Jack Bruce was a berkeleying genius on the bass, since it was a power trio and Clapton often doesn't take up a lot of sonic space the bass is all the melody and the groove. John Paul Jones is great, but I believe even he said Bruce was better( I think, dont quote me there). And then realize that the intricate bass line you hear is only part of what Bruce was doing......he's also singing at the same time.
And live hes more batE36 M3, guitar solos end up being entire band solos as Bruce starts taking the melody, inverting it, changing it, going up a 5th, up an octave, playing what Clapton is playing, often as Clapton plays it for the first time. Ginger Baker makes the whole thing even crazier as he starts doing complimentory fills to both Clapton and Bruce's parts.....that they are making up as they go.
Played a short scale bass a lot too.....short scales are cooler imo
In reply to Antihero :
Cream's Crossroads has one of my favorite bass solos of the era, possibly only eclipsed by Zeppelin's The Lemon Song.
If you're digging deep into that era, make sure you check out Tim Bogert too. While his work with Vanilla Fudge sort of set the standard, these two later tracks of his are the ones that really do it for me.
I only learned a few weeks ago that Superstition was originally written for Jeff Beck, but he & Stevie Wonder happened to be jamming on it, and they decided it was likely going to be such a big hit that Stevie should release it first.
I'll have to open my ears a bit more to some Cream. I grew up hearing a lot of Clapton's solo work to the level of annoyance that I basically turned a blind eye to any other projects he may have been involved with.
Pete Gossett said:In reply to Antihero :
Cream's Crossroads has one of my favorite bass solos of the era, possibly only eclipsed by Zeppelin's The Lemon Song.
If you're digging deep into that era, make sure you check out Tim Bogert too. While his work with Vanilla Fudge sort of set the standard, these two later tracks of his are the ones that really do it for me.
I only learned a few weeks ago that Superstition was originally written for Jeff Beck, but he & Stevie Wonder happened to be jamming on it, and they decided it was likely going to be such a big hit that Stevie should release it first.
Cactus is a hell of a band most have forgotten, hell I hadn't heard that song in awhile either. Great song
Azryael said:I'll have to open my ears a bit more to some Cream. I grew up hearing a lot of Clapton's solo work to the level of annoyance that I basically turned a blind eye to any other projects he may have been involved with.
Cream is nothing like Clapton's solo work, it's pretty much the polar opposite really.
Antihero said:Cream is nothing like Clapton's solo work, it's pretty much the polar opposite really.
I'll take sometime this evening to sit down and give them a thorough listen.
This customization thread has actually stirred my desire to build my own Balalaika. Something about playing a Russian Folk Dorito seems like loads of fun as well, as I enjoy experimenting with other stringed instruments to keep my hands moving while learning new things. I suppose I could keep it bass-themed and go straight for a contrabass balalaika, but I'd rather start small first.
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