Any bassists lurking here? Bass rig help.

  • Thread starter Thread starter Mr. Willy
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Mr. Willy

Mr. Willy

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I'm trying to help my bassist out a bit. He's wanting to upgrade/diversify his rig, but he's not sure what to look for. His main bass is Rickenbacker. Main amp is an old (60's/70's) Fender tube bass amp. He's getting a decent tone with this rig, but he's wanting more definition and cut in the mids/highs. He wants to get another head and 410 cabinet to run with his Fender amp. I don't have much experience with bass rigs. I know I dig Ampeg, SWR, and GK stuff. I dislike Hartke bass amps (they sound tinny to me, could've been how they were dialed in). Other than that, I can't offer him much help. His favorite tones are Geddy's from the Rickenbacker days and Chris Squire's tone. He's looking to spend about $1000 max.

I know this isn't a lot of info to go on, but I'm hoping you guys can help me get this ball rolling. Thanks!
 
Ampeg svt 7 pro is awesome with the MXR M80 great combo if I ever go back to bass that's what I'm doing you get a very nice natural grind from that sort of rig and its pretty versatile the Mxr M80 is like a MarkV for bassists but needs a decent power source hope this helps
 
I'm thoroughly pleased with my current bass amp set up. GK 1001RBII into a Mesa Boogie Vintage Powerhouse 4x10. Very punchy tone. Very versatile. Can get some slight growl but generally just a good rock/funk rig. I went with the GK head and Mesa 10" cab combination due to it being the basis of Justin Chancellor's rig and Flea's old rig. Very full lows, great definition for bass chord work in the Primus vein, harmonics pop if you want to do the whole artificial harmonic thing.

It really moves air. Highly recommend a similar combo. It will get you in the $800-$1000 range used.
 
I'm kinda biased, because I only play Ampeg bass amps. I have had several of the SVT Pro series heads, and they all do the trick for me. I'm using the 2 Pro now for the huge tube rig. I also use a Fulltone Bassdrive to get all kinds of gain out of my rig. I recommend a few tips to getting a better response out of the rig.

1) Every piece of the rig matters. Running passive pickups means a high impedance signal that can easily be destroyed by chains of pedals and cables. Monster Cables suck the highs out of everything and make everything muddy. Quality cables matter for a passive bass. Also, if there is a pedal rig involved, make sure there is a buffer in line somewhere. A chain of pedals is just a long line of capacitance that sucks the highs out of the signal.

2) Strings make a difference. We bassists like to forget that. I know I go a long time without buying strings, usually because I don't ever break them. Changing strings can bring a bass back to life. Plus, there are different kinds of bass strings to choose from. If he is using nickel strings and wants more highs, he might want to try stainless steel strings. They are brighter and tend to be punchier.

3) He is running a tube amp. If he sets that head on a bass cab on a regular basis, things will get worn out. Perhaps he might want to re-tube and service his head. That could breathe new life into his rig.

4) Finally, when all else fails, get the EQ. Most of these bass preamps that are so popular make such a difference to people simply because of the EQ. An active preamp in the bass, an EQ or preamp pedal in line, or a rack setup in the loop can fix things right up. The Ampeg Pro series heads all have a graphic EQ, and that is my best friend. A simple SansAmp setup might do the trick.

Oh, and don't forget the compressor. That is how we make things pop!
 
My bass player plays a Rick into a Sansamp bass driver then into an SWR (tube pre-SS output section) and runs an old DBX comp in the loop.
It is friggen MASSIVE sounding. The Sansamp makes a huge difference without being too pricey ;)
He also runs an old Ernie Ball and a Fender Jazz bass through it and its still a huge difference. The Sansamp gives it some growl and gain but as was stated, the EQ in makes a ton of difference, especially with the Rickenbacker, which as I'm sure you know already, is unlike anything else out there.
The SWR sounds like a good bass amp should, but its pretty normal sounding without the Sansamp.
I'd try the sansamp first, you can use it with whatever you end up with later, not too expensive, and it transforms nice and normal into monsterous :lol: :LOL:
Just my 2 cents worth. I'm not a bass player, but I've watched him go through several changes over the years, and that little box blew our doors off :yes:
 
Post over at talkbass, great forum for bassists. Even though there are some great posts in this thread so far, might as well cast a broader net.

The idea of a sans amp or bass preamp into a power amp is a great option. I run an Eden WTDI into a crown k1 power amp into am ampeg bxt210m. I like that the WTDI has a built in compressor plus if i don't need an amp, I can run it direct.

My other rig is an ampeg svt3 pro into an ampeg svt410 cab.

I have also used my Mesa mark IV into the ampeg 410 cab, the mark IV is a surprisingly nice bass amp. Just something to consider since you can pickup a Mesa mark III pretty cheap and still keep with tubes. My experience when looking at how well a guitar amp will do at bass is to look at the output transformer. Is the output transformer beefy like a fender bassman head or small like a fender bandmaster head. The bandmaster reverb head I have has a small output transformer and just didn't sound very good with my fender jazz bass. Fender bassman head I had worked great for bass of course, but was a one trick pony was far as sound.

As far as gk amps, they are nice. Swr makes nice amps but for my personal style it was not the tone I was going for.
 
Black ba what's the svt pro 3 compared to the svt pro 7 as far as using pedals
 
Sounds like he wants to keep the Fender in there, so try slaving it into a solid state power amp. Carvin is just as an example of new stuff with decent quality at a lower price. You could shop used for an old QSC or Crown and some sort of nice cabs like Ampegs.

Carvin 1000W power amp $350
Carvin 4x10 cabinet $370
Carvin 1x15 cabinet $300
Weber 100w Mass Attenuator dummy load $185
Total $1205

Bank buster but it is a 1000 watt full stack.

There are these overdrive / preamp pedals from a company called Darkglass that sound really good. They're a little pricey but could sound awesome in front of an old Fender head and could serve as a backup if a tube takes a shit.

http://www.darkglass.com/
 
Thanks a lot for the replies guys. Already some good info that I never would have thought of in this thread. I'll direct him here and see if some of this info can help him out. I can't remember the exact model Fender he's playing through, but it's a combo deal about the size of a Super Reverb but with an 18" speaker.
 
From some of the info I'm getting here, it sounds like keeping the Fender as the foundation of his tone but adding a preamp, eq, and compressor plus a different cab/cabs might very well get him what he's looking for.
 
http://www.tech21nyc.com/products/sansamp/rbi.html
or this
http://www.tech21nyc.com/products/sansamp/psa1_1.html
into a power amp. I would suggest a Crest CA6. They sound awesome
and can be had used for around $400 or less most of the time. The
only drawback being they weight about 50 lbs. But he would get an extremely
versatile rig for well under $1000.
I've never been a fan of 18 inch speakers. To me, all they are good for is moving air.
Tell him to get the 4x10 cab first, I think that will change his tone drastically.
 
I've got two bass amps. For smaller gigs, I use a TC Electronic BG250. It cuts nicley, has built in fx and only cost $350 new. If 250 watts is too little for you, I'd suggest looking at their other bass amps. Their stuff is superb! My main bass amp is a Markbass CMD102P. Its a 300 watt combo amp into a 2x10 tilt-back cab. If you add another cab, its rated for 500 watts. Markbass makes a very clean sounding amp. I use both the EHX lumberjack and Soul food pedals to add a little bit of fuzz to the sound. The markbass combo only weighs about 45 LBS and cuts like nothing else!!! I used to use their CMD121P which is the same amp into a 1x12 speaker combo. The amp weighed like 20 LBS and sounded monstrous with an OD in front of it. It never gets lost in a mix.

besides TC Electronic and Markbass, I'd also check out Hartke and Mesa.
 
Mr. Willy":1roh854a said:
Thanks a lot for the replies guys. Already some good info that I never would have thought of in this thread. I'll direct him here and see if some of this info can help him out. I can't remember the exact model Fender he's playing through, but it's a combo deal about the size of a Super Reverb but with an 18" speaker.
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Did not realize he had a combo, I would do a good 410 cab first ;)
 
I've already suggested the 410 cab as the first purchase to see what difference that will make. Great minds think alike!
 
BrentSSL":3bg90c7n said:
Black ba what's the svt pro 3 compared to the svt pro 7 as far as using pedals
Click to expand...
No idea on the difference as I have never used an svt7 pro and only pedal I use is a diamond bass comp. I have toyed with the idea of using my musket fuzz and trying one of my guitar ods, but never have.
 
He ended up getting a GK 1001 and a David Eden 410 cab. Thanks for all the help guys!
 
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