Multiple basses and "My Sound"

[SKATE RAT]

 +1 on the Crayola thing,but i would love to have 2 of each.for a back up.  (i dream of a pair of Ric's 1 blk, 1 wht)
as far as "my sound" i tend to use 1 bass sound at a time for each project/band.at least for a while.i like to suit my sound to who i'm playing with and what kindamusic we're doin'.at home i do whatever i feel like that day.
right now i'm in 2 bands. both hardcore/punk but very different.

band #1.is more mid tempo, straight forward and kinda rockin' with some weirder stuff sprinkled about.i use my '92 les paul bass. (3 knob passive)with a DOD "Flashback Fuzz" pedal. fuzz all the way up.real dirty heavy on the mids and highs.on the faster songs i use the bridge pup only. on the more rockin' stuff i use the neck pup. i never use both together.but i do use the tone knob a lot.

band #2. is super fast, thrashy, mean and ugly.with some spooky heavier stuff. i use my '76 Ripper with '71 Guild "Sludgebuckers" (the ones with the big 'ol screws) they're super powerfull.i only use the bridge pup.when i was running my Ampeg,i pluged straight in.right now i'm using a loner Sunn Coliseum but its too clean so i've been using my Rat.but just a touch of fuzz. i use a lot of bottom and mids.real boomy.

at some point in the future i'd like to do some thing dark and new wavey gothish like Joy division,the cure,the wipers and some thing really lo-fi and swampy surf buzz. bands like that would probably require more than one sound.

[Basvarken]

I like the crayon analogy, but I think it doesn't really cover the whole story.
If some basses are the crayons, some are feltmarkers, some are pencils, etc.

My basses all have something in common. But they're not all the same.
Most of them are mahogany. But some are short scale, some are long scale.
Some are solid, some are hollow. Some are bolt on, some are set neck.
I have one bass that is maple with a long scale set neck. But it has LO-Z Gibson pickups and a Gibson type three point bridge. Which makes it "family" of some other basses I have.


If you stick with the crayon analogy, you can make a beautiful drawing with ton-sur-ton colours.

[Barklessdog]

Uwe's is the Toyo Color Finder, about 1500 hues, keeping the contrasting colors side by side.

[Highlander]

They give me lots of crayons in the quiet-room...

[Hornisse]

I'd have to say my favorite sounds are Fender Precision and Jazz bass ones.  I have one of each as well as an older Guild Pilot, BachBird, and the Grabber of course.  My main player is a 5 string Jazz style bass with Duncan stacked pickups and an Aguilar OPB-1 preamp.  For a live sound that is the one I prefer as it seems to always cut through. 

[uwe]

Yes, the crayon analogy is nice. But Picasso is still Picasso whether he does an oil paining, a pencil sketch or a sculpture. 

[TBird1958]

I rehease and gig with all my basses at this point, tho I rarely switch during a show I always bring two. I think all my basses have a slightly different voice and thus to bring that out I use a Line 6  pedal that allows me to choose one of many amp simulations (Acoustic 360 for me!) and then use a separate parametric eq for each of them. The info is stored in a named bank on the pedal so I can bring up the proper eq'd model for any bass very quickly in a live situation and not have to worry about changing anything on my amp, which I view as a large colorless device that the basses and the pedal enhance. Its taken some time and I'm not completely satified with it for all the basses yet but I'm close, all my "players" are dialed in pretty nice and I'm very happy with the individual sound they each have to my ear.

[clankenstein]

thats a good idea having a preset for each bass.i think i will try something similar on my me50b to iron out level diferences etc between my eb4l(with mudbucker and 2 carvin blade singlecoils as a humbuker in the back position)-loadsa level and eb2(with pitbull)-not as much level..

[Barklessdog]

[Denis]

Hahahahahaha! Nicely done! Uwe would need the 144-crayon box though.

[ramone57]

brilliant!  well done!

[Barklessdog]

Thats the thing most people do not "get" about Gibsons, Rics Etc is that each bass has its own color or sound.

Tones so good you can taste them.


Built in sharpener is optional.

[Highlander]

Grabber Blue... 

[Pilgrim]

MAAAAHHHHveloussssss.....!