Most influential basses

[Chris P.]

This is just a detail in all that great work, but this was the first time I ever heard this: "Early basses had flatwound strings and damping under the chrome cap, for a short, dry double bass sound. Soon players removed that damping and in the 1970s Rotosound came out with the first roundwound strings."

I knew early electric bass strings were primarily flats, but I had never heard that rounds weren't even available until the early 70s. I've always preferred flats, but I started playing the electric in 1967 and there were flats on my '63 P-bass when I got it.

If I'm right only Danelectro used rounds. Entwistle went to Rotosound to make the roundwounds for normal basses.

[Chris P.]

Great article! Thanks for sharing!

Thank you! I think it appeared two years ago in my magazine.

[soulman]

If I'm right only Danelectro used rounds. Entwistle went to Rotosound to make the roundwounds for normal basses.

The early '60s Danelectro I had did come with roundwound strings which surprised me a bit because every other bass out there seemed to come with flats.  I actually thought they were a bit strange and didn't like them at the time.

[Dave W]

The Silvertone Danelectros always came with rounds, even back to the late 1950s. But you couldn't buy them separately. That's supposedly why Entwistle went to Rotosound, otherwise he was having to buy a new bass just to get the strings he wanted.

[Chris P.]

The story goes JAE bought several Danelectros cos he broke te strings.

[morrow]

He must have found strings , or maybe just kept buying new Longhorns. There’s lots of live shots of him playing Longhorns. Back in the later 60’s I remember occasionally seeing someone using those odd shaped things. But had no idea the were just cheap little things. I just assumed they’d be in the same price range as Rickenbackers and Gretsches.

[gearHed289]

The story goes JAE bought several Danelectros cos he broke te strings.

He ended up with 3 while recording My Generation, and ultimately ended up using a Jazz Bass with tapewound strings for the final version.