Roasted Maple
Roasted maple, anyone? Every new customer brings new ideas and impulses with them. In a two-hour brainstorm session, we figured out the plan for this red one-off low-ender together. A multi-string studio bass with which a fast fretless lick is also possible.
Make it special
A studio operator called me, he had just recorded a band with a Hot Wire Thermoneck “roasted maple” bass. He was enthusiastic about this “totally balanced tone across all registers” and now wanted to have his own studio bass.
So we set down to talk, I put one bass After the other into his hands, and designed his instrument on the basis of a “roasted maple neck”. Here, the neck wood is heated to around 160 Celsius. All the moisture goes out, the molecular cell structure changes, it takes on this chocolate color and sounds like it has been played for 30 years - and it feels that way too. To enhance that feel, we apply Tung-Oil instead of laquer finish.
Our W-Bucker pickups with the serial-parallel function appealed to him. Passive, please! He wanted a smaller scratchplate. In terms of tone, he liked the warm sound of the mahogany body best. This then was painted matt red.
One third fretless
As for his neck, he had the idea of being able to play fretless from the 15th fret. For a quick lick in between. It occurred to me that in Mr. Bassman's time, around 1982, I had seen a press photo of an Ibanez Musician Bass that was fretless from the 12th fret. I never had it in my hands. Who knows how many of them were made back then.
I worked out the idea with my team and we came up with an ebony slab with side fret markings. That works great.
So there you have it! The Americans would say “Awesome”. A pretty flexible bass that covers all directions. And looks good doing it.
