It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Subscribe to our Patreon, and get image uploads with no ads on the site!
Base theme by DesignModo & ported to Powered by Vanilla by Chris Ireland, modified by the "theFB" team.
Comments
Small fret wire that could not withstand round wound strings - check
Stoopid, low quality POS bridge/tailpiece/mute design - check
Annoying machineheads - check
Distinctive tone - check
People tolerate all of the crappy aspects to get that distinctive sound.
Having said that, Geddy Lee tells a story of all the fan mail compliments that he received for the tone of his Rick on the Rush album, "Moving Pictures". Ironically, all but one of the songs featured Geddy's black Fender Jazz Bass.
I have thought about getting one for years, and haven't, because I don't think it would add anything to my collection and dare I say it, I think they are a bit anachronistic..
Some Rick idiosyncrasies are not detectable in photographs. They only become apparent during ownership. i.e. After you have parted with yo' money. That is why Dave is hacked off.
The reason why I own a 4001 is because, like the Fender Jaguar, nothing else makes those sounds. (The Geddy thing is mainly down to his picking hand technique.)
The Rick 4001/4003 is one of the best, most flexible-sounding basses there is. They are anachronistic only in the same way as the Precision and Jazz, in that there were perfected early on so there has been no need to change almost anything about them.
Nonsense. Not for the quality they are.
Nonsense. Most Rick players use roundwounds.
There is a small amount of truth in that, yes. The casting is not a very high quality metal and they can suffer from 'tail lift' over a period of time.
Nonsense. They're the same as any other Kluson-type heads. (Or Grovers, on some old ones.)
Absolutely.
In fact, I will give you a fault you missed - the pickups. They have no hum cancellation as standard, which is unique among professional-quality basses I can think of except for the reissue '51-style P-Bass. It's relatively easy to fix even if you don't want to change the pickups - but the pickups themselves are not the best quality either, it has to be said.
I admit that mine has humbuckers - a Rick HB1 in the neck and a Kent Armstrong in the bridge. It still sounds just like a Rick though - the distinctive sound is not actually in the pickups, surprisingly.
For me they are the most perfect of all bass designs and I wouldn't play anything else normally.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
What a total load of tedious, moronic, uninformed bollocks. If you want to learn something about Rickenbacker basses, start by *not* wasting fifteen minutes of your life watching this.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
You can RWRP the bridge pickup on a 4003 easily, because the magnet is only held in place by the screws that attach the coil to the baseplate, so you can flip it and swap the coil connections - instant hum cancelling, although only when both pickups are on and at the same volume… still useful though - essentially the same as a Jazz Bass.
In my opinion it's a huge oversight on an otherwise professional-quality instrument, but they won't change it… John Hall says it affects the tone. He's wrong - I recorded my bass before and after at full WAV resolution - there was no audible difference.
Funny that this idiot doesn't even mention it - unless I fell asleep at some point .
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
Bit like the intonation screw positions in that bridge - I mean, I know my P basses are only bent plate bridges, but I could adjust intonation with a Birmingham screwdriver on them
Clearly he did not know this either… or that the narrow truss rod access rout isn't a problem if you use the correct tool - a nut driver rather than an angled socket wrench. It's easy to be angry and dismissive when you don't bother to learn the right way to do something.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
Nil Satis Nisi Optimum
Worth mentioning for anyone else who took anything the idiot said at face value though .
Only that it's exactly the same as on any other bass.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
The neck pickup (Rick HB1) is a little thicker than a High-Gain - for a while I had it wired in parallel to sound more like a Toaster, but it lacked a bit of thump so I put it back to series.
The bridge pickup is a happy accident - it's a Kent Armstrong guitar humbucker from the neck position of an Eggle New York Broadway - it happened to fit, so I thought I would try it. It's a 7K humbucker so quite low-wound. I don't know if it's even available any more, but it shouldn't be too hard to find something similar - it's quite like a Firebird mini-humbucker. It did need the baseplate drilling to fit, but no other mods. (When I got the bass it had been drilled anyway, for Bartolinis.)
I would definitely recommend something like this if you want a Rick but don't like hum - it's a better solution overall than the RWRP bridge pickup since all the sounds are now hum-cancelling. The only real problem is that the Rick HB-1 can be hard to get, and nothing else perfectly fits the pickguard.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein