Know what we need?

[cozmik_cowboy]

An Acoustic Element bass.


Just sayin'.


Peter

[edwardofhuncote]

I'd be glad to line up for one, and second a vote for R&D on it. I think we'd wind up where most ABG's do though... they are mostly underwhelming without really good electronics to reproduce the acoustic qualities. Yeah, you can do it.


Every so often I return to the hare-brained notion of Alembicizing my upright somehow. Tried to imagine a marketable Activator-equipped thing that could be fitted to an upright... somewhat easily installed or removed. And therein lies the problem.


But yeah, I'm in if a Element Bass is goin' down.

[jazzyvee]

I'd be glad to line up for one, and second a vote for R&D on it. I think we'd wind up where most ABG's do though... they are mostly underwhelming without really good electronics to reproduce the acoustic qualities. Yeah, you can do it.


Every so often I return to the hare-brained notion of Alembicizing my upright somehow. Tried to imagine a marketable Activator-equipped thing that could be fitted to an upright... somewhat easily installed or removed. And therein lies the problem.


But yeah, I'm in if a Element Bass is goin' down.

I'm sure somewhere on the forum Mica mentions that you could use a set of P-style alembic pickus on an upright bass.

[cozmik_cowboy]

I ahve never actually played an ABG plugged in, but, while the overall quality has varied, every one I've played naked has had a flabby open E - with one exception (Breedlove B350Cme4, IIRC).  Thus my suggestion. And if anyone make the electronics whelm you.........

Peter

[edwardofhuncote]

Again, I'd be all for it. Alembic (as we know) doesn't turn new things loose until they are 200% perfect though. And piezo electronics have not been something they were all that excited about getting into. Maybe they'd go another direction for acoustic amplification. Maybe it'd be some kind of blending capability. I'm sure whatever it was it'd be fantastic.

Personally, I think they'd do better with a Starfire-type product. Maybe there's a way to make a hybrid of it, and add a piezo bridge, or synth capability to it.

I do remember something like that Jazzy, but it was from another Club Member whose imagination was wilder than mine. (remember ed_zeppelin?)  I'll have to ask Mica about it sometime.     

[cozmik_cowboy]

Again, I'd be all for it. Alembic (as we know) doesn't turn new things loose until they are 200% perfect though. And piezo electronics have not been something they were all that excited about getting into. Maybe they'd go another direction for acoustic amplification. Maybe it'd be some kind of blending capability. I'm sure whatever it was it'd be fantastic.

Personally, I think they'd do better with a Starfire-type product. Maybe there's a way to make a hybrid of it, and add a piezo bridge, or synth capability to it.

I do remember something like that Jazzy, but it was from another Club Member whose imagination was wilder than mine. (remember ed_zeppelin?)  I'll have to ask Mica about it sometime.     

Yeah, they're Alembic; I assumed they'd come up with a more elegant solution than piezo.
I never had a lot of chances to mix with an upright, but the best sound I ever got from one was by wrapping an SM-58 in a bar towel & sliding it into the hole in the bridge.

Peter

[edwardofhuncote]

The old 58-in-a bar towel. Yep... BTDT. I hope you don't mind Coz - I improvised on this a bit with some custom cut foam rubber in the old days. 

In spite of there being far better systems out there for commercial use (David Gage makes a fantastic, easy-to-use device) I still have on my gig bass, to this day, the prototype AccuSound system developed for double bass by the originator himself. The company I hear was sold after his death. I went around and helped him demo these things, like, 30 years ago. https://accusound.com/instrument-microphones/Double-Bass It still works for me.

*and I found what you remember Jazzy... in my own old thread... (good call mate!): https://club.alembic.com/index.php?topic=23331.0

[cozmik_cowboy]

The old 58-in-a bar towel. Yep... BTDT. I hope you don't mind Coz - I improvised on this a bit with some custom cut foam rubber in the old days. 

In spite of there being far better systems out there for commercial use (David Gage makes a fantastic, easy-to-use device) I still have on my gig bass, to this day, the prototype AccuSound system developed for double bass by the originator himself. The company I hear was sold after his death. I went around and helped him demo these things, like, 30 years ago. https://accusound.com/instrument-microphones/Double-Bass It still works for me.

*and I found what you remember Jazzy... in my own old thread... (good call mate!): https://club.alembic.com/index.php?topic=23331.0

Very nice; mine was a spur-of-the-moment improvisation when the high-dollar condenser bought just for doghouses sounded like crap at soundcheck.....

Second-best was a Barkus-Berry on Jimmy Wimpfheimer's bass (Roomful Of Blues, c. 1980; we did a weekend with them at our "home club" - I did monitors for both bands - and Sat. AM our bassist & I took Jimmy out to buy it.  Don't know what he had on it Fri., but the B-B was a massive improvement).

Peter