Aluminum-Necked Basses

[Khrist92]

I searched the forum and only found one mention of an aluminum necked bass (a Kramer), however, I thought because we're probably stuck at home with our basses and lots of time that I could give a little info on these if anyone was curious, some sound clips if people want, and etc., since they have made a big comeback in the last 10-15 years, especially in rock/metal/experimental circles. Not to mention, they're pretty dang rad.

I became enthralled with them after seeing Sumac (Aaron Turner of Isis [the band], Mamiffer, Old Man Gloom, etc. and Brian Cook, of Russian Circles, These Arms Are Snakes, Botch, etc.) a few years ago. Both Aaron (guitars) and Brian (bass) were using Electrical Guitar Company aluminum-necked instruments. Since I had a good job back then I put a deposit in with EGC, who were the company who got the ball rolling in the 00's, and promptly waited two years until the below bass came in early this past March.

The bass is is an aluminum core (neck through to the bridge) with an acrylic body. Schaller straplock buttons, two humbuckers, pickup switch on the lower horn, and tone and volume for each pickup, like a Rickenbacker. First thing to know about this bass, is its HEAVY. I would ballpark 14-15ish pounds, whereas my Distillate (pictured next to it) is probably around 11-12. Neck dive isn't too much of an issue, especially with the right strap.

The neck takes some getting used to, because it is always cool to the touch, but the profile (a thin-ish C) is quite comfortable. Being aluminum, it has no truss rod, and the bridge only requires adjustments if you changed the tuning wildly or string gauge - this is good for me, since I'm always quite hesitant to do adjustments on my basses, but, maybe I'll learn how to during this quarantine.

What this bass does well: it is clear, clear, clear. Not just talking about the body. Each note is crystal clear, and I can hear articulation I've never heard before. Tapping on this bass sounds like I've always wanted to. On the neck pickup, it is a crystal clear P bass type tone. On the bridge, it is reminiscent of a Rick - overdriven if you dig in, but it retains the low end stunningly well. On both pickups, it is clear and deep. Harmonics on it sound amazing.

There are a few more companies doing the aluminum neck thing. The big ones in the 70s and 80s were Travis Bean (of whom EGC is the "inheritor," since the original guy gave his blessing to use their designs and etc.) and Kramer. Nowadays the big aluminum names are Electrical Guitar Company, Robot Graves Industries, TTTides, Alef Guitars, Obstructures, etc.

Some famous aluminum-neck bassists: Brian Cook in Russian Circles and Sumac, Scott Shriner in Weezer, and Dominic Aitchison in Mogwai.

Adam

[cozmik_cowboy]

Wow - aluminum neck & acrylic body; the love child of Travis Bean & Dan Armstrong!  The photo looks like the fingerboard is AL, too; is that right?  And if so, at least it does have steel frets, right?

Nice Distillate; never seen one with a point before.

Peter

[gtrguy]

The ones I have played (Kramer) sounded good, had neck dive and were too heavy, and the aluminum felt cold unless it was nice and warm out.

[lbpesq]

Long ago I played in a band with a guy who played a Travis Bean.  VERY heavy guitar (though I think this was more due to the wood).  He complained about the neck never warming up on outdoor gigs.

Bill, tgo

[fmm]

I've got a Kramer 450B.  It was the first new piece of gear I purchased.
Very long sustain.
I replaced 1 pickup (bad idea) and converted it to fretless myself (very bad idea).  It's currently strung with heavy gauge flats.  The neck doesn't care what you put on it.

[Khrist92]

Peter, yes, the fretboard is aluminum as well, and it does have stainless steel frets.

The Distillate is awesome, only thing that competes with it that I've played. Very different beasts.

I don't mind the cool neck, but I think it'll be refreshing in summer. We'll see

[keith_h]

I don't mind the cool neck, but I think it'll be refreshing in summer. We'll see

As long as the neck hasn't been sitting in the sun too long. Of course if it has you can always fry a couple of eggs on it for breakfast. 

[KR]

I checked out a really nice Travis Bean bass at a music store a while back. It was good sounding, but sorta sounded like a Ric 4001 because the pickup locations were very similar.

[edwin]

Dave Torbert had a Travis Bean back in the day with Kingfish. Also, I used to see Reeves Gabrels in a local band in Boston ca. 1980 and their bass player had a Kramer which always sounded good. I have a recording of them somewhere that I made.

[gearhed289]

My aluminum neck journey - Back around 1981, I had recently discovered John Entwistle, Stanley Clarke, and Alembic. I'd been playing for about 4 years and was way into Rickenbackers. In late '79, I had wheeled and dealed my way into owning a brand new Ric 4001, but now I was fascinated with these Alembics. As a high school kid, there was no way i could afford one, so I started looking at the currently popular aluminum-neck Kramer basses. They had lots of wood laminates and lots of switches, LOL! I found one I liked (SMB-2 Stagemaster) at a price i could afford, so I sadly sold my Ric and bought the Kramer. I didn't realize until I got it home that I hadn't tried playing it standing up... Major neck dive! Especially with the slippery new nylon strap I bought to go  along with it. I really liked the bass though. It was all passive with Schaller P/J pups, vol/tone/vol/tone knobs, pickuo selector switch,  and a series/parallel switch for each pickup. You could dial in a variety of tones, and I found the P Bass and Alembic tones to be especially convincing. I remember playing at a bar when I was 19 and some older dude asking how I got "that Stanley tone".  Looking back, I guess I only used it as my main bass for maybe 5 years. In the early 90s I had it converted to fretless and put EMG pickups and electronics on it and I still have it to this day.
In the early 2000s, I picked up a very rare (possibly 1 of 1) Kramer XL-98 eight string. I had seen something on the vintage Kramer web site about the possibility of there being an 8 string with the XL-9 body, but they weren't sure. I remembered a bass a former co-worker had shown me, and sure enough, it was exactly that, so I bought it. I sent some photos to the Kramer page and there's one up there now. I sold the bass when I came across an 8 string Ric that is amazing. I'd very possibly still have it if it weren't for the Ric.
And finally, I just wanted to mention that I played Tom Petersson's EGC 12 string a few years ago. I found it to be pretty light with a great neck. I believe it's hollow, but I could be wrong.

[gtrguy]

I played a kramer 8 string a few months back that was for sale in a local music store. It was black and really beat, but the price was not very much. It was so beat up that I passed on it. The neck also had a lot of bow from the pull from all those strings.

[dfung60]

Everybody knows I like the alternative material basses, so I couldn't resist showing off some aluminum from the vault.  The upper one is a TB-2000, the "regular" Travis Bean bass, this one in koa.  It's rare, but not like you'll never see one.  It's a really great bass with a very distinctive tone.  It's heavy but quite comfortable - balances really well with the long upper horn.  The black bass is really, really rare.  This is a Travis Bean Wedge bass.  The previous owner of this bass was Bill Kaman, the founder of Ovation, who had a notable collection of 70's Travis Beans.  This bass appeared in an article in Vintage Guitar about Travis Beans, and I believe there are only about 17 authentic basses total.  The neck hardware is the same as the regular bass and as you can imagine, the Wedge suffers from "a little neck drop".  I've got another TB-2000 which was a little too hard to dig out.  And I was the original owner of a Kramer 650B which was the fanciest of their original models.  That was a beautiful bass (figured walnut and birdseye maple with a german carve body) with really bad electronics, and I foolishly had the original pickups removed and replaced with Bartolinis.  Unfortunately, that bass was stolen 3 years ago. 
Sorry for the poor snapshot photos - happened to be reading this at night, and just wanted to grab some quick pics.

[elwoodblue]

Everybody knows I like the alternative material basses, so I couldn't resist showing off some aluminum from the vault.  The upper one is a TB-2000, the "regular" Travis Bean bass, this one in koa.  It's rare, but not like you'll never see one.  It's a really great bass with a very distinctive tone.  It's heavy but quite comfortable - balances really well with the long upper horn.  The black bass is really, really rare.  This is a Travis Bean Wedge bass.  The previous owner of this bass was Bill Kaman, the founder of Ovation, who had a notable collection of 70's Travis Beans.  This bass appeared in an article in Vintage Guitar about Travis Beans, and I believe there are only about 17 authentic basses total.  The neck hardware is the same as the regular bass and as you can imagine, the Wedge suffers from "a little neck drop".  I've got another TB-2000 which was a little too hard to dig out.  And I was the original owner of a Kramer 650B which was the fanciest of their original models.  That was a beautiful bass (figured walnut and birdseye maple with a german carve body) with really bad electronics, and I foolishly had the original pickups removed and replaced with Bartolinis.  Unfortunately, that bass was stolen 3 years ago. 
Sorry for the poor snapshot photos - happened to be reading this at night, and just wanted to grab some quick pics.

*removed formatting


Cool basses David 

[xlrogue6]

I sold my TB2000 to Bill Kaman through the guy who was my Ampeg rep way back when, as it happens.

[gearhed289]

Cool, I totally forgot about the Wedge basses. When I was a kid, I saw one in some rock magazine - Hit Parader or something - and thought it was one of the coolest things I'd ever seen!