Musician Forum - Band Discussion Board - BandMix

HEY BASS PLAYERS! I want your input on your pro rigs. I do have a GK 800RB. I am thinking about a GK upgrade, 1001?, What about Hartke, Bose, Mesa, Roland D-Bass? Ampeg? Those are some choices I am thinking about. I play all styles of music, at all volumes, in mostly club, bar, gig situations . Aluminum vs. paper cones? 10 inches seems to be the speaker zeitgeist. What do you use and think? Why? What about weight and portability? I realize my Brothers and Sisters, that just as important are the factors of what axe is used, and hand/finger technique. SOUND OFF!

OK, I'll bite. I use a homegrown rig. It cost much less than any that you named but provides an extremely professional sound. My speaker cabs are Avatar, a couple of 12-inch cabs and a cab with two 10-inchers. All the speakers are Eminence. The thing I love most about these great-sounding cabinets is that I can carry them easily. That is important to me at age 59. The head is home-grown too. Instead of using a “bass amp,” I use a Behringer Europower 2500 power amp. I know that Behringer makes a lot of junk but this is an amazingly clean and powerful amp, 750 watts per channel (two channels) at 4 ohms, 500 watts per channel at 8 ohms, and 2,400 watts at 4 ohms when the channels are bridged. I preamp the EP2500 with a Tech 21 Sansamp RBI, an analog preamp that emulates tubes well (Geddy likes it too). I push this rig with a Pedulla Rapture RBJ2-5, a Schecter Stiletto Custom-5 and a Fender Jazz. It handles them all well and for very little money I have an extremely professional-sounding rig that I can actually load into my Toyota Camry. Rock out.

I'm a long time user and abuser of Gallien Krueger for the last 6 years and have used a 400RB-III, a pair of 800RB's, and currently a 700RB-II with a pair of NEO 112's for the ultimate portable setup. 540 Watt head with a pair of 1x12 cabinets that weigh 39 lbs apiece and fits in the cab of a small pickup. The 1001RB-II has the same preamp and simply has a more powerful power amp section.

You also may want to wait a few months, GK will soon be releasing their much anticipated GK Fusion 550, their first amp with a tube preamp, and 500W + 50W power amp.

I use a Carvin Cyclops combo. 600 watt, 1x15, 2x8 and a horn and all the features you'd ever want. Pre-shape, parametric, foot-switchable graphic, noise gate, a CONTROLABLE compressor (not just a couple of button presets like many out there), bi-amp with variable crossover... this thing's simply a monster! Plus I can easily load it into my car (into the back seat of a 2-door!) without help and it's got plenty of power to blow drummers off the stage with headroom to spare.

But the true strength of this amp is that it's so transparent. When I switch between my Jazz, Roscoe Beck and 4003FL it really allows the personality of each bass come through. I've even used it with keys, cello, viola, acoustic guitar and it shines on all those too.

Unfortunately, they don't sell the combo anymore, but the amp head is still available (the R600), or you might find one used somewhere.

I have pretty much tried them all over the years. I found that there are very few amp rigs out there that will fill all the venues and the different types of music. I do a lot of studio work, for commercials jingles, and bass playing fill ins for bands. For what I like to play, which is mostly blues, blues rock and classic rock, I prefer either my Eden WT800 with the 2-4x10 cabnets, or my SVT rig with the SVT2 pro. The Eden gives me more mids, and the SVT gives me more bottom. If I'm doing a small gig, I'll usually take the Eden with 1 cabnet. When doing an outside gig though there's nothing like the sound of the SVT with 2 -8x10 cabnets. I'm using mostly Fender Jazz basses and Music Man (both 4 and 5 string). It's just what works for me. After 30 years of playing I have found that you end up with the basics that worked for you. Full circle if you will. I can get any tone from these 2 rigs and basses that someone elso would spend twice the money on. Not that SVT,'s or Edens are cheap. Once you find what works, you stay with it. Ken

All the amps & basses on these posts are good ones. And as they said, It works for them. I myself, like the SWR, Workman amps. great mid-range, & tweeters for the highs. I like SWR. over the Ampeg, which is also a great bass amp. Its what works for you that counts.

This has exceeded my expectations! I get a headache with the choices out there. Thus this post. This gives us a real world voice sounding board. I look at my guitars and gear as WOMEN. Something you love that brings you joy and fulfilment. In some ways it is better. Women come and go, but I will always have MY MUSIC! My brothers, thank you for introducing me to some new beauties! As well as sharing the romance serial. A BIG HELLYEAH!

whatever you do, biamp so you can seperate your lows and mids. i built my rig and am rather proud of it, let me know if you are interested.

Very interested! Deets please

i use an SWR Workingman's 4004 head and 4x10 cab with a Hartke 4x10 cab.

check this out!

http://www.laserbeast.com/photos/121006/hunter-01.jpg

http://www.laserbeast.com/photos/121006/hunter-03.jpg

Amps alone pushing 3800 Watts!

Lightning Bolt.

top that.

Mein Gott! Don't mess with Texas! I'm diggin your scene Dad! If it's too loud, your too old! No hearing protection allowed right! Thx and Marsh On!

yeah man, they are really F---ing Loud!

i mean c'mon. if you play rock and roll quietly, you're not playing rock and roll!

I've been playing bass since the late 60's and have used many a bass rig.

The one I use live and have for the last 8 years is the Ampeg SVT 3pro
coupled up with a yorkville 4 x10 +horn cabnet.
I use a Music Man Bongo 5 through this setup.
It cuts through the mix and kinda sticks out if you know what I mean and the lows are still intact and solid as the should be right down to the low B
. This combo is easy to carry and takes all of 5 minutes to setup at a gig.

For practice I use for lack of better words old stuff..
The head used for practices is and old Yorkville 400B.
The cabinet is a JBL Cabaret model 4625B. this cabinet was discontinued in the 1980's..
What a sound this combination produces I'm so excited about the sound off this combination I am trying to find another of these JBL cabinets up here but after a 4 mounth search I'm thinking it's like looking for a needle in a hay stak. I'd like to add another to the practice rig and run it with 2 of these JBL babinets..

I have other Bass amplification gear that sounds great as well sort of semi retired (saved) on a shelf for possible future resurrection. I try to hold onto what sounds really good and discard (sell what dose not..)..

Cheers
Rich[/img]

Ya im with him iv been using a ampeg pro3 head which is a tube/solid state hybrid through an 8x10 cabinet and im hooked though i would suggest getting the pro 4 which is almost the same thing except it comes with a compressor built in and its about 3 times the wattage-peace and love to all buddhists in the world and ok i guess christians get some love to-later

Ya im with him iv been using a ampeg pro3 head which is a tube/solid state hybrid through an 8x10 cabinet and im hooked though i would suggest getting the pro 4 which is almost the same thing except it comes with a compressor built in and its about 3 times the wattage-peace and love to all buddhists in the world and ok i guess christians get some love to-later