Interesting SFB claims

[mellowgerman]

My attention was drawn to this SFB page through the current SFB-I auction on ebay. Though the page has pretty decent and accurate information for the most part, the end makes me wonder what the author was trying to say

"The acoustic tone that blends with the plugged in sound blends well with rock and jazz, but has a kind of inherent distortion that would not be suitable for R&B or other kinds of music where a cleaner bass sound might be preferable."

"A classic sound of a particular time and genre of music that is suitable for jam bands, but might be mushy sounding for music that requires a supertight drum & bass sound"

http://psychedelic-rocknroll.blogspot.c ... ivoli.html

 

[fronobulax]

Like many hollow-body guitars of the period, the "Guild Starfire Bass" has a maple body and short-scale (30 1/2") mahogany neck.

Not true, right? There were mahogany bodied Starfires that were more numerous and less desirable than the maple bodies.

Designed to be played with flat-wounds

Can't recall ever hearing that claim before. Do I need my ears examined? (He says after using rounds on a Starfire for over 30 years).

The whole thing reminds me of machine editing. Some automated process strung together a bunch of sentences or paragraphs that were related but the result barely makes sense and has no sense of "flow". English as a second language might also apply.

The comments that started this in mellow's post do seem to be saying that the SF does not produce a wide variety of different tones and the tones it does produce are not suitable for all types of contemporary music and bass playing, which is true but also irrelevant if you are looking for "that tone".

 

[mellowgerman]

I just don't get the first quote about the "distortion" at all... and in regard to the other one, a SFB-II on the bridge pickup or even an early SFB-I (with the middle/bridge position pickup) have as much, if not more, clarity and tightness as any other bass ever will.
And yes, many SFB's were made with mahogany bodies -- probably the majority. And, although I do trust mgod and take his opinions very seriously, I'm still not convinced it's more desireable; suppose I'd have to have more maple experience to really form my opinion on that though.

 

[fronobulax]

I'm guilty as charged when it comes to believing everything mgod says. It might be a generational thing (I think he's within 4 years of my age and you're young enough to be dating our daughters :wink: ) but it is also true that he seems to have more hands on experience with more Starfires than anyone else I know who posts. Of course, the first Starfire I played was a friend's green one and when I have more money than sense I would search for a green Starfire II. It would have to be a maple one because the green on mahogany is much darker than what I remember. Thus the maple is more desirable.

8) 8) 8)

To the comments at hand, there is to my ear a distinctive edge to the sound of a Bi-Sonic equipped Starfire. People who use the word "edge" or "woody" describe something that makes sense to me. However, I would also accept slight distortion as a description as well. The reason is because when I have the JS with Guild humbuckers and I am desperately trying to get it to sound more like the Starfire, I usually end up adding some distortion to the sound. So, and I am long winded this morning, if I am starting from somewhere else and want to get close to a Starfire/Bi-sonic tone then I would add distortion. However if I am just describing the tone without comparison I probably would not use the word because it doesn't really capture the edgy aspects of the tone.

 

[mgod]

What can I say? By the available evidence, the guy who wrote that page on the Starfire is an idiot. But we know that can't be right, because idiots never put up web pages, about anything.

FWIW, I don't recall saying that maple Starfires were more desirable. I believe I said something like, I desire them more. Seems like that guy what used to play with the Grateful Dead did OK with the other ones through, (so that's it).

 

[Default]

Being only a recent member of the down-low gang, I only have one experience with a Starfire, and that was a cherry fretless with tapewounds on it. You might argue if the reviewer had one of those, he'd be correct, you couldn't use it in certain circumstances. In gum commercials or as a tentpole. (Rolls eyes)
I would say that that particular bass, as set up, would have excelled for jazz or jump blues. It probably would not have done as well with Larry Graham thumping and popping, but I would have load that on the strings. The talent is in the fingers, as I remind myself everytime I buy a nice piece of gear. ;-)

 

[dlenaghan]

Maybe he's talking about overdrive. My JS gets a bit of fuzz out of my amp in a way that most of my other basses haven't, so perhaps it's a bisonic/output thing?

 

[fronobulax]

Maybe he's talking about overdrive. My JS gets a bit of fuzz out of my amp in a way that most of my other basses haven't, so perhaps it's a bisonic/output thing?

I've been playing with a Line 6 Studio 100 which has various amp models, a compression option and a pre-amp gain. As a tangent, one of the mild frustrations is that changing amp models can result in some serious changes in perceived volume. However I have noticed a few things which might relate. First the Starfire/Bi-sonic triggers the compression at a lower level than the JS/humbucker. Second, the Starfire produces a distorted sound at lower pre-amp levels. Third, the ability to get a distorted sound out of the JS is highly dependent upon whether the tone controls on the bass are rolling off treble, or not. Finally if I try and tweak things so that the basses sound similar, those tweaks only apply for a single amp model and have to be "re-computed" when the model changes.

From this I conclude, based upon a sample of one, that a) the Starfire's output is at a higher level than the JS's. b) the output frequency spectrums are different enough to drive the amp models differently. c) The amp's ability to produce distortion is closely tied to the high frequency output of the bass.

So to restate the obvious, if I want the JS to sound like the Starfire, I first crank up the treble on the bass and then bleed in some distortion.

 

[mellowgerman]

I suppose I didn't think of it in terms of output-to-distortion, which makes a little more sense. Still though I would associate output with the bass and distortion with the amp