Music man stingray. How do less clank, more zing?

[medic999]

I love this Bass, but there's gotta be something to tame this clankyness. Don't get me wrong, I love clank, but holy crap sometimes it sounds like clankapalooza around 1500hz. Strings are Ernie ball too. Is there a way to get more of a consistent zing sounds?

 

[BLUElightCory]

Fresh stainless steel roundwound strings and a good setup.

 

[medic999]

ahh, i think we were using nickel

 

[greyskull]

If you really weanna mellow out the trademark Stingray FUCKING LOUD A STRING. try flatwounds.

 

[Derykus]

Fresh stainless steel roundwound strings and a good setup.

Fresh ss strings will just piss him off more!

It's really the nature of that fat ass humbucker they have.

 

[StefTD]

what helped me was to recude the pickup height a bit (especially on the high strings) and
use a multiband comp on the di, if you still dislike it, change the pickup - there are some
cool pickups out there (EMG, Delano and probably many more, the Delano is awesome!).

 

[Firaxis]

Have you tried flat wound strings?

 

[mickrich]

try a fast attack high ratio single band of a multiband compressor (bypass other bands) to catch it.

I used to have a Stingray in the studio and always had trouble getting it to sit in the mix. All sub and clang with no low mid punch.
I got an American P Bass and it sits perfect in the mix.
Sold stingray and am completely happy with my bass sound now.
Most bands use the P Bass even if they initially want to use their 3 band eq Ibanez or whatever but when they hear the P in context it nearly always wins.

 

[~BURNY~]

That's one of the many uses of a multiband compressor. Just compress the high mid area so it shaves only the louder clankapaloodzilla clanks off and not the core tone.
I tend to use a deesser for this which yields basically the same results.

 

[egan.]

If you want less clank and more low mids I'd look at the bartolini replacement pickup.

 

[BLUElightCory]

Fresh ss strings will just piss him off more!

It's really the nature of that fat ass humbucker they have.

He said he wanted a consistent "zing" sound. To me that means the metallic, piano-y sound that fresh steel strings have. Old strings or flatwounds won't give him anything resembling a "zing" - and yes, I realize the inherent ridiculousness of us using this kind of terminology.

To me, the "clank" (and maybe we're all talking about different things) comes from the strings hitting the frets/pickups/etc., which is why I suggested a setup.

 

[egan.]

Down tuning (loose strings) adds to the clank as well. Using heavier strings (with the setup Cory recommends) will help as well. You lose some highs with heavier strings but given the problem that shouldn't be an issue. If the problem really is @ 1.5k then old strings can actually exacerbate it b/c you lose the high end extension and those mid become more relatively prominent.

 

[medic999]

So much good stuff here thanks guys. I think we are going to try a set of blue steels in the future and possibly raise the saddles a turn or so. In the meantime I'll experiment with compressing the offending frequencies. Thanks again.

 

[plague_rider]

Love clangy A-string...

 

[greyskull]

All sub and clang with no low mid punch.

God Yes