How "excited noobie" is this idea?

[Alex Xander]

Th biggest challenge with your proposed build has nothing to do with the bass. There isn't a speaker on the planet that will do justice to a string tuned to G0 - at least not one you can fit in a car. Many bass guitar cabs won't even reproduce the first harmonic (octave) of that note well.

I have to respectfully disagree with this.

I’ve built probably a dozen basses with F#0 strings (there’s build threads here for maybe half of them), and my gigging bass is a 6 string tuned F#BEADG. While I play primarily through cabinets I’ve designed and built myself, I can comfortably get away with a steep HPF set as high as 60hz. With a Broughton RFE pedal, sometimes even higher if I dial in some resonance.

However, my F# tuned basses have absolutely improved over time with respect to low end clarity, and my early builds had a mediocre F#. Getting the neck (and neck join in a bolt on) right has been something of a learning process. I would be more concerned about an inexperienced builder creating something with a mediocre G0 string than I would be finding a commercial cabinet that will work with the tuning.

 

[micguy]

I have to respectfully disagree with this.

I’ve built probably a dozen basses with F#0 strings (there’s build threads here for maybe half of them), and my gigging bass is a 6 string tuned F#BEADG. While I play primarily through cabinets I’ve designed and built myself, I can comfortably get away with a steep HPF set as high as 60hz. With a Broughton RFE pedal, sometimes even higher if I dial in some resonance.

However, my F# tuned basses have absolutely improved over time with respect to low end clarity, and my early builds had a mediocre F#. Getting the neck (and neck join in a bolt on) right has been something of a learning process. I would be more concerned about an inexperienced builder creating something with a mediocre G0 string than I would be finding a commercial cabinet that will work with the tuning.

You may like the result with that kind of rig, but if you get to play through PA's on a regular basis that actually do justice to a low B (not even they really do a G or an F# justice), then you'll understand what I'm talking about.

 

[Alex Xander]

You may like the result with that kind of rig, but if you get to play through PA's on a regular basis that actually do justice to a low B (not even they really do a G or an F# justice), then you'll understand what I'm talking about.

Conversely, if you have regular gigging experience with an F# equipped bass through “average” bass cabinets, then you’ll understand what I’m talking about

My point is that while good PA is objectively better for stings lower than E, the average bass cab is not objectively unusable with such tunings.

 

[micguy]

Conversely, if you have regular gigging experience with an F# equipped bass through “average” bass cabinets, then you’ll understand what I’m talking about

My point is that while good PA is objectively better for stings lower than E, the average bass cab is not objectively unusable with such tunings.

The average bass cab simply doesn't support fundamentals ofd the lowest notes - it's a sound, many people are OK with it, and in a club, sure, it's "OK". However, any big concert you attend, the line arrays used nowadays go down to 60 Hz just fine. The subs that they pile up, that take up a lot of space, that necessitate an extra semi (or two) to deliver, and that demand a buttload of power to drive them only cover one additional octave - they go down to 30Hz.

Why do tours go to the cost and trouble of bringing subs if 60 Hz is "good enough"? Because it isn't good enough for them - you miss a lot of impact if you don't support those lowest fundamentals.

 

[Alex Xander]

it's a sound, many people are OK with it, and in a club, sure, it's "OK".

That’s my point. Your first post suggested the OP should not have a bass built for G0 tuning because he’ll need a cabinet that won’t fit it his car to use it. He’ll be “OK”, without such a cabinet.

 

[micguy]

That’s my point. Your first post suggested the OP should not have a bass built for G0 tuning because he’ll need a cabinet that won’t fit it his car to use it. He’ll be “OK”, without such a cabinet.

You are welcome to your opinion. I will stick with mine. It's OK to disagree.

 

[DragonCurse]

I have to respectfully disagree with this.

I’ve built probably a dozen basses with F#0 strings (there’s build threads here for maybe half of them), and my gigging bass is a 6 string tuned F#BEADG. While I play primarily through cabinets I’ve designed and built myself, I can comfortably get away with a steep HPF set as high as 60hz. With a Broughton RFE pedal, sometimes even higher if I dial in some resonance.

However, my F# tuned basses have absolutely improved over time with respect to low end clarity, and my early builds had a mediocre F#. Getting the neck (and neck join in a bolt on) right has been something of a learning process. I would be more concerned about an inexperienced builder creating something with a mediocre G0 string than I would be finding a commercial cabinet that will work with the tuning.

Thank you for this. I'll also take a look at the broughton rfe

 

[Alex Xander]

@micguy and @DragonCurse

The following may be of interest to you. Here's a very amateur recording of an F#0 bass. Importantly, there was no high passing at all. Lots of low passing through a fairly big tone capacitor, which makes this analysis easier.



Here's a few points of interest. At 22 seconds a G0 (24.5hz fundamental is held). We could debate the tonal qualities, but could likely agree that there is discernible, fat low end pitch there.

Here's a spectrogram of that note

Note the almost complete absence (30db down) of the 24.5hz fundamental. Garageband or youtube may have automatically high passed it out, but the fact is, there's almost none of it there. We have lots of 49hz, with a peak volume on the 73.5hz harmonic.

At 37 seconds there's on open B

Note that the 31hz fundamental is at least 10db down from the 62hz and 93hz harmonics.

Play the youtube track through some headphones. I believe this presents strong evidence that fundamental reproduction on low notes isn't required.

It is my experience, and I believe these spectrograms back it up, that fundamental reproduction of low notes simply isn't needed to have a fat and coherent low end. For a G#0 tuned bass, if you can reproduce 52hz with authority (not unachievable with a lot of readily available cabinets), you should be just fine. There's no point stressing on finding a cabinet to produce 24.5hz (in my example) if there's nearly none of it in the source signal.

 

[Fynn]

Generally speaking, the fastest way to learn is by trial and error. As long as you understand that he could fail, and he understands that he could fail, I don't see the problem. When a lot of money gets involved, or expectations are too high, then that can get very dangerous. But if you're fine with him messing up, potentially taking two or three times as long as you expected, then I would say the sky is the limit.
As with any sort of manual labor or art form, if you have time and more than one try, you can really do anything. Give me 10 years and unlimited tries, and I'll paint you a Mona Lisa.

A little bit of advice for you though, really make sure that you get an idea of what you would want in a new custom bass. One of the worst outcomes would be if he makes you an absolute masterpiece of an instrument and you end up not liking it, because you changed your mind.

 

[micguy]

@micguy and @DragonCurse

The following may be of interest to you. Here's a very amateur recording of an F#0 bass. Importantly, there was no high passing at all. Lots of low passing through a fairly big tone capacitor, which makes this analysis easier.



Here's a few points of interest. At 22 seconds a G0 (24.5hz fundamental is held). We could debate the tonal qualities, but could likely agree that there is discernible, fat low end pitch there.

Here's a spectrogram of that note
View attachment 7076856

Note the almost complete absence (30db down) of the 24.5hz fundamental. Garageband or youtube may have automatically high passed it out, but the fact is, there's almost none of it there. We have lots of 49hz, with a peak volume on the 73.5hz harmonic.

At 37 seconds there's on open B

View attachment 7076868

Note that the 31hz fundamental is at least 10db down from the 62hz and 93hz harmonics.

Play the youtube track through some headphones. I believe this presents strong evidence that fundamental reproduction on low notes isn't required.

It is my experience, and I believe these spectrograms back it up, that fundamental reproduction of low notes simply isn't needed to have a fat and coherent low end. For a G#0 tuned bass, if you can reproduce 52hz with authority (not unachievable with a lot of readily available cabinets), you should be just fine. There's no point stressing on finding a cabinet to produce 24.5hz (in my example) if there's nearly none of it in the source signal.

OK, you've built a bass that has one pickup, which is slammed against the bridge - maybe an inch and a half from the bridge saddle to the pole pieces. The neck pickup on a Jazz bass is about 4 times as far from the bridge as the pickup that you have - it will have 4 times the fundamental in the signal coming from the bass that you have in your bass for notes low on the fretboard. That's 12 dB more fundamental than there is coming out of your bass. The pickup you have rolls off any upper mids and highs - what i hear in your recording is a LOT of upper bass and low mids, with no upper mids or real low extended end at all. Yes, it's kinda "bassy" but it doesn't "dig" like real 30 Hz stuff does - the real impact that you get from low fundamentals comes when there isn't an overabundance of of mids and upper bass - the low end is just "there' - the room shakes, and while it's related to the rest of your sound, it isn't a big bassy mess - it's just solid.

Here's a response curve that'll take some explaining:

If you do a bunch of Physics, you can get the "frequency response" of a bass guitar - it's a bit complicated, but pickup positions, the mixing of pickups, and the electrical response of the controls, cable etc, are all in there. If I ran a response curve of the setup you have, yes, it wouldn't have much at the really low end (pickup position has a really powerful influence on how much fundamental there is), but for my bass, there is a bunch of stuff down there. This curve is for the B string (every string has it's own response, Physics lecture left out for brevity). This bass has the neck pickup (which is most of what you see here, there are a couple of tricks past what a typical bass does that i have in the mix here) at the "51 P" position - a bit further from the bridge; there is a bit more fundamental (by only a dB or so) than you'd see on a regular Jazz bass.


When you pluck a string, at the start of the note you get roughly equal amounts of fundamental and the first half dozen or so harmonics happening. along with a transient of stuff above that that dies down quickly. Where the pickup is decides how much of each harmonic you hear. Over time, the harmonics die out from top to bottom; the fundamental stays longer than anything else - at the end of the decay, it's all fundamental.

So, after the initial attack of the note, what you would see on a spectrograph coming out of my bass is that the low B is down about 5 dB when compared to the highest amplitude harmonic - which would be the third at 90Hz ish - that's at the peak in the curve. Over time, the fundamental will win, though - it'll still be there at the end of the decay - in the music I play, yes, I end up with very long sustained notes at times.

Other evidence for this: I have, at times, had pedals (overdrives) that would take out some fundamental - one of them was about 3dB down at 30 Hz. Playing through a big PA that does just fine down there, you could not only hear when I turned the thing on, you could feel it - the stage was shaking considerably less. There was noticeably less impact. You could, no doubt, use that pedal and be perfectly happy with it. I can't. I envy you in that respect.

The answer to whether or not extended low frequency response is important to you is situationally dependent. A piano goes half a step lower than a 5 string bass, but it lacks fundamental support on that note - it has a timbre that is far different than a bass guitar, which is OK, because it lets us have the job of filling that in. You have built an instrument that, like a piano, de-emphasizes the fundamentals of the notes you play. If it works for you, that's OK - I'm not going to tell you that what you have is useless or that you can't make good music with it. The error you make is assuming that your situation is the same as mine. It isn't. I have a very different instrument, I play through a very different rig, and I probably play very different music. Extended low end is a big part of my musical world. I have the expertise to understand what you're saying and also to know what I am saying is absolutely true.

Go make your music. I'll go make mine. It's OK that we're different, and that what matters to you is different than what matters to me.

 

[Alex Xander]

OK, you've built a bass that has one pickup, which is slammed against the bridge - maybe an inch and a half from the bridge saddle to the pole pieces. The neck pickup on a Jazz bass is about 4 times as far from the bridge as the pickup that you have - it will have 4 times the fundamental in the signal coming from the bass that you have in your bass for notes low on the fretboard. That's 12 dB more fundamental than there is coming out of your bass. The pickup you have rolls off any upper mids and highs - what i hear in your recording is a LOT of upper bass and low mids, with no upper mids or real low extended end at all. Yes, it's kinda "bassy" but it doesn't "dig" like real 30 Hz stuff does - the real impact that you get from low fundamentals comes when there isn't an overabundance of of mids and upper bass - the low end is just "there' - the room shakes, and while it's related to the rest of your sound, it isn't a big bassy mess - it's just solid.

Here's a response curve that'll take some explaining:
View attachment 7077163

If you do a bunch of Physics, you can get the "frequency response" of a bass guitar - it's a bit complicated, but pickup positions, the mixing of pickups, and the electrical response of the controls, cable etc, are all in there. If I ran a response curve of the setup you have, yes, it wouldn't have much at the really low end (pickup position has a really powerful influence on how much fundamental there is), but for my bass, there is a bunch of stuff down there. This curve is for the B string (every string has it's own response, Physics lecture left out for brevity). This bass has the neck pickup (which is most of what you see here, there are a couple of tricks past what a typical bass does that i have in the mix here) at the "51 P" position - a bit further from the bridge; there is a bit more fundamental (by only a dB or so) than you'd see on a regular Jazz bass.


When you pluck a string, at the start of the note you get roughly equal amounts of fundamental and the first half dozen or so harmonics happening. along with a transient of stuff above that that dies down quickly. Where the pickup is decides how much of each harmonic you hear. Over time, the harmonics die out from top to bottom; the fundamental stays longer than anything else - at the end of the decay, it's all fundamental.

So, after the initial attack of the note, what you would see on a spectrograph coming out of my bass is that the low B is down about 5 dB when compared to the highest amplitude harmonic - which would be the third at 90Hz ish - that's at the peak in the curve. Over time, the fundamental will win, though - it'll still be there at the end of the decay - in the music I play, yes, I end up with very long sustained notes at times.

Other evidence for this: I have, at times, had pedals (overdrives) that would take out some fundamental - one of them was about 3dB down at 30 Hz. Playing through a big PA that does just fine down there, you could not only hear when I turned the thing on, you could feel it - the stage was shaking considerably less. There was noticeably less impact. You could, no doubt, use that pedal and be perfectly happy with it. I can't. I envy you in that respect.

The answer to whether or not extended low frequency response is important to you is situationally dependent. A piano goes half a step lower than a 5 string bass, but it lacks fundamental support on that note - it has a timbre that is far different than a bass guitar, which is OK, because it lets us have the job of filling that in. You have built an instrument that, like a piano, de-emphasizes the fundamentals of the notes you play. If it works for you, that's OK - I'm not going to tell you that what you have is useless or that you can't make good music with it. The error you make is assuming that your situation is the same as mine. It isn't. I have a very different instrument, I play through a very different rig, and I probably play very different music. Extended low end is a big part of my musical world. I have the expertise to understand what you're saying and also to know what I am saying is absolutely true.

Go make your music. I'll go make mine. It's OK that we're different, and that what matters to you is different than what matters to me.

Thank you for the detailed response, @micguy

Yes, we make different music and probably have different requirements- I think that’s great. It’s our differences that make life interesting.

I’m quite astonished that a parallel could be drawn between a mudbucker equipped bass and a piano timbre, but there you go. As mentioned before, I have built maybe a dozen F#0 tuned basses. The most recent one, with the mudbucker slammed hard against the bridge comfortably has the best pitch definition in the low notes of anything I’ve built. Probably for the reasons you’ve described. It would be an interesting exercise to play it through a one of your PA’s and see if it’s “lacking”

The error you make is assuming that your situation is the same as mine. It isn't. I have a very different instrument, I play through a very different rig, and I probably play very different music. Extended low end is a big part of my musical world.

If I am guilty of making that error, then you are too, in assuming that the OP’s situation is the same as yours.

I hate to be a dog with a bone here, but I feel like you’ve consistently missed my point a little.

All I’ve been trying to convey since chiming in on this post is that they OP shouldn’t shy away from a low tuned bass because they don’t have gear that will reproduce a G# fundamental (you intimated would need it). It’s not an attack on your credentials, or your live sound tastes. While your situation is one where reproduction of the fundamental of such a low note is important, it may not be to the OP. I hazard a guess that given F# strings seem to be much more prevalent here on talkbass than Danley tapped horns, the average low tuned punter either isn't concerned about fundamental reproduction, or thinks they’re achieving it when they aren’t.

Anyway, I didn’t wish to open a can of worms, or start an argument. My apologies if that’s how I’ve come across. I just happened to be looking at spectrograms yesterday and thought I would drop a low tuned bass track into the software and that the results were worth sharing.

 

[Max Bogosity]

@micguy and @DragonCurse

The following may be of interest to you. Here's a very amateur recording of an F#0 bass. Importantly, there was no high passing at all. Lots of low passing through a fairly big tone capacitor, which makes this analysis easier.



Here's a few points of interest. At 22 seconds a G0 (24.5hz fundamental is held). We could debate the tonal qualities, but could likely agree that there is discernible, fat low end pitch there.

Here's a spectrogram of that note
View attachment 7076856

Note the almost complete absence (30db down) of the 24.5hz fundamental. Garageband or youtube may have automatically high passed it out, but the fact is, there's almost none of it there. We have lots of 49hz, with a peak volume on the 73.5hz harmonic.

At 37 seconds there's on open B

View attachment 7076868

Note that the 31hz fundamental is at least 10db down from the 62hz and 93hz harmonics.

Play the youtube track through some headphones. I believe this presents strong evidence that fundamental reproduction on low notes isn't required.

It is my experience, and I believe these spectrograms back it up, that fundamental reproduction of low notes simply isn't needed to have a fat and coherent low end. For a G#0 tuned bass, if you can reproduce 52hz with authority (not unachievable with a lot of readily available cabinets), you should be just fine. There's no point stressing on finding a cabinet to produce 24.5hz (in my example) if there's nearly none of it in the source signal.

The missing fundamental phenomenon is well established in psychoacoustics, allowing people to perceive a note from only its harmonics. Interestingly, though, it seems that not everybody hears it.

Another thing that could be going on here is masking: when two (or more) frequencies are very close together it becomes impossible to hear either of them clearly. There's a continuous 'smear' of frequencies from 20 Hz to 40 Hz in the attack of that note, which will tend to interfere with perception of the fundamental even if it is present, while the higher harmonics are clearly delineated.

I actually don't hear the G0 at the 22 second mark at all, just an un-pitched rumble. I do hear the G an octave higher slightly later when the initial attack has died. I'm tempted to download the audio and run it through a high-pass filter to see if that makes the G0 audible to me.

Individual variations in missing fundamental perception and masking might be the root of the disagreement here.

 

[Alex Xander]

The missing fundamental phenomenon is well established in psychoacoustics, allowing people to perceive a note from only its harmonics. Interestingly, though, it seems that not everybody hears it.

Another thing that could be going on here is masking: when two (or more) frequencies are very close together it becomes impossible to hear either of them clearly. There's a continuous 'smear' of frequencies from 20 Hz to 40 Hz in the attack of that note, which will tend to interfere with perception of the fundamental even if it is present, while the higher harmonics are clearly delineated.

I actually don't hear the G0 at the 22 second mark at all, just an un-pitched rumble. I do hear the G an octave higher slightly later when the initial attack has died. I'm tempted to download the audio and run it through a high-pass filter to see if that makes the G0 audible to me.

Individual variations in missing fundamental perception and masking might be the root of the disagreement here.

I had never considered that we may perceive the missing fundamental phenomenon differently.


Important question for context - do you have perfect pitch? That might make this perception less subjective.


I have been discussing the missing fundamental concept here for a long time. I had quite the heated discussion with Jauqo X III about it when he was convinced his phone could reproduce the 17hz of his C# string.

I'd be interested to hear of your perception if you do download the audio and high pass it. The longer I spend playing with and building low tuned basses the more I am pushed in a direction the removes the fundamental and focusses on harmonics. Obviously everyone has different needs and desires in this space.


I feel like I have been the cause of a wild derail here, so please PM me if you discover anything of interest.

EDIT: I can’t help but think that it isn’t a coincidence that high pass filters became commonplace in the same era that low B fundamental capable speakers (Fearful et al) did. Did we achieve 30hz reproduction in a bass rig and decide we didn’t like it?