Looking for Recordings: Fender J With Flats

A huge majority of everything that was played on a Jazz Bass prior to the mid ‘70s to the early ’80s. You’ll get a shorter list by asking what great bass tracks were recorded on a Jazz Bass with rounds. With the exception of some great ‘70s and ‘80s R&B and some (but very little) ’60s and ’70s rock-n-roll, there hasn’t been much great recorded on rounds, to my musical tastes.

All the main Fender basses were designed around high mass/tension/output flats; the pickups, the bridges, and the controls were designed to work with these strings. It’s rounds that are, from an engineering perspective, the strings that are “different” on a Fender bass. Certainly not by popularity for the last 45 years or so…but definitely by the original engineering parameters of the basses, which haven’t changed much since.
 
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Into The Mystic by Van Morrison with John Klingberg on bass...



Besides a Burns Bison bass, Alan Henderson played a Fiesta Red Jazz Bass while he was with Them. Presumably, he used flats considering it was '64/'65-ish.

them-1964-unknown.jpg



 
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