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What are the good headless basses? I've seen steinberger, hofner, kramer the duke ... the duke is the best right?

I have two The Dukes and I love them but I'd be hard-pressed to say they would be the best for a few reasons because they have quite a few shortcomings. They might be the best of the headless basses though, IDK having not played any other headless basses outside of an old washburn my stepdad had that is riddled with unaddressed issues. The steinbergers are kinda the ones you see the most from that era and usually considered the best I guess.

Here's some things you should be aware of regarding The Duke as far as its quirks/attributes.

Short scale - This is my biggest personal beef. I can do some fun chord-stuff that my ham-hands can't do on a standard scale bass but it just never sounds "right" to me tone-wise.

Pickup placement - Right by the bridge. Again, a personal preference but for me bridge pickups on bass always have sounded better for finger players. The stock pick up itself is fine, but I still added a P-pickup to one of them and really like that a lot better, especially as I'm much more of a pick player.

Half-aluminum neck - the neck isn't fully aluminum. It's a t-shape, so you don't have the same rigidity and strength as an fully-aluminum neck. Aluminum is NOT the strongest metal and these Kramers can bow and be really difficult to straighten. This hasn't been a major issue for mine & The Duke seems less prone to it than the 8-string basses for example w/ the additional tension added by the extra strings.

One plus though is that for an aluminum-necked instrument, it has very little neck dive due to not being fully-aluminum throughout + no headstock weighing things down needlessly & shooting way out past the balance of the fulcrum.

Prepare to stand - I haven't figured out a way to play this sitting down.

Footprint - takes up no space in the band van & if you need a case, go to a sporting goods store and get a rifle case for $20 or whatever. Also as you'd expect from above, the weight is obv not terrible. Probably more than some of the others mentioned above.

Cost - unfortunately these have gotten stupidly over-priced on Reverb (like many others). Be patient, don't spend $1000 on one. An FM friend might be selling his if you are super serious.

I have a Steinberger XL2, it's an exceptional instrument and does the stuff that people say they do.

Records beautifully, no dead spots on the neck, no weird notes blooming out louder than others, etc.
I can't remember the last time I had to adjust the tuning - it sits in a gig bag in my closet for months, I pull it out to record something, it is still perfectly in tune.
Looks ridiculous, has a kickstand so you can play it sitting down, the combination of ergonomics and scale length are a bit off-putting (it feels like you're reaching way the fuck out to get to the low frets), but it's a stupidly nice, well-thought-out, instrument.

It's strikingly heavy, I would never be caught dead with it out of the house (I am vain/insecure).

In the studio though? Good enough for Loveless, good enough pour moi.

mdc wrote: Thu Apr 18, 2024 12:55 pm I have a Steinberger XL2, it's an exceptional instrument and does the stuff that people say they do.

Records beautifully, no dead spots on the neck, no weird notes blooming out louder than others, etc.
I can't remember the last time I had to adjust the tuning - it sits in a gig bag in my closet for months, I pull it out to record something, it is still perfectly in tune.
Looks ridiculous, has a kickstand so you can play it sitting down, the combination of ergonomics and scale length are a bit off-putting (it feels like you're reaching way the fuck out to get to the low frets), but it's a stupidly nice, well-thought-out, instrument.

It's strikingly heavy, I would never be caught dead with it out of the house (I am vain/insecure).

In the studio though? Good enough for Loveless, good enough pour moi.

Damn, let me just get one of th-.... holy moly those prices. I guess that makes sense though, it's a good instrument

I stumbled into it in a trade for some bike parts several years ago - I don't think either one of us had any idea what it was actually worth at the time (which was significantly less than they seem to go for now... hatchie matchie)

I love that Gary Young from Pavement's dad was involved in the development. Apparently any of the guitar parts on Slanted that have whammy bar are played on a steinberger with a transtrem.

^^^ Hahaha that is awesome.

They had a Steinberger guitar at my local shop a while back, the one with the relatively normal looking body. I'd never seen one iRL. I had a quick go on it, couldn't get my head around the no-headstock thing, just felt so weird.

Just remembered I have a small question that doesn't fit anywhere. I have one of these:


It has a spring reverb that sounds awesome, but it's somewhat intermittent. It's generally ok once it's been on for an hour or so, but when I first turn it on it's flakey, will cut out every few minutes then come back on at random.

Any ideas? Things to check? Thanks!

Anyone have any opinions on trimpots? I'm adding one to a guitar product to limit a bypass cap to control gain, specifically to tame bass response. Initial plan was to something like so https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/BI ... jQ5A%3D%3D
with many turns so you can set it and it won't be vibrated off-value. Very tiny to adjust, any downside beyond average consumer not having a small enough flathead? do these bother anyone?

Is there a reason not to do this, other than it being dangerous and inconvenient?

^ I mean you can Velcro together groups and try to straighten it out a little. But the reality is every setup (other than the most impressively type A) has a fair amount of this shit but you can't see it because it's covered by the desk or the rack. It's the reason that every time I have to change something behind my racks I whine a little as I grab my flashlight.