4004 Impressions

sloop_john_b · Post by **sloop_john_b** » Mon May 29, 2006 12:56 pm

I've had my Ci for a few days now. A few general thoughts about it:

- Not thrilled with the HB's. When I first played them through a small F****r combo, I thought they sounded a bit "neutral" - not especially good, but not bad either. I eventually plugged it into my friend's SVT to get a better representation of what it could *really* do. The pickups sounded very growly - a great hard rock sound undoubtedly, but not really my thing. I'm more of a flatwounds guy who doesn't use much treble.

I gigged with it on Sunday through an Eden rig and kept the tone and volume rolled pretty far back, on the neck pickup, to get more of "my" tone. The output is crazy on these pickups. They also have lots of low end as well. For people who like Rickenbackers but are generally dissatisfied by the "shortcomings" of the 4001/3, I can see how this bass could be a godsend.

- I hate not having a mechanical mute. I never realized how much I actually use it before.

- It's very pretty - When I opened the case, all I could get out was "Wow."

- The previous owner, foumite Ron Plichta, installed concentric pots. I can not imagine this bass without them. This is a mod i'd reccomend to all 4004 owners.

- It's quite light, which I did not expect.

- The fretboard seems to be wider then what i'm used to from Ricks. When I went back to my 4003, it felt a bit like a toy in my left hand.

- The oil finish feels great.

I'm going to stick with it for a while and see how it grows on me. I may try a pickup swap, as I have a toaster pickup sitting around and i've heard much about Jeff Scott's success with toasters in a Cii.

markbass99 · Post by **markbass99** » Mon May 29, 2006 2:50 pm

Yea- I'm loving these toasters. I'm also a flat wound kinda guy and run chromes on just about everything I got. I recently dropped the g string side of the pickups down about 1/8" because that string was dominating the fretboard and everything sounds more even now. Tremendous clarity with these pickups, with both dialed up nice full sound, with neck dialed down the grind starts to go up, very satisfied with this setup.

jwr2 · Post by **jwr2** » Mon May 29, 2006 3:28 pm

the 4004 is a most excellent bass ... with a few mods ... I am not a fan of the toggle volume tone wiring ... but vvt works awesome ... I like the neck, the look and the pickups ...

jwr2 · Post by **jwr2** » Mon May 29, 2006 3:29 pm

and I love not have a mechanical mute ...

edski · Post by **edski** » Tue May 30, 2006 12:54 pm

I'm seriously considering the concentric pots mod...and the neck is wider than a 4003/1.

I'm a flats guy, too, but so far for a year plus a bit I've used rounds on it. But the current strings are about 9-10 months old, which would qualify as dead in most people's book. They are starting to get the effect of sounding bad unamplified and fantastic through the rig.

But I think I might spring for some TI flats soon for it.

Like Jeff Rath, I've had no use for the mute on the 4001, so I don't really notice it's not there.

incubus2432 · Post by **incubus2432** » Tue May 30, 2006 1:23 pm

John, I hope it grows on you some more and sorry to hear you don't much care for the p/u's......they are the strong point of the the 4004's IMO.

I'm about to finally do the concentric pots mod myself. With the flats lack of overtones I can see more use for it than I did when I was using roundwounds. I either palm mute or alter my left hand technique to deaden the note so I've had no use for the 4001/4003 mechanical mute either.

henny · Post by **henny** » Tue May 30, 2006 1:29 pm

- Not thrilled with the HB's. When I first played them through a small F****r combo, I thought they sounded a bit "neutral" - not especially good...

THANK you! Thank you!

See! It's not just me.