Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

after trying out several flat sets,i found a ghs 40-100 set to work great. they are reasonably lower in tension,have a great clicky tone when played with a pick,and a smooth full bassy sound played fingerstyle. my experience with the fender and the chrome sets was: very stiff/hi tension/clangy sounding. i actually love pyamid flats,but the ghs strings sound similar,at a lot lower cost.

Steve, with a pick, the Chromes might be more bright than you'll want. Just a caveat, having Chromes on my 4004C. Tension-wise they are what you want, as would be the Fender flats. I bought a couple sets of those when they were $13 a set at Marshall Music a couple years ago and though nice tone, I notice the open E sounds a bit phasey due to the way it vibrates.

Todd, really nice tune. That bass has an upright sound to it.

Steve:

The real strength of a musicman bass is how it can really bring out the treble. It can be eq'd to sound like a passive p-bass also. But maybe you should consider getting a passive p-bass 5 string or a passive fender-bird 5 or a passive t-bird 5 stringer.

And if you detune to E flat then you need to raise your action and get fat strings.

Also if you detune a 35" scale bass could be nice.

A nice cheap 5 string bass that performs well is this one here ...

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/ ... sku=512618

I have been thinking about getting one of those basses myself.

LaBella Deep Talkin' Bass flats and D'addario Chromes are great! Got LaBellas on a Hofner Club, and Chromes on a Ricky, and Fender flats on a (what else) Fender (Mustang). The Chromes pulled the neck a bit on the Ricky, though. I plan on trying the lighter gage Fenders flats (9050) on it for a while. The gage is more like the originals, and though stainless should work well. I prefer nickel to stainless when possible however. Just my opinion...

My faves on the Hofner are Hofner flats (supposedly made by Pyramid). But the consistency is terrible! It took 4 sets to get one whole set working right. But nuttin better after that! And the Ricky likes to change its sound per set/brand/type of strings. The Chromes gave me a huge range of tones. Though I also liked LaBella made Carvin strings on it too... Great "stand-up" sound - MoTown all the way!

Those who say the Ricky isn't as versatile as a Fender are crazy!! I gave up a perfectly good 4003 in the 80s, and kicked myself util I replaced it recently. Wish I'd waited for the full width "shark tooth" inlay though!

Half the fun of trying different strings is discovering new sounds with your guitar/bass. Let the good times roll, man

I use D'Addario Chromes on my OLP/Music Man SR, and the tone is great. I have a Bartolini MM pick up in it that's voiced for low/low mid tone. That makes for some huge powerful tone. I've gone to using DR rounds on my Ricks for a little more versitility, so I can go from twangy to thumpy to major growl if I need to.