Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Scott, I really like the black/chrome motif on your Laredo. I liked it enough to keep my 4003S BT but put on the chrome neck pup and shoe'd horsey. Nice mix of colors.

I think it works OK. I thought it looked a little plain and was considering all black hardware, but after looking real hard at the black and chrome lettered TRC, and the black and chrome pickups, the thought of the black and chrome bridge came to mind since I was replacing it anyway.

I'm up in the air about the knobs. I've located some bubinga ones that would compliment the fingerboard that I might try.

Maybe give it a "boutique" look.

loving the black/chrome combo-and i REALLY love the laquered fretboard on your bass. so the blend control didn't work for you,and you went with vol vol tone,did you use a 500k ohm for the additional vol pot? howsit sounding with the blendable vols? i was talking to someone in a shop this weekend about adding the blend contol,and they seemed to think it could cause a major drop in the pickup output versus doing a vvt setup....i am going to have something like this done to mine in the near future.

Do the V V T mod. The additional tonal color a must.

With the neck pup rolled back slightly, I can get a tone that sounds just like CS's "Into the Lens" off the Drama album. With the neck pup rolled back about half-way, I pick up the Geddy Lee rick tone when I dig in with my fingers.

I really want to point out that this bass sounds alot different than the CII that I had. The CII sounded good, but I couldnt really get a 4001/4003 tone out of it. This bass gives me a 4004 tone, and the 4001/4003 tone. It must be the solid maple construction.?

I tried the blend control but couldnt get it to work properly. When wired up, I had bridge vol. and tone, and neck vol. and tone, but when I blended them together, I got total cancellation out of both pickups. I'm not and electronic whiz and couldnt figure it out, so I bailed and went V V T. All pots are 500K.

I highly recommend the V V T mod though.

Interesting-
to me.

I have seen that these (and other) basses are modded by those with the skillz and knowledge to do so.
All good; prolly adds a great deal of color, etc.
New hardware, different knobs and pots, changes both cosmetic and funtional...
Even a Laredo 5'er....

Players do that too to "another" great bass, the G&L SB-2, even have a special stacked pot furnished for 'em by Butch.

Now me-
Not just that I'm old-school about it, but I would not even touch a thing about my Laredo, and I'm not blind to eq-
I have some basses that are extreme in pre-amp including Warwick, MM, and a G&L.

I also have some great rigs that take the signal from the bass and ---like S-E-X, 'cept louder...Don't say it, you can't back it up!

When I played my 4004 for the first time, I was literally blown away by what those humbuckers do, and starting flat on the amp and tweaking (very little) from there-
Rolling of tone, boom. Toggling- fine-boom.

Not dissing anyone's choice and method to mod- not my point.

But me likey stock.

Eihter way, enjoy your instrumental means of self-expression~

larry- i am usually loathe to make changes to stock instruments,esp.since i am a danger to the environment with a soldering gun. I really like the idea of being able to blend the pickups,it is an easily reversible mod,plus i'm not crazy about the teensy weensy selector switch.

I'm not even sure if it's the "point" end of the nail we're supposed to bang in, myself.
Don't mis-understand, for those that can and do, or for those who WANT more tonal options or control flexibility, I think it's great.

I saw a 4003 e.g. and the owner had modified it with a hand-made pg, as well as changing the pups- His work was top-rate, luthier like quality, and the bass looked great, and probably killed sonically.

I'm sorta retentive about certain things, at least with my instruments.

Briefly: (yeh right! )

Whilst wandering thru a well-known Vintage shop here in LA (Norman's Rare Guitars- very sweet stuff, mostly Gibsons, etc)

I saw (2) things- A dead-mint all original 60's-something J-Bass in LPB- even had hang-tags!!! They were asking something like $6K or more, I forget.

Next door- A beat to hell '69 P-Bass- Bridge rusted, tuners replaced with 70's disco-style Fenders (with the hoods-ugh-good tho!), the pup n/g, needed TLC.
I played it and that neck was/is the greatest thing EVER!... UN-REAL!!!!! Wait. I'm gonna cry....



(takes breath...) OK let me go on....
Got it 400 bucks.

Added:

BAII Bridge, SD 1/4-er pup, new Black hardware inc Fender OEM tuners, knobs, string retainer, new pg, neck sanded light tung-oil, re-fret, and--Now the bass had been spray painted flat matte black- Spray-painted! And it was dinged to *((&*^&

My tech told me to leave it be, he'd bang it some more with his hammers.
I had Wilkins take the paint off, and found that it had a very nice grain for Alder, so we left it alone, and lightly oiled it.

That bass is a 1st-cabin player, and when I want phat passive phunk -Nothing compares to 40 year old alder.

SO it's not the $5 grand bass a perfect OEM 1969 Sunburst Precision would bring- but it is the bomb- the atom bomb!

OTOH-

My (stock) Laredo-

Let's call it shall we say..."P-Bass Plus... order to-day and we'll include, AT NO CHARGE!! Neck-through!

I kinda like the little toggle btw.

And the aforementioned mods- quite cool, absolutely.,

But - for me-

"MOVE AWAY FROM THE LAREDO, PLEASE!" This is the Police!

I understand how you feel Larry. I was the same way with the tranny red CII I used to own. But I learned alot from that bass, and bought the 4004 Larado with the mods in mind.

Ahhh, it's just me...
I'm "retentive" that way.
Like I mentioned, I've seen some modded Ric's that were waaay cool, and improving/augmenting the very basic
eq and controls of the 4004 series certainly makes sense.

OTOH, there IS some charm in their being "Plain Janes"!

cheyenne wrote:I really want to point out that this bass sounds alot different than the CII that I had. The CII sounded good, but I couldnt really get a 4001/4003 tone out of it. This bass gives me a 4004 tone, and the 4001/4003 tone. It must be the solid maple construction.?

Scott, I would attribute the ability of the Laredo to get the 4001/3 tone to the all maple construction also. The walnut on the Ci and walnut sandwich on the Cii add a darkness to the tone. Still sounds like a Rickenbacker, but a different tone range.

Just to back up my praise of your choice to go chrome/black I offer mine: I really like the contrast of shine and black. I was considering going all chrome and white guard before I mounted the pups and then liked it so much I stopped right there.

As to the V V T, do you miss individual tone control for each pup?

Looks good John!

Individual V T is nice,, but I really like the simplicity of the V V T.