So how does dingwall do it? Get all that high end without hiss.

I bet hosting at Warwick’s

Sick Andy! I send all my bass students to your videos !!! Great stuff!

Does it any better than my Fender Geddy Lee Jazz Japan model? Or my 1978 Rickenbacker? Or my PRS King Fisher? Or my 2021 Fender American Jazz? Or my 2013 Sandberg Jazz? Huh? Lol, it’s an Addiction! I want a Sadowski Jazz Deluxe! How much?

Thank you for this explanation. I really like the high treble, though. Is there anything I can do to stop the hiss?

Amen something I have said for years and years

maple: brighter & tighter rosewood: sweeter & warmer ebony: more immediate response & stronger fundamental (the note blooms shortly /after/ striking with maple & rosewood fingerboards.)

I've just used Music Nomad F1 oil just now for the first time & the first thing i noticed is it's not coloured or scented.

pffft what would this boomer grandpa know, just because he worked on thousands of actual instruments, i'll go take my advice from that cool young dude who strapped some strings to his bench and therefore scientificly made proof. This guy sounds like that other grandpa from prs or whatever

Where the bass ???

Those blue edge/black center curly maple top basses are always prominently displayed in these videos, because they are freaking awesome! Glad to own one of these out of a hundred made.

Great

Hey Andy,awesome video! That will be my next bass 😎🍺🍺😎

Great demo and it's always a pleasure to see and hear Andy

You forgot about players should can play. There is no difference between wood if you can't play bass.

Lovely 🩵🩵🩵

Oh yeah, nice colour.

Niiiice 👍

Seasoned guitarist that are musicians know this. People that deny it just want it to be false. The difference between maple and rosewood is very noticeable. Mahogany and Ash are completely different when used in a body. A maple stave compared to a mahogany stave will make the neck sound different. I like Maple, Ebony, Alder, Swamp Ash, and Mahogany. These are the woods that get the sounds that I like. Poplar is horrible. Some cuts of Mahogany used in a body will create a hollow sounding bloom in the body which I can't stand. I like a body that mutes the mids and the bottom and has a ton of mids and sustain. Thank you for making this video. Mahogany, Alder and Swamp ash all accomplish this to different degrees. Mahogany mutes the mids and overall resonance most it attenuates the sound best and sounds super sweet and balanced. Alder has a growl to it and is more open sounding with more volume than Mahogany. Swamp Ash cuts and has good balance across the frequencies and it's a little honky and has a lot of snap and attack.

So, if no one can feel it it doesn't matter. Let's be honest.

100% Rosewood oils dampen most.

Wow!

wow amazing colour

Anyone know if this is from a song?

Bass in particular is sensitive to tonewood. IMO the bass midrange is in the same resonant frequencies as are predominant in the woods. Roger's observations are very similar to my own. The better the bridge, as well, the better the relationship between strings and wood. This is why the Leo Kwan Badass bridge became the archetype replacement bridge. Heavy brass plate and heavy duty saddles. Don't overlook the composition of the saddles either. Brass seems to give me more of that growl from the wood than steel.

If I listen carefully I can tell the difference between my alder and my swamp ash bass. It makes no difference however when I have 3 layers of distortion on, in a dodgy venue with a crappy PA and a crackhead behind the console, which is all I seem to play these days it seems (shocking for crust punk/hardcore, I know)

Seems to be a lot of loving care going on in the production process. Great to see :-)

Tl;dr: Tonewood isn't perceived with your ears, it's perceived with your heart.

I don't have 50yrs of experience, but what Roger kindly shares is what I can hear too. What matters the most is what the player hears, more than what others do. Great phrase and very true! The relationship with the instrument brings out emotions and indeed the player feels what is playing more deeply ❤

The sound of a string vibrating causing pressure waves in the air that we can hear is different from the sound that is produced by a conductive material creating eddy currents in an inductor (electromagnetic pickups) sent through a length of cable and then amplified, filtered, amplified again and finally transduced through a speaker. While both of these are sounds, they are derived from entirely different processes that don’t have very much at all to do with each other.

Color me dumb but I didn’t know Sadowsky was connected to Warwick. Are these available for sale to install in any bass?

I'm with ya Roger. I once built myself a solid body LP style with an ebony fretboard. I played one gig with it and absolutely hated it. Replaced it with Indian rosewood, loved it, played the guitar for years. Ever since I always use rosewood on electric guitars. On acoustic guitars I think it's too much, so there I use ebony or even better African blackwood. Anyway, I've been telling people for many years that it's pretty much all about the fretboard wood, and practically nobody believes me. Maybe if I tell them you said so too, they will!

Very nicely presented, Roger! I've seen too many beginners that insist that they can't hear any differences in any type of bodies or fretboards. I believe that they can't. The problem arises when they flame anyone who actually has experience and good ears. I also agree with the point that the sonic differences and 'feel' of the instrument make a huge difference in touch, and how an experienced musician will play. Someone at the back of the room may not be able to distinguish alder from swamp ash, but they certainly should be able to tell differences in the players' approach.

How does the guitar ring on or resonate? That will be reproduced by the pick up. I’ve played dead sounding guitars, they should be avoided. Otherwise the amp with all the buttons give you different sounds. Pickups are just magnets and wire. A magnet is just a magnet any way you look at it.

Thank you for sharing this with us.😎👍✨

As I always say, people who think wood doesn't matter fall into one of these two categories: 1. Lacking experience 2. Simply cannot hear the difference (again lack of experience with sound analysis, or just simply lacking an ear or hearing skills)

Hey, wondering what is the difference between the Sadowsky pickups in the SMX and other Sadowsky pickups? I thought they were all the same.. Thanks for the video.

I´ve had an Alembic Europa 5 for many years. Ebony fingerboard, multi laminate neck through of maple and purleheart, mahogany body wings with maple top. Lovely bass! Some years ago I bought another Alembic. Same pickups and electronics, same construction, and I was expecting it to sound the same as the Europa. But it didn´t. It had a much brighter sound. I found this strange since it was the same bass. But after some investigations I found out that it had maple body wings instead of mahogany. And it made a lot of difference! It must be said that the pickups on Alembic are a bit microphonic and are screwed tight to the body without any springs, and thus make a more solid connection with the body.

Totally agree sir! Wood matters as does everything else that makes a bass! By the way, I wrote and performed the song in the outro “Lazy Laura” ❤️ kzfaq.info/get/bejne/aJuKdaeZlcXOqYk.htmlsi=y89uzWWhtrdC1eIa

This topic will never be settled. There could be two maple fingerboards out there that sound more different than a maple and a rosewood one by comparison; two exactly the same J basses by design might sound and feel completely different due to the properties of the wood. When we say wood makes a difference, I've for some time believed it's the material's density, moisture content and make-up, rather than the differences being due to species of wood. I do agree that the key factor that matters is how the player perceives the instrument!

Tell 'em, Roger! ❤

Very interesting video, thank you for the presentation. I like your ending takeaway "it's what the player hears..." so true.

Is the sadowsky will lee preamp available for sale? Really loving the sound!

Finally a no nonsense video, no unboxing or a lot of BS. Roger just tells it like it is! Thanks Roger!

Second comment; I remember the first time I heard the name; "Roger Sadowsky". It was in early '82. I was working as a tech for a (then) up-and-coming guitarist no one had yet heard of. He got connected with a similarly rising singer/songwriter. As part of the record deal, some new gear was purchased. One, a 50's gold top Les Paul. I remember being told it was a '52 but it was certainly a few years after that. I believe it was purchased at Styvesant Music on 48th St. (I could be not remembering that part correctly). It had humbuckers, and the bridge/tailpiece was original. Big, chunky neck and sounded great. But; it somehow had super-tiny frets! We joked they must be banjo frets! So it needed refretting and complete set-up. This is the part where Mr. Sadowsky comes into the picture. When we got the guitar back, it couldn't have been better. It really was a gem. And though I, personally, never had need of further business with Mr. Sadowsky, his was a name in the industry I never forgot, and mentioned often.

Thanks for your sage advice. Going back to '79, when I bought my very first real quality guitar, LP Gold Top (brand new '78), I chose it after playing it a while and listening to it - not having plugged it in AT ALL the whole time. Not kidding. Once I found one that felt good, I (uncomfortably) pressed my ear down on the shoulder and listened to the (wait for it) GUITAR. Not the pickups. not the tone knobs. The wood. The instrument. When I found one where all the notes rang even and true, and chords were clear and sounded all the notes together with sounding mushed or mixed, then I checked the neck (3-piece maple [loved it]) and made sure everything else was in order, I ended up with one of my favorite guitars I've ever owned. Great tone, Even note balance. Enjoyable sustain............. Every guitar or bass I've ever bought or built since then had to pass that test before I have ever considered anything about the electronics. The sparky stuff has massive affect on the output sound, for sure. But you have to start with the instrument first. IT has to be right first. I won't do it any other way. 🙂

Beautiful outro music

Blind test it

Is it better to set the tone control first, and then set the treble and bass boost? Or vice-versa? (I think the former.)

The comparison of different Wood types hast been done (and much more) hast actually been done by German Scientist Manfred Zollner, complete with a full blown theoretisch background. The result: the Wood hast to do ONE Job: vibrate a lot less than the String. And, surprise: Just about every Wood does it equally well for all practical purposrs. To do this comparison in a repeatable and provable way is not trivial, But now it has been done. Differences in sound stem from many other components But definitely you may forget the Wood. The 1500 pages thick two-part book is only available in German language, as well as his fantastic series About "Physik der Gitarre", which is available in KZfaq.