Teach me about bass strings, please.

[solspirit]

Round core, hex core, Flatwound, stainless, nickle etc etc.

 

[uOpt]

Yes.

 

[alex1fly]

99% of strings are hex core, nickel, roundwound or flatwound. Start there, no need to go outside of that unless there's a specific use case.

I preferred rounds until I gigged bass with a real band, selling tickets and booking regional venues and doing all that. I found that flatwounds fill the sonic space better than rounds, and haven't looked back. It's not that roundwounds can't, its more like flatwounds are more consistent in helping me do my job as a bassist from amp to amp, room to room, genre to genre, ensemble to ensemble. I've never lacked in treble either. They're also quieter with finger noise and last longer.

 

[esandes]

When I played bass I had to change to flatwound as they were so much easier on my finger tips.

 

[solspirit]

I'm yet to try flatwounds. Bass strings are expensive, as you obviously know. I have to wait until absolutely I need to change them. On a guitar I have sometimes ripped off a set of strings that still have plenty of life, to experiment.

 

[Wattage]

just switched to DR Sunbeams, they are a round core. They seem a little smoother than the EBs that were on here prior

we'll see how they hold up but first play thru they sound and feel good

 

[jeremy]

i used to use sunbeams for a while, really liked em. used fat beams on another bass. only have a short scale with flats at the moment. i think dr are made down in your neck of the woods. i use their pure blues 11s on basically everything these days

 

[Wattage]

I am loving the Sunbeams so far

 

[GuitarStv]

Tried and absolutely hated stainless strings on my J-bass . . . it's already kinda bright and the stainless strings made it waaaaay too bright.

Ever since then I've always used nickel roundwounds. What's the sound difference between round and flat for strings?

 

[Snake Aces]

I used DR stainless on a Stingray in the past. My sweat absolutely destroys strings in about a week, so I used to use DR stainless bass roundwounds. I did get fret clicking when fatigued but I had longer lasting strings.

I just recently switched to Elixir Nanoweb roundwounds on my bespoke Orpheo bass since I use them on my guitars. I am debating between them and going back to DR for bass.

I was always flatwound curious, but I never dipped a toe.

I have always used roundwounds on my Jazz basses and my former P-Basses. In the early days, I went through way too many sets of EB Slinkys before switching to DR in about 2005.

 

[Wattage]

I would strongly recommend the Nanowebs over SS unless you have SS frets. I have 2 clients that are destroying their frets with SS strings.

 

[Snake Aces]

I would strongly recommend the Nanowebs over SS unless you have SS frets. I have 2 clients that are destroying their frets with SS strings.

I do have SS frets on all my guitars except two and SS frets on my main bass. I love SS frets these days. I am enjoying the nanowebs so far on the SS fret bass though.