Double Bass and Beyond - Gary Upton of Upton Bass
Double Bass and Beyond - Gary Upton of Upton Bass
Silent Strings - Unmasking the Phantom Buzz with Gary from Upton Bass
Ever wondered why your bass suddenly starts buzzing out of nowhere? Join Gary from Upton Bass as he demystifies the notorious "phantom buzz" and turns you into a bass problem-solving pro! Get ready to dive deep into the anatomy of your instrument, where Gary explains how the table or top of your bass acts like a speaker cone, amplifying every sound and vibration. Through careful observation and practical steps, Gary reveals why a loose bass bar is rarely the issue and guides you toward pinpointing the real culprits behind those unexpected noises.
In this informative and engaging episode, Gary uses a real-world example with Upton's Breschen model to demonstrate how to effectively diagnose and fix the buzz. From identifying resonant frequencies to meticulously checking different parts of the bass, you'll learn actionable tips and tricks that can save you time and worry. Discover how a tiny gap under the A string at the nut was the true source of the problem and how you can apply these insights to your own instrument. Tune in, and let’s get your bass back to its pristine sound!
Hey guys, it's Gary with Upton Bass.
Speaker 1:Thanks for checking out our podcast. We just wanted to let you know that a lot of these podcast audio files are pulled from our videos. So if we're chatting and talking about certain features and things about bass topics and you're scratching your head going what's he talking about, hop on over to our YouTube also our courses. uptonbass. com, and oftentimes Instagram, for partials and entire videos that will describe what you're hearing on these audio files. Again, thanks for listening and we'll talk to you soon. Hey guys, it's Gary with Upton Bass.
Speaker 1:In today's video we're going to talk about phantom buzz in your bass, or as some people put it, my bass bar is loose and I'm going to show you. On this Upton bass or our Brescian model, there's a buzz and when we listen for the buzz, interestingly enough it comes from here. Now what I need you to think about, what I think about is the top of the instrument, the table. It's like a speaker cone and its job is to amplify everything that's going on with the bass. All these noises everybody ends up coming, obviously, from the source noise. I can hear myself tapping the E string peg, but I can also hear it through the body of the bass, so let's keep that in mind. So many times I'll hear someone's got an old bass, a new bass, whatever it be, and they've got some crazy buzz going on. And they're so sure because they read something on some forum on the internet my bass bar is coming loose. And I'll tell you 999 times out of a thousand it's not your bass bar coming loose. Your bass bar is not coming loose. It's probably not ever going to come loose unless you've got something like an old Kay. It's usually, in most cases, something very simple. Now, if your bass is 150 years old, 200 years old, and it's a German flatback, some Tyrolean thing, it's got a bunch of cracks in the back. It's never been restored. You've moved, you've done something and you're hearing a funny buzz come from a very specific spot. That's you know. I'll give it to you.
Speaker 1:Let's start hunting out what's going on on some old instrument like that. But I still would recommend, like in this example, let's see if you can hear it. When I play this A string, there is a clear buzz coming from here and if anything, I'd say my ears tell me it sounds like it's coming from right here. And if anything, I'd say my ears tell me it sounds like it's coming from right here. So I start listening to the bass. Maybe it's coming from here, maybe it's coming from here, but I'm certain that as I'm playing this bass it is buzzing in and around the top. What's in the top of my bass Sound post, bass bar? Oh, my goodness, it must be my bass bar. So take a deep breath, check this out. Remember this pitch? Let's find it somewhere else. So if the body were to have a resonant frequency that is bothering it, like this open A, the first thing I'd recommend you do is play the same note somewhere else. Obviously, if it's an open E, you're going to have a hard time playing it somewhere else, but in this case let's use the A.
Speaker 1:Now I can hear the growl under my finger. That's not the same as this noise. I've done the work already. I'm going to take the pie out of the oven. It's like a cooking show. Here's the ingredients, now here's the pie. Check the string. Check down here, check here. Check in the peg box. Guess what it is.
Speaker 1:As the A string is leaving the nut, there's the tiniest bit of space under the ridge in the nut and the string. And when I listen, like this, in the nut and the string and when I listen like this, I can actually hear it very clearly in my ear originating here. It's then transferred through the bridge into the body and it is surely a buzz coming from right over there. I would bet my bottom dollar on it, but it's not. As I play with this, I'm going to put my finger right on where the string comes out of the nut, and I understand the fineness of the recording and things of that nature may not be picking up the distinction between the buzz and not the buzz, but I can also tell you that now, as I inspect, I can see there's a little room for the A string to buzz there, and I've already spoken to Jack, my setup guy, about this, and we both went through this and we both found it very quickly. The string is buzzing right there on the A string. So we're going to take the string off the bass. We'll cut the groove down a little bit, we'll re-round it out, make sure it's smooth, get rid of the issue, put a little bit of back pressure on it. The buzz will completely go away. I've kept it intentionally for this video, but other things I see like this will be a A wrapping on a string is starting to come loose but you can hardly tell. You could have a bad groove in your bridge. Sometimes there's something funny on the after lengths. That's the strings between the bridge and a tailpiece, or even the balls behind the tailpiece and even this little nut here that supports the strings on your tailpiece. If you have an old tailpiece that's got cracks and funny things, I'd always check those out 99 or 999 times out of a thousand.
Speaker 1:do find it to be something relating to the setup componentry of the bass. Another common one are loose screws on the pegs of the tuners, even the small screws. Or we'll even see a string inside the peg box where someone's not been careful about how they wrap their strings and the end of the string is touching the side of the peg box or it's touching one of the other strings and it's just buzzing a little and again it reverberates through the strings into the bridge and you're sure it's coming out of the bass from right here. And I know my bass bar is falling out of my bass and oh my goodness. I read online and it's a catastrophe and I love this bass but it's just bound for restoration and repair and that stinks.
Speaker 1:Take your time, take a breath, look through the setup componentry. It's nearly always in the path of the strings, the path of the strings. Think of the path of the strings strings. So that wraps up how to not panic when your bass is buzzing and to really look through the setup componentry and the things that are going on. Always think about where the buzzes start. Where the good buzzes start usually are connected to the bad buzzes that are going right through the speaker cone.