Burgos, Spain
About this listing
Modulus Graphite is an American manufacturer of musical instruments best known for building bass guitars with carbon fiber necksThe company was founded in part by Geoff Gould, a bassist who also worked for an aerospacecompany in Palo Alto, California and coworker Jerry Dorsch. When they split, Jerry started Graphite Guitar Systems in Washington state.The name is a reference to "Young's modulus", a measure of the stiffness of an elastic material, used in the field of solid mechanicssolid. Carbon fiber has an exceptionally high modulus.Traditionally, electric giitarand bass necks are made from hardwoods and reinforced with an adjustable steel truss rod. Wood, being a naturally occurring material, is prone to variations in density and flexibility. This, coupled with the high stresses created by stretching steel strings across them lengthwise, makes wood necks prone to certain unpredictable and undesirable qualities. Among these are twisting, incorrect "bowing" (either too pronounced or too subtle), and "dead spots," or areas on the neck where notes are quieter or more indistinct compared to other areas. Non-traditional neck materials such as carbon fiber and aluminum are attempts to correct these issues by replacing wood with lighter, stiffer and more uniform components.Gould was inspired to experiment with non-traditional materials after attending a 1974 Grateful Dead concert, at which he marveled at the size and complexity of Phil Lesh's heavily modified bass (customized by Alembic) and began to consider the possibilities of lighter, stronger materials. After being passed over by his employers in the aerospace industry, the project of creating hollow, carbon fiber bass necks was brought to fruition by Gould and Alembic, who built a bass with a prototype neck and displayed it at a trade show in 1977. This model is named Quantum 5-35 and it is a 5 string bass with a carbon fretless lined neck. It was made in 2009 but it could almost pass like new. Incredible condition. It has a traditional bolt on construction and the carbon neck attaches to an alder body with a gorgeous figured bubinga top. The fingerboard is made from phenowood, an extra hard material that is absolutely perfect for fretless basses. The lines will help you play in tune too.Some early carbon neck basses (Modulus, Zon, Status, Vigier) didn't have a truss rod because of the rigid nature of the material. However, it was later discovered that installing a truss rod is a benefit because this allows the player to set the right neck "relief" and curvature to match their playing style.This bass comes with a two way truss rod so it's possible to set the perfect "sweet spot" depending on your right hand technique. If you have a soft touch you can set the neck totally straight and you'll get an amazing super responsive "mawh" and growl. If you prefer to dig in harder then you can set the neck to have a little relief and you'll get even more dynamic range. Depending on your playing style and your right hand's position, you'll get perfect results time after time. So cool!Everything works as it should in this instrument. No issues at all. Perfect string to string balance, amazing low B, super responsive all across the fingerboard. Scale lenght is 35" and this is in part responsible for a great 5th string but the good news is that this extra stretch is hardly noticeable. It just feels great.The sound is absolutely fantastic thanks to the two Bartolini USA soapbar pickups and Bartolini USA NTMB-918FL preamp with 3 band EQ. All the sounds on tap are really good and absolutely noise free. Even the Balance pot works better than in most basses because it's far more progressive. This means you can dial in the bridge pickup (our favorite fretless sound always) but move the pot a little towards the center and get a little extra low end from the neck pickup. This is really cool because the Balance pot in most basses acts as a 3 way switch in practice meaning that as soon as you move it from the center detent, only one pickup will be heard. But wait, there's more: the bridge pickup is absolutely fantastic, but when you blend both you get an all round bass sound that allows you to get a regular "fretted" sound. Even slapping sounds insane. In practice this means you can use this bass for all kinds of styles. Depending on pickup selection, your right hand's approach and using or not glissandos and those things, this bass will sound as a fretted or freltess bass on demand. So cool.The icing on the cake is the neck pickup as it sounds nicer than in most cases. This could be a combination of the pickup itself, its location, the carbon neck, etc... To sum up, a really solid fretless bass that can do it all and do it right!
Price£4,780.43
+ £144.31 Shipping
