“You’re always trying to play the song better,
but ‘better’ doesn’t mean playing it the same
night after night—it means getting to the
essence.” —Jack Casady
Tone is something you’ve
obviously given a lot of consideration to. What’s your
beacon for tone?
I’ve gone full-circle on basses.
After beginning on passive hol-
lowbodies, experimenting with
active electronics, and using
solidbodies, I’m back to pas-
sive hollowbodies. One of the
things about active electronics
is that your tone is less about
your hands and more about the
miniature preamp. So when I
developed my signature bass with
Epiphone, I wanted to make it
a bass guitar that had acoustic
properties but would record real-
ly well. I wanted the bass to have
one fat-sounding, low-impedance
pickup, which gives you a greater
dynamic range. I focused on
how many windings it had, the
strength of the alnico magnets,
and finding a good preamp,
power amp, and speakers. Access-halve-page-ad-22211.pdf 2/22/11 4:16: 23 PM
so I always measure my electric
sound against the sound you can
get from a standup bass. I sat
in front of jazz guys like Charles
Mingus and Scott LaFaro, and I
was always amazed at the diversity of sound coming from the
same instrument played by different people.
Jack Casady’s Gearbox
BASSES
Epiphone Jack Casady signature hollowbody,
fretless Epiphone Jack Casady signature
hollowbody, Fender ’ 62 Reissue Jazz bass,
Fender ’ 53 Precision bass
AMPS
Alessandro Basset Hound 60-watt head
driving an Aguilar DB 285 JC cabinet
(for studio and acoustic work), Aguilar DB
680 tube preamp through an Aguilar DB
728 power amp driving an Aguilar GS 410
4x10 cabinet (electric rig)
STRINGS
Dean Markley Blue Steels (.065–. 105),
Thomastik-Infeld flatwounds on fretless
Epiphone and Fender Jazz bass
