Silhouette Bass Guitar ponderings

[Beth]

Hi Scott,

No worries, can't find anything out unless you ask!

It's called the Silhouette Bass Guitar. Our FAQ says this about it:

"Q: The Silhouette Bass: Is this bass a true 6 string bass or is it a Baritone guitar?

A: The Silhouette bass is probably best described as a hybrid bass and guitar.

It has a 29 5/8" scale which is almost halfway between a guitar and bass scale length. It is tuned E-E a full octave lower than a guitar and uses all wound strings from .20 to .90 gauge. In some applications, it could not be used the same way as a long scale 6-string bass, but with the 10 different switching configurations it does have a very wide range of tonal characteristics from a nice bass tone to a great higher-pitched tone such as lower notes on a guitar. It is even suitable for playing some chords. It is tuned like a guitar, only an octave lower. It is also available strung as a baritone guitar, tuned from A-A. "

The specification sheet on the Silhouete Bass Guitar can be found here:

http://www.ernieball.com/mmonline/specs/instruments_silhbass.html

So, it's not really a baritone per se, but more of a hybrid. The tones that you can get out of this guy insert themselves nicely in between the registers of the bass and the guitar, which is a nice place to be heard, I've been told.

-Beth

 

[lumberjack]

Hello again,

Thanks for the info and the link. I actually saw that but assumed it was an actual BASS guitar and not a BASS/BARITONE 6 stringer.

I think one of those is going to have to go on my WANT list.

 

[Beth]

Its the new sleeper hit! The Silhouette Bass Guitar!!

 

[Beth]

Now all we need is NoRM's input.... Hey NoRM, didn't you get my PM?

 

[NorM]

That little dancing powder puff thing is hpypnotic. Also thank you for the copy and paste functions of this computer. The same thing (basically) is on the bass version of this thread.


Silhouette Bass Guitar.
Just like the ad says "It's a guitar for bass players and a bass for guitar players." From the first time I played one I knew as soon as I could afford one I would have one. I warn you that these things are fun fun fun to play. Who would of thought there would be a bass I could shred on. As a bass player I think, Wow! I can make chords on this thing really easy and they don't sound muddy.
Think of it as a baritone guitar. Mine is tuned E A D G B E one octave below a regular 6 string guitar (and the same as a bass guitar for those of you who have trouble figuring that out).

Tuned E to E all of the strings are wound. (Not wound and plain like on a regular guitar) I find this add a lot of consistency to how the strings feel under your fingers. Mostly this thing feels good. I like trying other manufactures baritone guitars but to me (IMNSHO) the EB just feels better.

I haven't tried this but I understand that you can get a different set of strings and tune these beasts from A to A (A D G C E A ?) a fifth below a guitar. I haven't tried that cause I don't want to have to do the transposing math to play with other people (like that would ever happen given my lack of social skills) and I am scared I would like it to much.

This ______ (<-- insert what ever you want to call it here)
has 2 split coil humbuckers with a 5 way pickup selector and a 2 way series / parallel knob to give you 10 selections from the pickups. I think my favorite is the single coil near the bridge. That is probably a function of as a guitar player I like to hide mistakes by using way to much chorus delay and reverb. When I run it through a bass amp I give it just a little something something (FX wise) to sweeten it up then the hard part is finding which pickup selection I like the best. (This one , no this one ... no I like this better. Then I remember what Luke said: "Sometimes you just gotta Shut Up and play!") Still with 10 selections that's a lot to choose from. Almost to many. (That's big talk coming from me as my BD SiLO EMGed Piezo guitar has 27 different combinations)

Unique things about MINE:
The neck has little tiny tiny tiny birds eyes on it. Sure it's the luck of the draw and maybe it adds or subtracts something to the sound, stability, feel, look, taste (ahem), smell whatever of the guitar. All I know is I like it. Mine is also in pearl purple and I love purple. (I make no further comment on purple) Also I found a set of MM Schallar locking tuners on ebay. (The tuners on the Silhouette Bass Guitar are the standard non locking Schallars) and put those on. I had to drill new pilot holes for the screws and bore out the string hole for the low E string but it is what I wanted to do with mine so I did it.

The scale of the neck is short enough that I don't feel burdened when I switch from a guitar to this. I don't know (care) how I feel when I switch from bass to this other than to say the SiLO bass guitar is still comfortable.

The next time you see Aerosmith in concert, Joe Perry is playing one on "Back In The Saddle"

Things to consider that may not necessarily be in a positive light:
These are unique instruments. Not everybody (aka nobody) plays one. Finding a niche for these things is something that may take work. I think the only reason that is is because nobody's done it yet. So let's read that as here is your chance to be original. That may not be for you. If you are happy doing what everybody else does you just keep on doing what you're doing. That's fine.
The range of these instruments can really clash with a guitar or bass when played together. So I think it is important that a bass guitar (baritone) play something that neither the bass or guitar is playing. This was demonstrated well by Sterling Ball at the open house and the BB All stars show in Indio. (I'm just one lucky SOB)
So to use one of these in a band you will have to arrange / write a whole new instrument line. (Crap, more work <--BS more art creation)



All, Pics of this thing are on Rod Trussbroken's sight.

 

[PeteDuBaldo]

NorM pretty much summs it all up there. I've played a couple of these guitars/basses, and think they sound frikkin sweet in the A-a tuning. I have not yet tried one in E-e, but a customer has one on order that's due in shortly, and if he doesn't mind....

Making the transition from a JP 6er to a Silhouette Bass guitar took all of about 20 seconds. OH SO MUCH FUN! I WANT ONE I WANT ONE I WANT ONE! I only had the opportunity to run it through a Fender HotRod Deluxe (Soldano was having work done to it) so I never really got to push one around. Anyways, in the half-hour that I jammed on it, I was convinced enough to tune my '67 V to A-a, and I've written a few songs that are just begging for a real SiloBass to find it's way into my hands for a studio session.

There is a member on here who bought a RadRed A-a Silo Bass from me and hot-rodded it with a D-sonic and loved the outcome - maybe I can convince him to chime in....

Mr Steve C, are you out there?

 

[Eilif]

I haven't tried this but I understand that you can...tune these breasts...

 

[Devnor]

Here's mine:

The color is radiance red. It's tuned A to A (1 step lower than the B on a 7 string guitar). Unlike Norm's silo the top 2 strings are plain steel strings. BTW they ring like crazy. The longer scale makes the distance between the nut & 1st fret 1/4" longer. It's not hard to adjust to and I have medium sized hands. Action is farily low. The neck doesnt seem as rounded as Axis/EVH but is thicker than a older Morse. You can do all the usual tricks on this thing: bends, shred, hammer/tapping stuff, powerchords, ect.

Ok the tone...first of all it sounds different than any other guitar when played in the same register. Throaty is how I'd describe it. Playing it clean thru a decent tube amp & closed back cabinet is the bomb (Mesa/Bogner here). Position 4 & split on; yum. If you've got some fingerstyle technique, it can sound like you have a bass player. I mean big booming bass. The higher registers just ring out unlike any guitar I own. Play any acoustic piece that you're used to hearing in standard tuning and you'll gain a new perspective.

Higher gain stuff...playing the lower registers with the stock pickups sounded like I plugged my Stingray into my guitar amp. I didnt care for that so I dropped in a D-Sonic. That tightened it up a bit & if I had a Recto amp it would probably nail Panic Attack. But I felt with the D-Sonic it lost some of the clarity I love in the clean modes so it was converted back to stock.

Everyone that has played mine won't put it down. I dont know why these aren't more popular. Buy from Pete.

 

[lumberjack]

Thanks guys for the info.

So if I played a lot of songs that are detuned:

One step down
Two steps down
Drop D One step down etc,

Would you recommend this guitar to handle the job?

Thanks,
Scott

 

[NorM]

I personally wouldn't bother detuning. This bad boy is already an octave lower anyway. Just play it. A SiLO BaSS is already good and low. Just pick it up and go. I respect that sometimes you want to detune in order to be able to play a piece in a certian way but after listening to Morse for so long I just have to believe that all things are possible in standard tuning. Even though Steve does play the song "Modoc" in Eb

 

[lumberjack]

Thanks for the info, NorM

 

[andyshand]

help please

I am the hong kong player in question with the e-e which was converted from an a-a bass (not by eb).
When i had it in a-a mode and now in e-e mode all the strings are perfect in
tone and clarity except for one. That is the low e on e-e mode. Its sounds
barely acceptable on the open string but when fretted at A or higher it
just becomes a lifeless donk. This isnt a dead string since all the sets i have tried are like this. Just as a test i put an A string in its place and detuned it. As
expected it was pretty loose but it sounded much better in the tone
department regarding a true twang ..a distinct range of harmonic. I also
tried putting true bass guitar strings on it which are higher tension but
tawnged a lot better. This sort of suggests to me that the string spec is
not the best it could be... i thought even that it might be slightly to large for the saddles. I thought maybe the jerry jones ddario strings with low e 84 might be a good compromise although i cant get those in hong kong.

So maybe norm could you please confer on this (for some reason i always thought your guitar was tuned A-A?)....does your low E fretted at the A sound like something you could include on a session recording when using the eb
shortscale bass strings...does the E fretted at the A sound anything like the
open A which is fine. I am looking for an E that rivals the e string on a fender vi....i
would have expected that the silo bass would have rung even better since it
has a fixed bridge and is more or less the same scale.

cheers guys...and thanks beth for raising this for me!!

 

[NorM]

I put some ideas on the bass version of this thread.

 

[NorM]

Here it is:
Bach's Prelude in C with the Ave Maria melody played on my Silhouette Bass Guitar
[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2bBf_BWFUk"]YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.[/nomedia]
Flame me please cause I need help with my inferiority complex.

 

[beej]

Hey- good stuff Norm! Nice to hear one of those bad boys in action.

 

[Eilif]

Nice!

It's almost like hearing Chris Squire play...the register is way up there compared to normal bass playing yet below where a guitar is. I can see why these are so liked!

Thanks for sharing.

 

[Progdude]

I have the OLP Baritone that is the same as the Silo and I really like it. It came shipped in B-B but I dropped it to A-A. Im not sure if Id want to go to E-E. becuse the strings are SO big already. But I do like it in A-A.

 

[Beth]

I am the hong kong player in question with the e-e which was converted from an a-a bass (not by eb).
When i had it in a-a mode and now in e-e mode all the strings are perfect in
tone and clarity except for one. That is the low e on e-e mode. Its sounds
barely acceptable on the open string but when fretted at A or higher it
just becomes a lifeless donk. This isnt a dead string since all the sets i have tried are like this. Just as a test i put an A string in its place and detuned it. As
expected it was pretty loose but it sounded much better in the tone
department regarding a true twang ..a distinct range of harmonic. I also
tried putting true bass guitar strings on it which are higher tension but
tawnged a lot better. This sort of suggests to me that the string spec is
not the best it could be... i thought even that it might be slightly to large for the saddles. I thought maybe the jerry jones ddario strings with low e 84 might be a good compromise although i cant get those in hong kong.

So maybe norm could you please confer on this (for some reason i always thought your guitar was tuned A-A?)....does your low E fretted at the A sound like something you could include on a session recording when using the eb
shortscale bass strings...does the E fretted at the A sound anything like the
open A which is fine. I am looking for an E that rivals the e string on a fender vi....i
would have expected that the silo bass would have rung even better since it
has a fixed bridge and is more or less the same scale.

cheers guys...and thanks beth for raising this for me!!

No problem, Andrew! Looks like progdude has one too, you guys should start a band!

 

[Progdude]

Im trying to start a band!!!!