Help! Sterling Slap issue

[igharib]

hey Guys,

I have an Ernie ball sterling 4 H since many years now but I never felt comfortable playing slap on it, although i love it for finger-style.
first , my other basses are American P bass and a jazz bass with a P neck. the latter is the one i mainly use for slapping. but from reading these threads, I see that i haven't unleashed the full potential of my sterling.
The problem is that when i slap , it sounds dull and when i switch from finger to slap I can barely hear the bass , specially the pop on the G string. the other thing is the feel , on all my basses i have low action , but on the sterling i don't get the fluidity i have with the others , the strings don't feel bouncy enough somehow and dead even when new ( now they are not )
Does anyone know why i feel this way towards the sterling? any solution?

Thanks a lot !

 

[sanderhermans]

Strange.... mayebe check your setup all over again? Might be too low? Also make sure to check neck relief.
You might want to punt the eq at centre and start working from there adding or cutting certain frequencies.

I cant help you anny further. I love all my ebmm basses so much, sold all my fenders.... but if you prefer p-bass neck size, a stingray might be more to your liking.

 

[Orangejulius3]

What kind of amp or rig are you running?

Could be EQ on your amp or cab. Where are you playing as well?
How far do you have the Pickup from strings?
How old is the bass and have you cleaned the frets or did a fret dressing?

 

[73jbass]

Start with a complete setup using fresh strings. Put everything back to factory recommended specs.

 

[Mu5icM@n]

If the sterling sounds dull when you slap, check your switch setting. The series setting has less treble and sizzle than the parallel setting.

 

[Golem]

`

StingRays are generally considered excellent slap
basses and Sterlings are basically hotted up SR's.

The obvious question is "Has anyone else, has any
other slap player, found this particular Sterling to
be deficient ?"

That question hangs over this thread. Without any
answer, no further speculation seems reasonable,
to me. YMMV, but my experience is that I see all
the local slap kings borrow any piece of wood and
wire at various jam nights, and strut their stuff,
no holds barred. Take that ax to a jam night and
have it put thru the wringer.

`

 

[danny-79]

Start with a complete setup using fresh strings. Put everything back to factory recommended specs.

That's the best place to start.
In regard to a weak G there are countless threads talking about that. a quick fix is rather than raising the pick up on the G treble side, lower it slightly on the E side then adjust your amp accordingly

 

[syciprider]

It's your EQ. Here's a video of me playing fingerstyle 0:00) then slapping (0:30) in the same song in a practice situation through an old Guyatone combo. You can clearly hear all the strings. I set mids on the Ray to about 11:55 (cut) but boost around 800hz on the amp. Treb and bass just a hair (about 3 minutes after 12:00). My passive basses are pretty point and shoot. My Ray and Bongo need a few more minutes of tweaking IME especially if I am forced to use an amp other than mine.