Contrabass Guitar Build (Scale And Tone Test) 

Man, those elevator cables look really good on a bass.

Technically, guitars are a baritone instrument. What we call "baritone" guitars are actually bass instruments and electric basses are in the contrabass register. You, sir, have made a sub-contrabass guitar.

Question: Does it djent? Answer: It Contradjents

Damn that tuning is lower then my self-esteem

I can't believe you didn't play Seven Nation Army on that thing

I get the feeling my phone speaker doesn't do the sound justice

Finally, a Bass that Elephants & Whales can appreciate!

You can tune the lower strings using their harmonics at the fifth and 12th frets they will resonate at their higher octave pitches making a more accurate tuning.

The background music is in 7/4. Cool

4:40 - Perfectly heard, and not too much *at all* I *love* how the 0 octave notes sound, and it's really bad stock instruments don't normally cover that *thunder beautiful* range.

I'VE GOT BLISTERS ON ME FINGERS!

When tuning outside the range of the tuner, use harmonics of the octave (12th fret, 5th fret, just past the 2nd) don't use any others as they will be out of tune with 12TET. The string will also vibrate less than the full length of the string, so it may be a little sharp when plucked, unless you get a longer scale length or thicker gauge. Listening on good headphones, anything below E0 is pointless really, there aren't many loudspeakers/headphones that will produce the fundamental, most speakers stop at 50hz unless it's a subwoofer. Everyone on their phones won't hear any fundamental frequency played on any fret of that bass. E0 is the functional limit, but bass amps don't really go below E1. So you would need a very expensive rig to even hear it AND be in a huge room where the longest dimension is at least 17m, 20m for C#0, 22m for C0.

FINALLY a guitar that sounds like a fart

Tune using the 12th fret or 5th fret harmonic.

Brutal man, I can dig it, having something like that is unique, not sure how I would use it in a mix as often any bass below 70 hz is often cut to make room for a kick drum and also to avoid mixes that resonate too low in car speakers but its a nice tone and the upper harmonics could be enough to make it worthwhile. I would love to see this used in the context of a mix.

that poor bass neck

Y’all here acting like $30 strings are expensive when violin strings are like $110 a piece for good full size ones.

Use it for drone. Give it to Sunn o)))

My headphones have a good range, so i felt like my eardrums got a massage LOL.

You could get a rotary subwoofer for your extreemely low needs. (It looks like a fan... with actuating blades) They can go down to 1 hz. And yes. You DO feel that shit. Edit: actually im very suprized that it doesnt destroy buildings. Cus it is very powerful.

Listened to it wearing headphones, felt like the fluid in my eyeballs was vibrating. Nicely done!!

Check out quake bass guitars. The longer scale on those bass guitars will make this tuning sound damn clear and such.

“It goes as low as A#0” “I can only tune as low as Bb0” Hmmm 🤔

I've always loved the way guitars sound with the super low and distorted tunes, its just really hard to find any artists that use it without the incoherent screaming.

Wow.... Is that C#0 the brown note?! **checks pants** Nope, not quite low enough. LOL

Tip to improve tuning below 20Hz: (for experts): connect the pickup output to a digital oscilloscope and check the output frequency waves or better with FFT analysis. Congratulations for having the courage to experiment.

This really makes me want a contrabass guitar. Sounds like something I’d love to try.

Nice experiment! I usually just repeatedly whack a wet sock against a drywall surface for the same effect

that random riff feels really cyberpunk, nice

Psycho By Muse. I think that was the first "random" riffing

Has djent come too far?

I play super low tunings on bass - a tuner will pick it up better if you use the 12th fret harmonic to tune.

Excellent experiment. Keep in mind. The bass notes you produce are longer in frequency than the room you are in. I owned a Bag end P.a. system that could go down to 8 hz. That was very impressive. But it is very specific. You need to have a band who is aware of it and can take advantage of it. Keep at it. You are on the right way. Now create your own bass. Based on what you learned here. Raise the low strings. Think of the ellipse it needs.

Wonder what would happen if you had an extra long scale length for this. Double basses have almost a 44 inch length. Tune to C0, and can you really djent?

Low F sharp is kinda usefull string for me. It sounds nice. A little bit of overdrive, and low f sharp shines.

What a hero. Sounds how I hoped it would.

It's surprisingly musical! Great to see more experimental low tunings. Bongripper and Conan both use basses tuned to down to F0 (Doom Metal)f. There's also Loathe and a ton of other bands that tune super low. All bands worth checking out depending on your taste.

Those soundgear basses are perfect for such experiments lol, done the same years ago with the 4string version of this and warwick darklord strings, of course the thickest was 175. After all these experiments ended up with standart 5string sets (135) and just using a pitch shifter for downtuning digitally, it has more clarity and sustain, than these thickest strings.

skip to sound 3:09 F#0 scale C#0 scale

Ahh that low frequency vibrating 😊

Bro I love how you modify your 5 string bass guitar so cool!

I NEED A CONTRABASS GUITAR NOW

I've never seen strings T H I C C E R than those ones

To tune to odd notes you need a stroboscopic tuner. They are based on optical phenomena, so don't really have any limitations on low or high notes.

Sounds better than I expected.

4:00 Marilyn's beautiful people + muse's psycho?

Late to the party but we should totally get this to davie asap

doesnt matter if you cant hear the note by its self. because when its underneath the guitar which is an octave higher, it provides the low end necessary under low guitar tones. periphery is a band that has an amazing guitar and bass tone, and although most of their songs are in 6 and 7 string tunings, their song titled "hell below" is tuned down to C#, and the bass is tuned to what you have it here. AND IT SOUNDS H U G E

2:50 tune the low strings using the harmonics on 12th or even 5th fret

This bass is literally perfect

3:30 C# Major Scale

Man, you are a genius! I love the way you think.

the perfect bass to play “my name is mud”

Binging all videos from old to new. I can't get enough of you, you really have passion in experimentation!

Can definitely hear the bass in the context of a scale or where key is clearly defined. It's ridiculous but I can see the uses for it!

The coiling on that thing is INSANE

a bass player that changes his strings ! Glen would be so impressed

Does it djent?

Primus: “heavy breathing”

Tune lower, everything was too high pitched

This genuinely sounds great and should be used.

I have a bass with .266 as the low E0. The best way to tune them is to be sure your bass in correctly intonated and then tune from the 12th fret as if it were open. With finely corrected intonation, your 0 and 12th will be a perfect octave.

C#0 for this bass is too much :D it can't handle it very well

That's crazy awesome Youngblood, you got talent, keep on with your good work.

Tuning - you could always try tuning with the harmonic at the 12th fret since that's an octave up, or if that still doesn't register then the 5th fret as that's 2 octaves up. Cool experiment though! If it were me I would've used a 6 string neck with only 5 strings to give a bit more space between strings, or 4 strings on a 5 string neck. Either way, we gotta give one of these to Les Claypool.

That tuning is lower than my grades

I gotta say, I actually enjoyed the sound. It was so low that it resonated inside my chest

Use the 5th fret harmonic for tuning really low strings, it's 2 octaves up and tends to pop out even on really fast strings. The 12th fret is only one octave up and seems a lot quieter on fat strings.

I have a custom fretless LTD 4 string bass tuned drop A,D,G,C. It fills out that low end.

I think it would be pretty cool for a metal context, can’t imagine it’s low end being useful for much else besides that.

wow my ear drums are rattling ;-; thats like lower than an 808 bass i think

Nobody: Bass players

Jauqo III X developed this Bass and concept over 10 years ago and has a fretted and fretless model built by Surine. Oh and he recorded an album called The Low C# Theory.

Use it as an octaver. If you use these ultra low strings on an 8 string base guitar together with strings which are tuned an octave higher, then it would give your bassline a lower dimension.

This dude looks like Toby maguire

Well done test, glad I came across this

Man that thing is draconian , your a clever chappie aren't you ? ok then I'm gonna cary on learning my scales..

Random riffing at 3:54 sorta sounded like Muse - Psycho. Sick video man!

Imagine this beast with maximum overdrive

"this is kevin from said too much" ENORMOUS BLARE OF NOISE

Tuning strings below the range of your tuner you say? Use open string harmonics to produce a higher fundamental, 12th fret = +1 octave, 5th fret = +2 octaves

For tuning your lower Strings you can use their octave overtones (the ones at frets 12 and ~7, or even slightly touch the string at both locations for the third octave). It's a pretty good trick i found out

Use harmonic points to tune them with your ear.

Sounds great man

I enjoyed the sound, but i have some some questions, where did you buy a C zero string?? Or from what did you do it? What is the diameter of it? Firstly, it seemed, that it is a piano string.

a) A strobe tuner b) Tune the attack rather than the decay. The pitch when you pick rather than the pitch the string settles into.

a double bass is playing in the same octave as a regular e bass, which is the contra octave /thus, contrabass)

Worked surprisingly well!

In fact, our efective range reaches about 35Hz, but i think it's easier to hear low frequencies with harmonics

*Technically this is subcontrabass territory. Bass guitar has contrabass frequencies already. (Same strings as double bass which is contrabass already) great vid tho!

What about to add heavy heavy compression, slow attack, fast release to start with? I love these experiments, COOL!!!!

I think you could use a pitchshift, increase pitch by an octave and tune by ear that way. It's not the best solution but it'll do ok.

That low string vibrates with so much amplitude that it looks like you could miss the string when you put your finger down because it's wagging off to the side of the fret board. But I've always wondered if it's possible to generate bright & clear subcontrabass tones, even if you have to go to a synthesizer and mess with the wave form to get it.

Holy heck. Those are some bridge cables.

Just found your channel. Loving it

sounds great .with headphones on it sounds like im listening to a sub bass in hip hop almost pretty cool man

What I'd like to try sometime is regular bass tuning--an octave lower. If I were in a band, I would consider doubling a regular bass down the octave.

What a beast of a guitar.

Figured I'd drop this gem: My band Burn The Grave's bassist decided to go full stoopid and heavily modified a shit rogue 5 string bass. Custom multiscale neck of 37 to 34 and made it headless and put it in D0 with a .184 string

C#0 string sounded great to me I think that there needs to be higher frequency system like a high freq knob on the bass for that string to hear the note I belive we can to that in today's music technology