Trubore bass

[Indiebass1993]

Hey all!

I'm just curious if any of you have had much experience playing basses with Shires trubore valves. I like the concept of them but haven't had much experience with them myself.

Let me hear your thoughts!

[Burgerbob]

I had a set for a while and never really got along. Now, I think much of this can be traced back to my playing and not necessarily the instrument, but I couldn't ever get that instrument to make a convincing "bass" sound, with multiple slides, leadpipes, bells, you name it. It played easily and was very even in all ranges, the valve action was amazing, and people kept wondering if I was playing a tenor trombone based on the sound. I eventually traded the instrument for a Thayer 50 that instantly got me 90% closer to my sound concept.

That said... I have played them a couple times since and liked them a bit more. The Bollinger travel bass from Shires I thought was quite good. I like the axial version more (the non-travel version), but it was much closer to how I like valves to respond and feel.

As always with a modular instruments, it's about the sum of the parts rather than one of them. I'm sure there's a Trubore bass out there with my name on it, I just didn't have those components put together.

[elmsandr]

I like them. My journey... I played Thayer basses from ~’99, with a big dual bore slide for a good chunk of that time. Valves from Edwards and from Ed Thayer. Starting in ‘12 I got a nice old Bach with the older style valve. Was starting to get sick of the air hog and maintenance of a Thayer. Picked up a used single Trubore.... I liked that. It is a little more compact feel and blow, but not as compact feeling as some rotors. A nice balance for me. Now I also have a dependent set of Trubores to go with it. Note, these are not on a Shires setup anymore, they are on my Frankenstein Bach setup where I can use them with a 45 tuning slide and bell as well as a 50.

I am thankful that somebody else bought that used Indy set in the classifieds the other day... I was very tempted and do not need another valve section.

Cheers,
Andy