This week’s bass is a custom build order built by Diego La Porta for Nicolás Tarantini. Here is a bit about his work:
My friend Diego La Porta, a bricklayer/home builder and bassist himself from Ituzaingo, a suburban area near Buenos Aires, started building his own basses about 2 years ago and became very famous among Argentinian bass players. I wanted to find out what could happen if I made the “best of the best” woods and hardware (in my opinion) and let him build a protoype bass for me. This bass would be his sixth project ever built.
The on-board 9V preamp was specifically designed to cover as many audio alternatives as possible by a boutique preamp company called Aural Tronix, owned by another friend of mine, David Mochen, and based in La Plata, Buenos Aires.
– Nicolás Tarantini
Here are some of the stats for the build:
•Woods – Wenge/Maple neck-through
•Custom single-cut shape
•Fingerboard – Wenge
•Scale – 34”
•Nut – Warwick Just-A-Nut, 5-String, 45 mm. Brass
•Bridge – Hipshot A style 19mm spacing. Gold Brass
•Tuners – Hiphshot 1/2″ Ultralite Gold / Y Key
•Frets – 26 Warwick bell brass jumbo
•Double action truss rod
•Nacrous dot Inlays (8 mm)
•Pickups – 2 Delano SBC 5 TF Times Square Dual Coil
•Jack – Switchcraft Gold 1/4″ WDE12SG
•Strings – Elixir nickelplated steel 045-135
•Straplocks – Dunlop brass
•Handmade metallic logo
Aural Tronix Preamp and Circuit
•Neck pickup volume; push for active /pull for eq. by-pass (100% passive)
•Bridge pickup volume; pull turns on general volume booster
•4 position rotary switch for neck pickup: bridge coil, series, parallel, neck coil
•4 position rotary switch for bridge pickup: bridge coil, series, parallel, neck coil
•Passive tone (also works in active mode)
•Stacked knobs for hi/low boost
•Stacked knobs for mid boost/cut and frequency
SWEET!!!!!
I love everything except the battery box location.
Oh wow, gorgeous build. I love the contours on the back.
-M
The bass is gorgeous! That being said, I’m not crazy about the top “horn” above the fretboard.
This design should give you great fundamental tone as your neck cantilever (free, no support) distance is much reduced.
Crazy hot looking bass I like it !!!!
6th build? If he keeps building, and his quality continues to improve, this guy has a real future as a top notch builder/luthier. Beautiful use of woods, excellent components, extremely versatile. Bass should be capable of many different tones. Cant judge playability unless I hold it in my hands. I would definitely play it. Im really curious how much this cost? As a young luthier, he may not be charging much at this time for his work. Im always looking for a deal. Give us more details…..
Really nice!! Only thing I would do different is go with an 18v system. Need a video to hear it.
Wonderfully cool.
100% minus 2% for bat location.. Such a teaser without an audio sound clip!! Please give it up!!!!! Post something for us to listen to this beauty.
Absolutely beautiful build! This guy is already a master.
Would love to hear it.
I agree with the criticism of the the placement of the lower horn, which is at the 13th fret. This really limits the thumb being behind the fingers of the left hand. The average placement is around the 18th fret. Those low strings are playable up to 20 -22 frets.
The battery box could be on the other side of the bridge,with the wiring going under the bridge.
Can i have it? lmao
Sure the batt box location could have been better. In future builds also, the new’ish luthier might want to tweak the headstock to get a straight string path to all tuners. Overkill on the knobs as well, sure options are nice, but maybe some of that could be accessed from the rear cover? And/or a couple mini switches for PU modes?
That said, v well done for a 6th instrument.
Criticism on the ‘upper horn’ connected at the 13th, is from someone who maybe hasn’t played this style of bass. Having your thumb ride over the bass side of the neck while playing the upper register notes, is either poor L hand technique or freakishly large hands, when talking 5 or 6 stg basses. If you DO use proper L hand positioning, there does seem to be lots of room for the thumb to support playing in that register. It’s hard to ‘see’ until you actually play one.
Hi J Lawrence, thanks for your feedback! I designed and built the electronics for this bass. Nicolás did want to max out the options provided by the splittable Delano pickups, so we went for the rotary switches instead of the mini switches. The latter only allow 3 modes, whereas the rotary switches allow all 4 modes (single coil A, parallel, series, single coil B) with the added option to tame out the Series mode output for a more consistent loudness between all 4 modes.
Best regards,
David Mochen.
It looks Fantastic ! and judging from The Neck woods and Brass Frets, I would say it sounds very much like the Sound I prefer ! , Growl Sustain and Solid !
Beautiful bass!
Beautiful design!
Beautiful craftsmanship!
If it sounds as good as it looks that’s one awesome bass…
Beautiful bass, love the head stock and the neck true part, i think this preamp sound amazing, beautiful gold hard ware, only the part of the battery need a wood box
The bass is very beautiful. What I would like to have in a bass since I play lots of hours per week is something that is extremely light, long scale, easy to play and has simple electronics.
Parker made one some years ago that Steve Swallow played. I would like to get my hands on something like that.
Beautiful work, Diego! Nice choice of woods, love that multi-piece neck, well thought out and executed – not ostentatious. Congratulations – you can’t stop now!
Absolutely gorgeous, to say it is beautiful would be an understatement because it breaks lots of moulds – The wood and finish spacing of the contour it would be something that really grows on you and would fall in love with again and again .. it really beholds itself as something more than just a showpiece a credit to the man who built this
Hey, I absolutely agree with your vision about the upper horn. With proper H technique, there shouldn’t be a problem. I played similar basses like Fodera & Marleaux, and didn’t have any problem with the ‘attached’ upper horn. And indeed, small switches for the PU modes would be cleaner. Sire (Marcus Miller) does it on their M7 series now. Fodera did it aswell.
And… as a tech/repair guy, I agree with the straight path onto the tuners. Always a better option, imho. For tuning, and for durability (nut wear).
But overall, this looks like a gorgeous bass. Nice!
Cheers, Maarten
Beautiful baas but it would be wasted on me. Too many knobs.
Feel free to check out the whole process and hear the results at the same time!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RY0XnA14MAg
very beautiful bass build ! would love to hear it.