{"id":5145,"date":"2014-01-22T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-01-22T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/?p=5145"},"modified":"2017-04-04T16:50:17","modified_gmt":"2017-04-04T21:50:17","slug":"bass-of-the-week-sparks-trs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/bass-of-the-week\/bass-of-the-week-sparks-trs.html","title":{"rendered":"[Bass of the Week] Sparks TRS"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"padding:6px;background:#ffffc0;border:1px solid #555555\">See the business listing for this bass builder <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/techdirectory\/detail\/edward-sparks-9337\">here<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Bass builder Edwards Sparks calls his TRS &#8220;special,&#8221; and oh yes, it certainly is.<\/p>\n<p>Edward writes:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>My first bass was built in 1980 from kit parts and resembled a 70&#8217;s Fender Telecaster bass, complete with an original Fender Telecaster humbucking pickup and Fender tuners (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/hipshot-tuners.htm\">need Fender-style tuners?<\/a>).&nbsp; It had certain custom features, such as a switchable Hi to Low Z circuit built inside the control cavity and, later a built in tuner.<\/p>\n<p>After playing my friend and bandmate&#8217;s Breedlove acoustic fretless bass, I was inspired to build a fretless of my own! I designed this new bass with the Hi to Low Z circuit, installed a (now discontinued) &#8220;N-Tune&#8221; volume control mounted tuner and a blend control instead of the standard pickup selector switch.<\/p>\n<p>Body: Alder, with two body cavities, one for the control cavity and the other for weight reduction. Capped with a 1\/2-inch thick curly maple top.&nbsp; The twin jacks are mounted on an ebony plate, recessed into the lower bout.&nbsp; The binding is on the body top only and is two layers, the inner layer cream plastic and an outer layer of tortoise shell.&nbsp; The control cover and string through plate are tortoise shell as well.<\/p>\n<p>Neck: A 34-inch scale Carvin made solid rock maple neck with fretless ebony fingerboard and an ebony headstock overlay inlaid with my last name and a star in mother of pearl.<\/p>\n<p>Electronics: Two Carvin passive radiused-top Alnico V humbucking pickups. Two <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/pots.htm\">volume and two tone controls<\/a> and a blend control in lieu of the standard three way selector. The neck pickup volume switches the N-Tuner in and out. The neck pickup tone control switches in the low Z circuit, allowing the second output to send a balanced signal direct to a mixer or record input, and also acts as a kill switch when using only the Hi Z output. The blend pot has a middle position detent and blends the two pickups together to the desired degree.<\/p>\n<p>All hardware is gold plated including the Carvin bridge, Schaller strap locks, Martin tuners and output jacks. The faux ebony\/tortoise shell bound tailpiece hides a 9 volt battery compartment (which powers the tuner) and is held on with small magnets. The cover is also in inlaid with my wife\u2019s name in mother of pearl and a dime. The dime is dated 2003 and represents our tenth anniversary.<\/p>\n<p>It is a special bass indeed!<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD back headstock 1\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD back headstock 1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-back-headstock-1.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"957\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD back neck joint 1\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD back neck joint 1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-back-neck-joint-1.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"387\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD body back 1\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD body back 1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-body-back-1.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"388\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD body front 1\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD body front 1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-body-front-1.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"399\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD body front jacks 1\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD body front jacks 1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-body-front-jacks-1.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"364\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD body whole 2\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD body whole 2\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-body-whole-2.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"840\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD headstock\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD headstock\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-headstock.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"887\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD tailpiece 1\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD tailpiece 1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-tailpiece-1.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"399\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD tuner 1\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD tuner 1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-tuner-1.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"398\"><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><img title=\"DDD Ed and bass\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"DDD Ed and bass\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/DDD-Ed-and-bass.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"1222\"><\/p>\n<p>Very well done, Edward! Great fit and finish!<\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><strong>Want to have your bass featured for Bass of the Week?<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/botw-entry\">Submit yours right now<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>See the business listing for this bass builder here Bass builder Edwards Sparks calls his TRS &#8220;special,&#8221; and oh yes, it certainly is. Edward writes: My first bass was built in 1980 from kit parts and resembled a 70&#8217;s Fender Telecaster bass, complete with an original Fender Telecaster humbucking pickup and Fender tuners (need Fender-style &#8230; <a title=\"[Bass of the Week] Sparks TRS\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/bass-of-the-week\/bass-of-the-week-sparks-trs.html\" aria-label=\"More on [Bass of the Week] Sparks TRS\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":5147,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5145"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}