Amber Technology | Expect to pay: A$1,699.00
In the gear world, there’s only two truths: everything can Djent, and all the best products are designed in Germany. This sentiment rings particularly true when it comes to brands like Warwick, who’ve been responsible for some of the best bass guitars made over the past 25 years.
Renowned as pioneers of creating versatile basses with exceptional tonal precision, Warwick have just released the latest entry into their affordable RockBass range, the Corvette Double Buck ($$) Electric Bass in Natural Satin. It comes with an oddball design that combines a bizarre (yet very comfortable) body shape with an upgraded 24-fret fingerboard, making for a commanding combination that bassists of all calibers will come to appreciate.
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Straight out of the case, it’s clear that this bass has form, function and comfort. The Corvette shows off an impressive sustain of intonation and tuning from one fret to the next and sports a beautiful flat ash body, three ply maple neck with ekanga veneer stripes, and a wenge fingerboard. It is also paired with Warwick’s ergonomically angled machine heads, chrome hardware and a two-piece Warwick bridge, all of which help to round out a pretty impressive spec sheet.
The RockBass Corvette Double Buck has a bolt-on maple neck with ekanga veneer stripes, which means that sustain is its middle name. The instrument’s ability to hold consistent tuning from one fret to the next is a standout feature with 24 extra high jumbo nickel silver frets, a 34″ scale length and a 20″ fingerboard radius.
The tonewood that Warwick has opted to use for the body on this particular model is ash, creating a transparent, fluid tone that is perfectly suited for styles like rock and metal. It sits really nicely and is comfortable to play with its flat body shape and of course, as Warwick would ensure, its weight is a perfect 4kg on average for optimal low-end sounds.
Now, let’s talk about that body shape. Some of the more immature bassists among us may laugh at the Corvette’s curious contours, and the bass has unfairly been the butt of many phallic jokes on the internet. However, the Corvette is actually one of the most comfortable body shapes available today: the ergonomic curves of the body allow for a breezy playing experience whether standing or seated, and the unique design will almost certainly provoke conversation with the support act at your next gig.
The Warwick Corvette Double Buck also has Just-A-Nut III Nut and a quick access truss rod cover for intricate adjustments to tone and intonation, but even better still is its two-piece Warwick bridge. This bridge, a feature on all Warwick basses, allows you to adjust on all four points, up and down, and back and forth, for intonation and comfort adjustment, right down to string spacing so you can adjust the feel to suit your playing preference. The strings also come over the top of saddles and angle back into the body into the tail piece for vibration and sustain, ticking all the boxes of function, form and comfort.
This bass is one that really accommodates the trained ear, making it suitable for audio and recording enthusiasts and those in need of a flexibly built bass to cover all… bases. The selections available for fine tuning sound are vast with its passive EQ with two push/pull volume and a single tone control. This allows exceptional control of its two passive MEC MM-style humbucking pickups, which lets you access a huge range of classic low-end tones.
Bass frequencies can be one of the more difficult things to mix in a band or recording setting, naturally, our ears have a little more trouble hearing it, so when you find people sweating the small stuff on their bass rig, it’s probably warranted. Warwick does not mess around when it comes to solving many of the hurdles faced by bassists and audio engineers in this field.
The two passive MEC MM-style pickups have ceramic magnets and are chunky in appearance to match their thick, punchy and massive tone, popular with metal and bass guitarists. These pickups have a simpler circuitry to active pickups as they are passive, but they deliver a much clearer sound and will be far more touch-sensitive. Its accompanying switches are simple yet highly effective, with two push/pull volume knobs and one single tone control.
Bass can be rather temperamental when it comes to sitting correctly in a mix, so the more options to fine tune there are, the better. The option to switch the pickups from series to parallel is a fantastic addition that expands your tone control tweaking options, making it optimal for recording. In series mode because impedance is combined, you can get a very high output and more prominent low and midrange timbres. On the other hand, parallel wiring will give you the option of more clarity and transparency with your tone.
At the end of the day, this Corvette bass is exceptionally considerately designed for such an accessible price point! It’s hard not to appreciate Warwick’s dedication to the finer features in low-end frequency instruments to ensure they get the best fighting chance at making a perfect contribution to your mix.
Check out the Warwick RockBass Corvette through their Australian distributor Amber Technology.
