Reverend Dub King

Semi-Hollow Power

If you’ve never played a short-scale bass with a semi-hollow body like the Dub King, you are missing out. Its set neck gives it excellent fullness and resonance, and its hollow body gives it exceptional clarity, articulation, and three-dimensionality. The attack has a wonderfully woody, snappy quality, and its voice speaks with resounding warmth and woody power; in fact, it sounds sort of like a svelte upright bass! It’s also quite touch-sensitive, and you can make it really growl when you dig in. Or, if you lay off, you can get a really nice warm, deep tone.

Pugnacious Pickups

The Dub King has plenty of firepower thanks to its two muscular pickups. The neck pickup is a Split Brick, and it sounds like a classic split-coil on steroids. As soon as my amp powered up, I felt compelled to play Sabbath, then to thump my way through a Motown tune, so it certainly evokes those classic tones. But, it has a bit more girth in the low-end, broader midrange response, and more chime in the trebles than an old-school split-coil. And, it also has a fantastically snappy, percussive attack. It's the sort of bass sound that's so solid you could build a house on it without sacrificing clarity or definition to do so.

Closer to the bridge, you'll find a Thick Brick humbucker, which has a bit of a brasher personality. Its low-end response is piano-like and full, its midrange is focused and biting, and the trebles have plenty of clank and snarl. In general, it has a bit more of a scooped sound, and it growls beautifully when you dig in. It presents a delightful contrast to the neck pickup, and it is supremely useful for cutting through a mix.

Best of all, you can blend the two pickups easily using the pickup pan knob. At the notch at twelve o'clock on the knob, both pickups are running full-bore. If you roll it all the way forward or backwards, you get just the neck or bridge. At all points in between, you hear a blend of the two. This simple tool gives you an extraordinary amount of tone-shaping ability. However, it's awfully hard to leave that point of equilibrium at noon, because it sounds so divine. You get the warmth and midrange punch of the neck pickup AND the booming lows and brashness of the bridge. The two sounds blend seamlessly, and you get full frequency response across the board AND exceptional clarity and articulation.

Short-Scale Sweetness

There's a lot to say about how great these Dub Kings sound, but first I have to talk about how incredibly easy they are to play. For bassists accustomed to the typical 34" scale length, the fast feel and easy playability of a short-scale bass can almost make you feel like you're cheating. You may find yourself feeling guilty after a couple tunes because it feels almost wrong to produce so much low-end with so little effort.

Once the initial shock subsides and you become acclimated to the 30" scale, all sorts of new possibilities open up. The closer fret proximity allows you to make bigger stretches more easily, and the lower string tension allows you to fly up and down the neck with ease. Quickly, you'll find that you can focus more on the nuances of your performances because you aren't being distracted by left-hand fatigue. Basically, it shortens the gap between the moment you have a creative impulse and the moment you put that impulse into action. In that sense, the Dub King is a powerful creative tool.

The short scale length also shapes the Dub King's sound in an inspiring way. Because there's less string tension, there is more "give" to the attack, meaning that you get a lovely percussive attack before the note quickly blooms into full resonance. Short-scale basses like the Dub King also tend to have a warmer timbre, giving them a dash of upright bass flavor.

Of course, the actual neck itself is quite comfortable. It's Reverend's classic medium oval, and it's slim enough to feel fast but substantial enough that you feel like you have something to grip on to. It also has a 12" radius, which allows you to set the action lower without losing depth or fullness of tone.

A Note About Accessibility

Obviously, the Dub King's incredible playability is great for all bass players. But, it also provides players who otherwise might not be able to work a long-scale bass with a ticket to the Low-End Realm. Long-scale basses are ferocious beasts, and they can present quite a challenge to players with small hands, short arms, or health problems.

This subject is near and dear to me because I (Trevor, Wildwood's resident Web Scribe and sole member of the Bass Department), am a gigging bassist with lupus. Thankfully, I am able to manage the disease through diet and medication, but there are times when it flares up and gives me arthritic symptoms in my joints. In those moments, I am thankful that there are basses as easy to play as the Dub King because I know that I will still be able to bring the rumble even if my health worsens in the future. So, the Dub King gets me quite excited, because it allows everyone to experience the joys of bass!

Dub-Ble Vision

As you can see, the Dub King’s regal title is well-deserved. It has a unique and inspiring sound, and it’s a blast to play, and it looks cool as all-git-out. We’re proud to showcase this low-end monarch, and we know it will inspire you to bring the thunder!