[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

OWEN O'MALLEY: Welcome back to Gearwire.Com. I’m Owen O'Malley and this is the Ibanez AEB -- hang on, yeah, yeah -- AEB10E in a gloss black finish. It’s an acoustic-electric bass guitar. It retails for about $350, and it plays pretty nice. It’s available in this gloss black finish and also a low-gloss natural finish. Right now, we’re just listening to it through an AKG C414.

This bass plays pretty well. It’s got a little bit sort of a quiet acoustic tone and sort of not the most exciting acoustic tone. The neck is a pretty straight neck. It’s very easy to play. It’s very easy to get around on this fretboard. It’s a rosewood fretboard with 22 frets. It’s a mahogany back, neck,and sides, and a solid spruce top.

You’d think there’d be a little more projection with the spruce top. Maybe there is more in the natural finish, the low gloss natural finish. Anyway, it does play pretty well though.

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

There’s one of the spots that I was talking about.

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

It also does have a preamp built in. It’s a Fishman Sonicore or the SST, the Ibanez SST preamp which has a built-in tuner. It’s got three range -- or rather three band EQ (treble, middle, bass}, a phase switch, single volume control, and then a shape contour which is basically for combating feedback on stage when this guy’s plugged in. Let’s actually plug it in. As you can see, it’s got 1/4” and XLR outputs. Let’s just plug in the 1/4” and listen to what the transducer sounds like on this guy.

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

So now we’re listening to the AEB10E through a direct box, through the Fishman transducer, and the Ibanez SST preamp. It’s a very simple preamp. There is a tuner built in. The tuner also mutes the output, which is nice. There’s a phase switch [PLAYS A FEW NOTES], there is a shape control for combating feedback [PLAYS A FEW NOTES], pretty subtle sweep there, and just a three-band EQ. I’ve got everything right in the middle.

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

There’s treble...,

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

...middle...,

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

...and bass.

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

So there’s actually a nice amount of bass frequency that comes out of this transducer...,

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

...but not a lot of growl. Part of that might have to do with the fact that the saddle is plastic, that’s why you’re not maybe getting all of the sort of, you know, that mid rangey growl...,

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

...of the strings transferred to the actual transducer. If you want to spend the money on getting a new bone nut carved for this, that might help out a little bit. There’s also animal-friendly alternative nuts out there, but anyway that’s basically it. That’s the Ibanez AEB10E in gloss black.

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]

A very nice playing bass if not the best fret job and if not the most exciting transducer and if not the most exciting unplugged tone. Still 350 bucks, not a super-expensive bass. You've been watching Gearwire.Com. I’m Owen O'Malley.

[OWEN O'MALLEY PLAYING AN IBANEZ AEB10E ACOUSTIC BASS]