Sandberg Forty Eight Victor Brandt Bass, Matte Black (B-Stock)

Player’s Perspective

Music Store Live is proud to be an official Sandberg dealer! Made over in Europe, with the finest German engineering, the Victor Brandt signature Forty Eight bass will slap a smile on your face that you just can’t shake. 

The design of this bass is absolutely rockin’. It balances really well and doesn’t at all feel heavy nor does it have any neck dive! So this beauty will be a joy to play whether you have a long studio session, a long gig standing up on stage, or a long rehearsal/jam session with some friends. The Euro ash body and snappy ebony fretboard both have awesome figuring, but also contribute to the sound and feel of the bass. Ash and ebony team up to provide a bright tone that is full and punchy in the low end and sizzle in the top end. So it’ll be a bass that can really cut through sharply when you need it to, but also will be able to be warm and round in the mix if you need it to. The reverse headstock, along with really standing out, is also functional in that it helps if you down-tune to keep the strings just a bit less floppy.

As well as being effortless to play, this Sandberg Forty Eight comes loaded with some powerful and thoroughly kickass electronics. Instead of Sandberg’s typical 2-band EQ that straddles the line between vintage and modern, this one has the 3-band Black Label pre-amp that definitely helps pump some solid output from your bass. It’s active/passive and you can use the treble knob, when in passive mode, as a traditional tone knob (we really love this “hidden” feature of the Sandberg preamps). So you really end up with an immensly versatile array of tones to choose from. Heck, you could use this to play Motown funk and jazz, if you wanted to. But it can also tackle the more aggressive stuff and handle distortion and fuzz and saturation with ease.

A reverse split-P pickup in the neck and a single-coil by the bridge give this a modern take on a fairly traditional pickup configuration. The p/j has become a classic in the bass community. But we love how Sandberg likes to take that P pickup and flip it around. By placing the E, and A string pole pieces closer to the bridge, you end up with a tighter, punchier, and more focused tone on the bass strings while having a slightly fuller and rounder sound out of the D and G treble strings. The resulting tone is one that will sit perfectly in a mix, no matter how many other instruments are playing along with you, and will never be muddy or indistinct. The single-coil in the bridge adds just enough bite and growl to the tone without making things nasally. Add to that, the zero fret which eliminates that disparity between the way your fretted and open strings sound, and you truly have a bass with even response across all strings and all notes.

It doesn’t get much more rock n’ roll than this beauty! Another clear example of why Sandberg basses are such favorites here at the shop.