There’s no official lower limit to how far a bass player can tune, but if you’ve reached drop F, you’ve probably gone far enough. This month, however, manufacturers have been doing their best to encourage us to venture further into the sonic abyss.
Highlights include Dingwall’s Amos Williams Signature Combustion, a BEAD-tuned four-string built for subterranean lows, and the Ron Petzke Cyclops Bass from Dunable Guitars. If you’ve ever thought your bass simply wasn’t capable of moving enough air, Dunable and Petzke would like a word.
Other artist-driven releases include Ashdown’s Combo of Doom, created with Black Sabbath legend Geezer Butler, La Bella’s Aston “Family Man” Barrett Signature strings, and JCA Audio’s Endless Bass plugin, which packs multiple amp tones, DI and sub channels and a parallel mixer into a single plugin.
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With a host of new basses, strings, pedals and plugins designed to make your low-end even louder, here’s our pick of the biggest bass gear releases in July.
Dingwall Guitars Amos Williams Signature
Although most of us would sooner drop an SVT on our foot than venture into tunings as low as progressive metal band TesseracT, there can’t be many bass players who haven’t at least considered going lower.
TesseracT remain one of prog metal’s heaviest hitters, and anyone drawn to the low-end manoeuvres of bassist Amos Williams should take a serious look at his Signature Combustion from Dingwall Guitars.
The four-string version features Dingwall’s renowned 34.75–37-inch multi-scale design and comes factory-tuned to BEAD, offering plenty of extended low-end range straight out of the box.
There’s an environmental angle, too. In keeping with Williams’ commitment to reducing waste, each bass is constructed from carefully selected body offcuts that would otherwise be too small to build a complete instrument. The result is a sustainable approach that also means every bass is genuinely one of a kind.
Joe Calderone Audio & Toby Peterson-Stewart Endless Bass
Lauded as one of the modern-day heroes of the electric bass, Toby Peterson-Stewart has teamed up with Joe Calderone Audio to create Endless Bass, a custom plugin that’s designed to give you control over multiple amp tones, with a dedicated DI and sub channel, plus a full parallel mixer – all in one plugin.
“We made Endless Bass to provide the most complex bass tone, with the simplest workflow,” says Peterson-Stewart. “All modern bass tones are an amalgamation of different parallel channels that are combined together to make one big tone. So we decided to put it all into one plugin.”
The parallel mixer can be accessed from the plug-in’s Mix Page, with each channel featuring its own full parametric EQ. There’s also a Pre-FX page with fuzz and chorus, although crucially, these effects don’t affect the Sub channel.
The result is a streamlined multi-layered bass signal that would otherwise require several amp, effects and mixing chains, all from a single plugin.
Ashdown Geezer Butler Combo of Doom
Here’s one for the Sabbath fans – following Geezer Butler’s monstrous bass rig for Black Sabbath’s 2025 “Back to the Beginning” concert, Ashdown has unveiled the Combo of Doom – a UK-built 200-watt bass combo created in collaboration with the legendary bassist and limited to just 70 units worldwide.
The control panel features a five-band EQ, tube-emulated drive, Shape and Active/Passive switches, while an effects loop, Line In, balanced XLR DI, headphone output and optional footswitch provide plenty of flexibility for both stage and studio use.
Visually, it shares the same purple Tolex as Butler’s colossal Ashdown rig, but at just 10.5kg, and with a single 1×12-inch speaker, it’s a far more portable alternative – and a tempting proposition for Sabbath devotees and bassists alike.
Dunable Guitars Ron Petzke Cyclops Bass
If your idea of a sensible bass tuning ends somewhere around standard, look away now. Dunable Guitars has teamed up with Bongripper bassist Ron Petzke for a limited-edition USA Cyclops Bass built specifically for players who like their low-end to venture into truly ridiculous territory.
Designed with drop F in mind, the recipe is suitably stripped-back: a single D-Bird pickup, a charcoal finish and a hefty slab of swamp ash.
With its USA-built construction and limited-edition status, this latest model from Dunable looks less like a conventional bass and more like a dedicated piece of heavy-duty artillery for anyone who thinks drop G simply isn’t low enough.
La Bella Aston “Family Man” Barrett Signature Flatwound Bass Strings
La Bella reckons its 760FS Deep Talkin’ Bass flatwound strings played such an important role in Aston “Family Man” Barrett’s legendary tone that the company has developed a signature set in tribute to the late bassist.
“For decades, ‘Family Man’ relied on La Bella flatwound strings to deliver the deep and powerful tone that became the heartbeat of countless classic recordings,” say La Bella. “His basslines provided the foundation for some of the most influential music ever created, making La Bella strings an integral part of his unmistakable sound.”
The set uses .045, .065, .085 and .105 gauges, finished with distinctive red, gold and green silk ends – a nod to Barrett’s Jamaican roots and musical legacy.
Serek The Grand Batch #12
If you like your basses with a little more attitude than your average slab of mahogany, Serek’s latest limited-edition Grand should be firmly on your radar.
Batch #12 is the latest instalment in Serek’s semiannual series, and it arrives with a mahogany body finished in Wild Mountain Berry, accented with Cream stripes and topped with a custom-engraved “Four Thousand Holes” pickguard from Decoboom.
As with previous Grand models, Batch #12 features a TV Jones Thunder’Blade pickup and Serek’s “Skuzz Serkit” passive fuzz circuit. A roasted maple neck, Indian rosewood fingerboard and Hipshot hardware round out the spec.
Jad Freer Audio SARTO
We’re already partial to the Jad Freer Audio CAPO, and always pleased to see the Italian-based company release another of it’s studio-style preamp pedals. The SARTO is billed as a “channel strip in a small box” – a compact preamp/EQ pedal designed to bring clean-tone shaping to just about any instrument.
It’s based on the clean preamp circuit from the CAPO and is built around an ultra-high input impedance, making it particularly well suited to piezo-equipped instruments such as upright basses.
An extended EQ section and resonant high-pass filter give players plenty of control over the frequencies that can make or break a live or studio sound.
There’s also a balanced XLR output, making the SARTO a practical option for bass players who want to go straight to a desk or recording interface.
Winzz Guitars EBS714 & EBS715
Winzz Guitars is looking to bring neck-through construction and modern active electronics to a wider audience with its new EBS714 and EBS715 electric basses. Both combine an okoume body with a walnut top and sleek matte finish.
Winzz has fitted the pair with active dual-humbuckers and a three-band active EQ, giving players boost-and-cut control over the bass, middle and treble frequencies alongside a master volume.
Chrome hardware completes the package, but the real attraction is the combination of a 35-inch scale, neck-through construction and active dual-humbuckers.
Swiff Audio Maestro Series WT09B 5.8GHz Wireless System
If you’re tired of cables getting under your feet, Swiff Audio has another wireless option for your bass rig – and this one promises to keep things seriously stable.
The Maestro Series WT09B 5.8GHz Wireless Transceiver System arrives just two months after the 2.4GHz WT09A, upgrading to the less congested 5.8GHz frequency band for what Swiff describes as studio-grade tone and rock-solid wireless performance.
The launch also comes with some serious player endorsements. Guitar virtuoso Bernth Brodträger and slap bass extraordinaire Charles Berthoud have both officially joined Swiff Audio as global brand ambassadors for the Maestro Series – suggesting the company is keen to position its latest wireless system as a serious tool for serious players.
BOSS CB-EB15 Bass Guitar Gig Bag
It may be BOSS’s first bass guitar gig bag, but the CB-EB15 looks like the company has done its homework – offering plenty of protection and practical touches for bassists who need to get their instrument from A to B in one piece.
The exterior is made from durable 600D polyester, with thick padding throughout and extra reinforcement to protect the strap button on the lower bout. A cushioned end guard features an adjustable fit, allowing the bag to accommodate basses of different shapes and sizes.
Inside, your bass gets a velvet-lined interior and two detachable neck supports with adjustable straps, while heavy-duty zippers add another layer of protection. There’s also a sizeable external front pocket for accessories, along with a padded carry handle and two padded backpack straps for even easier transport.
