The Worp has been developed in the late 90s thanks to customers‘ wishes that wanted to combine the patented neck profile of the “Universal” with a bass to hang around the shoulder.
„If you had the opportunity to charm sounds out of a Universal you know that the widening of the neck makes a huge difference concerning the sustain. As the Worp in addition fields a full-grown body, you meet a bass force that you simply wouldn’t expect from a wooden e-bass.” (…) “Only with the Worp ordinary bassists can enjoy Bassline’s broadneck technology. The Worp has been designed to be used while standing up as well as sitting down with a first class handling.” (Bass Professor 4/98 Karsten Fernau.)
Rüdiger Ziesemann actually glued body wings to the innovative form of the Universal’s neck. Tested on several prototypes the unconventional but functional form used up to today has cristallised out, a form that is based on the multi-stripe neck-through-body- construction and extra wide neck. This trend-setting design and the innovative neck/body construction led to the name “Worp” (from the “warp drive”).
Advantages of this combination with its extra long scale of 88,5 centimeters and its channeling guide for the thumb on the back are an extreme boost for the H-string through its considerable stability.
The Worp Standard is made of flamed maple. This headless bass is equipped with a “Headless” tuning system by ETS and is available in a fretted as well as a fretless version.
The “Art” version of the Worp is covered with precious woods for the cover and the back. Almost any combination of woods and pickups is possible. In the section “Masterpiece” Dirk Groll wrote in “Gitarre&Bass” (10.2003) about the Bassline Worp Art Fretless with core of swietenia, its cover of olive and its back of walnut and its 7-stripe neck: “What makes the Bassline Worp a masterpiece is the consistant concentration on the maximum length of sound and the vividly detailed sound culture” (…) “the five-stringed Worp offers a really fabulous sound potential to Fretless enthusiasts.”
The Worp Acoustic, developed in 2003, draws on the maximum of the natural and acoustic wooden sound of a fretless bass. Like the Bassline Viper a sound chamber is shaped into the body that is covered with an optionally veneered spruce cover. By using a Piezo system (Shadow Nanoflex) in the wooden bridge and a magnetic pickup system (Häussel Jazzbucker) the sound orientation regarding naturalness can be continuously variable at random. Of course other wood and pickup variations are possible with the Worp Acoustic.
Like any of our basses all Worps are equipped with active electronics by Klaus Noll.
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