Rotosound SM77 Jazz Bass

The Rotosound 77 flatwounds are one of my favourite strings. They deliver possibly the most wonderful sounding midrange from ANY strings I've tried and the lows are perfectly balanced, not excessively boomy like some other strings. They are far less thumpy than "old school" flatwounds like LaBellas. The Rotos are the sound of British 70s rock, the LaBellas are the sound of American 60s soul. The Rotos have a lot more sustain and are considerably brighter/clearer than the LaBellas. The only brighter flatwounds I can think of are the Thomastik Jazz Flats but they have a more orchestral vibe and are much lower tension (some would say floppy).

The Rotos are far better allrounders than most flatwounds in my opinion. Which of course also means that if you're looking for the old school 50s/60s thump they're not the right choice.

The regular 45-105 is a bit too stiff and high tension for me. So I decided to try this 40-100 set instead. They are perfect! The tension on this 40-100 set feels more like a typical roundwound 45-105 set, which is my personal preference.

They do however have some of the same quirks as the regular gauge set. Mainly that the D+G strings settle in and lose most of the "zing" pretty quickly while the E+A stay brighter for a much longer time. In other words they go through a phase where they sound quite unbalanced from string to string. I like my strings mellow and broken in so for me this means a couple of weeks of use before they sound the way I want them to sound.

Apart from that they're great and I recommend them to anyone looking for a less thumpy flatwound and like the sound of British 70s rock. Together with the Pyramid Golds these Rotos are my favourite flatwounds and once they've settled in they don't suffer from the Pyramid's extreme unbalance in sound between strings.

Highly recommended!