Which Barefaced?
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Barefaced Generation 3 - a game of two halves: 12XN vs 10CR
The new range have been designed to be as tonally versatile as possible, so if your musical situations and personal tastes change in the future your Barefaced cab should be able to handle them. This versatility has allowed us to simplify the range which makes the decision-making much easier.
12XN - Big Baby 2 & Big Twin 2
The Big Series can reproduce any tone you could ever need thanks to their extended frequency response and low colouration - absolutely zero compromise tone and performance. If at first you think "I'd like a Super Compact or Super Twin with a tweeter" then these are the cabs for you - they can do everything the SC & ST can do, and more!
12XN - Super Compact & Super Twin
Not everyone needs the extended treble or super deep low bass response of the Big Series - this allows us to produce two alternative cabs with simplified designs (no HF system or crossover) and smaller enclosures with no detriment to performance or tone for these players. 20% cheaper, lighter and smaller but 100% tone & performance for that goal.
12XN - Super Midget
For some bassists the Big Baby 2 and Super Compact are still too large - we therefore offer the Super Midget. This cab still has the output to perform effectively in a rock band but needs more power to produce a lot of bottom and still can't match the SC let alone the BB2 when it comes to depth. The SM has the same tweeter as our previous generation cabs because it allows us to make the cab much smaller than if we used the large HF driver/waveguide in the Big Series cabs.
10CR - Retro Six10 & Retro Two10
The 10CR250 driver shares the goals of high output, extended range and wide dispersion with the 12XN550 driver but instead of aiming for minimum colouration and flat response it was designed to add a distinctive vintage character - fatter warmer mellower and rounder with a nice edge and bite to the treble. The Six10 can handle almost any gig whilst the Two10 is ample for smaller gigs and can be stacked up in multiples for louder scenarios. The use of multiple 10CR drivers gives very high sensitivity for maximum SPL from lower powered amps, whilst the tonal curve flatters amp overdrive so you can push your valve amp hard.
12XN smaller or modular solutions
If you want one small cab that can handle anything go for the Big Baby 2. If your fingers/bass/amp/FX can create a tone than the BB2 will reproduce it faithfully and LOUD with plenty of bottom and great dispersion around the room.
If you do not need extended HF response (i.e. you prefer old flatwound strings, roll your tone knob off, turn your treble down) then the Super Compact is the answer. The only exception would be if you tune down to below low-B or use a lot of FX with synths and octavers with extremely high LF output.
If small size is absolutely critical then the Super Midget is the cab to have - it will need a more powerful amp to create as much bottom as the SC or BB2 but it will easily outperform any other 1x12"s.
In louder situations if you are using a lower-powered amp then you may need a pair of our 1x12" cabs. In very LOUD situations or outdoors then you may need two even with a powerful amp pushing them.
12XN larger one cab solutions
If you want one cab that can handle anything go for the Big Twin 2. If your fingers/bass/amp/FX can create a tone than the BT2 will reproduce it faithfully and VERY LOUD with plenty of bottom and great dispersion around the room.
If you do not need extended HF response (i.e. you prefer flatwound or old roundwound strings, roll your tone knob off or turn your treble down) then the Super Twin is the answer. The only exception would be if you tune down to below low-B or use a lot of FX with synths and octavers with extremely high LF output.
Modular equivalents to the large 12XN cabs
If you want the performance of the Big Twin 2 but would rather have two smaller cabs than one larger cab, then two Big Baby 2s have near identical tone and performance (they actually fractionally better it in the lows thanks to having a little more enclosure size and more port area and are taller so more audible on very cramped stages if you're tall).
If you want the performance of the Super Twin but would rather have two smaller cabs than one larger cab, then two Super Compacts have near identical tone and performance (they actually fractionally better it in the lows thanks to having a little more enclosure size and more port area and are taller so more audible on very cramped stages if you're tall).
Mix and match 12XN rigs
All the 12XN550 Barefaced cabs will work well together. However the best pairings are either with identical cabs or with matching 1x12" and 2x12" variants (i.e. BB2 with BT2, SC with ST). The other particularly good pairing is the Super Midget with the Super Compact.
Barefaced Generation Two - discontinued models information (2010-2013)
The Engineered Modular System
Our most popular cabs, and indeed the ones that suit most bass players, are the modular range of Midget, Compact, Super Twelve and new Super Fifteen. These cabs have a tonal profile similar to other top quality bass cabs yet produce greater output for their size whilst weighing less. They do not suffer from the excess midrange and weak lows which characterises the earlier and cheaper neodymium magnet bass drivers but have the full fat yet clear sound of expensive drivers in carefully aligned, properly braced and correctly damped enclosures.
Both the Midget and Super Twelve are available with high quality tweeters with custom built crossovers which extend the response to the limit of human hearing with remarkably even response, low distortion and none of that spikey fizzy sound that marrs less well designed woofer+tweeter cabs. They can even do double duty as high output compact PA cabs!
These four cabs can be used singly or in various combinations, to handle the smallest to the loudest gig, and have been carefully engineered to couple as efficiently as possible and provide an effective polar pattern when multiple cabs are used. The most popular modular Barefaced rig of Midget+Compact can play louder and fatter than any 4x10" on the market, yet you can use a lone Midget as a tiny but very loud stage monitor or to fill surprisingly large venues with bottom, whilst the Compact as a standalone has comparable midrange punch and treble clarity yet bigger deeper lows so can handle larger venues without PA support.
The Big Series
2013 update! The cabs haven't really changed but the amplifier landscape very much has - the typical power output of bass amps, particularly lightweight ones, is usefully higher than when we started Barefaced. Consequently we'd say that if you want a BIG sound and either have a powerful amp or are willing to buy one, then these are the cabs for you. The Big Twin and Big Baby (and corresponding Baby Sub) represent a quantum leap forwards in bass cab technology. Some bass players will find these cabs too revealing but if you are after the most accurate representation of the sound of your instrument, which remains consistent both on and off-axis and as you turn up louder and louder to punishing SPL, then these cabs are quantifiably the best on the market.
The Big Baby and Big Twin are the second generation of the Big Series, replacing the original Big One, and are designed to go even lower (happily handling basses tuned down to low F# or super-low E), and remain more consistent at higher SPL (due to the greater thermal power handling and thus reduced power compression), whilst the Big Twin uses the new bracing/porting scheme pioneered on the Super Twelve to give our large format enclosures greater strength and non-resonance yet lower weight. Originally offered as a 2-way woofer+mid design the Big Series cabs provided deeper lows, more accurate mids and smoother highs than traditional bass cabs. Now only offered as 3-way woofer+mid+tweeter designs the Big Series cabs reveal their incredible transparency by sounding more like a giant clear yet thunderous studio monitor than a bass cab, yet you can still turn the tweeter down (or off) for that woofer+mid sound. They're just too useful as amazing PA cabs or as big studio monitors when mixing/mastering your bands recordings for us to continue selling them without tweeters.
If you crave the sonic size and weight of a huge rig but don't want to carry it then the Big Series cabs are the route to take. Alternatively if you're after the sound you get when hearing your bass DI'd in a professional recording studio but have never been able to get on the gig, then the Big Series can do it for you. The sonic clarity which lets you hear every detail of your bass also helps the Big Series excel with heavy FX, letting you disguish between all your different distortion pedals through the roar of a loud band, allowing more subtle modulation to get heard properly for once and having the depth and dynamic ability in the lows to get the most out of octavers, synths and envelope filters.
The Niche Models
Our first genre-specific bass cab, the Dubster is designed to give ska, rocksteady, reggae and dub players the massive fat sound of a big rig but at a fraction of the size. Tuned for maximum sensitivity in the critical lows the Dubster doesn't need much power to do bigger bottom than similarly sized 'sensible' reggae rigs whilst if you have the power it'll produce similar SPL to a classic dual 8x10" rig. Two Dubsters are enough to play loud reggae outdoors without PA support.
Our second niche product, finally launched in December 2012, the '69er is designed to emulate the bright enough but mellow enough, punchy enough but fat enough, and compressed enough but dynamic enough, and indubitably highly coloured tone of the original 1969 8x10" cab, whilst also exhibiting greater power handling and thus maximum output, and superior polar response for improved tone in acoustically poor venues. Unlike all the other Barefaced models it is a sealed cab with more traditional drivers (less powerful motors, lower Vd, higher THD), partly to get that specific tonal colouration and partly to ensure good coupling with the output transformer on a valve amp. Like the other Barefaced cabs it has a light but stiff enclosure making it the lightest ferrite magnet 6x10" on the market (actually we think it's the lightest 6x10" on the market full-stop!) and a unique crossover to achieve excellent polar response despite the side-by-side woofers. We're really thrilled with the '69er, it's just so musical sounding and really fits with the bass rig as part of the instrument vibe.
Barefaced Generation One - discontinued models information (2008-2010)
Compact, Big One and Vintage
The Compact 1x15" was the first bass cab we sold and it continued right through Gen 2 production. The Big One was an advanced 6.5"+15" with similar design goals to the subsequent Gen 2 Big Baby & Big Twin and then the Gen 3 Big Baby 2 & Big Twin 2 models - some of the later Big One's were Big One T 3-way designs. The Vintage was a silver cloth grill fronted 2x15" designed to perform like two Compacts in one large box. Ironically the last 'Vintage' had a black steel grill and one or two also had tweeters!