Wal (bass)

The company introduced distinctive eight-coil humbucking pick-ups and proprietary bridge hardware which became a feature of all future Wal bass models.

These basses followed the basic design specifications of the JG series (solid ash body, maple, hornbeam and Amazonian hardwood neck and rosewood fingerboard), with plastic rather than leather scratchplates.

The active models introduced switchable filters for each pick-up, allowing certain frequencies to be cut or boosted to provide a wider range of tonal options, and they featured a "pick attack" feature, which boosted a narrow band of upper-mid range frequencies to simulate the attacking tone of a plectrum when playing fingerstyle.

This series introduced the laminated bodies which are now standard on all Wal basses, and various woods such as American walnut, schedua, hydua, padauk and wenge were offered as facings over a mahogany core.

[7] After 2000, there was a significant contraction of the company, which culminated in Stevens working as a sole trader with little or no additional workforce, and the supply of Wal basses becoming increasingly limited.

On 20 August 2008, it was announced that business would resume under the control of luthier Paul Herman, who had worked at Wal during the late 1980s and 1990s,[8] with production moved from High Wycombe to a workshop in Fetcham, Surrey.