New to Bass - what should I get?

Secret_Sam · October 2022

Fair enough. I yield to better knowledge about Precisions.

You are quite right about the Roscoe Beck: according to Google it was derived from a Jazz. As I remember it, it felt and sounded very different to a Jazz. It had a big, clunky neck and a three-position pickup selector, allowing the user to choose one of three timbres, none of which was quite right.

I ended up buying a US- made Jazz 5 string of some kind of high end spec, with graphite rods in the neck. It needed different amp settings to my other basses, but dialled in it sounded pretty good.

All was well in the common Jazz keys. Until you played any B natural, at which point it would resonate strangely and give lots of fret buzz. So back to the luthier for a couple of days. Because it was a Fender.

I got rid of it a year or so later. I had previously owned a couple of Japanese- made Fender 4 strings, which I bought when new to bass because, well, hey it's a fender. One was fretted, needed fret filing, and was ultimately a bit uninspiring. The other was fretless and needed some uneven spots in the fretboard sanding out to make it play properly. Both were rapidly traded in for a Yamaha bb5000a in one case, and a Status Graphite Matrix in the other - both the Yamaha and the Status were truly outstanding instruments.

So, out of three fender basses, there wasn't one that I fell in love with. I also had a Japanese 50-something reissue Tele that could sound really good on the neck pickup with the treble rolled off. But pretty thin otherwise. So that's four.

They churn out instruments by the tens of thousands, so I am sure there are some great ones out there, by design or by accident. They are iconic, and I have been guilty of believing what I read. But after four encounters with the cold reality, I have given up.

I apologise for being a bit of a troll, but if they paid more attention to making working instruments with consistently high quality, and less attention to mining their back-catalogue for some kind of spurious, hipster authenticity, I would be more interested. I am several glasses of wine into the evening, so don't mind me.

Yes I know lots of people like fenders. But it wouldn't be the internet if everyone agrees.

Rocker · October 2022

If nobody has said it yet: get yourself a good wide strap for whatever bass you end up buying.

ICBM · October 2022

Secret_Sam said:

The weirdest one to me is the thick but very narrow Rickenbacker, but many people love them.

Not all Rickenbackers have thick/deep necks - mine certainly doesn’t. Some do, but my experience is that most don’t, it’s a feature of some more modern ones but even then not all - Rickenbacker seem to change the spec when they feel like it…

prowla · October 2022

Secret_Sam said:

There are many bass neck profiles and widths, so trying out a bunch of them is strongly recommended. The weirdest one to me is the thick but very narrow Rickenbacker, but many people love them.

Last piece of advice: work on your left hand technique: thumb and fingers properly opposing each other. No thumb-pointing-down-the-neck, and no sticking your thumb over to play bottom G. Guitarists can get away with it, but you can't.

ICBM said:

Secret_Sam said:

The weirdest one to me is the thick but very narrow Rickenbacker, but many people love them.

Not all Rickenbackers have thick/deep necks - mine certainly doesn’t. Some do, but my experience is that most don’t, it’s a feature of some more modern ones but even then not all - Rickenbacker seem to change the spec when they feel like it…

As owner of several Rics, I can't relate to the thick but narrow neck assertion.

A few people played one of mine at an event on the weekend and they rather liked them.

However, since the stated budget is £200, it's an irrelevance to this thread anyway (other than to warn to not be tempted to go for a Chickenbacker!).

I also disagree with the do not do thumb-over-neck mantra; again at the event we had a very versatile professional bass player (West-end musicals, named bands, Scott's Bass Lessons) give a talk and he was doing it.

https://cdn.basschat.co.uk/monthly_2022_10/VID_20221023_140132.mp4.bf80759d38e72d7dfd688fbfc8c0d2dd.mp4

prowla · October 2022

Another suggestion is to look at what your preferred bass players use; if it's a Fender, then a used MIM is an obvious choice, though it might push the budget a bit.

The thing about buying used is that you can likely sell it on for the same price, thereby making it a zero-cost exercise.

slugelise · October 2022

Keep an eye on the classifieds here, and also gumtree. I think all of this years acquisitions for me have come from one of those, and the CV jazz bass I got was a bargain at £190.

ICBM · October 2022

prowla said:

However, since the stated budget is £200, it's an irrelevance to this thread anyway (other than to warn to not be tempted to go for a Chickenbacker!).

Very true!

Tone71 · October 2022

I have a short scale Gretsch which is good and sounds great but still looking at getting a full scale at some point as it is a bit guitary. Btw I'm also near Epsom and looking for a bass player when you're sorted!!

Zoonyboy · November 2022

All cheap basses sound OK to me. I have some pricey ones, but they all do the job. Remember, it's just BASS. Nobody wants to hear it go TWANG!

Dave_Mc · November 2022

prowla said:
I also disagree with the do not do thumb-over-neck mantra; again at the event we had a very versatile professional bass player (West-end musicals, named bands, Scott's Bass Lessons) give a talk and he was doing it.
https://cdn.basschat.co.uk/monthly_2022_10/VID_20221023_140132.mp4.bf80759d38e72d7dfd688fbfc8c0d2dd.mp4

I'm no bass player (cynics would say I'm no guitar player either

) but I'm always very wary of "You must do this ALL THE TIME" type advice (and this pretty much goes for anything, not just music). I suspect you want your thumb around the neck less than guitar*, but to say you should never do it, even if it might make something easier (or more importantly, sound better)? Far as I'm concerned, technique is a means to an end, it's not the end- you do whatever makes things easier and sound better. It's pretty hard to do decent-sounding vibrato- even on guitar- if you don't put your thumb round.

I'm always interested to see how good the "THUMB BEHIND ALWAYS" merchants' vibrato is...

*I should add, I've seen several guitar players online say the same about always having your thumb behind for guitar, which I also disagree with- they seemed to be arguing from classical guitar technique, which seemed bizarre! I've never played classical, but it seems different enough from electric guitar that they should be treated as their own thing, surely? As I said, I've never played classical, so maybe I'm missing something, but there's not a whole heap of distortion noise to keep down with classical guitar, is there?

stickyfiddle · November 2022

@dave_MC completely agree. You'll see loads of folks screeching about alternating 2-finger picking without exception, but in reality a flexible approach of alternating fingers, efficient finger picking (including your thumb if it works) and even using a pick sometimes is going to be better.

That said I still think a P-bass is as good a place to start as any, unless you already know you really specifically love a particular bass sound, in which case I figure there's no need to ask the question

Dave_Mc · November 2022

stickyfiddle said:

@dave_MC completely agree. You'll see loads of folks screeching about alternating 2-finger picking without exception, but in reality a flexible approach of alternating fingers, efficient finger picking (including your thumb if it works) and even using a pick sometimes is going to be better.

That said I still think a P-bass is as good a place to start as any, unless you already know you really specifically love a particular bass sound, in which case I figure there's no need to ask the question

Yeah definitely. For certain things a pick is definitely what you want. A P-bass with a pick just sounds right for so much stuff. (It's kind of funny, too- you can tell "real" bassists (i.e. bassists who started on bass and for whom bass is their main instrument) from "fake" bassists (i.e. bassists who started on guitar) by how they react if told to play with a pick. The "real" ones are usually "Oh no, a pick!" whereas the fake ones are usually "Oh goody, a pick!" I deliberately try to almost always practice bass without a pick because I started on guitar, but even with that, I'm way better with a pick without even trying, lol!)

Part of me thinks you should get a second pickup... I know there are problems with PJ layouts (the big ones are getting the outputs to match, and unless it's a noiseless J you get noise in 2 out of the 3 settings), but it does give you more options. There aren't usually that many other options at that price point for 2-pickup basses, at least two pickup basses where the neck pickup is a Precision pickup- I agree with you, the P-pickup is so useful it seems a shame not to get it as one of them!

ICBM · November 2022

The pick snobbery thing is ridiculous. It's just a different technique for different sounds, and although it's certainly true that there's a lot of overlap and you *can* use either for a lot of stuff, one isn't better or 'more right' than the other. You may as well say that proper bass players don't use frets.

I did start on guitar - but then so did many great bass players - but started playing bass early enough on that I hadn't really got a lot of technique set in stone. The really funny thing is that I play guitar almost exclusively with my fingers! For many years I did for bass too - until I started playing in a punk covers band. For the sounds you need for that, I had to learn to play bass with a pick

.

I'm also in another band where I almost always play fretless without a pick. Does that make me more or less of a proper bass player than ones who only play fretted with their fingers? I also don't always use the alternating two-finger technique, except when I do use it. It's irrelevant - if you can play the music you want to play, it's all good.

Dave_Mc · November 2022

^ Agreed.

I definitely didn't start bass early enough- I was very much a "guitar player" by the time I started. And I almost always play guitar with a pick! But (after getting some advice online about what not to do if you're coming to it from guitar) I very deliberately tried to approach it as a bass player- I'm not saying I could pass as a bass player, but hopefully it's not too obvious that I'd rather be playing guitar!

That thing I said about the pick thing, about not being comfortable with a pick- you can often even see it in really good, professional bass players. You can tell they're not that dextrous with the pick. I'm talking about really, really good bass players, who are way better than me. Yet they look about as comfortable with a pick as a guitarist who's been playing for about 3 months!

stickyfiddle · November 2022

I’m very similar; ~20 years on guitar before I took up bass, and I consciously didn’t let myself use a pick until I felt I’d got a vague handle on using my fingers properly. It didn’t hurt that I finger pick on guitar a lot, but obv the techniques are still quite different. Now I’ve been at it a good couple of years I feel very comfortable using either and choosing based 99% on the sound I want to achieve.

Dave_Mc · November 2022

IIRC I actually did use a pick at the very start, just so I could play something! But I also very deliberately tried to get a handle on the fingers thing, like you said. I'm no shredder with my fingers, but I can play most standard-speed lines with my fingers just fine. Like you- I don't want to feel I'm choosing a pick because I can't play with my fingers, I want to feel I'm choosing a pick because it does the sound I want.

Reggaebass · November 2022

olafgarten said:

probably aiming to spend under £200 on the guitar.

Any advice or recommendations are much appreciated.

Did you manage to get anything yet

Bellycaster · November 2022

Classic Vibe Squier or one of the new 40th Anniversary ones. Go and try some in a store with decent stock. I think Jazz Basses sit better and are more comfortable to play than a P-Bass.

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New to Bass - what should I get?

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