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cheap brands for second bass

$700 is cheap? Shoot, my backup bass is a $120 Johnson. It looks good and sounds good (after I put Fender pickups in). The only thing I dont like is the ugly headstock. Other than that, you wouldnt know that it wasnt a Fender P.
 
Aria STB basses (= more or less Fender-style) seem to sell for about AUD 300 in your country, and from what I've seen the build quality is very good, as is the hardware.
 
Buy used. I don't know what's available at what price down under, but I use a Lakland 5501 for backup. They sell new in the US for 700 of our rapidly declining dollars :-)
 
Geez, $700 is more than twice what I've ever paid for a bass.

CHEAP is in the $100-$200 range. SX, Jay Turser (their impressive JTB-401 '54 P clone comes to mind), Rogue (The VB-100 Beatle Bass is a good choice) and used basses are in that range.

$700 is getting into the high end as far as I'm concerned.

Dude, did you read the post?? AUD=Australian dollars. .88 US Cents is equal to 1.00 Australian Dollar.

You also have to understand people in Europe and other countries pay a lot more for some of the same consumer good we do such as Automobiles, Motorcycles etc. Yeah, the US dollar is weak right now, but we have it made when it comes to this stuff.
 
Thats a little over $600 American to work with---should be able to get something pretty nice---maybe an Ibanez, Peavey, or ESP LTD.

Ideally that would be the case with a straight conversion. I would consider it closer to about $350-400 US (in terms of "bass buying power"™) after you take into account the prices of new basses here vs the US (shipping, import costs, the middle man) $700AU wouldn't get you a brand new MIM P-bass here while $400 US can over there.

I think the Squier Vintage Modified is worth looking at, they go for about $550AU and supposedly they are quite good. Look on Aus E-bay as well, there are usually a few good deals on there on Fender, Ibanez etc.. Used gives you the best bang for the buck as long as you don't pay too much and know what you are buying.
 

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