I would highly recommend calling Mike Lull's shop and talk with Spencer Lull about your ideas. He's a really great guy to talk to, and they make such an amazing P bass.
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Custom P bass
- Thread starter truand85
- Start date
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This is good to know. There go my assumptions based on others comments. Thanks!
A g&l lb100 custom shop would be the way to go. You just might have to wait 7-9 months to get it
For any P-style bass, I personally would not go custom route even if I have the budget. It is one of the simplest (yet one of the best) electric bass designs ever; and even with moderate skills at best, you can put one together yourself from parts (and it is a lot of fun, believe me).
I have had a Fender Custom Shop '59 which was a great bass, but my two home-made/assembled P basses with woods from Warmoth and/or Hosco as well as Lollar and Arcane pickups are by far the best P's I have ever played (including vintage stuff from 60s), and they are both significantly better than my CS. If you cannot find a chunky neck to your liking from Warmoth, USACG, etc., I would try whatever Fender or Squier you can find at your local music store and I would simply upgrade the electronics and spend the rest of the money for a much more boutique bass or amp project.
Just recently, one of my friends bought a Squier P and I cannot tell how good the bass is even before upgrades.
Just IME and IMHO... Best,
Alper
I have had a Fender Custom Shop '59 which was a great bass, but my two home-made/assembled P basses with woods from Warmoth and/or Hosco as well as Lollar and Arcane pickups are by far the best P's I have ever played (including vintage stuff from 60s), and they are both significantly better than my CS. If you cannot find a chunky neck to your liking from Warmoth, USACG, etc., I would try whatever Fender or Squier you can find at your local music store and I would simply upgrade the electronics and spend the rest of the money for a much more boutique bass or amp project.
Just recently, one of my friends bought a Squier P and I cannot tell how good the bass is even before upgrades.
Just IME and IMHO... Best,
Alper
Lots of recommendations, many I've never even heard of, thanks a lot to everybody this is more than I was hoping!
Thank you for taking the time to post, I was hoping someone with both a Fender CS P and Warmoth builds would chime in. I am strongly leaning toward Warmoth still but I'm in no hurry I'm going to check out the luthier/websites recommended and get a few quotes and see.
Thank you for taking the time to post, I was hoping someone with both a Fender CS P and Warmoth builds would chime in. I am strongly leaning toward Warmoth still but I'm in no hurry I'm going to check out the luthier/websites recommended and get a few quotes and see.
I thought G&Ls tended to have a slimmer neck compared to Fenders, am I getting that wrong?
Yeah that's been my experience also. No idea if it's because the chunk in the neck makes notes easier to fret for my hand or what, but I get a fat bottom end on a chunky 70s fender neck that I could not get on any other Ps - and when I do they are typically 1.75" at the nut where I want 1.625
With the custom shop, you can order whatever you want. but the Fullerton Deluxe LB100 I have is a 1 5/8" neck, and it has thicker/broader shoulders than the modern C fender necks I have played. It's hard to describe, but the G&L feels thicker in the shoulder part of the neck. Front to back depth is probably the same though.
A custom build is really attractive when you can't find what you want out there, but go in with eyes open.
I commissioned a custom build over 2 years ago for what was supposed to be a five month build, and I'm still empty handed. Worse yet, my repeated requests for an ETA have gone mostly unanswered. I still haven't learned my lesson though and have another custom build in the works right now with a different builder.
I had a replacement Warmoth neck once that sounded noticeably worse than the neck it replaced, but I'm not sure if that says something about Warmoth or just my rotten luck when shopping.
I commissioned a custom build over 2 years ago for what was supposed to be a five month build, and I'm still empty handed. Worse yet, my repeated requests for an ETA have gone mostly unanswered. I still haven't learned my lesson though and have another custom build in the works right now with a different builder.
I had a replacement Warmoth neck once that sounded noticeably worse than the neck it replaced, but I'm not sure if that says something about Warmoth or just my rotten luck when shopping.
Good to know, that might be an option then, I think I can find G&Ls locally to test out I'll give one a try.
Thanks, that's also part of the attraction with Warmoth, fairly quick turnaround time compared to most other out there. I've followed some of the threads about luthier horror stories (the Zon thread for example), so I'm going into this with somewhat of an idea about who not to go with.
All of the newer LB100's that are MIA have the first neck on this option if it helps. It's the best P bass I played.
USA Bass Options
Also, if you go the Custom shop route, I highly recommend Greg at Rocket Music. He is a sponsor here on TB. I ordered a build to order bass from him about a month ago, and he made the process so easy.
Fodera can easily build you a $5000 P bass hahaha. They can do literally anything you ask for. My modulus has a P pickup, the graphite neck and P combo is an absolutely glorious sound. I fall in love with it everyday. However, they have a little narrower neck than you're talking about and would probably take 2 years to build. But it could be as light as 6-7 pounds if you go chambered RevoLite.
I considered the higher end builders at first, but going Fodera for a P bass seemed kind of overkill. While I'm not hurting financially, if I can get similar quality (feel and tone I'm looking for) and spend less, that's for the best.
I've ordered a custom bass from Maruszczyk and a parts bass Warmoth at around the same time. Interestingly it took longer for the parts bass to arrive. The custom bass arrived in about 8 weeks, and it took an extra month for the Warmoth to be delivered.
