for "high-end" bass owners...

[K.Ross]

basshead 5,
To answer your question,for me it was SAVE-SAVE-SAVE...And while you're saving,read reviews...look up sites...and talk to bass players.As stated above,there's something "special" about a bass someone spends time building for you. There are SEVERAL extremely conscientious builders out there that make their "livelihood" listening to what a bass-player is looking for,then carefully building it.Mine was built by Scott at Birdsong,and it is EXACTLY what I wanted. There are many others,which gives you the choice to get what you want and need.I was "attacked" awhile back about putting in a good word for custum basses...It all depends on what you're looking for,and what you feel like spending.Many on this site buy (and swear by)buying used...That's a way to get a nice bass for a good price.Many buy less-expensive and upgrade them...That's also a way to get a nice bass for a good price.Many buy kits and build their own...If I were confident on how that would work for me,I'd try it.I wish you luck on what you choose to do...Don't be offended by what others might say...If you want a higher-end or "hand-built" bass...save,study up,and go for it...Do what YOU WANT TO DO.
Just my 2 cents worth.
LOL,
Kent

 

[two fingers]

A couple of questions to the OP. Do you make any money playing the bass? If so, roughly how much? Plus, go into the guitar shops and play as many basses as you can as often as you can. Maybe a cheap bass will call out to you. I have made a LOT of money playing bass over the years and right now my favorite basses are Ibanez BTB's. I own two of them (one of them I have played over 1000 gigs with). They run from about$400 to about $1200 (mine are in the $600 range).

 

[RicoDirenzo]

Back in the day when I played with a band, I used fender p's and gibsons. Nice axes, but when I finally opened up my wallet and bought an Alembic, man oh man my playing really changed, for the better! A high end bass can really make a big difference, As a builder I take more time with fret work, neck carving, wood selection, pick ups, ect. Custom builders also listen to there customers, they make their living by word of mouth, not production of "how many can we build this year".

Bingo. Went from a Squire to a Carvin Custom 5 er with Aguilar 18 volt pre professionally installed.....night and day!!!

 

[Jeff K]

"Save, save, save..." is good advice. Personally, I went about it in a slightly different manner. I "upgraded".

I started out on a short-scale, no-name P-copy that I got for $50.00. Soon, I sold that and used the money (plus some that I saved) for a used Japanese Squier. Eventually, sold the Squier and bought a MIA P. Bought a few others when they would hit my hot button; but never went into debt to do so.

After amassing a modest collection of basses, my philosophy shifted to "buy one/sell one". In other words, if I saw something I just had to have, I'd sell off the most expendable (to me) bass in my arsenal to help offset the cost of the new one.

The only problem with that is that you eventually reach a point where you really like everything you have. That makes it tough to sell one off...

 

[bmc]

In 37 years of professional playing, the price of the bass had minimal impact on my skill level. I've gone the range from cheap to personalized hand made, and back again.

Sure there's a correlation between price and sound quality. But there's no relationship between skill, musicality and taste and the price of an instrument. None. You put lipstick on a pig and it'll still be a pig.

 

[KrisH]

A lot of my love for more expensive basses is based on an appreciation of attention to detail and aesthetic elements.

I understand that production level instruments, while of a higher quality than in the past, don't have that "fit and finish" that a well-made hand crafted instrument may have. I can see how that would make the instrument feel better in your hands, and even easier to play. (Heaven knows, I've played on some poorly built instruments that felt like a struggle to the death to get decent sound out of!) So yeah, a hand crafted "boutique" instrument might be worth the premium price over a standard run production model.

Recently I bought a hand-crafted bass, not made for me, but made by the builder for her own use. It has all the "coffee table" aesthetics, top-line hardware, carefully thought out design, and some real serious attention to the leveling and dressing of the stock Precision neck and frets. As a result, even though I'm not partial to precision necks, this one is more enticing that any production Precision I've played. It has a greater range of tonal capability than my other basses (although I don't like all the possibilities), and looks kind of cool.

Thing is, I hesitate to call it a "boutique" bass. It's certainly one-of-a-kind, with detailed attention to the design, hand-crafting, fit and finish. But it wasn't built for me, I know the builder too well, and it certainly was not expensive. High end? Maybe in component selection and finish, but not price. How can you say?

 

[stflbn]

IMHO a person technique is not noticably hindered by 99% of the lowmid to mid range instruments out there. Technique is technique. It will shine on any decently setup bass.

 

[john turner]

The higher priced instruments help your ego much more than your playing.

we don't insult people because of their instrument choices here at talkbass. it's not conducive to a positive conversational environment.

A good player can sound very good on a used $50 Squier.

that's true - i've played a few squiers that sound suprisingly good, considering.

how someone chooses to dispose of their income, however, is completely up to them, and not open to criticism by others here at talkbass.

 

[john turner]

to answer the OP - i've purchased quite a few custom instruments in my life, instruments built for me. it was a lot easier and affordable than a lot of folks realize.

a custom instrument takes time to build. you can make the money with a good job to afford the instrument as it's being built. when you find a builder that you like, you discuss what you want from him, and discuss how much money down you want to place on the instrument. usually, in my experience, it costs about 20-30% down to get a good, reputable builder to start on your instrument.

most guys building decent instruments have a bit of a turn around time - don't expect the instrument to be done in a week or two. all my custom instruments took from 3 to 20 months to build, based on the options and how busy the guy building them was. in that time, it is easy to accumulate the dough required to pay for the instrument - get a job, or an extra job. stop going to movies, or eating out. quit smoking heh. whatever you end up blowing that extra cash on. this is worth it, in the long run.

it's not like you'll go to the builder and be required to put $4000 in his hand for a bass - it will take him time, and as you get the dough you pay him what you can. that's how i did it. in my collection up above, i got on average one bass a year from '92 until 2003 (the jazz-looking 7 i got in 2006, and the doubleneck rickenbacker i got for a steal in '91.)

again, it's a question of willpower and priorities. a lot of folks will slag you for how much you spend on an instrument, but then they'll be driving $60,000 suv's, or have a whole pile of dough wrapped up in some other hobbies (like sportscars or home theater systems, for instance). while i was accumulating my collections, i drove a $1000 car. i had a $500 tv. priorities.

did i play better with my customs? you bet, but that was only partially because they were great instruments. i went from a 4 string 70's jazz and 4 string fretless pedulla to 7 string fretted and fretless instruments. i -had- to learn how to play -a lot- better, just to be able to play them. a lot of sloppiness that can fly on a 4 won't cut it on a 7.

furthermore, the custom instruments are much easier to set up well, are much more stable, and hold their tune much better, than the relatively cheap instruments i have had experience with. my conklins in particular are built like tanks. on two occasions the strap locks on my main 7 came loose and the thing fell of my body, and bounced on the drum kit (i was leaning over to talk to the drummer both times) and finally landed on the stage in a heap. didn't even go out of tune.

as for choosing customs, well, there were no other options for me back in '93 when i went from 4 to 7. i play 7's, that's the instrument i was born to play. even now, the options are sorta limited, so were i to want to purchase some more instruments, i'd probably have to go the custom route, but if there were "Squier" 7 string basses i'd probably give one a shot, and if it sounded decent and met my criteria (dimensionally) i'd probably own one.

they're not for everyone, but neither are any other instrument styles and designs. that's why there's options.

 

[Eminor3rd]

When I picked up my Pedulla for the first time, on sale as a used item at Sam Ash, I was not in the market to buy a bass. I had never found a five string that I liked. I was not in a particularly good financial situation.

However, after playing it for about 3 minutes, I knew I had to find a way to get it. It was simply the best sounding, most comfortable bass I had ever played. So, I traded in three of my four basses, pulled some money from savings, and funded the difference by convincing my friend to let me use his Sam Ash card. I paid off the difference directly to my friend in monthly installments. It wasn't pretty, but I had to have the bass.

It wasn't the fact that it was a "high end" bass that attracted me to it, it simply spoke to me like nothing else. If I had picked up a $300 Fender that felt and sounded that good, I would have done whatever it took to acquire it as well.

 

[BartmanPDX]

Hard to improve on waht John Turner said.

IMHO a person technique is not noticably hindered by 99% of the lowmid to mid range instruments out there. Technique is technique. It will shine on any decently setup bass.

This is pretty important though. Until you get to a certain skill level, there's not a huge difference in the impact on your playing between a very well set-up inexpensive bass and a high end bass, if you're talking about regular fours and fivers.

FWIW, I have both a modded Squier VM Jazz and an NYC Sadowsky. The Sadowsky gets most of the playing time, but I've gotten the Squier to the point where it plays very well. Some upgraded parts bought over time, a pro setup, and I've put together a bass I'm willing to play on gigs. It's the kind of bass I would have been thrilled to own for several years while I saved up for a dream bass.

 

[Coelho]

The higher priced instruments help your ego much more than your playing. A good player can sound very good on a used $50 Squier.

AMEN!

 

[Coelho]

In 37 years of professional playing, the price of the bass had minimal impact on my skill level. I've gone the range from cheap to personalized hand made, and back again.

Sure there's a correlation between price and sound quality. But there's no relationship between skill, musicality and taste and the price of an instrument. None. You put lipstick on a pig and it'll still be a pig.

AMEN II

 

[two fingers]

Very well put John Turner.

 

[MultiScaleMale]

Sometimes I wonder if I played better when I had only one bass and boiled strings to try make them last two years. I didn't have to think about which bass would sound better. It was this one.

Anyways, today's low end basses are pretty damn good compared to what was around when I first started playing. I'd say that unless you have a very crappy bass, if it's hindering your technique you need a setup rather than a new bass.

 

[Greevus]

I think that sage wisdom like "eye of the beholder", "the indian, not the arrow", etc, come into play. WIthin reason, wood is wood and metal is metal. Some will be better than others for sure, but "boutique" or "stock" or "$$$ value" don't make it necessarily so. Growing up, a lot of self-loving players would have Rics and display them ever so proudly with their egos. Boring. I think of players like Jaco pulling the frets out of his own Jazz, or Billy Sheehan putting the mudbucker in his old P. Nice guitars, but going against the grain. I think a very good setup and some decent electronics can go a long way. Setup is far more important to technique development than having some individual builder "create" your dream bass. I have said before-look at the 'great' bassists through time and few of them are playing one of a kind boutique basses. Maybe one here or there, but not overall. I keep thinking of all the P's and J's that immediately come to mind. I think ego comes into play here big time. A poster earlier compared it to buying a car. How many jackasses drive fancy cars for their egos?? A lot.

 

[richnota]

If I could sound as good on a used $50 Squier as I could on my Rob Allen, I would have never purchased it....er, them.

Very little in the world's gonna sound and feel like that RA monster 6. Im still amazed by it.

 

[Demonator]

Very nice 6

 

[Just Thumpin']

It is amazing how many posts don't even address the OP's question.

John Turner's post is spot on. For me, it is a combined answer -- discipline and priorities. Save the most you can reasonably afford to save EVERY week (or month). When I was younger this was literally a $10 or $20 bill in a shoebox, now it is direct deposit from my paycheck into a "gear fund" account, but the key thing is to put something in it religiously.

In terms of priorities, most of us have ample ways that we could cut back on our spending if we really care to. When I decided that I wanted to get my first high-end bass (that I "couldn't afford"), I decided to stop getting a new car every 3 or 4 years. Now my wife and I aim to keep our cars a minimum of 6 years and we put the substantial savings into a combination of things including gear (me), gardening (her) and vacations (us). This last point is really important -- I have always tried hard to make saving a shared sacrifice and a SHARED reward. If WE did all the saving but I got all of the benefit, that fails the "happy wife, happy life" test.

Now that I have answered the OP's question, I will add that my playing improved so dramatically once I started playing premium instruments that it is not even funny. The ability of these instruments to translate every nuance of how you play them into audible tones is, in some ways, scary. When I picked up my first Fodera, it took me well over three months (after having played for over 15 years) just to play "cleanly" enough to have my playing sound decent again. I just had no idea how much garbage noise I was creating with my excessively heavy touch and somewhat sloppy fingering techniques (of course, I didn't realize that they were sloppy until I could hear their results). But over time, as I paid my dues in the woodshed, it was off to the races.

Every aspect of playing now mattered -- I now not only got to chose my notes, but could also chose to play them in different positions because I liked the sound of that note in that particular position on that string better than anywhere else. The difference in tone between varying amounts of right hand touch (and styles of right hand playing and the location of my right hand) was no longer something that was barely noticeable -- it could now make my basses almost sound like different instruments! For me, it is truly like the difference between looking through a grime covered window at a gorgeous landscape and then having the windows professionally cleaned. I hope to one day come across a $50 bass that allows for this level of detail in my playing (which has really become a key component of my overall sound), but until I do...priorities and discipline will have to rule the day!

 

[spade2you]

Now that I have answered the OP's question, I will add that my playing improved so dramatically once I started playing premium instruments that it is not even funny. The ability of these instruments to translate every nuance of how you play them into audible tones is, in some ways, scary.

....and what's the action on one of your Foderas? I've seen it before, I just like when I hear people say that you can do that with any bass.