Hii I am new at this forum. My name is James. I am some what new to bass but started playing guitar at age of 14 and now I am 56. I say some what new to bass because I used to own a bass from 1998 to 2014. When I owned it I didn't really try to learn on it, I just messed around a bit but now I want to focus and learn bass. Some say bass is only playing the root note of the chords in songs and while there is much truth to it there is a lot more to it than that. Bass can be more involved and deeper than that and that is where I want to go.
My current bass I bought used and is a Japanese Precision Bass, PB70 US. I bought it used right around Christmas. I love this bass. It had some chipped paint in the backside and lower end, but heck it is a really nice quality bass and people actually pay big money for a factory made relic guitar but this was done naturally by the previous owner. Previous owner upgraded the pickup to a Seymour Duncan. He also changed the pickguard to a totoise shell but I wasn't crazy about it because there are different tort guards and this one was okay but not great. Kinda like my 2003 AVRI 62 Jazzmaster I bought new in 2003 has a great tort PG. They had a few but I got the good one according to the posters at the Offset Guitar Forum, and I agree it looks better than most. Well, I changed the one on the P Bass to a red pearloid guard. It looks amazing to me. I was not going to but I saw a bass posted here that was pearl white and had a red pearloid guard. Wasn't sure how it would look on mine because my bass is aged white, not pearloid white but in fact turned out great. I changed the strings to D'Adarrio Chromes. Funny for guitar flatwounds I don't like Chromes BUT on bass I do. For guitar it is Thomastik or Pyramid flats.
Oh, my first bass I had was a 1987 Jazz Bass Special. It was in grey, not sure if you would call it charcoal grey or gun metal grey but looked nice. In 1998 got it off eBay for $275 plus $25 shipping. Came with case. Those were the days you could get deals on eBay because eBay was in it's infancy and so was e-Commerce. Also inflation on instruments was not high like now and not everybody and his brother were not on the Bay buying up stuff. In fact I had placed my bid and it had four days left and I went to Las Vegas to visit my dad. No smart phones then, I had no laptop so it wasn't until I returned home that I saw I won the auction. No one bothered to outbid me. I fell on hard times and sold the bass in 2014 right when I was coming out of hard times but thought even with a new job I should sell it. I'm in LA, sold it to a guy from Miami visiting his mom in Pasadena. Sold it for $450. Now I think these go for about $800 used.
For guitars I prefer 1950s and 60s vintage or reissue but for P Basses I love the 70s models. I love the bigger headstock and the big Precision Bass logo on the headstock over the small one on previous generations. Originally this RI and the original P Basses of the 70s would have had a black pickguard but I went with the red pearloid. I am a fan of Pete Farndon of The Pretenders and he had a 70s P Bass but his had maple fretboard which I like also, but I like rosewood too. Also like Paul Simonon and he used a 70s P Bass. These two influence me on my choice of 70s RI P Bass.
My current bass I bought used and is a Japanese Precision Bass, PB70 US. I bought it used right around Christmas. I love this bass. It had some chipped paint in the backside and lower end, but heck it is a really nice quality bass and people actually pay big money for a factory made relic guitar but this was done naturally by the previous owner. Previous owner upgraded the pickup to a Seymour Duncan. He also changed the pickguard to a totoise shell but I wasn't crazy about it because there are different tort guards and this one was okay but not great. Kinda like my 2003 AVRI 62 Jazzmaster I bought new in 2003 has a great tort PG. They had a few but I got the good one according to the posters at the Offset Guitar Forum, and I agree it looks better than most. Well, I changed the one on the P Bass to a red pearloid guard. It looks amazing to me. I was not going to but I saw a bass posted here that was pearl white and had a red pearloid guard. Wasn't sure how it would look on mine because my bass is aged white, not pearloid white but in fact turned out great. I changed the strings to D'Adarrio Chromes. Funny for guitar flatwounds I don't like Chromes BUT on bass I do. For guitar it is Thomastik or Pyramid flats.
Oh, my first bass I had was a 1987 Jazz Bass Special. It was in grey, not sure if you would call it charcoal grey or gun metal grey but looked nice. In 1998 got it off eBay for $275 plus $25 shipping. Came with case. Those were the days you could get deals on eBay because eBay was in it's infancy and so was e-Commerce. Also inflation on instruments was not high like now and not everybody and his brother were not on the Bay buying up stuff. In fact I had placed my bid and it had four days left and I went to Las Vegas to visit my dad. No smart phones then, I had no laptop so it wasn't until I returned home that I saw I won the auction. No one bothered to outbid me. I fell on hard times and sold the bass in 2014 right when I was coming out of hard times but thought even with a new job I should sell it. I'm in LA, sold it to a guy from Miami visiting his mom in Pasadena. Sold it for $450. Now I think these go for about $800 used.
For guitars I prefer 1950s and 60s vintage or reissue but for P Basses I love the 70s models. I love the bigger headstock and the big Precision Bass logo on the headstock over the small one on previous generations. Originally this RI and the original P Basses of the 70s would have had a black pickguard but I went with the red pearloid. I am a fan of Pete Farndon of The Pretenders and he had a 70s P Bass but his had maple fretboard which I like also, but I like rosewood too. Also like Paul Simonon and he used a 70s P Bass. These two influence me on my choice of 70s RI P Bass.
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