how has your taste in basses changed?

[dbsfgyd1]

when i first started playing bass in 1994 and for years after, i played black PJ basses with rosewood fingerboards. then i changed... i started thinking a little variety couldn't hurt. i got a minty green (ibanez called it lime) mikro. i enjoyed it. the world didn't end.

now i have a red bronco (maple neck, fingerboard is part of the neck), a surf green mustang, a wood finish GSR100EX, a roadster orange mezzo (i always like that orange, but it didn't used to fit in with my dark color scheme). i also owned a sunburst traveler TB-4P that i sold.... apparently along with all my black basses. my semi-hollow ibanez SRH500 doesn't even come in black.

when i went to order my smallguitars.com bass, i went with daphne blue, and it was then that i realized both of my black basses, only bought to mod, aren't even with the basses i currently play. * gasp *

and the only bass i'm pondering now is a short scale EBMM stingray. not a PJ, not black.

i also moved from long scale to short scale, but that wasn't so much taste as injury. on the other hand, i love my short scales - i just hadn't given any a chance before that. sort of a machismo thing - can women have machismo?

so what - if anything - has changed when it comes to your bass taste / preferences?

Starting out as a huge Jack Bruce fan, I had a couple of EB3s but found out I didn’t play like him much and never could duplicate his sound. Next up, a Rickenbacker 4001 hoping I landed somewhere between Entwistle and Squire and didn’t. But I did discover Ric-O-Sound using a SVT head, Ampeg V4B 215 reflex inclosure for the neck pickup, and a Hiwatt custom 100 head powering a 412 Hiwatt cab for the bridge pickup, was a glorious experience filling in the voids of a power trio.

Then in the mid 70’s the touring stopped and recording started. A buddy that had a studio set up, asked me to lay down a track using his bass, a Fender PB that had the deadest crusty flat wounds he resecuted from some primordial swamp wrapped around dinosaur bones. My thought from this session was if this bass sounds this good as it was, if would be amazing with a decent fresh set of rounds.

Been using Fender Basses ever since.

 

[J-Bassomatic]

sort of a machismo thing - can women have machismo?

Machisma?

 

[rtslinger]

Not sure it has? I had always been draw to basses that weren't the same old same old designs and it still clouds any rational thinking during the hunting and buying process.

 

[bassdude51]

I've gone from basses with automatic transmissions to basses with manual transmissions. In other words, from "whistles and bells" to single coil Precision Basses.

 

[Baa]

Not at all, and probably won´t...

Started playing in the early 80's and bought a Vantage my second year playing.
And now almost 40 years later it's still Vantage VP710B.
I have changed, the music has too, but my instrument of choice is the same.

 

[AudioTaper]

In my mid-life teens, I liked the lightweight and small bodies of Ibanez SR and Pedulla Rapture. Then I moved into heavy Jazz Basses and a Musicman Stingray once I was in my early 20's.
15 years later, I like all of the above, except for a couple Really heavy Jazz basses I had. I miss the Pedulla and the Stingray a lot, but I have a small army of Peavey Cirrus. The Cirrus has 'always been there' in my line of go-to basses. I prefer 24-fret, I just like where my thumb hits for slapping. Heres one of them, I just went over it thoroughly.

I miss the Stingray sound, so I'm planning a fairly involved mod of one of the Cirrus.
Here is link to the thread for anyone interested Peavey FrankenCirrus mod thread

Edit
After reading some of the other members responses, I wonder how much of what we play now and why has to do with
A. Different musical taste
B. Working around injuries.

At least for me, I've always had some hand 'limitations', so that's not changed. But my musical taste has changed a LOT in the past 25 years of playing. I used to listed to a lot of Metallica and Red Hot Chili Peppers.
Now I listen to a lot of Metallica and Red Hot Chili Peppers

 

[mongo2]

My taste in basses over the decades has been...in a word...

Eclectic.

 

[Ostie]

years ago, i, too, felt that anything but fender was the way to go. turned out that when i gave them a chance, i love fenders and squiers.

I had several basses before I got my Jazz in 2001. In order, they were T-40, Victory, Rick, Kramer, and Foundation. Once I got the J I decided that Fenders were just fine. I’ve also had a Sting signature and a Jag, but they didn’t stick around. I don’t see the J going anywhere, though.

 

[Ric5]

how has your taste in basses changed?

For years I was a vintage, passive, 4 string only guy … that was from 1968 to 2001 … then I got in a band where I needed to have a low D … in a few years I completely re-invented myself and now all of my basses have more than 4 strings.

 

[Erich Bruning]

I've pretty much been a P or P/J fan, although I have flirted with other styles. What has changed, is a switch from preferring a fat U shaped neck to a flatter C profile.

 

[Pings Bass]

When I couldn't afford it, I wanted a boutique exotic wood neck-through. Now that I can afford it, I realize I can get my sounds on cheap, but well-built, production instruments.

I used to see Leo-designed basses as ho-hum pedestrian, and felt kind of stuck on them. Now I embrace them all.

 

[Dynomuttasaurus]

I've gone from thinking that one, expensive bass was the holy grail of respectability. Brand name somehow made the player more legit.

I now have a stable of low-mid price basses that sound fantastic and give me a crazy rainbow of bass textures to play with.

 

[Jeff Hughes]

I have gigged P basses for 15 years. I just got an SG bass, and suddenly my preference is leaning toward the short scale glued in neck. I have not gigged it yet, for obvious reasons, so I hope that the SG has more than “playing at home” or “in store appeal.”

The string spacing and radius just seem more comfortable. Short scale glued neck is what my first bass was, so maybe I am coming back home as it were. This is probably the last bass I will buy. I have owned all of the bucket list basses I wanted, and that is not many.

 

[Seashore]

I'm with you there. I've had several basses pass through my hands since I started playing circa 1994 and it's only now that I feel like I have my two "forever" basses. It's like with dating- you go out with multiple people to really discover what you value most.

And what's interesting is discovering that what you think you want isn't always what's best for you. A bass that's totally your type on paper may not move you when you play it whereas a bass that isn't really your type may give you that "OH YEAH!!!!" feeling when you strap it on.

Both of my forever basses are testament to that, as they run counter "my type" in multiple ways. Like, if I were designing my dream bass from the ground up, it wouldn't be anything like my current basses. And there is a good chance I may not like it as much.

But perhaps that's the beauty of it all. I love my forever basses to bits and GAS for nothing else.

Indeed, my "dream bass" on paper years ago would probably have more to do with specs that I thought would sound good and/or look cool, and probably wouldn't have been very fun for me to play. I have a natural tendency to view instruments as challenges, and always feel a little drive to go for something BIGGER and BETTER next time, and that's led me to bite off more than I can chew on a couple of occasions. My first six string and my long scale baritone were like that, I figured I could just jump in and everything would come together. Oops. The last bass I bought was accompanied by a very conscious effort to rein that in and buy for specs I already knew and used successfully.

 

[CallMeAl]

I don’t know if my tastes have changed, so much as I’ve been able to narrow down what I prefer.

I started on an Ibanez SR- something or other. All I knew about it was the neck felt great, it looked pretty cool and the price sure was right! Not my photo, but this is what it looks like in my memory:

In between I’ve had a host of basses, mostly 2-pickup, and they all were chosen based on a neck that felt similar to my first neck.

Maybe 18 months ago I got my first P bass. I love the sound and simplicity, and realize I’m a sucker for the classic Fender look. But that neck didn’t fit me; I realized I had burned that tighter string spacing into my muscle memory.

So I decided to get crafty and put on a Jazz neck. So glad I did, this bass is perfect for me. My current taste:

 

[fishdreams]

The change has been that I started focusing on what i really wanted to be able to do on a bass and realized that there is no factory bass out there that covered all my usual musical scenarios comfortably in one instrument (or 2, given I do fretless/fretted in ~70/30 division).

So I went to Martin Keith , got the fretless and now am awaiting delivery of its fretted sibling. Similarity in neck shape, setup etc will make it seamless for me to switch between fretted and fretted.

This induced another change: the playability and scope of expression of the Martin Keith is such, that it inspired readjusting my attack (technique) towards a soft touch, because the tone is so much richer (and audibly so, in the stuff i do).

So this has in turn led to a reassesment and re-valuation of my other basses. The Abass, a great bass but rather softspoken and with a subtle tone that had a tendency to choke a little when hit hard, got back its flats, and really shines again now that I play it continuously with a soft touch. At the same time, The Danelectro Longhorn my wife gave me, the $65 BB300 and the Geddy are tons of fun for certain things.

 

[micguy]

1970's - Rick 4001. Since 1982 - no Rics. Early 80's - Kramer metal neck basses (the best basses from metal). 12 pounds, healthy neck dive, etc. Today: I do have one bass that's 8 pounds - a 5 stringer. All the others are lighter, down to a 6.6 pounder. All custom Warmoth builds, with aluminum hardware, roasted necks, etc. None of them have even a hint of neck dive.

 

[210superair]

I haven't touched an electric bass since I started uprights.

 

[Diminishedfilth]

Years back, I didn’t like any of Fender’s 5-string Bass offerings (of course, never having played one). I always thought that it looked forced into the template.
Well, guess what I recently purchased

I’ve had a few 5-string Basses before. They always “had” to be 35” scale, neck-thru, 4+ types of lumber, etc... basic gear snob behavior.
I’m honestly in love with this one. Glad I came around.

 

[luciens]

My tastes have changed, but generally according to the wear and tear of age. My arms/wrists/hands are a lot weaker and prone to injury now than when I started playing. And my hearing can't handle high-db SPL's anymore either.

So I started out on fretted basses, and even adopted 5 and 6 strings for quite a long time. But I can't physically handle gigantic instruments with huge necks on them as well as I used to. Also, my hearing doesn't like lots and lots of low bottom bass energy so huge humbucker type tones aren't quite as desireable for me as they once were.

So I've ended up with 4 string FL jazz basses as my main instruments, at least for now. The bridge PU soloed with a nasally, but muffled, tone and tons of compression tends to be the tone I prefer these days. So the humbucker at the bridge thing isn't absolutely priority #1 now, unless it's also capable of a single-coil or parallel tone.

That's not to say I won't end up with a 5 or 6 string again, just that it won't be the main bass anymore.

I probably will eventually end up with a humbucker at the bridge, since I do plan on an L2K at some point in the future, soon as I find one with the right neck on it, etc.

So I've kind of gone full circle, except for the frets I guess.

As for brands, I went through a very lengthy no-Fender period, but when I discovered G&L that eventually changed that. Now I have 2 fender jazz basses and eventually an L2K on the way plus or minus the force of GAS....

L