A Squier Vintage Modified Jaguar SS could be another viable short scale option if you can find one used. I picked up a mint one for $140 off Craigslist last year.
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It's a "help me pick a first bass" thread, but maybe with some interesting angles
- Thread starter Horseflesh
- Start date
OP, this bass is discontinued, I agree it's a good choice, but they are getting harder to find.
People that have them are holding on to them.
$140 for a mint one is the exception not the rule,
they generally cost more if you can even find one....057912
If this is true, that's a pretty limited experience you've had. Personally, I see all different brands and styles of basses being played out there. By bass players.
If anything, I would assume guitar players would just go for the P or J bass. Not really knowing about all the other great basses we can play.
Not to dispute your personal experience but I think it's counterproductive to limit a new player to just a few options.
Use your $300 to buy a 1980s Peavey Foundation. American made and rock-solid. Amazing tone and playability. You won't regret it and they're lightyears ahead of the ones you're considering in terms of quality. Don't dismiss the regular long-scale basses because it will eliminate a lot of great options.
wintremute
mediocrity at its finest
- Oct 16, 2014
- 6,942
- 29,552
- Disclosures
- Endorsing Artist: Langstrom Carrot Farms
I'm not offended at all. I thought it was funny. To me it's quite strange to say "this massively popular brand of bass guitars is not really for bass players, so I don't recommend that you consider it."
Yep.... there's no need for you to buy a DI box. Your hi-z input will be fine with just about any bass or guitar.
I didn't own an amp when I first started playing bass. I'd practice through my daughter's guitar amp (at very low volume to avoid damaging it). I probably did 8-10 gigs going straight into the desk before I even bought an amp.
Wow...lots of questions. The Ibanez always give good value for the buck. They also have nice necks, meaning they are thin (not thick) and fairly narrow. Now, I've always play a Fender Jazz Bass (since 1966) so I like that slim and narrow neck. It's very easy to move around on. And don't limit yourself to short scale. A "normal" 34" scale bass is easy to play. I play bass, guitar, and keys. My bass is a 34" scale of course because it's a Fender Jazz and the guitar is tiny by comparison. But I have no trouble making the switch back and forth.
As other's said, don't get hung up on active or passive bass. My Jazz basses have both been passive, but I do have a 5-string that is active. However, I usually play it in passive mode (does both) I don't have to change the gain setting on my amp and I actually like the passive sound on it better than the active. When I play it in passive mode, the bass and treble controls don't work but the volume and the blend between the two pickups does. So just using the blend control works fine for me. Leads me to believe the electronics are not the best. But that's pretty typical in a $200 "active" bass.
My 5-string is an inexpensive one that I bought because I needed a 5'er to play about 5 songs for the group I was in and I was tired of down-tuning the E string of my Jazz. It's an early Rogue LX405 Pro (2009) when they were made in Korea. So it's the original Pro and not the Pro II or Pro III. Really excellent fit and finish on it and the sound it OK, but it doesn't compare to my Jazz. Now they are made in China and fit and finish is sometimes good and sometimes not so good. If I recall correctly it was either $199 or $209 when I bought it. I probably used it twice last year, so I'm not about to spend the big bucks for something I'm going to use that rarely.
My Grandson got a Squier "kit" (bass, amp, cord, and gig-bag) for Christmas two Christmas's ago. We were spending Christmas with them in Australia so I got to check out his bass. It was a Squier Precision with P and J pickups. Precision bass with their split pickups have a very specific sound, but that sound is on more records than any other bass. Virtually every recording studio knows how to make them sound good. Jazz bass can get close by turning off its bridge pickup and only using the neck pickup and rolling off a bit on the tone control. But it's not exactly the same. Jazz bass however is capable of a lot more sounds than the Precision. So his bass is a bit of the best of both works. His has the standard split pickups in the neck position and the Jazz bar-type pickup in the bridge position. So it hits the Precision sound right on the money and does a good imitation of the Jazz sound too.
On precision basses, the neck is both wider and fatter. I hate the neck on most P-basses so I don't have one. The neck on my Jazz is both narrower and slimmer than any P-bass. His 'Squier by Fender" wasn't really fatter than most Jazz basses I've picked up, though it was still wider. After playing it for a few minutes I though, "you know, I can comfortably play this". It was a bit surprising to me so I'd have no trouble recommending that to you. And I believe this was the Affinity version, which is the lowest priced bass of their offerings. The VM (Vintage Modified) is the next step up and it's around $100 more. Hard to go wrong here.
As other's said, don't get hung up on active or passive bass. My Jazz basses have both been passive, but I do have a 5-string that is active. However, I usually play it in passive mode (does both) I don't have to change the gain setting on my amp and I actually like the passive sound on it better than the active. When I play it in passive mode, the bass and treble controls don't work but the volume and the blend between the two pickups does. So just using the blend control works fine for me. Leads me to believe the electronics are not the best. But that's pretty typical in a $200 "active" bass.
My 5-string is an inexpensive one that I bought because I needed a 5'er to play about 5 songs for the group I was in and I was tired of down-tuning the E string of my Jazz. It's an early Rogue LX405 Pro (2009) when they were made in Korea. So it's the original Pro and not the Pro II or Pro III. Really excellent fit and finish on it and the sound it OK, but it doesn't compare to my Jazz. Now they are made in China and fit and finish is sometimes good and sometimes not so good. If I recall correctly it was either $199 or $209 when I bought it. I probably used it twice last year, so I'm not about to spend the big bucks for something I'm going to use that rarely.
My Grandson got a Squier "kit" (bass, amp, cord, and gig-bag) for Christmas two Christmas's ago. We were spending Christmas with them in Australia so I got to check out his bass. It was a Squier Precision with P and J pickups. Precision bass with their split pickups have a very specific sound, but that sound is on more records than any other bass. Virtually every recording studio knows how to make them sound good. Jazz bass can get close by turning off its bridge pickup and only using the neck pickup and rolling off a bit on the tone control. But it's not exactly the same. Jazz bass however is capable of a lot more sounds than the Precision. So his bass is a bit of the best of both works. His has the standard split pickups in the neck position and the Jazz bar-type pickup in the bridge position. So it hits the Precision sound right on the money and does a good imitation of the Jazz sound too.
On precision basses, the neck is both wider and fatter. I hate the neck on most P-basses so I don't have one. The neck on my Jazz is both narrower and slimmer than any P-bass. His 'Squier by Fender" wasn't really fatter than most Jazz basses I've picked up, though it was still wider. After playing it for a few minutes I though, "you know, I can comfortably play this". It was a bit surprising to me so I'd have no trouble recommending that to you. And I believe this was the Affinity version, which is the lowest priced bass of their offerings. The VM (Vintage Modified) is the next step up and it's around $100 more. Hard to go wrong here.
If you are looking at DI's with preamp, I'd really recommend the Eden WTDI. We used to play at a local Brew Pub a lot. We hosted an open mic on 3 to 5 Fridays a month. The first time there I rolled in my DNS-410 cabinet (by DNA) and my 800-watt Eden amp and the owner said, "no, that's way to much for here. Use that amp", and he pointed at a small Peavey 112 combo. It was loud enough for the room but the problem was I couldn't get what I considered a good sound out of it. So I bought a WTDI, which is an Eden stomp-box sized DI box with built-in Eden WT preamp plus a built-in adjustable compressor.
I plugged my bass into that, set my Bass and Treble flat, toggled the mid control to 500Hz (can also be set to 2.2KHz) added a touch of boost up to about 1:30 on the dial and then plugged the output into the effects-return of the Peavey combo. Voila', that Peavey combo now sounded like an Eden amp. That's because I plugged it into the effects return of the Peavey, which totally bypasses the Peavey preamp, and fed it right into Peavey's power section to be amplified. Eden is known for a very clean and warm sound and I've made all kinds of backline amps sound like an Eden amp with that WTDI. That worked great for me for over a year.
Then one Friday I show up and there's no amp. And I, of course, didn't bring one with me. Come to find out that amp belonged to someone who worked for the owner and they took it home. Was not a big deal though. I just ran an instrument cord out of the WTDI into an unbalanced input on the PA and played through the PA all night long. That worked great and I did that for another month or so before actually buying a small Eden set-up to use at that one venue.
And then later in 2019 we went to a recording studio in Seattle to put together a demo CD to send around to new clubs. They put our two guitarists in separate isolation booths and Keys, drums and bass in the big room. They wanted to put me through a DI to the board because using my amp and cab would cause too much bleed over into the drums. So I pulled my WTDI out of my gig-bag, plugged into that and plugged it into the wall. They really didn't want me to use my own DI because to them it was an "unknown" property and they knew what their standard DI box sounded like. I insisted and they let me do it. Sounded good in my headphones, so we continued on. It was a full three hour session and after I had taken my headphones off they asked me to put them back on and they played back parts of a couple of the songs for me.
Then they asked me what I thought about it. I said it sounds really great to me. The bass frequencies are a little more pronounced than usual, but those lower frequencies are really clear and everything really sounds great to me. The owner of studio smiled and said, that is exactly how your feed came to us. We haven't put any compression on it or done any EQ'ing to your signal. Mind if we come take a closer look at what you're using? So the engineer and the owner came out and looked at it while I explained that I ran it flat with just a little boost at 500Hz. Then the owner asked the price. It's $149 pretty much everywhere. Then he looked up and said, "Doesn't Eden want to sell amps anymore?".
Below is a shot of it. It comes with its own power supply. I carry it in my gig bag at all times and if I have to go through an FOH or am forced to use a backline amp, I pull it out and make everything sound great.
I don't think you're quite understanding. The Ibanez GSR200 bass is active, but it does not have active pick ups. The "active" part of the bass is the pre amp NOT pick ups. The person writing the article is WRONG. It is an active bass, it does not have active pick ups.
The Ibanez Mikro & Squier are passive. They have passive pick ups and no pre amp.
There are very few basses with active pick ups.
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Lot's of good advice here. I don't have anything new except to confirm the following.
- Active electronics on a cheap bass is usually going to have a poor quality preamp.
- You will be better off buying a D.I./ preamp. Eden, Sansamp, etc... than going with a cheap bass with active electronics.
- Play lots of basses, even out of your range so you hear the difference. If you can't play, have the sales guy play it for you but make sure you try so you can feel it.
- Buy used. It's a buyers market right now. I recently bought a used USA Jazz bass for $500. You can definitely find an overseas made bass for under $300.
Ah hah! Thanks!
I am definitely checking the used market now, the models recommended in this thread give me a lot of options to look for.
I wouldn’t call Ibanez basses massively popular, especially versus all the brands I recommended instead - I’m fine if you think so though. So why not stop quoting my post and deriding my opinion?
I think: If you want to learn photography, buy a Nikon or Cannon SLR. If you want to learn to skeet shoot, buy a Remington or Mossburg 12 or 20 gage. If you want to learn to drive a race car, buy a manual transmission rear wheel drive BMW. If you want to learn to play bass, buy a Fender (or Squier) P Bass. Frankly, any camera, any shotgun, any car, and any bass will worK. But going with the tried and true, the thing that most people who do the thing you want to do agree works, is a good tool to start off with.
Given the amount of research you have already done, and the solid advice in this thread, it would be very hard for you to screw this up. That being said, if you end up playing bass long-term, it's almost a sure thing that you will eventually end up with a different bass than the one you are buying now.
Outgrowing an instrument even a year from now would be a reason for celebration. I just need to pick something that isn't such a junker that it dissuades me from practicing after my first month. It sounds like any of the options discussed here will be a safe pick... And maybe I will hit the jackpot and find a great deal on a used bass next door.
If I am not so lucky as to find that one-owner Jaguar, and I just buy a new Bronco, or Ibanez, or whatever... It'll work out.
But I would sure like the right bass to make itself known tonight so I can have it this weekend.
Outgrowing an instrument even a year from now would be a reason for celebration. I just need to pick something that isn't such a junker that it dissuades me from practicing after my first month. It sounds like any of the options discussed here will be a safe pick... And maybe I will hit the jackpot and find a great deal on a used bass next door.
If I am not so lucky as to find that one-owner Jaguar, and I just buy a new Bronco, or Ibanez, or whatever... It'll work out.
But I would sure like the right bass to make itself known tonight so I can have it this weekend.
It’s not even about outgrowing or upgrading— no stone-cold newb could possibly know what they will and won’t like about certain basses. You may still be a rudimentary player a year from now, but even then you might realize you’d prefer a $300 Epi EB-0 over a $300 Squier Jazz. There is no way for you to know that right now.
Entry level guitars and basses have improved by leaps and bounds in the last 20 years or so. You seriously have to go out of your way to find a junker.
A lot of people would tell you to ignore the small differences at this stage, go with your gut, and buy the bass that you’d want to wake up in bed next to in the morning.
wintremute
mediocrity at its finest
- Oct 16, 2014
- 6,942
- 29,552
- Disclosures
- Endorsing Artist: Langstrom Carrot Farms
Sorry my own personal experience offends you personally. I agree, we should stop quoting each other.
I'm not offended, but I am annoyed. You know that two people can have conflicting yet equally valid opinions, right? It would be one thing if you were actually contributing to this thread with something that wasn't just replying to my posts and criticizing my very valid opinion, but I see three posts here and that's all you're doing. Trolling is against the forum rules.
