After selling my 2 main basses, Sandberg and Maruszczyk, I was looking for a budget friendly alternative that still feels and plays similarly. The M2 fit the bill with the 35'' scale, 24 frets and the 12'' fingerboard radius, and I'm quite happy with this bass overall.
Starting with the headstock end, the tuners are only okay, not particularly great. They do their job but there is quite a bit of play in them and they offer some resistance when you turn them which suggests that they might need some lubrication.
The nut is cut properly as in the nut slots are at the proper height and the proper shape and size for the strings, but they are a bit rough and could use some polishing (and of course lubrication, the old graphite from a pencil will do). Around the nut itself you can see some glue and some marks, and the paint of the matching headstock bleeds over the edge a little.
The fingerboard is rosewood, and at least on my example it's nice and dark. I've seen pictures of this bass with a light colored rosewood board and I think it really doesn't look good with the satin black finish. So I'm quite happy with mine but it's something to look out for if you order it unseen.
The rounded fingerboard edges are a nice touch, it's really quite comfortable to hold and play.
Fretwork, on my example, is great with the exception of a 5-fret area from the 12th to the 17th fret. After spot levelling that area I can play with a very low action, as low as on my sandberg or maruszczyk basses. (measured at the 24th fret, capo on the first fret to get the nut height out of the equation, from G to B .040'' 0.050'' 0.070'' 0.090'' 0.120''). That said, without the spot levelling the action on the G string had to be set quite high (for my taste) in order to not choke out. So I can only really recommend them to people who can fix up the fretwork themselves or are okay with investing in a fretjob in addition to the cost of the instrument.
The body is mahogany, you can see that faux binding where they didn't apply the black paint. Ergonomically speaking it's great and I do like to the look of it as well.
The bridge is a bent L shape bridge, Fender style pretty much, but it's an all steel construction as opposed to cheap, soft alloys that are used on many cheap instruments. I've never had an issue with said cheap bridges but it's still reassuring to know.
The pickups are just great, I honestly really like them. I thought I'd replace them at some point but I don't think that'll be necessary. They also have 4 wires + the shield wire so you can install some 3-way switches for serial/single coil/parallel mode on each pickup, something I really like.
The preamp sounds good as well, you have a trim pot inside the electronics cavity to adjust the preamp output to match the passive bass output (or however you like it). All the potentiometers except for one are sadly these little green ones which are impossible to maintain/lubricate if they develop issues from my experience.
The issue where the stacked pots engage each other when turning was quickly resolved on my bass by simply pulling on the top knob a bit so they have some room between them, not an issue IMO. The only other critique of the electronics are that the center detent is not very defined on these pots and that the pickup blend pot doesn't have a smooth transition from one pickup, to both, to the other but rather jumps around the center detent. Fairly common as far as I know, but still a bit annoying.
The battery compartment is held on with 4 screws. The entire electronics cavity only needs 3 but apparently it's necessary to hold this little plate in with 4 screws. A quick change plastic cavity here would obviously be better, but they opted for wooden covers on these basses for a more premium feel. Sadly that doesn't allow the quick change of batteries between songs on a gig in case your batteries run out, so in that case you'd have to fall back on the passive mode.
I think that's it, for 380€, if you're willing to invest some time or money into it for the fretwork and maybe get some upgrades down the line, this is honestly a great instrument in my eyes. I'm quite happy with it and it does properly replace my Sandberg and Maruszczyk basses for my use.
Starting with the headstock end, the tuners are only okay, not particularly great. They do their job but there is quite a bit of play in them and they offer some resistance when you turn them which suggests that they might need some lubrication.
The nut is cut properly as in the nut slots are at the proper height and the proper shape and size for the strings, but they are a bit rough and could use some polishing (and of course lubrication, the old graphite from a pencil will do). Around the nut itself you can see some glue and some marks, and the paint of the matching headstock bleeds over the edge a little.
The fingerboard is rosewood, and at least on my example it's nice and dark. I've seen pictures of this bass with a light colored rosewood board and I think it really doesn't look good with the satin black finish. So I'm quite happy with mine but it's something to look out for if you order it unseen.
The rounded fingerboard edges are a nice touch, it's really quite comfortable to hold and play.
Fretwork, on my example, is great with the exception of a 5-fret area from the 12th to the 17th fret. After spot levelling that area I can play with a very low action, as low as on my sandberg or maruszczyk basses. (measured at the 24th fret, capo on the first fret to get the nut height out of the equation, from G to B .040'' 0.050'' 0.070'' 0.090'' 0.120''). That said, without the spot levelling the action on the G string had to be set quite high (for my taste) in order to not choke out. So I can only really recommend them to people who can fix up the fretwork themselves or are okay with investing in a fretjob in addition to the cost of the instrument.
The body is mahogany, you can see that faux binding where they didn't apply the black paint. Ergonomically speaking it's great and I do like to the look of it as well.
The bridge is a bent L shape bridge, Fender style pretty much, but it's an all steel construction as opposed to cheap, soft alloys that are used on many cheap instruments. I've never had an issue with said cheap bridges but it's still reassuring to know.
The pickups are just great, I honestly really like them. I thought I'd replace them at some point but I don't think that'll be necessary. They also have 4 wires + the shield wire so you can install some 3-way switches for serial/single coil/parallel mode on each pickup, something I really like.
The preamp sounds good as well, you have a trim pot inside the electronics cavity to adjust the preamp output to match the passive bass output (or however you like it). All the potentiometers except for one are sadly these little green ones which are impossible to maintain/lubricate if they develop issues from my experience.
The issue where the stacked pots engage each other when turning was quickly resolved on my bass by simply pulling on the top knob a bit so they have some room between them, not an issue IMO. The only other critique of the electronics are that the center detent is not very defined on these pots and that the pickup blend pot doesn't have a smooth transition from one pickup, to both, to the other but rather jumps around the center detent. Fairly common as far as I know, but still a bit annoying.
The battery compartment is held on with 4 screws. The entire electronics cavity only needs 3 but apparently it's necessary to hold this little plate in with 4 screws. A quick change plastic cavity here would obviously be better, but they opted for wooden covers on these basses for a more premium feel. Sadly that doesn't allow the quick change of batteries between songs on a gig in case your batteries run out, so in that case you'd have to fall back on the passive mode.
I think that's it, for 380€, if you're willing to invest some time or money into it for the fretwork and maybe get some upgrades down the line, this is honestly a great instrument in my eyes. I'm quite happy with it and it does properly replace my Sandberg and Maruszczyk basses for my use.
