After approximately 2 years of being a beatles fan (yes i know, two years isnt that much but im crazy hooked), finally got myself a violin bass! Decided to pull the trigger on this guy mainly because it was on sale, but i was BLOWN AWAY by the quality of this out of the box! The finish was great, a little blemishes here and there but hardly noticeable cuz they were all on the backside. The light flamed maple top was nice, i like how it isn't too obvious. Purfling looks great too, didn't even notice it was there from the pictures! only real complaint about the appearance is that the neck and neck pickup look really high up on the body compared to a hofner, makes it look kinda cheap and bootlegish, like it doesn't have to branch out that far. Most reviews i've seen have talked about the terrible fretwork on these, but mine were levelled pretty well! no sharp ends or anything either! bridge intonation was great out of the box, just needed action adjustment. tuning machines hold up ok for now, but we'll see in a few months. The roundwounds sounded ok out of the box, really weak and grindy, restrung it with some ernie ball cobalts and WOW this thing sounds great. super tappy and uprighty, but still has a little growl on it. only thing is that you have to make sure to string it with like 2-3 inches of slack and fiddle a bit with it, because i put the E string on straight and there was CRAZY fret buzz, even after truss rod adjustment because it was too high and i was trying to figure out where the hell the buzz was coming from so that was kind of a downside. Bridge pickup isn't as horrendous as people make it out to be, i actually quite enjoyed it. only major flaw i can think of about mine is that when i took the pickguard and truss rod cover off, it was absolutely caked in sawdust. what the hell man... my dad's gonna be mad at me for getting the floor all messy. oh and also the output jack was super loose (not the jack itself but the grip on the cable it kept falling out) so i have to kinda hook the cable under my strap. Overall pretty good bass, probably got lucky with this one but i'm gonna give it a solid 7/10. definitely not worth the money at full price though, wait for it to go on sale at GC or MF or Target or Walmart or any of those other places. Took the super sharp cheesy pickguard off him and glued a bassman sticker on (not pictured). Really happy with Maxwell (thats his name now i know he didnt play a hofner on maxwells silver hammer so just deal with it) Big tip for anyone who buys any violin bass, DONT take off all the strings at the same time, restring on at a time so it doesn't fall out, it will be a pain trying to get it back in the right place. thankfully i didn't take em off all at once haha.
