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Playing Left sucks when you don't have endless resources

#22
Sign me in for the "leftys playing righty" club. My dad's also a lefty who plays righty guitar, so it was a no brainer for me. If it's good enough for Patitucci, then it should be good enough for all of us! :D
 
#25
Hubbabubba said:
Who plays left and knows this feeling frustated looking on endless opportunities for right hand player while we have to pull a Hendrix.
I mean come-on music man with there one propper sterling model that looks like a Ikea bookshelf type a wood. No color option nothing.
And you can't find a jazz bass with a neck with inlays for leftys without loosing an arm and a leg.
And then hits covid and worse become Armageddon.
Sucks isn't it??
Click to expand...

I hate to rain on your kinda whiny rant, but; speaking as a lefty who currently owns 23 left handed basses; 7 left handed guitars; and a left handed, long scale banjo from 1963? You need to be doing a little less bitchin' - and a whole lot more looking. I've managed to find a left handed "A" neck '78 Fender P-Bass; a couple of lefty Danelectros; a couple of lefty Gibson Thunderbirds; even a real, factory-lefty Gretsch bass. My left handed Alembic is very nice, too. It didn't happen overnight; it took time; patience; and a whole lot of diligent looking. Lots of us lefties love to bitch about how nobody makes anything for us, and blah blah blah. Is it going to change anything? No. There aren't enough of us - who can't play right handed - for companies to interrupt production for about half of the lefty 10% of the population. A very, very tiny handful of which wants to play a bass...
Yes, it does bother me; bothers me a lot. But, I can't do anything about it; the company's bean counters aren't about to let them interrupt making things that they can (and will) sell, to make things they can't/won't sell. It's all about the bottom line; and the bottom line says "too bad for you - and the rest of you". So, I suck it up, and I don't worry about it - much. Which is probably why I managed to get to be a 70 year old guy, with no ulcers and all my hair... I got almost all my instruments by scouring the Internet. Lefty music stores; regular music stores; and of course - eBay. Where I recently found a very nice, Left handed Schecter C6-IV Hellraiser bass that's giving me a little GAS. There's lefty stuff out there; all you have to do is look a little harder...:whistle:
 
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#28
Hubbabubba said:
Who plays left and knows this feeling frustated looking on endless opportunities for right hand player while we have to pull a Hendrix.
I mean come-on music man with there one propper sterling model that looks like a Ikea bookshelf type a wood. No color option nothing.
And you can't find a jazz bass with a neck with inlays for leftys without loosing an arm and a leg.
And then hits covid and worse become Armageddon.
Sucks isn't it??
Click to expand...
Who needs endless resources when there's one prime resource available?
Photo-Collage-1629060546548.jpg
 
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#35
I just want to give y’all an idea of what it takes to make lefties. I worked for an acoustic maker for five years. 12 employees. We had two weeks a year that were designated for lefty instruments; 24 guitars. That’s all.

The reason is this - EVERYTHING has to be flipped. This is somewhat of a consideration for electrics as well, but it’s really a big deal for acoustics. Top thicknessing; reversed. Bracing; reversed. Whole set of body molds just for lefty cutaways. Inlays: reversed on tops and sides of fretboards. And peg head carving and inlays. All reversed. We had the weekend before to retool the entire shop and the weekend after to reverse those changes. We did it and we did not upcharge for it but we really should have; the amount of overtime was punitive and the cost of building new tooling and molds for two weeks usage per year IMO wasn’t worth it.

That being said, for electrics, CNC should take a lot of the work out it, but still leaves you with programming costs, testing, reversed tuners and nut blanks.
 
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#36
arbiterusa said:
I just want to give y’all an idea of what it takes to make lefties. I worked for an acoustic maker for five years. 12 employees. We had two weeks a year that were designated for lefty instruments; 24 guitars. That’s all.

The reason is this - EVERYTHING has to be flipped. This is somewhat of a consideration for electrics as well, but it’s really a big deal for acoustics. Top thicknessing; reversed. Bracing; reversed. Whole set of body molds just for lefty cutaways. Inlays: reversed on tops and sides of fretboards. And peg head carving and inlays. All reversed. We had the weekend before to retool the entire shop and the weekend after to reverse those changes. We did it and we did not upcharge for it but we really should have; the amount of overtime was punitive and the cost of building new tooling and molds for two weeks usage per year IMO wasn’t worth it.

That being said, for electrics, CNC should take a lot of the work out it, but still leaves you with programming costs, testing, reversed tuners and nut blanks.
Click to expand...

That's very interesting thanks for sharing.
 
#37
Every once in a while I see a cool used lefty instrument for sale way less than a right, probably ultra niche demand or lack thereof. But yeah, you have a bit less choice in general.

My kids will play right even if they are left handed. The notes come from the fingerboard anyways.
 
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#38
In today's market you can still find a ton of lefty basses at a great variety just on Reverb and Ebay alone. Not mentioning Craigslist, facebook market and other forums, even here on this forum there's a few up for sale.
Gotta dig for it!
 
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#39
GIBrat51 said:
I hate to rain on your kinda whiny rant, but; speaking as a lefty who currently owns 23 left handed basses; 7 left handed guitars; and a left handed, long scale banjo from 1963? You need to be doing a little less bitchin' - and a whole lot more looking. I've managed to find a left handed "A" neck '78 Fender P-Bass; a couple of lefty Danelectros; a couple of lefty Gibson Thunderbirds; even a real, factory-lefty Gretsch bass. My left handed Alembic is very nice, too. It didn't happen overnight; it took time; patience; and a whole lot of diligent looking. Lots of us lefties love to bitch about how nobody makes anything for us, and blah blah blah. Is it going to change anything? No. There aren't enough of us - who can't play right handed - for companies to interrupt production for about half of the lefty 10% of the population. A very, very tiny handful of which wants to play a bass...
Yes, it does bother me; bothers me a lot. But, I can't do anything about it; the company's bean counters aren't about to let them interrupt making things that they can (and will) sell, to make things they can't/won't sell. It's all about the bottom line; and the bottom line says "too bad for you - and the rest of you". So, I suck it up, and I don't worry about it - much. Which is probably why I managed to get to be a 70 year old guy, with no ulcers and all my hair... I got almost all my instruments by scouring the Internet. Lefty music stores; regular music stores; and of course - eBay. Where I recently found a very nice, Left handed Schecter C6-IV Hellraiser bass that's giving me a little GAS. There's lefty stuff out there; all you have to do is look a little harder...:whistle:
Click to expand...

"on your kinda whiny rant"
Yeah sorry not all can be so cool about it like you with your 23 left handed bass guitars.
 
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