What was your first bass guitar?

[bassclef112]

After scrimping and saving from a part time job I finally had enough to go to Silver & Horland here in NYC (a well known shop)
and buy a brand-new-out-of-a-box 1970 Telecaster bass. After many years of mods I finally ran out of wood on the original body (which I still have)
and mounted the neck on a Koa Jazz body. Kept it that way for some years when I decided to bring back the Tele. Bought a loaded Warmoth body
off ebay and now have the original neck/tuners and pickup covers on it.

 

[GwenOnBass]

Ed: And how old was that bass?
Johnny: That bass is so old the foam mutes are petrified!

You probably need to be a certain age to even remember when that bit was funny. For me, it's close to home. Literally. My house on this timeline is within short walking distance of NBC Studios, where tourists line up each day for a chance of free tickets to The Tonight Show. Ours is a shared household of musicians who likely engage in all sorts of questionable behaviors. None of us can pass the Disneyland appearance check ....

What is not at question is a couple years earlier I sold my stereo to raise enough money to buy my brand new Music Man StingRay for $300. Same sum I paid in 73 for my prized Raleigh International. Reckoned playing music is better than listening to music. That was the spring of '79 and she's still my bass today. Bought her at a mom and pop shop that was essentially a piano store with some guitars in the basement level. Lordie how I wanted that Music Man amp, but all I could afford for an amp was a POS of unrecalled make.

Yes, the original foam mutes are actually petrified. Hard as rocks, what's left of them. Discovered this Monday when I demonstrated the foam mute system for a friend. Loosed the screw to show how it works and POP! off came a neighboring chunk o' petrified foam. First time I'd looked at the mute system, or even used it since Burbank days. (I took a few decades off the bass for career &c.)

The other standing Johnny Carson joke, of course, is about all the Old People in Burbank. I believe I know what he means.

And now the project is the restoration of the foam mutes. Attached: Exhibit A. "The Evidence": one detached petrified foam mute.

 

[Poor_Richard]

Mine was a black Ibanez TR-750 i bought from a guitar playing friend of mine because he switched to guitar and the band we were in at the time needed a bass player.
I still have it it's in dire need of an great maintenance job.

Didn't play bass for 15 years or so and then got me cheap POS Stagg BC300-5 bk because the next band had songs written for a 5-stringer, and i didn't like to downtune the bass. Reallly regretted that soon and bought an black Ibanez GSR205 which i now play. A while a go i bought a black Höfner Shorty for jamming and traveling, which i love to play even more than my Ibanezes.
I still have all my bass guitars.

(Update 29th june 2017)
According to some folks an Ibanez isn't a real bass guitar. So I guess the Höfner Shorty is my 1st "Real" bass guitar.
Since I had only 1 decent 5-string (Ibanez ) i needed another decent one for gigging. So last week i acquired a Stingray SUB5 at a local music center.
So i guess the Sterling Stingray SUB 5 is my 2nd "real" one

 

[ELG60]

I started by playing a white Hagstrom bass with a really cheesy tone imo, and horrible neck and action. Like you, in 1979, and being influenced by a friend of mine who was a quite good bass player, I went to Ed's Guitars on Bird RD, and picked up this 69 Jazz you see here. Just photographed it for this posting. I think that I paid about $450 but that's just a WAG.

Other than a Badass II bridge, and missing ashtrays, which weren't present when I purchased it, it's totally stock. I like it better than my 64 Jazz.


---

 

[Haroldo]

Initally a '67 Kingston violin bass - completely ungiggable (or so I thought). I would rent/borrow a EB-2, EB-3 or a beater Precision of unknown age/provenence until finally I purchased a gorgeous '66 Precision (surbust/tort as mandated by law). I was a foolish, foolish boy as I eventually ripped the frets of it and refinshed it to a natural brown. Sold it for $140. The folly of youth......

 

[JRA]

first real bass was a kay plywood DB. first EB was ric: the guy i knew who worked in the local music store told me that rics were the go-to EB for "serious" cats roflmao, so i bought one. (that was around 1975 --- i had already been playing saxes for over a dozen years.) don't have either of the bass instruments anymore --- like the OP = long gone.

 

[jasonrp]

93 MIM P bass. I've had many more over the years but this has always been my number 1. Other than an Am Jazz, I haven't found anything that I've liked as much as the P. (sold the J, kept the P)

 

[Brian Silcock]

I had gone thru a bunch of POS'es (Cort, Univox, Sears {remember when Sears sold guitars!}) before getting a new *then* 1989 Fender P bass. It is gone now and have had a great selection of Ibanez and Yamaha basses since. Which are also all gone! Currently waiting on a Sire V7 to be delivered.

 

[Haroldo]

Initally a '67 Kingston violin bass - completely ungiggable (or so I thought). I would rent/borrow a EB-2, EB-3 or a beater Precision of unknown age/provenence until finally I purchased a gorgeous '66 Precision (surbust/tort as mandated by law). I was a foolish, foolish boy as I eventually ripped the frets of it and refinshed it to a natural brown. Sold it for $140. The folly of youth......

ETA: RIP Henry's music, Green Bay, WI

 

[rtslinger]

My First real bass was my 1975 Gibson L9-S The Ripper in 1975 I got it from a local music shop called Sweet Sounds in Lyndhurst, NJ I paid $575.00 and ? extra for the case.
This bass has been with me ever since.

than and now

it is still all original nothing changed but the strings the place is still open and running today

My Ripper wasn't my first or second electric bass but I considered the others toys in comparison my first was a Norma short scale $56.00 Toy Guys Dept store. my second was a Kay EB-3 copy just to clarify since I've seen many posters adding what they considered (real basses)

 

[kevmc28]

1992 Peavey Fury

 

[Dammit_Carl!]

Whew...first girl to the dance was a Hamer of some sort. Can't rightly recall too much more except a P-ish sort of body, split pickups and...? What sold me on her was the luxurious purple paint somebody had applied (maybe came that way from the factory, don't know) with the black hardware. The hardshell case that came with it was a very, very nice plus too.

Wish I could say I had a long time playing it and so on, but I passed her on to get a Fender Jazz not too long after. Thanks purple Hamer, wherever you are!

 

[friskinator]

My first bass was a Matsumoku-made Vantage that I got for Christmas when I was 12. Played it and learned on it for around 3 years before I decided I "needed" something better. I had no idea at the time that the Vantage was a high-quality instrument, and since I was mainly into hair metal, I wanted something that looked the part. My parents then got me a white MIJ Charvel P that I played for several years.

I've owned a million basses since then, but I wish I still owned those 2.

 

[Bunk McNulty]

My 1st real bass was a Hagstrom like the one below but in white. It was stolen.

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Ha! Mine was a '60s Hag II. Skinny ski-jump neck, never had it set up properly. Oddly enough, it too was stolen. Always wondered what that gold mesh thingy in the center was about.

 

[Blue Dragon]

My 1st real bass was a Hagstrom like the one below but in white. It was stolen.

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Cool! My first was a Hagstrom too! "Futurama" This isn't mine of course, just an image I found but same model. Looks just like it except as I recall the vinyl on the back of mine was peeling more. In this case I remember it fondly but am NOT sorry I got rid of it. As OP said, the neck bow was so bad I could use it to shoot arrows. Funny, I went straight from this to a Rickenbacker 4001 (Rush fan doncha know back in the day.) Now THERES a bass I wish I still had! In fact, I don't think I'd ever heard the name Hagstrom again till last year when I hooked up with my current bandmates and the lead guitarist plays a Hagstrom. Guess they're still around, just out of the limelight.

 

[Koog]

1964 Hofner 500/1 purchased from Schmidt Musik in Kirschberg, Germany for 360 Deutsch Marks ($90 US). Bought two of them that day. One stayed with me, the other went to a friend. Mine is long gone. The friend still has his.

I have no photos.

 

[Doner Designs]

Stingray HH. I would still have it if not for a desire to play stuff that I put together myself.

 

[Stempelloos]

So let's hear what your first "real" bass was?

The first "real" bass I played was a 1980's Tokai Jazz sound bass.

Quite a bit more beaten an battered than the above, but similar in color.


It actually was the trumpet players bass. He asked me to play bass in the band he had with his drumming brother. He would play the trumpet and I would bring in my synthesizer.

It was quite a change from my first bass, a modded 1964 Italian hollowbody Cougar bass.
But it meant that I could play bass again after the Cougar was turned into art by a former band member and therefore beyond repair.

 

[Fight4Bottom]

Does an '85 Peavey Patriot count? I still have, though I never play it.

I consider it my first, because prior to that, I bought an very cheap and unplayable Madeira. I don't know the model, but it was an SG knockoff. After that, I got the Patriot, which at the time felt like a real bass. Then I ripped the frets out of the Madeira and filled it with balsa, painted the body white, and ended up with a nice looking unplayable fretless.

 

[hopwheels]

'79 or '80 Ibanez Blazer, first gen pickup, which I no longer own, then got a '81 or '82 Kramer Pioneer, which I still own and recently restored.

Finished...well...almost

• hopwheels
• Apr 26, 2016