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What was your first bass guitar?

#481
I'm very sorry to hear of your loss Dr. Cheese. I lost both my parents at about the same time over 20 years ago, so I understand the pain you're feeling right now. It's the good memories that will see you through this difficult time. Your bass playing is your Mom's legacy to you.
My first bass was a one pickup Kay with a metal parallelogram pickguard/control plate that I bought for $40. in a pawn shop near Times Sq. in 1964. I had to borrow $20. from my drummer (and best friend). They also had a Sonic blue Fender Jazz with matching headstock available for $80. which I wanted but couldn't afford. What would that be worth today? My folks were not supportive of my musical ambitions at the time, so there was no help from them. However, the next year, I wanted to buy my first amp (I had borrowed up to that time), and I asked them for a little help and they both looked at each other and said no. Later on that evening my father came to me and handed me $50. and said "Don't tell your mother about this". I swore not to and grabbed the cash. About an hour later, my mother came to me and handed me another $50. and said " Don't ever tell your father about this". Needless to say, I took her up on that offer as well.
The funny thing is, until they day they left this life, I kept my word and never told either about those deals. Thanks Mom and Dad.
Remember Dr. Cheese, as long as you keep people in your heart they never truly leave us.
 
#482
cheese,
i am verry sorry about your mom. i lost mine 4 years ago today. jeeze i almost forgot until i read your post. i think that is how we cope is to try and forget thisngs like this over time.
my first real bass was my 1969 dan armstrong plexi. i named it "dan". every christmas my mom would would hang a little stocking on one of the machine heads. on christmas morning there would always be some money in the stocking for "dan". that will always be my favorite memory of my mom. that and the day i met little steven and the next day telling my mom about it. i was giddy as a little kid on christmas. my mom just sat there and listend and paid to have the autographs framed for me. in a time like this cheese, just remember the good and fun times. it never get easier, just less painful.
 
#484
alanbass1 said:
Condolences offered, it's hard losing a loved one.

My first bass was a Musicmaster, which I saved up for myself and purchased for £70 in '76. I thought is was great and it had the al important 'Fender' on the headstock, just like Gary Thain's bass, my idol at the time!
Click to expand...

Sorry to hear about your mother Dr.Cheese.

My first bass was also a Fender Musicmaster bought as a xmas gift from my mom when I was 13. The only reason I got the bass was that the Red Congas I wanted were $200 and the bass was $100 and $15 for the case.
 
#485
My condolences about your mother, Dr. Cheese. Don't think of it as Earth losing a person-think of it as Heaven gaining an angel.

Both of my basses were gifts from my grandparents. My first was a Washburn XB100, that I still own and use. There's a bunch of things wrong with it right now, but I plan on fixing it up.
 
#486
So sorry to hear about your Mom. I hope you had many great years with her, and that many great memories are with you.

My first bass was bought for me by my mother. It was a green Hofner copy of an unknown maker. She also got me my first real bass amp, an Ampeg B25-B, which I still have.

Again so sorry for you loss.
 
#487
My first bass is a Cort Action Bass, I asked for it for Christmas about 3 years ago. I played it for a couple of days (tried playing it is a better word) then put it away for months. One day I remembered I had a bass, took it out, and been playing 5 hours a day min ever since :)
 
#490
wow, sorry about you mother.


my first bass was a Cort "Spacebass" headless Steinberger ripoff. My 1st music teacher convinced my mom to buy me an electric after I was playing in Orchestra (using school basses) and I joined Jazz band. I learned my first Rush song a few days later and the rest is history.

That teacher was a great influence on my playing, and developing myself into the musician I am today. He taught all of us how to listen and play together, and to approach music from different angles and experiment with different sounds. He died in a motorcycle accident almost 15 years ago. But his legacy lives on through all the musicians in our area who are still playing.
 
#492
The first bass I owned was a gift...

I started out on a Hagstrom bass in the mid 70s that belonged to a studio where I was hanging out with some other musicians (I was a young trombone player back then). An Australian woman I was getting to know around that time asked me over to her house one afternoon and took me into her bedroom to show me a sunburst '64 Fender Jazz bass lying on her bed. "It's yours," she said.

It turns out her brother had been a bassist who'd travelled to NY to buy this bass new, toured all over Austrailia with it, then died in a car crash a few years later. Her mother had hung on to the bass, sayng it should go to "someone who'd appreciate it." Without my knowing it, my friend had arranged to have it shipped to her from Australia to give to me.

I lost touch with that woman a long time ago, but I still play -- and appreciate -- that J-bass to this day. I've had many offers to sell it over the years, but of course I never will.
 
#493
hang in there doc

my first bass was a fender Mexican made pbass with emg's. i got it for my birth day totally buy surprise it was second hand off ebay with the emgs and a badassII in it (it's very cool to me at least). i had been trying to fix up and old P.O.S. p copy that a dead friend of my dad left him. it was going to cost me alot so my dad surprised me with a good bass.



this is it(i still have it as my main bass)

pbass3.jpg


pbass2.jpg


thats the living room (so no that tv is not in my room)
 
#496
I'm happy to see that this thread brought back some memories for fellow TBers about their basses and their loved ones. I'm back home now getting ready for the funeral. Since the whole family came and it was on short notice, I have no bass for a while. I know it sounds tacky mentioning this at such a time, but bass is a bit of a pacifier as well as a funkifier for me!

It is great to read TB for while, and I look forward to getting back to playing. As I said before, I will always honor my Mom because she made it possible for bass to be such a fun part of my life.

It's funny, my Mother's last day was my birthday, and I spent part of my birthday jamming with another bassist at GC. There are two basses at GC that I have loved over time and that I may try to get when the dust clears: I really love the Corvette fretless. It is so easy to play in tune on that bass even though it has no fret lines and it sounds wonderful. The other is the SC/H Bongo. They had just gone on sale for President's Day. I have to say that although I may try the single H Bongo again, the SC/H Bongo really gives me a sound I love and I think it would really compliment my 55-02. Oh well, we will see what happens.
 
#497
My first bass... was a borrow from my uncle. A 69 Jazz with Emg pickups... I had no clue what I had in my hands back then. I had it for roughly 2 weeks (Just think about it, I didnt even know how to play, It was a 69, I was born in 1980 and I was 15.) It was stolen from me when a couple of robbers took it by the force while also stealing my mom´s car. I was going to take my first lessons with my uncle that day.

After that, I had to pay my Uncle $500 for that bass, and then ask my parents to buy me a Crestwood P800 (crappy P-Bass copy) , to start out alone.

I tought myself from that point, as I never took a lesson with my uncle due to the robbery.
 
#498
My first bass wasn't a "gift", I bought it for myself at a pawn shop, but my mother was there for the "gift" part of it...
Right after I bought it, I caught Mono, I was 16, and it was mid-June. My spleen was so swollen I wasn't able to leave the house, so my mom took the bass to the shop and had a new nut put on it, and got it a pro set-up, stuff that a $90 pawn shop bass needs.:cool:
She came home on my birthday with my bass that she had taken while I was sleeping, and a Mel Bay Bass I Method book, and said "Well, you've got all summer in the house, here you go."

If she hadn't done that, who knows? That bass might have ended up in a closet, never fixed up, never played, and I would have never spent the whole summer of '95 in my basement shredding to MTV and studying the Mel Bay Method.:D

Stupid me, I sold that bass, and I saw it in a pawn shop not long after. I wish I still had it, it was a Mako brand BC Rich Warlock copy in Electric blue with dual-P pickups and string thru body high mass bridge...:mad:
C7
 

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