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What's your one true "Forever Bass"?
- Thread starter BassKing
- Start date
If it had to be one it'd be my Nash P, the Dee Dee look is what I wanted all along. Best neck and sounds good through every amp
The one in this picture...my "mutt" 1965 L-series Fender Precision, Warmoth Jazz neck, Lollar pickup, TI flatwounds.
I had a chance about 8 years ago to get a 70's fretless P from the original owner for a really good price and I kick myself all the time for not getting it. My wife (fiancé at the time) told me to buy it too... It was my dumb idea to pass it up.
Of course it does. It means nothing. It means everything.
This is Talk Bass, doncha know....
This one keeps impressing me. My 2014 Vintage VJ74, equipped with 4-way switch for neck, bridge, parallel and series switching.
My first "forever bass" was a Peavey Sarzo that I bought in college. If I was just a little smarter, I'd still be playing that bass. When I graduated from college in 1993, I bought Kubicki Ex-Factor and it was the only bass I touched for a long time. Eventually, the Stu Hamm connection landed an Urge bass in my hands. I'd have stopped there, but I broke the truss rod on that bass.
Since then, I've been searching. I moved to a Jazz bass, but I knew that wasn't going to be a winner for me. I've used various P basses, and I thought I landed on a real "forever bass" with my Lakland 4-94 and my Dingwall AB1. Neither of them were quite it, though. I have tried (and I still own) a ton of basses, and I've come close to perfection with my Spector NS3CRFM. It really is just a rocker though, so I keep looking.
Currently, I'm hoping my "forever bass" can be a combination of a few basses, all acquired this year, and all better suited to me than anything I've tried previously. I have a Dingwall Super P that takes everything I love about a P bass and makes it better. I also have a Guild M-85 that makes those warm, vintage tones that I can't find anywhere else. When I want more edge, I'm experimenting with a Dingwall D-Roc to see if it can usurp my Spector. And when I absolutely have to have a five string, my AB1 is competing with a Thumb BO 5.
So, I guess for me, it is fair to say "forever basses."
Since then, I've been searching. I moved to a Jazz bass, but I knew that wasn't going to be a winner for me. I've used various P basses, and I thought I landed on a real "forever bass" with my Lakland 4-94 and my Dingwall AB1. Neither of them were quite it, though. I have tried (and I still own) a ton of basses, and I've come close to perfection with my Spector NS3CRFM. It really is just a rocker though, so I keep looking.
Currently, I'm hoping my "forever bass" can be a combination of a few basses, all acquired this year, and all better suited to me than anything I've tried previously. I have a Dingwall Super P that takes everything I love about a P bass and makes it better. I also have a Guild M-85 that makes those warm, vintage tones that I can't find anywhere else. When I want more edge, I'm experimenting with a Dingwall D-Roc to see if it can usurp my Spector. And when I absolutely have to have a five string, my AB1 is competing with a Thumb BO 5.
So, I guess for me, it is fair to say "forever basses."
I've had the red one 30 years this Christmas. The nut broke when I was a kid and the shop replaced it with brass. Beginning of the year, I had the original bridge and pickup replaced. Pickup's and EMG Geezer, and the bridge is a 12oz brass Hipshot. I switch between DR Fatbeams and Roto 66's. It was forever by default, before. Now it's earned the position.
The black one was a pawn shop score. It's heavy. Mahogany and walnut. Ebony board. Active EQ. I don't know what's in it for pickups, but I have Fatbeams on the high strings and D'addario XL's on the lows. .105 and .135, respectively.
When I bought it, I didn't have an amp and hadn't in 20 years. It was cheap enough that I could buy it for nostalgic reasons. It made a perfect sister to the Warlock (Blackie Lawless and Nikki Sixx were my first real bass idols, and my tastes have never fundamentally changed; they just grew).
There was no way for me to know what this beast would sound like when I plugged her in. I was buying art.
Art sounded unreal through a Rumble 25 with the overdrive lit. So unreal, I built an Eden stack to hear it through, and a dirt board to set it on fire. I'm a member here now because of what it sounded like.
I can't think of anything else I'd want from a bass. (An 8 string Bich or a fretless Mockinbird, maybe; both rare and expensive). It's not going anywhere.
