Oh lighten up there sugar boobies (unless your boobies are literally made of sugar, then I guess you and I are right back to square one). It doesn't take a genius to see that this is a light-hearted discussion and that I don't hate old people. (When did we become such PANSIES????? Now, THAT was meant as a pejorative, so you have my permission to be offended starting right now. Ready........ go.)
OK, now that you are officially ticked off, let me explain my point (again). Nobody gives a crap what an old guy on the street corner in Hampton VA thinks. It doesn't happen there. It happens in the INDUSTRY and trickles down. These days we're really talking about Nashville. (Anyone who doesn't think that musical trends are mostly coming out of Nashville these days is fooling themselves.) So, the OLD GUYS who run the music business in Nashville are trying to keep things the way they always have been. So, all the new kids showing up in town are pretty much FORCED to go out and get something that either IS a Fender P bass, or looks JUST LIKE a Fender bass built by a boutique builder (or at least a high-end builder). I'm not pulling this out of my butt! I have TALKED to them. They show up to town with a Fodera 6 string thinking that everybody they run into will love it. Next thing you know, they are playing a 4 string P bass. And their $5000+ bass sits at the house. They come from Julliard, North Texas, Berklee, Bloomington, etc. with all kinds of boutique basses. POOF! Within weeks, it's a 4 string P bass. (And secretly they hate them. But don't tell anyone. Let's just keep this between us so as not to disturb the machine. K?)
So, my point had NOTHING to do with LOCAL old guys pounding away at bass players, and EVERYTHING to do with the INDUSTRY pounding away at them.
And my point STILL is, you HAD your day. Now let the kids have their day. And let Fender CATER to those kids with WHATEVER crazy designs they want! And quit pissing and moaning every time Fender decides to try something NEW rather than offering you OLD GUYS a freaking TELE bass with a mudbucker at the bridge in SHERWOOD GREEN! If you WANT one of those, put one together with parts or have the custom shop MAKE you one. And let them MARKET new ideas to the MASSES.
Don't let my all-caps words get your panties in a wad there Princess. I'm not mad. Why should you be?
Here. Here's a smiley to make it all better -->
Group hug? No? How about a slap on the butt like they do in Football/Baseball. No? Man, you're hard to please.
with all due respect to Nashville - music is being made in other places as well and it's influence outside of the US is somewhat limited. yet Fenders are still the most common brand around in many a music scenes. bands from all over the world sport Ps and Js.
look at the indie scene - dominated by young people who couldn't care less about what the "old guys" think but still you'll see Ps and Teles all over the place.
much more reasonable factors to Fender's prevalence would be:
1. people want to have the tones they grew up with at their disposal and since about 90% of popular music recordings in the past 60 years feature a P-Bass it's only natural a Pbass would feel like home to most bassists, it's instilled in most people's mind as what a bass should sound like.
2. it just works. a P or J is a proven design that stood the test of time while hippie sandwich, graphite necks, headless etc. disappeared or were reduced to the status of niche market products as passing fads. seemingly superior designs came and went, the P and J (along with the Tele and Strat) have remained virtually unchanged from the basic designs. think what you will - most people interpret this as a sign of a good, versatile, enduring product that wont fall from grace a few years from now.
3. beginning players will want to play the same instruments as their idols play and like it or not Jamerson, Dunn, JPJ, Jaco etc. played Fenders. maybe they played Ps and Js just because thats what was available to them at the time but fact is that Fender is a strong brand name associated with the world's most renowned musicians right from the get go of popular music.
it's a chain reaction (Hendrix->SRV->John Mayer) and it's not likely to break up anytime soon.
4. Am. Std. Fenders are reliable workhorses, readily available and familiar enough so everybody knows how they sound in a variety of genres and mixes through different amps.
you can buy a MIA Fender pretty much sight unseen and you know what you are getting - it's the meat and potatoes of guitars and basses: not cooked by a chef but everybody likes it and it won't leave you hungry.
a touring band with Fenders knows they could get replacements and or service almost anywhere in the world and it's also much cheaper to replace if lost or damaged while touring, which leads me to the next point...
5. price. you can argue whether the MIA and American Reissues are priced right or not but at the bottom line you can buy 4-5 run of the mill MIA Precisions for the price of an MTD so if a 19 years old kid wants an MTD or not he is pretty much bound to a price range where Fender is the indisputable king in terms of bang for buck.
you'll mainly see baby boomers playing boutique MTDs, Ken Smiths, Foderas, Ritters etc in youtube vids and small coffee shop jazz gigs. most indie bassists at SXSW will play a Fender simply because it's cheaper (and not as undesirably pretentious looking as a multi string laminated bass with a coffee table top).
6. still in the economic side of it all - resale value.
try selling your $3000+ bass on Talkbass (not to mention locally) and you may find yourself just trading it for multiple Fenders and selling these off.
even selling another brand of similar price point may prove the supremacy of Fender's resale value.
Fenders always sell fast and hold up their value, money-wise, better than any brand. for some people that's important and makes them more confident at purchasing a new Fender than say, a used Zon or used Dingwall which may come up at an almost equal price not to mention brands like G&L and Lakland Skyline which make great Fender inspired instruments which are of great quality and loose value in the 2nd hand market compared to Fenders of equal MSRPs.
7. Nostalgia. don't underestimate it's power. lots of people feel nostalgic toward times when they weren't yet adults or when they haven't even lived.
look at hipsters - keen on reliving the early 80s though most of them were born a decade later. or guys aged 50+ buying Mustangs, Camaros and Challengers (new production or restorations) to relive their teens.
that holds true to musical instruments too.
