Why Do You Stick To The Same Type Of Basses?

[Passinwind]

Purpleheart fingerboards never don't blow my mind, but in unlined fretless?! What a lovely slab!

Yep, and more or less pure chance that I got it. Marco decided to make me a bass out of spare parts and that was the only pre-built unlined four neck that we could find in the shop at the time.

 

[JimmyM]

Unbelievable that before the first page was over, we've had three people totally committed to fretless! I'd have never thunk it.

 

[jerry]

Unbelievable that before the first page was over, we've had three people totally committed to fretless! I'd have never thunk it.

fretless cats stay up late!

 

[DJ Bebop]

Oops, forgot the obligatory pics. Here are my current two:

'03 Crescent Moon fretless, maple/ebony neck-through, one piece sapele body, w/Q-Tuner pickups:

View attachment 3659266

2018 Marco Bass MV, bolt-on maple/purpleheart neck, ash center block, cedar body, maple top wings, custom neo sidewinder Marco Bass pickups:

View attachment 3659268

Your rigs love that!

 

[DJ Bebop]

My first real bass was fretted for about a year then I went fretless.
Then I played it that way all through my first real band, The Reef Aires and never stopped
You've seen it before:

 

[SteveCS]

fretless cats stay up late!

Or get up early!

 

[A9X]

My first love in a bass, was actually my third: a Steinberger XL2 which we bought new in late 86 and I still have. I love the look, the feel, the tone, the balance and the fact that it never goes out of tune, plus from my engineering background, it's a brilliant piece of design.

In the middle, I had an affair with Alembic shortscales, eventually owning 4 of them. They eventually went due to short term finances which is sad, but such is life.

Even through the Alembic period, I kept acquiring more headless basses, and now own 5, and a guitar. Current collection includes Status S2000, Hohner B2 and B2V, Steinberger Spirit and a Spirit guitar. Pic below.

I've owned far too many others to list and have about 10 others.

More recently I've begun to work with these two girls who sing and play guitar, and are strummers much more than pickers, so that leaves more room for me to be melodic underneath. So, I've now got a pair of Ibanez 6ers that I play most recently, an SR760 and an SRC6 (like a Bass VI, just not hideously ugly).

In my dreams, I'd get a Steinberger style 6 made to round out the collection, but setting the B2V up E-C might be just fine for the foreseeable future (it came with a custom single ball adaptor).

 

[JimmyM]

So these aren't my main basses, but they are basses I have multiples of, more or less...

Guitar Factory neck-thru active basses. Obviously one's a 5 and one's a 4 with a whammy bar and they're different size bodies, but they're made about the same and sport EMG PJ actives. They are fantastic at what they do well, and the 5 is my only 5 so once in a great while I need to trot it out. I always bring a Fender and swap in and out as quickly as possible, though. Thought about getting a Fendery 5 but just don't care enough. I'll take one if someone wants to give it to me, but that's about it.

Violin basses. 2006 Jay Turser and late 60's Realistic violin bass made by Matsumoku. The Realistic sounds better but the Turser plays better and the sound I think has definitely improved as the wood is drying more and getting used to being a bass instead of a tree.

But I'm posting the Black Brigade again just to show that Fenders aren't just for the ones who conform and bend to society's will (and because they're pretty). I'm very much a rebel and choosing Fenders as my only stage basses is tough sometimes. But of the Big 3 Fender colors (sunburst, white and black), black is the most ominous. Totally plays to corporate America, but we know, don't we?

And each of these basses distinguishes itself as the basses of a non-conformist in other ways...the Hammersmith isn't even a Fender. It's a brand that only a handful of people know. The 09 AmStd P took a couple of spills and droppings and shows it, including a big one on the front that I've deftly covered up with a Devo energy dome sticker. And the 76/83 P looks good from the stage and in pics, but it's been modded, painted, and abused to heck and back, and 3 weeks ago, I sprayed it from natural with tung oil finish to flat black with a can of Krylon because it wasn't black and it had to be. First I did it as a heavy relic but decided against it because it wasn't corporate enough, so I settled for a few flaws and zero prepwork.

And every time I pick up one of these basses, the most widely used type of bass out there, I am giving the middle finger to The Man, only The Man doesn't know it. In many ways, that's more insidious and subversive than showing up with a Mothman in purple metal flake.

 

[dmt]

View attachment 3659171
View attachment 3659173
Right now besides my Ricks, i have a...gl lb100, an epiphone Embassy pro...

Oh wow, that's an interesting pair of photos to me. Regarding the Embassy Pro's visual design, I'd always considered it as basically a P with a runty lower horn and an overly trimmed pickguard. But seeing your white one next to your white Ric there, I now see where it's coming from - it's more kind of a combination of a Precision and a Ric. All sorts of Ric design elements there.

Still not my favorite look, but you may have just helped Epiphone sell me an Embassy Pro sometime later this year

(So much for commitment to one bass, lol! I am mainly a P guy though - Why? Because that's the sound in my head)

 

[equill]

Another fretless lover here. I just gravitated to fretless and, apparently, to basses with two humbuckers.
Also EUB - I have one of those resting against my desk right now, because I have a lesson after work.

One fretted bass still in my collection, which is the Steinberger Spirit. Still on the fence about whether to de-fret it, but doing so will probably mean I play it more.

 

[Gianni "Orlandez" Orlati]

Not actually "in service" as a bass player since as many years as many of you (I think I started playing in 1990), however I started with a Korean P-bass copy (Hondo II) complaining about the width of its neck but playing furiously on it to the point that I developed epicondylitis on my right elbow after two years .. then I moved to Korean BassManiac inspired basses, lightweight and manageable but lacking low-end punch .. thereafter I stopped playing for some years as I started working abroad ... in 2010 I started playing again (I was living in South Africa at that stage) .. wanted to buy a jazz bass, which was the go-to bass in my head being a huge fan of Jaco .. however, I could only find a Cort GB-94 with a jazz-like neck and an almost suitable pickups configuration .. I played it until 2013 but still thinking about acquiring a real jazz bass.
I then bought a MIJ Fender Marcus Miller jazz bass in Singapore; great bass but without a tone control not really sounding jacoesque; I then acquired a Fender Am.Std. post 2012 model jazz bass .. workhorse but the pickups didn't do the trick .. meanwhile I was bitten by the P-bass mosquito and bought a MIJ PB70 and an Am. Elite P-bass and, especially playing the PB70, I thought "in the end who really cares about Jaco's sound?" ..
Then bought a loaded Am. Pro P-bass body with an Am. Std. jazz bass neck .. good combo but pickups are too soft and in the end I didn't have much time for playing it as I started a new employment in Poland .. when I was there I decided to give the jazz bass another final chance and bought an AO '60s jazz bass in CAR from Eddie's Guitars through Reverb and I found it .. a multi-functional, powerful, clear and truly beautiful bass .. at that stage, however, I wasn't very familiar with the different tonal possibilities which different strings could offer and I was also listening to a lot of Yellowjacket's music filled with what, presumably, were Tobias and Roscoe's instrument's fitted with large soapbar Bartolini's humbucking pickups.
I decided to go for the "boutique route" buying a luthier-made Italian bass and an Elrick Evo 4 (whilst selling several stuff meanwhile) .. both are very smart basses, lightweight, provided with solid electronics packages, sporting nice exotic woods etc. .. however they do not sound like a P or a jazz bass whereas, especially after starting my experimentations with flatwound strings, I realised that the bass sound in my mind is definitely that of a vintage Fender-like instrument .. so I lately bought a MIM RW '50s P bass, I put the covers and the thumbrest onto it whilst replacing the pickups with a set of active pickups I had (this may not sound as a vintage move but, in reality, the EMG PAX pickups sound like gnarly but clear '70s Fender P-bass pickups, to find a synthetic definition); I installed a set of 40-100 Chromes onto it and I'm playing funk and soul every day using this bass; meanwhile, my CAR AO '60s jazz bass got a set of TI JF344 and became an even gnarlier replacement of a vintage P-bass .. hence, yes, for me vintage sounding and possibly Fender.
The next step will definitely be a couple of Custom Shop instruments but I have to find attain a solid job/employment condition before this

Edit:

By the way, the MIM P-bass neck is even chunkier than that of my Hondo II (which I still own, by the way) but my fingers, albeit substantially small, became able to manage larger necks with time, so I can't complain anymore

 

[knirirr]

Unbelievable that before the first page was over, we've had three people totally committed to fretless! I'd have never thunk it.

May I join in?
I've been sticking to unlined fretless jazzes - the only thing I've found which is comfortable to play. Currently, I have these:



I tried a fretted one once but soon sold it on.

 

[Bboopbennie]

Jimmy my first real bass / love. Dan Armstrong with a sliding pickup.... very cool.

 

[Baa]

As some people might have noticed, i'm just a tad singleminded when it comes to basses.
In the early eighties i saw a bass that was so beautiful i just had to buy It.
I was in school but worked evenings and weekends to be able to afford one.
I have tried all kinds of basses but have stuck with "the one". Ergonomics, sound and playability are just what i look for in a bass.

 

[Leonid Nidis]

I grew up mostly on P bass music.
When I decided to switch from guitar to bass I traded my gear for an american deluxe p bass that was active only.I couldnt understand why I cant get it to sound like I want to.I didnt even know what passive or active was.
Later I got an american elite and a T bird.

Had a recording to do and was exited to use the T bird,the guitarist advised that I bring the P too.
The moment I took the T bird out the producer sent me to get the P bass
Now the elite is gone and I ended up with the P bass I see myself plying to the end.
Fender P 57 AVRI 1982,It has a tonestyler installed,love the versatility.It weights next to nothing and sounds great.

I also play a musicman and recently couldnt resist the price and got a G&L L2500 but the P rules.
Tried as many jazz basses as I could,from sire via fender and to more expansive but never found one I like sound wise,maybe its not my thing.

 

[SteveCS]

As some people might have noticed, i'm just a tad singleminded when it comes to basses.
In the early eighties i saw a bass that was so beautiful i just had to buy It.
I was in school but worked evenings and weekends to be able to afford one.
I have tried all kinds of basses but have stuck with "the one". Ergonomics, sound and playability are just what i look for in a bass.
View attachment 3659338 View attachment 3659339

Nice shell/pearl pink. Reminiscent of Mark King's Jaydee Supernatural. Presumably yours is of similar vintage...and probably from the same factory as my original Westone Thunder I.

 

[dbsfgyd1]

Posting this as hopefully a fun thread with without judgment, without whininess because someone doesn't want to play yours or my favorite basses. I'm in it for the pics and fun stories of why some folks have settled on only one type of bass or one beloved favorite for everything. So please don't muck up this thread with douchebagginess, but yes, I'm going to talk about why I ultimately stuck with Fenders or Fender "tributes." Please feel free to contribute stories about what made you stick with only one type of bass if you have, and leave the sniping at other brands to a million other threads. And post pics.

When I started, my first good bass was a new 76 Fender Precision. We had a store in Orlando with a great selection where I could play all the different types of basses out there from Alembic to whatever ended in Z back then and the P sounded and felt as good as any that I was willing to pay for. Nice bass, a little too wide a neck pocket but as good as any from that era once you deal with that. I'd occasionally paint it and mod it over the years once I decided the pickup wasn't doing it for me by itself, but it was my only good bass for 15 years and I couldn't wait to ditch it and get something more high end and "modern" back when "modern" was the proper term for a bass with now-45 year old technology. That's what I did. I totally didn't want to play Fenders just on principle of being too broke to afford anything else.

So once I got some money, I experimented with others. I've tried everything from hollowbodies to active neck-thru boutiques, the cheap to the sublime, and they work very well for me on some types of music, OK for others, and not too great on a couple types. The only thing I could bring and always sound great on everything no matter what it was were Fenders. I still have bouts of wanting to use a different type on a gig, but I've given it up. Love a good P, love a good J, but I've decided on the PJ format with Geezers for my number one all-around does-everything bass, though I usually stay on the P. I'm counting my P in with the PJ's, too, but a PJ always goes to first time meetings with new musicians.

In black of course. With Hipshot Bass Xtenders. Still got that 76 Precision too, though the only thing left of the original bass is the body. It's the one in flat black. Doesn't have to be a real Fender, though. My go-to is a Hammersmith PJ I got 3 years ago. But it has to be black and have Geezers. I have a pieces parts PJ with flats in seafoam green, but it almost became black 2 weeks ago until my wife ordered me not to touch it. So it can stay here for her whilst I rock the Black Brigade:

View attachment 3659163

 

[dbsfgyd1]

Jimmy,

For me being born in 1952, Fender Basses were used more than any other brand on music I liked. I've been programmed that Fender is the definitive electric bass sound. Further, having done a lot of recording work over the past 40 years, my Fender Basses record exceptionally well and are easy to blend in the mix.

 

[bolophonic]

I just really like the look and feel of a Precision. I build all of mine from scavenged parts, so the simplicity appeals to me. I have started branching out a little in the past few years with building non-P jalopy basses, but these are my go-to instruments.

 

[Leonid Nidis]

I just really like the look and feel of a Precision. I build all of mine from scavenged parts, so the simplicity appeals to me. I have started branching out a little in the past few years with building non-P jalopy basses, but these are my go-to instruments.
View attachment 3659356

WOW On the sunburst with the custom pickguard and pickup rings