I had the VM 70s Precision for a while as a backup and it was a nice bass, but to be honest it was nowhere near like my US Standards. I think more than anything it was the Duncan-designed pickups, they just sounded, well, wrong for want of a better word. The bass itself played fine but the sound from the pups wasn`t to my liking, but then I`m comparing to Custom Shop pickups so it`s unlikely they would sound similar.