Leowasright

Don't like modern basses beyond the MM Stingray. Hate Metal basses and flying V's. It's easier to state what I do like: Fender Jazz, Fender Precision, MM Stingray/Cutlass/Sterling. Gibson SG type basses, and that is almost about it.

Most of this surely proves Leo got it most right in 1960 with the Jazz. I have thought about Precisions, MM Stingrays, G&Ls, but I always seem to buy another Jazz.

I can barely play the 4 string. 5 strings would confuse me

I've always wanted to do She's as beautiful as a foot, by Blue Oyster Cult......

Wouldn't say I was a successful guitarist..... I started on Bass in 1986, but my father had guitars around the house before that. I then got a Gibson SG in 1988 ((Which had a sad end, I sold it to a friend, who lent it to his drummer, who had it out of it's case (goodness knows why) on the back seat of a (Austin) Mini, and had to suddenly brake hard, the guitar slipped off the seat and broke in two...)), then a Les Paul, etc. But in the early 90's it always seemed there was a lack of bass players, so I got a MIJ Squire Jazz to have a decent bass. I then did not play in a band from about '95 to January 2008, when things changed for the better, and I got a bass gig in a local indy/rock band. I have a Les Paul Studio and a Mex 50's Fender Telecaster to dabble on/record with, but as far as the band goes I am a BASS player.

Bass solo? Just don't do it.

It's nuts and I have just realised recently.... I am actually up to six at the minute (5 jazz and 1 Epi EB-3) But I really need to slim down to 3 or even 2 if the MIA Jazz goes. I can manage with the MIM Jazz (Midnight wine and fitted with a black scratchplate I made by hand) fitted with USA pickups, plus my MIJ Squire Jazz fitted witha '62 reissue CIJ Jazz neck and reissue pickups. And this is not about needing the money. Having that many is just....insane.

Just remember it's what the bass and drums do that make the audience jump up and down. And if you have just joined a new band, and the rest cannot work out why the band is now going better, it's because of YOUR bass playing.

I don't slap or pop either, but the ultimate shield is being able to play "their" instrument as well, knowing they couldn't really do the same job on the bass. And being able to play the mandolin as well. We recorded a song some months ago, where one of the G-tarists just could not get the rhythm guitar track down against the drums. In comes the bass player, on guitar,and gets it down 1st take .

No disagreement here. I may have simplified the role electronic generation has had in the bass frequency region, but we are mutually agreed that no stringed bass/bass guitar, no matter how evolved from Leo Fender's original "doghouse" replacement, is ever really going to revolutionise music or the playing of it again. As I said before, that will only come with the passing of the electric guitar and bass, and that may take another 50 years. Or more. God knows what will finally eclipse them.

If Fender ever did start doing a Candy Apple Red version of the 60's MIM classic, I might be tempted, but I've already got too many Jazzes....

[quote]Plus all the real cutting edge work in low frequencies for the last 30 years has been electronically generated. Quite right. The electronic music of the early 80s threatened to replace the electric guitar and bass, but never quite managed it. And we now have pedals to simulate synth bass on bass guitar! Oh, the nearest to a revolutionary fretted bass since the Precision was probably the Steinberger of the early 80s. That stripped the instrument down to the minimum amount of material required, and dismissed the need for wood. Yet even that failed to fully catch on, and only Hohner copies are made now, in wood!

It's mainly down to the fact Leo Fender got it pretty much right in 1950/51 and got it almost perfect in 1960 (my biased view). 58 years later the electric bass that Leo Fender designed/invented is pretty much STILL what bass players want. At the time (1950) the instrument was pretty darned revolutionary. We still seem to be struggling to evolve the acoustic 6 string guitar at this point in time as well, and that dates in it's present form over 100 years. Any new electric bass is destined to be an evolution of the original (even the Jazz), until the electric bass (and electric guitar) is replaced in popular music culture by something else. Remember, 100 years ago, the mandolin family was vastly more popular than the guitar was. Think on....

If i had to, I could manage with just the MIJ Fender Jazz. But I break strings.

All things considered, A Mexican Jazz is a perfectly good instrument, as mine is currently #1 over the MIA Jazz. All I would say is the Mex pickups are the only thing that let the current MIM standard down. (Change 'em for USA ones like I did). Going back to the MIM/MIA differences, the US bridge (1995-2007) has the ability to allow through body stringing, as does the new current "high mass" bridge. All Mex and Jap instruments have the good old fashioned "wobbly bridge", surface mounted, with the strings anchoring in the right angled plate at the back of it. The MIM neck is thinner (front to back) than the MIA, has truss rod adjustment at the headstock end, and has a walnut truss rod fillet on the back, even though it has a rosewood fingerboard (why? it's not necessary). The MIA neck adjusts at the body end, as does the Highway 1 (which must be made on the same machine). Body wise the MIM can be made of up to 3 pieces of alder, whereas a MIA is probably 2 pieces tops nowadays. I await the howls of disagreement.

You can have two MIA Fender Jazz basses!

Mine was a late 70s/early 80s Cimar (an entry level Ibanez name I think), which cost £40, regrettably traded for a Hohner P bass copy that had a broken truss rod. That was summer 1986. Xmas 1986 brought a Marlin Sidewinder P/J thing in metallic blue (plywood body and all) that lasted until I was distracted by a Gibson SG in 1988. I think the Marlins were about £120 new back then. The next bass was in 1994, a Jap Squire (silver series) Jazz bass, which I still have, and is still a pretty much a match really for anything else I have. NB I bought an Epiphone EB-3 last week for a bit of fun. Plays well, looks outrageous, sounds quite good. But my god, it is pure torture to play standing up, as it is SO neck heavy. No wonder Gibson never caught on in the bass playing world. Fender all the way for gigs I'm afraid.

Funny that. My MIM was OK straight out the box, and the USA required so much fiddling that I gave up and took it back to the shop to set it up again. And the USA's neck is unbelievably sensitive to tempereture change, which is odd, as it has graphite reinforcement in the neck where the MIM does not.

The entire way I play bass! I damp the E (and the A sometimes) with my fretting hand's thumb. In other words, I hold the neck in my palm and not with the thumb in the centre of the back of the neck. I play with a plectrum virtually all the time. (I can use fingers but can't be bothered). I have been known to strip out and simplify bass lines. The rest of the band thinks it is because I go for a more driving line than the last bass player they had, but is it just I'm sloppier?????? I have no technique!!!

The Mex Jazz pickups are still weak. I changed mine in a 2007 example for USA ones, the improvement was very noticable. It transformed the MIM into the one the band prefers the sound of .....(over a USA Jazz!). Apart from the pickups, the MIM Jazz is not far off the USA. The neck is a bit thinner though.

It's not that bad.... However, I can't understand anyone to buys anything other than a Jazz or Precision. Or maybe a Stingray, or to be different, some sort of Gibson SG bass.

I have to agree. The only basses I have had for the last 15 years have been Jazz's.

This 70's baby will be over £500 in the UK. The cheapest Mex 60's classic Jazz I have seen was £541, so expect the 70's one to be there or abouts. Was thinking about the 60s one until I saw this thread! GAS....

I am just glad to be playing again after 10 years "off". I quite by accident got a bass gig with a local "indy rock" band but that means we play anything from Razorlight to the Stones/Who via Oasis. It's close to what i would like to do (straight hard rock'n'roll a la AC/DC), but only nearly there. Being 37 (the rest of the band are 32-36), I don't really mind the musical mix, and we do our own songs as well (I haven't yet had an input on our own material). The two guitarists however, are only just noticing their indy outlook is founded on a hard rock rhythm section! We are not really that skilful and we are best nailing the crowd with 3-4 chord basic song. However, all the best pop/rock is structured this way anyway.

Well I am certainly not going to impress owners of modern/pointy etc basses with my gear list! I don't read the gear lists in other's signatures to be impressed or jealous, I think we all like to know what others use. Must get round to that valve amp for complete luddite regression.