MartyBRebelMC

I used Colron wood filler on my defret project. It seems to work fine and is a pale brown colour so provides a nice lined fretless look.

Is it the passive 5 or the active deluxe?

i think Henry Norton makes a good point, much of the reason for buying a USA Fender is buying into the brand...the 'real thing' i.e made in America, and for those who can afford it why not! But it's difficult to argue (if anyone was) that in pure quality terms you get what you pay for with mass produced instruments, a milling machine in China works just the same as one in America and the employees have the same skills, they just earn different amounts and have different overhead costs. If I were spending a lot of money I'd want a hand made instrument from the likes of Jon Shuker.....but I digress.

I have modified a Squier 5 deluxe by putting Nordstrand pickups on it and latterly an East U retro preamp. Those two mods alone cost around £400 and as such I probably fall into the slightly bonkers category. I did find out a few things along the way though. The Squier deluxe is active out of the box and i replaced the pickups as the first upgrade. This didn't do a great deal to improve the tone however changing the preamp to the East U retro made an extraordinary difference, so if you have one of these basses I'd say the preamp is probably the weak link in it's tone although I haven't had a chance to try the original pickups with the East. However I'm drifting of topic slightly, I think given the build quality of budget basses they are a great way of incrementally trying out high end parts that might otherwise only be available on very expensive instruments and as someone pointed out earlier you can take the bits off them and use in other instruments or sell on. I recently tried some AB testing in a few shops between Squire jazzes (in particular the CV 60's jazz) and their Mexican and American counterparts, I'm looking for a jazz and having recently bought a second hand USA MM stingray and been amazed at how good it is I thought I'd better check out some American made Fenders and see if they are way ahead of their Chinese cousins. I suspect other peoples ability and technique may well reveal differences that I as an only modestly able player was unable to, but I was hard pressed to tell the difference between the Squire and the American standard although in terms of build the fret finish was marginally better on the American basses neck. As for the mexican fenders...let's not go there! If you want a natural or transparent finish then the American made instruments are in a different league because of the wood used, otherwise I think the Squier basses are definitely worth sticking high end parts on. Martin

If the depreciation is a concern just buy secondhand then most of the fall in price has already happened. Since discovering this forum i don't think I'll ever buy another bass brand new - great bargains to be had and honest, pleasant people to deal with!

Interesting stuff, thanks for taking the time to record and post the clips Michael. My preference is for the ESP, but here's the thing - I agree with others that the MM sounds least impressive in this context, however, having recently started using a Stingray I have found that in the mix of a band the tone is wonderfull, probably because of the midrange hump. The problem often seems to be HiFi sounding bass EQ's are great when recorded but very difficult to hear when played with other instruments especially live, this has been my experience anyway. Which is your favourite live bass Michael?

I bought this Stingray off Bubinga5 and it is quite simply the best bass I've ever owned and played...effortless to play, very comfortable and the tone is to die for. I now run the EQ on the amp flat and just plug in and play, the tone just cuts through the band mix and sounds wonderful (barring my playing of course). I bought it because I've always hankered after a Musicman - just something about them (the bassplayer in a band I was in as a guitarist 25 yrs ago had one and always liked them since) so it wasn't anything as considered as what it might actually sound like! Therefore the fact that I've always wanted one combined with it sounding and playing great means this one is definitely a keeper, oh and its blue and sparkly too! Cheers Martin [attachment=38388:P1030640.JPG] [attachment=38387:P1030635a.JPG]