LeftyJ

I just found out they're doing a lefty Jazzmaster guitar too! That's seriously tempting 😯

I really like that lefty CV 70s RI Jazz!

I'd give Rob Green of Status Graphite a call. I would love a headless lefty Chris Wolstenholme 5. The full woven graphite facings on a regular series 2 design look stunning, much better than the Stealth IMO, and I like the idea of moving the pickups slightly closer to the neck and adding a knob for boost/cut level on the EQ section.

Not here yet 🙄 Anyone else still waiting?

And rightly so, it looks beautiful. I'm still loving your previous 5-string, I play it a lot!

@BassAgentneeds this in his life, even if he doesn't know it yet.

I had a Horizon guitar (with that same headstock, the so-called "c*ck stock") and loved it. I still kinda regret selling that one. The neck was terrific, and the fretwork just impeccable. Enjoy! Looks fantastic.

Men could, though 😅 But I agree, and there are definitely some names missing here. Yolanda Charles (Paul Weller ao), D'arcy Wretzky (Smashing Pumpkins), Paz Lenchantin (A Perfect Circle, Pixies), Nik West, Ida Nielsen, Divinity Roxx and so many more.

I liked the NG3 and the Peavey best in the clean samples, although I found the NG3 a bit flat and dull. The Thumb really shines with distortion, and keeps a lot of definition and clarity with all the notes still clearly defined, and the NG3 is a close second for me, sounding like a beefed-up version of the Warwick. The Lefay sounds fantastic too, but a bit metallic. The Stingray stood out in a mess of undiscernable rumble with a painfully harsh top end and no midrange, and probably needs some EQing to sound good. I think all basses on display are great in their own right, but some need their own EQ settings to work well.

I'm going to keep an eye on this, I'm really curious to see if I can keep this up. Coincidentally, I've been telling my girlfriend how happy I am with my current gear so I bet she's expecting me to 😅

Same here. I bought a new lefty 4003 at Guitar Guitar in 2009 and it just wasn't for me. Worst ergonomics of all the basses I've owned. Wide, square neck with a totally flat back, uncomfortable angular body, that bridge pickup surround with nowhere to comfortably anchor my thumb. And that bridge design with a loose, wobbly bridge that just rests on two small screws on the tailpiece and would rock back and forth when tuning, rendering any attempt at properly adjusting the intonation useless. I really wanted to like that bass. It was a thing of beauty, and I had lusted after one for years. I sold it at a profit to buy a new car and haven't missed it one bit.

Just ordered it through Amazon UK too. Considerably cheaper than here in the Netherlands.

Now now, what would the Nickelback museum need Geddy's basses for? 😉

Humcancelling would be a great match with a splitcoil, as it is wired in series and therefore humcancelling too. Blending a singlecoil with a splitcoil often results in hum when both pickups are on (and when you're playing the bridge pickup solo, of course). Any stacked-coil or side-by-side splitcoil will mix nicely. Nordstrand has some lovely splitcoils in a J-style casing. Nordstrand does not normally make a 5-string version of the NJ4SE, but it sounds like this would be a great match. Might be worth emailing them for a custom quote, as they seem to be open to this. https://nordstrandaudio.com/collections/4-string-jazz-bass-pickups/products/nj4se-hum-cancelling

Owned a Stingray 5, and loved it. It had no shortage on the low end, and especially in serial mode it packed quite a mid punch too! I don't think they're overrated, just a bit overpriced (new) outside the US for a fairly basic instrument.

Do these no longer come with magnetic pickups? The CR used to have single-string EMG pickups in addition to the Polar piezos.

My "one that got away" eventually did end up with me, just 11 years later! I spotted a unique solid white Status S2 Classic headless for sale on Leftybass.com, with the white epoxy Roman numeral fret markers of the John Entwistle Buzzard model. I'd never seen another one like it, and despite never having played a Status before, I had to have it! But I was too late, it had just been sold to someone in the US. Just before the summer of 2017, 11 years later, it popped back up for sale. In Israel this time! The guy bought it through Leftybass.com when he was studying abroad in the US. He already had a potential buyer, but the guy kept doubting and asking for more pictures. Finally the bass was sold to me, and I've been hooked to Status Graphite ever since.

I don't recall any bass-related purchases this year. I did buy a bassier guitar! (7-string, tuned to B)

My first bass was a Condor Jazz Bass copy from the 1970s with a heavy plywood body and a fairly nice maple neck with block inlays. It played fine and sounded more or less like a Jazz Bass should. I sold it when I bought my first "proper" bass (Yamaha TRB5II) but later bought another one out of seller's remorse and it was AWFUL. Just sounded dull and honky. Quickly sold it again. I'll never know if that first bass actually was a good one, or if it was just my inexperience and the thrill of owning my first bass.

I agree. Definitely a righty, and I agree with Beedster and wouldn't buy from this seller.

It says "right handed" in the title and URL.

I'm using a De Gier / Vanderkley FatBoost in my Jazz. It's likely the only one around, as they usually come with a De Gier Bebop bass attached 😉. It's one from the first run, with a fixed 6 dB boost. Newer ones are variable between 4 and 9 dB. It's activated by a rotary switch, a 4th control knob on the control plate.

I think to me this order is pretty accurate, but I disagree on the bridge and electronics part. Though not as important as your top 5, I think these do matter a lot. Different bridges will alter the tone of an instrument. When I changed the standard bent-plate bridge of my Jazz Bass to a Badass II, it changed the tone dramatically. The bass' tone brightened up a lot, with tighter lows and more harmonics. Many active circuits will colour your tone even when set to flat. Not dramatically, but noticably. Again from personal experience: when I changed the passive electronics in that same Jazz Bass to an Audere JZ3 onboard preamp, I loved it at first. Loads of tonal possibilities, and the impedance switch seemed like fun. But within weeks I found it wasn't for me, up to the point that I wasn't playing that particular bass anymore, even though it had always been a favourite. I changed it back to mostly passive, with just a switchable bass boost, and it's perfect for me now! It's mostly just set-and-forget for me, and if it gets overly finicky or doesn't sound the way I want to, it gets in the way of my playing and I lose interest in the instrument.

Left-handed pots are most definitely a thing, but this only has to do with the taper on logarithmic pots. Linear pots are "symmetric". If your pots work in the opposite direction, you have wired them wrong.

Several manufacturers offer a splitcoil design in a J-bass casing. Adding a series/parallel-switch should get you pretty close! Technically none of the pickups below (with the exception of the Aero) were designed with P-bass tone in mind, and a J-pickup is much less hot than a P-bass splitcoil, but any of these that offers 4-conductor wiring has the option to be switched to series like a P-bass splitcoil is wired. There's the Seymour Duncan Apollo, Lindy Fralin Split Jazz, the Aero PJ, Curtis Novak Splits, the DiMarzio Model J, the Nordstrand NJ5SE and NJ5SV and I may forget some options. Edit: and of course, the other way round is possible too: having a splitcoil P-bass pickup switching to parallel, like Fender did with their S1 switch. It cleans it up a fair bit.