Minininjarob

As a beginner I thought the Squires would be perfect for me. However what put me off was the gloss necks on most of them, I’m not sure if a satin neck is better or not but I preferred the satin on the Fender Player. I also tried the Fender and Squire back to back in the same shop and I am pretty sure the Fender was lighter. Also I could get a Fender player in the perfect colour which is obviously the most important factor. 😂😂 The quality of the Squiers was on a par though with the Fender. I bought my fender P bass for £650 delivered direct from Fender BTW.

I quite fancied one so I could build a Mark Hoppis style P bass……. But any old jazz bass could be butchered up to make one of those.

As a complete beginner I am starting off easy (LOLZ) and trying to learn “Look What Happened” by Less than Jake. Thankfully their bassist Roger Lima has a YT vid with him showing how to play it. My pinky finger is locking up badly learning the intro bit. It is not lost on me that it’s really really hard but it’s one of my favourite songs ever and even just playing a bar correctly has me smiling from ear to ear. 😁

I was recommend some of those by a pro audio engineer as comparable to his £400 custom ones. Ok they are custom fitted but he said the sound quality is excellent.

Even as a beginner I can tell both styles have their advantages - I want to learn using a pick mainly but have tried with fingers and it seems a bit easier so maybe it’s the best way round to learn!! There is definitely some music I would like to play that requires using fingers, and after trying a load of pedals out at a friends house I found that they seem to be tailored to the finger players as when using a pick the effects just sounded so wrong.

“It’s heavy” would use less words but I prefer your description! 😂

Thanks so much for that detailed description. I’ll try and audition one in a shop. Good to know it’s well made. I wouldn’t automatically assume cos it’s Fender it would be well made.

I could see if PMT have one to try out but to be honest I don’t really know what is good or bad. I think I want a fairly subtle compressor and overdrive

As the title says - online reviews are generally positive but anyone actually own one? I’ve been to a friends who has so many pedals of all sorts and tried them all out and I pretty much concluded I want a compressor/EQ/overdrive so apart from a tuner it would seem it covers all the functions I would need. Looks nicely made too! https://www.fender.com/en-GB/effects-pedals/bass/downtown-express-bass-multi-effect-pedal/0234538000.html?rdl=true

Excuse my beginners ignorance but isn’t this the ideal opportunity to buy another bass which you can set up to the different tuning and have ready to use?

Sorting that out would be child’s play compared to removing a rusted in cup and cone bottom bracket from a bike that’s been sat outside in the rain for 10years. 8 foot long breaker bar on a spanner + only 2 mmm on metal to grip onto = large cracking noise + skinned knuckles. 🤬🤬

Thanks all for the kind comments.

I’ve managed to sort out some bike stuff which other people have given up on - what happens to truss rods? I assume they can seize or snap maybe? Some sort of broken guitar would be helpful I suppose to mess around with. Fret levelling looks relatively easy but I would want to practice before trying it out on someone’s pride and joy.

Hopefully not sounding like a boast, I was surprised myself!! Just started playing the bass and I had to do some setup on mine as it was mail ordered. All I did was watch a few videos online and it all seemed simple. Full disclosure - I am a very handy DIYer (just built the staircase in my house) and good with tools, I’ve also resorted vintage push bikes in the past, and have an electronics background so none of the guitar setup stuff seemed difficult at all. Anyway, I was hanging out with a friend who owns 20ish basses and has been playing for 45 years and he said he had loads of fret buzz on a MM stingray 5 and it didn’t sound right anyway. He said he had never adjusted his own instruments so I said I could try what I had learnt on the MM - he said he hadn’t played it for years so it was worth a try. He gave me a set of strings and I took the MM home. Stripped it down, restored the chrome, cleaned the fretboard up, compound polished the body etc. Checked the electronics, put new strings on, set the truss rod and sorted out the intonation as well. He came to pick it up and when he tried it out (he is an AMAZING player) he was so pleased at the job I had done. I was genuinely surprised - I had been SO worried. He said he’d use it at a gig at the weekend he was so pleased. I’ve since learned that quite a few people don’t know how to set up their instruments - or at least the people I know - is this true of other bass players? I really enjoyed doing what I did and want to help other people out. I’ve looked at the specialist tools you can get to do more advanced stuff and it doesn’t seem too pricey and the work doesn’t look too difficult. Am I kidding myself about being able to do this?

I really really like that colour.

I would have said stuck with it but seeing the Jazz above with the white pearl pickguard has changed my mind! Personally I wouldn’t go with a black one but it’s not my bass!!

As a new bass player I am a little perplexed about the road worn/relic Fender basses, its fake patina right? I bought a Player series and I'm happy with it, I'd like to "age" it myself playing it for a long time!

Tell you what, I’m not that much into the older amp looks but that is gorgeous. Hope the project works out well.

I would agree, it works well. Thankfuly no vintage control, I really don’t need one of those. 😂😂

To be honest as soon as I saw it I had to have it, even though it was £300 more than the Squier PB which in reality was all I needed as a first timer. Its got to feel good though, hasn't it? 😉

My first ever bass bought recently, Player series PB in Tidepool blue. Yum. 😉

Thanks all for the help, I've got a GK MB112 now bought 2nd hand locally, see separate thread...

So after some much needed help on here and auditioning some small/medium combo amps I preferred the sound of the Fender Rumble series, tried Ashdown/Ampeg and even a MarkBass but it was the Fender I preferred. Anyway decided on the 100 but it was a bit of a stretch financially and they don't seem to come up 2nd hand very often so I looked 2nd hand at other options. This amp came up for sale in Sheffield - not too far - and checking out some videos it seems it might be the sound I was after. Brand new they are £650 but I got it for £150 from a lovely couple who were selling it on behalf of one of their parents as the father (who was a very musical person) had sadly passed away. I hope I'm a good next owner! https://www.gallien-krueger.com/mb-112-specs As soon as I tried it out in their house I was like "wow", really punchy and none of the rounding off I had heard in the Ashdown or Markbass amps. Like a Rumble but "more". Came with a nice Roqsolid cover (which I have just found is made down the road from me!) which is a bonus. Its a reasonably light unit too which I was struggling to get 2nd hand as a lot of cheaper amps are older heavier ones. I am sure other people know more but the GK stuff seems to be good quality (wow they make some monster amps!) so hopefully I have chosen well. The only thing that's a bit odd is that there is no separate master volume. Not a massive deal as I can turn the gain up and down and the volume on my PB but it is different to a lot of amps I've seen. Probably wont be an issue for me for the time being. You can add an extension cab to them but this is loud enough for me right now..... 😉

I am a beginner. I am also a huge 2nd buyer of bargains. However I don’t know much about basses so I did some homework to help me buy a 2nd hand instrument as my first bass. The problem is that my lack of experience means no matter how much I read up I could never be too sure as I couldn’t even play a tune to figure out how well it played. I would have no idea if something has been messed with or is beyond repair. I went round a few shops and decided what I really wanted was a P-bass and ended up buying a brand new Fender Standard PB in the colour I loved and it makes me want to play it every day. The only adjustment I made was a slight tweak to the truss rod to reduce the fret buzz but otherwise it’s fantastic. If I were you I’d go a get a brand new Squier P Bass if that’s what you’ve decided you want OR have a think about the music you would like to play or the bassists you want to sound like and try out what they use. Buy an instrument that gets you excited about picking it up - not just because it’s a good deal. I couldn’t care less if a PB is harder to play than a modern Yamaha or whatever, as when I picked one up and played it I suddenly felt like I was Mike Dirnt and that was everything. There’s so many amazing new budget basses nowadays - go and try a few out!