Fender Player II Mustang Bass PJ

[Aidan63]

A quick search on here didn't seem to throw this particular instrument up, I am wondering if anyone has any experience of them ? Looks like a lot to like, but of course the maybe usual Fender PJ downside too, but for the money looks a pretty attractive option, rolled Rosewood fingerboard - or maple if you prefer and some pretty colours; not quite a JMJ but they are silly money now (seemed expensive when they came out but almost doubled in price since and if you have an old one you can sell now for more than you paid for it it seems) - just a shame it's the only way to get that actual pickup but doesn't justify the price imho and I really don't like the formulaic relic job.

so wondering....

[Jean-Luc Pickguard]

I have three JMJs, but the bass sitting on a stand next to me at the moment is a Player (not the II version though) PJ mustang bass in Sienna sunburst with maple fingerboard. This bass is a lot of fun to play and offers a bit more tonal variety than the JMJs. I did do a fair amount of customisation to the PJ when I bought the bass secondhand at a very good price. This included shielding with adhesive copper tape and building a new loom with CTS pots, puretone socket, switchcraft switch and orangedrop capacitor. I also put on Fender hi mass bridge, hipshot HB10 lollipop tuners, and a fender thumbrest in the same position as on my JMJs. I also put ion a set of short scale Ernie Ball cobalt flatwounds. The pickups sound good so I didn't consider changing them for something else.

 

The only changes I made to my JMJs was to apply copper shielding and put on some medium scale D'addario chromes.

 

Having the spaghetti logo on the player II rather than a 70s-looking logo on my original player looks wrong to me, but I tend to get irked by inconsequential things like that.

 

I don't know if Fender has improved how they wire up the player II mustang bass, but the original player mustang has a circuit that reduces the volume when rolling off the tone unless the volume is fully open. I used an alternative circuit when I rewired mine to prevent this from occurring. You can read about my adventures in rewiring here: 

 

Edited 1 hour ago by Jean-Luc Pickguard