Learn to play the bass guitar.

[bloke]

I've never even picked up a Peavey and tried it. I guess I should.

I don't think it would be a good idea - economically - to sand the paint off the 73 Jazz bass, chips and checking aside.

I suspect that any Squier basses with good necks are the ones that people don't sell.

I used to sell some Precision knockoffs that cost me 60 bucks (back in the 90s). .
One particular sunburst had a really good neck, but I had to insert a wood shim to get the neck at the correct angle to the body. I wasn't sure how stable that would be, I didn't want to pay a luthier to do it right, so I just sold it too.

[arpthark]

I have a coworker who is a classically-trained cellist who now works in cybersecurity. She also plays bass and gets regular gigs with her rock band and as a freelance pop cellist in smaller venues. Pretty cool.

[iiipopes]

I've played bass since 1988.

Here's what I've found:
1. All cheap basses can be made to sound like an expensive bass by swapping out the pickups for active shielded pickups like EMG
2. A Fanned fret bass is a PITA, but worth the hassle on a 5 string
3. The sustain on a neck through bass is superior to a bolt on neck
4. Adding a string is possible on a peavey t-40, but the string spacing is really tight. Worth it
5. Basses are cheap and fun to modify. I don't own one that I haven't modded in some way

Responses, my experiences after fifty years of playing all sorts of basses, amplifiers, styles, and genres::
1. Indeed. My gig bass for many, many years was a 2011 Ibanez SRA305, the bottom line, now called a Gio bass: lightweight, good neck, swapped the pickups for EMG to keep the noise floor to the bottom so it ran clean through a DI box. I'm not sure, but with the EXB, I think I actually paid more for the EMG setup than I did for the bass. But my sound man loved it, and it earned its keep many times over on the Schedule C through the years.
2. Indeed. That's why on my fanned fret bass is it half-fanned, starting with a square nut, made by Sheldon Dingwall before he became famous, so I can use regular strings on it and treat it as a regular PJ-style bass. Link to pix and description:
https://www.talkbass.com/threads/a-diff ... ss.755914/
3. I disagree with this one. I have both. My Rickenbacker 4002 (yes, "2," not "1" nor "3") is neck through and my Kala U-Bass is glued-neck. All the others are bolt-on. If you put a bass together well, using good quality hardware, a bolt neck can have just as much sustain as a neck-through. It all depends on the quality of the wood to be straight grained, well seasoned, and well finished so i doesn't have the dreaded dead notes, for example, on a Fender-style bass, somewhere between the 7th and 9th fret on the G string. Get a laminated neck if possible, where the cross-grain will cancel the resonances and help sustain. Likewise, if you have good hardware and fresh strings, there is really no difference between top-load and through-body stringing, either.
4. With so many relatively inexpensive good quality five-ers out there, why bother? Especially with the heavy ash body?
5. Indeed. I have also modified all of my basses, now numbering a dozen, for the gigs I bought them for. And they have all earned their keep with gigs.

Oh - and I forgot to say on my post above about playing the guitar part, it took an almost classical guitar technique, which I am really not good at, to make sure everything blended well with the rest of the band.

[iiipopes]

4. With so many relatively inexpensive good quality five-ers out there, why bother? Especially with the heavy ash body?

The peavey tone is fantastic for Classic rock, and at the time I was playing a ton of that.
I actually lightened the body. It's under 10# now

[bloke]

I keep talking about the neck.

I talk about "intonation" relentlessly.
My old Fender doesn't feature fancy fretting, but (having picked through the individual tuning of each fret on each string, and understand about how to adjust a neck and how to set up a guitar) it's a helluva lot better than offered by the best tubas.

NECK:
The neck of the bass is to the slide of a trombone or the valves of a tuba.
IF it sucks, it isn't a bass.
I don't typically stand and play (though I probably should), but I don't much care how heavy my bass is. It doesn't seem heavy, and I have a cheap (just fine, as far as I'm concerned) strap.

PICKUPS:
I like the range of sound that I get out of the 1973 oem pickups (either the range of sound I get with flats, rounds, or "flat-brites"), so why should I screw around with some that I might not like, and which require batteries?

Give me something whereby - when I'm playing it - I'm not AWARE of it.

[iiipopes]

Not everybody loves the EMG sound, but it's a glorious tone, and I fell in love with it over 20 years ago. I have a yamaha BB that I installed them on back then, and with the exception of the Peavey, I've always made that mod. It turned that yamaha form sounding like a $300 bass to a $4000 bass

made a custom pickguard too for it. I used to pretty handy.

[bloke]

If I could find a 5-string that sounded like my old Fender and felt as natural under my left hand (albeit an unavoidably wider neck), and the price was "casual money", I might possibly buy it.

...but (to be clear) I'm really NOT looking.

[LeMark]

this is good information about active pickups

[iiipopes]

PICKUPS:
I like the range of sound that I get out of the 1973 oem pickups (either the range of sound I get with flats, rounds, or "flat-brites"), so why should I screw around with some that I might not like, and which require batteries?

Give me something whereby - when I'm playing it - I'm not AWARE of it.

NOISE NOISE NOISE
HUM HUM HUM
SNAP CRACKLE POP
TONE TONE TONE
These are the reasons to use EMG active pickups: great tone (they have models that perfectly emulate just about anything out there, including early '70's pickups, if that is the tone a player desires) and a -100dB noise floor. No hum, no noise, no hiss, no snap crackle pop. All the b***s*** about the "EMG sterile tone" is a thing of the past. When using modern digital boards, which are as clean and sterile as it gets, you get perfect fidelity, but as with Strat players, the board will embarassingly show all deficiencies in every instrument players' setups. With this setup, you do exactly that: play without being aware of anything detracting from your tone.

[bloke]

Since mine are quiet and they generate sounds that I like, and they are actually '70s pickups - rather than things that sound like them, why should I yank them out and throw them in the trash? (Oh yeah: never stuck without a battery, cuz I don't need one).

I thought about pulling out my wireless rig that I used to use sometimes with my tuba (to use with the bass), but then I realized it would be more techno-crap to haul to the gig and screw with.

I'm happy. Should I risk unhappiness?

Why do you care what pickups are in my bass?
Would it raise the value of an all original vintage Fender bass to put aftermarket pickups in it? Would it boost its value if I routed a battery compartment in the back?

I'm not particularly impressed with the tubas that either of you use, but I'm not trying to talk to you into altering them.

[bloke]

you are completely overrating our level of care about what you play. nobody is trying to get you to change.

You seem to have a willful ignorance about why people play active pickups, so we're trying to give you an education. Sit there with your fingers plugging your ears if you want to, I dont give a rat's ass

[bloke]

I'm nearly 70 years old, I'm not going to buy any gadgets - at this point in my life - or pay someone to devalue my vintage equipment.
I had this rig for sale less than a year ago (remember? yes, you do), and thought I would never play again.
I've bought my son both a guitar and a bass with active pickups. I know what they are (sheesh). When he was playing them, he was always asking us if we had any batteries.
As offended as you seem to be, you sure seem to care that I don't care.

When the most people are watching us (this is a sampler from a local TV show) we have the VERY LEAST control over our sound.
- Listen how ridiculously boomy my bass sounds (because the TV guy plugged in a "LINE OUT" thing and f'ed the bass sound all up).
- Notice how ridiculously boomy the bass drum sounds (same thing: the idiot TV guy who had control over everything).
- Notice how the mike on the tuba was probably turned OFF (same thing - the TV station jackass).
...so (even WERE IT THAT non-original pickups on my vintage bass ADDED value - and cutting a hole in the back of this particularly nice 53-year-old Fender bass enhanced its value) what would be the point? ...as some sound jackass is going to f everything up.

me?
Even though I seem to make a funny face when reading changes - and not even bar lines - changes written over lyrics (to tunes I've only played once or twice before) and thinking up stuff to play on the fly, at least I'm not starring at the neck.

the guitar/keyboard guy: He never played sax prior to buying that sax less than a year ago.
He's an investment banker, and just turned 30, this month.



all this crumbling-thread pissing-match $h!t:
JUST AS A REMINDER, the TOPIC is about encouraging tuba players to find a cheap/playable bass/amp and teach themselves to play (for various musical beneficial reasons, including beginning to free them up from their "music" being only notes-on-a-page)...not about "high-end gear", "what sort of wood", and not even whether 5-strings is an advantage or a disadvantage.

[LeMark]

this is a thread about bass. Not specifically about YOU

I was giving my perspectives about what makes a winning situation about bass guitar, not even directed at you, and you made it about you. That's very annoying.

No I dont want you to tear up your bass, but if someone is looking to have a great playing bass for just a little money, Adding EMG active pickups is a great way to accomplish that

[bloke]

this is a thread about bass. Not specifically about YOU

...so I said, in the first sentence of the thread:

Learn to play the bass guitar.

[Schlitzz]

Some people might fine more success singing as an alto. Don’t need to worry about sight reading. Some of them have been on the same note for 18+ years.

[bloke]

Some people might fine more success singing as an alto. Don’t need to worry about sight reading. Some of them have been on the same note for 18+ years.

Speaking of alto, are there any cheap mods that you would suggest doing to a cheap viola?