Buy a bass?

No frills, one passive pickup and two pots, the rest is in your fingers..... 8)
I like the simplicity as well, sometimes we are stuck in the details and forget most important issues as our fingers and the way we play the instrument. I'll try a Precision.

Thanks again Steinar! :D

BTW, nice site and great playing. Thanks for sharing.
As always, try before you buy - and make sure you're not just spending hard-earned money on something that's going to sit in a corner and gather dust.

Best of luck.....
Vic, as always, thank you very much. I'll try the Squiers, too. My idea, at least initially, is not to spend so much this time. If I like to play bass, I always can buy a better and more expensive one.

I'll check the short scale basses as well but I'm more or less tall and with normal/big hands. (I should send one of my pictures to Photos of yourself...)

I'll keep you informed! :D

I like playing both. I consider myself a guitarist and vocalist foremost. Then I continue to get better at bass, keyboards, and drums. I play all my instruments as much as possible and wish I had much more time for all of them.

Any recommendation on brands and models?

USED.
8)

Thanks guys! :D

A quick update. The David's book arrived yesterday. I've already read the first chapters...

If you read this: Nice book David! I like the way in which you explain the things, I also think it is better to tech to fish.

I also listened the CD! Cool tracks! 8)

One of my usual stores has also used gear. I'll ask if there are basses. Usually they have guitars and big amps.

I was doing a list of possible candidates according to prices, reviews and comments in several websites, sounds demos in YouTube, etc. Probably I will play some basses this week.

(I was sure I'd written this before in this post :? )

I will urge you to consider a fretless. It is a different instrument from guitar anyway and you will learn where to put your fingers soon enough.

I sneak off with my brothers fretless with flatwound strings as often as I can - very cool to play!! It is a de-fretted one - so it has lines where the frets used to be - good help at the beginning
good luck
lars

Hi Lars!
I will urge you to consider a fretless.
A fretless? Mmmm... I didn't consider a fretless... Yeah, it is a possibility. It could be challenging to play one of those instruments. I always said I couldn't play the instruments similar to the violin, i.e. fretless.

But we have the famous adagio that says: Never say "I will never drink that water" (and also it has a second part which can not be written here). And also we were always eliminated in quarter-finals and this year...

So I will try one of those fretless. I think I never saw an electric fretless in my usual stores.

Thanks for the tip!

depending of what sound you are after - Check if you can try one with flatwound strings too. Sounds and feels almost like an upright :D

Yesterday I read that the roundwound strings didn't appear before the early '70s so to achieve the old "sound" you need to use flatwounds. BTW I read it in the David's book.

And a new question. Is it important the number of frets? Precision and Jazz usually have 20 frets and some Ibanez or Yamaha have 24 frets. I guess it depends on the use and the music style. I don't know if the high frets of the cheapest instruments are very playable.

20 frets were enough for Jaco Pastorious...... :wink:

Fretless bass is a lot of fun, as I wrote earlier my only bass is a fretless Jazz Bass. It's easier to get into than many people thinks, just remember you don't have to slide into every note just because you can... :wink:

20 frets were enough for Jaco Pastorious...... :wink:
I guessed it! :roll:

If 20 frets were enough for Jaco Pastorious, probably they will be more than enough for me, too! :lol:

I don't think I ever got above the 12th fret on mine - but then again, I bought a bass just to add a few simple bass lines to my own songs. Root notes and a few fills were enough to be going on with - but then again, now as I've got a copy of David's book, it'd be a shame to let it gather dust....

I paid about £130 for my bass - then Darth Ordinary got the same model very cheaply on E-bay. I've since seen the exact same model a couple of times in a second-hand shop, in very good condition in each case, going for roughly half of that price! I know where I'll be looking first next time I've got GAS.....

:D :D :D

Vic

Fretless! Poppa votes for fretless.

Ever since I went acoustic and fretless, my electric fretted bass has become very lonely.
Now-days I'm pretty exclusively only playing my acoustic guitar and bass.

And I second the praise for David's book - I've had it for several years now and I love it.

-PD

Shopping. Take 1.

I was playing several basses this morning and I got some important conclusions:

I started with a Fender Precision MIA, sunburst, the classical. I think Timothy Schmit uses this model. It is not my target but I wanted to compare to a well known reference. It is nice. The sound is very smooth. (I'm an apprentice of guitarist and it was my first bass so it is also possible I didn't use enough strength in my fingers.)

I played a couple of Yamaha. The RBX170 is a very nice instrument. It feels "cheap". I mean, the knobs, the finish, the general feeling, etc. But the action was incredibly well adjusted and the neck is very smooth. I like very much the Yamaha's necks. The sound is "light", it'd need more "body".

The BB414 is very nice, too. One of my favorites today. It improves the sound and also the feeling of the RBX170. Very well adjusted, even better than the Fender. It has two pickups, a split coil and a single coil in the bridge. The selection is made by means of a switch. The three positions are very nice.

Squier. Well, I must admit I had a wrong opinion on these guitars. It is truth I played the "higher" Squier but they are very nice instruments. Perhaps I got that opinion from the reviews and the comments of some people. For this reason, it is important this kind of visits to the stores. I have discovered this bass: the Classic Vive Jazz. It seems it is absolutely new and there is not info about it. Sound great, action great (similar to Yamaha), finish great and very comfortable. One of my favorites too.

I had read very nice reviews of the Squier Vintage Modified series and the store has a Jazz model. It has a natural finish, very beautiful. I think I prefer a rosewood neck for the basses but it is also smooth. The action slightly higher than the Vibe but that is not a trouble. The pickups are "Duncan Designed".

I also tried a Rockbass by Warwick and a Cort (they are not I am looking for), another Squier (the Mike Dirnt Precision and... but it was the best Precision model available) and a G&L 2000 (a Tribute series, very heavy and very complex, so many options and knobs).

I want to try more Precision models but this store didn't have Squier or other similar brands, only Fender. The Jazz models sound very nice. I will go to another stores next week. Another of my usual stores has also fretless so I also will try them. I want to try the Ibanez as well.

Keep you informed! 8)

After pondering over similar doubts last year, I bought a bass. I have to say "Go for it, you won't regret it!" I don't think it makes sense to try and practice bass lines on a guitar, the bass really feels like a different instrument, although the fretboard itself feels

I played it for a while, and I think it really helped my sense of rhythm. I have not been playing it lately :oops: , as I have not been finding enough time even for my guitar playing, but I will pick it up again.

Regarding what bass to buy -- one suggestion I have is to try out a short scale bass (30") and a regular scale (34") bass. I just bought a regular scale bass, but wish I had tried the short scale as well before I bought. The short scale is a shorter stretch, and takes also it takes up a little less room.

I bought a bass amp as well, although I had thought about playing through my guitar amp at low volume. If you can find enough room to squeeze in an amp, I am sure you won't regret it. There are small practice amps available with 8" speakers, so it does not have to take up much room..

Lastly, I have to thank you for this thread -- you have inspired me to bring my bass out from my closet and start playing it again! :D

Lastly, I have to thank you for this thread -- you have inspired me to bring my bass out from my closet and start playing it again! :D
No, Vink, thanks to you for this post and also for the "To bass or not to bass" thread. I read it before I started this one and it solved many of my questions! :D

Tomorrow I want to go to another store. The idea is try out the basses in that store. They import Washburn. I did not read good reviews on this brand for the entry level but I will play them. They have a couple of fretless and I also try out them. I also saw a Yamaha BB414 so I will see if my previous feeling is repeated. I will ask for short scale basses as well.

This days I was reviewing my DVD collection looking for the basses that they use and also trying to identify the tones in each bass. Summarizing, I like three bass types. Almost all the bands I like use a Jazz bass (mainly Tim Schmit -Eagles-, John Paul Jones -Led Zep-, Marcus Miller, etc.). There are two or three BIG exceptions with Precision bass: Roger Waters, John McVie and a new discovering to me, Willy Weeks, what amazing player! The third set contains just one player: Nathan East but it is one of my top favorites. He plays Yamaha. I have an old recording in which he played an old BB bass.

First, I preferred the Jazz tone but then it started to seem too many bright. Perhaps "bright" is not the best word to describe it, I feel it as "sweet". Currently I think I prefer the Precision tone, perhaps it is more "heavy", powerful, full tone. The Yamaha BB has both pickups.

Anyway, I am learning a lot on basses and bass players these days!

PS. BTW, Vink, Tim Schmit also uses a Carvin bass but a different model.