paulie

Yeah Id agree with "you get what you pay for etc" but once you find a good standard jazz or P bass etc, with a great neck, well dress frets, good balance and well made its hard to pass it by. My experience with the high end ones is that they simply cut out the flaws that some of the cheaper models fall down on, but there are many regular 1k Fenders and Musicmans that left the factory near perfect and by putting the boutique pickups etc you get the same thing. But each to their own

Ive tried loads of compressors and I keep coming back to the EBS because its subtle, Others really do squash your tone when you dig in live. But in tube mode the EBS seems to go with your playing dynamic.

Funnily enough Ive had a love hate with P basses and Stingrays. Love them for some venue, not for others. The Jazz is prob the one id pick of the 3 if there could be only 1! I put Aguilar 60s pickups in it and in the Squire P, sound great. But yeah, I was only buying basses and amp in the past out of boredom. Now, I just want to get up and play

Having owned NYC Sadowskys, Zons, US Laklands, Fodera, F Bass, Skjold, Chris Larkin, Alleva Coppolo, Fender Custom Shop ive finally settled on a couple of basses that I just love to gig and not live in fear of them falling over or getting nicked! They are: a US Jazz bass circa 2001, a Squire JV p bass circa 1983/4 and a Stingray circa 1991 Ive come to realise that all my other basses were just posh versions of the above 3. And having replaced the pickups in the jazz and p bass, Im in tone heaven. All basses play, feel and sound every bit as good as my old posh ones and a lot better in some cases. A good outboard preamp suffices for an active eq. All in all, I have a range of sounds for any gig, the suit my music and my snob factor is gone.. So happy, for now lol