NBD Fender (natch) Player 2 PJ Mustang

[Lozz196]

Saw this on Coda Musics website, favoured maple neck whereas the majority of Mustang basses are rosewood, and pretty much spot on 7lbs, two major factors for my choices nowadays. Plus I can add some Hipshot Ultralite tuners and shave off a bit more so a 6lb-something bass, result.

 

Out of the box the set up is nice, good even, and though I don’t usually like Fender strings it both plays and sounds good. I’ll have no use for the Jazz pickup on its own but the Precision pickup and both pickups together are difficult to choose between, each being really nice.

 

Just have to make sure my arthritic thumb is ok with the neck, at first try it feels slightly thicker than my Japanese Mustangs so next few days I’ll be putting in the hours to make sure. 
 

Am sure I’ll keep it, intention is to swap the pickguard to black, and replace the string tree with a Hipshot triple retainer to encourage a better break angle for the A string. I was thinking about the bridge as well but it’s perfectly solid enough and given that I now play with a much gentler touch I’m not fussed about it not having any guiding grooves so it’s staying.

 

Edited November 26, 2024 by Lozz196

[fretmeister]

Very nice! Nice and light too.

I really must try one. I only have 1 long scale left now.

[Cosmo Valdemar]

Remove the J pickup, that'll help with the weight! 😁

[Lozz196]

Well an update, as per the text below from my initial post, sadly it’s going to have to go back as it’s causing my thumb some bother. Fed up as I really like this bass but no point in keeping it if I end up not being able to play it.

 

“Just have to make sure my arthritic thumb is ok with the neck, at first try it feels slightly thicker than my Japanese Mustangs so next few days I’ll be putting in the hours to make sure.”

[Obrienp]

That’s a shame! I know that arthritic thumb problem ☹️. 
 

Matter of interest; did you think the Precision pickup was better, worse, or about the same as a pucka Mustang pickup?

[Lozz196]

Well I found the combination of short scale, the Precision pickup soloed and the nickel strings to have a bit too many low-mids for me, if I’d kept it I would have put steel rounds on it to counteract that a bit.

 

So I’d say on a Mustang bass that a Precision pickup with steel rounds and a regular Mustang pickup with nickel rounds will get just about the same sound.

[Jean-Luc Pickguard]

Has Fender fixed the shonky circuit for version 2 of the PJ player? I had to rewire the original PJ player mustang I picked up a few months ago as whenever the volume was anywhere other than full on, rolling down the tone dropped the volume. I posted this & the fix on the repairs & technical forum:

 

[Lozz196]

I never tried out the tone control, just left it on full all the time. Pickup volume was nicely balanced, my fave tone from it was both pickups as it did the scooping mids thing nicely giving quite a modern sound.