how is this possible?

[NickA]

Back in around 1980 the cheapest playable twin pickup bass I could find was a rather awful jazz copy ( blockwood body and puny pickups that picked up police radio).  Maybe the 40W valve combo it came with was included ..not sure. Anyway, £90 ( I wanted a fender jazz, but they were £440)

 

But now, in this modern age, see here:  gear4music "Chicago" ( with a gig bag, cable, strap and a plectrum).

 

https://www.gear4music.com/Guitar-and-Bass/Chicago-Fretless-Bass-Guitar-by-Gear4music-Natural/1V6V?_gl=1*1koznj7*_up*MQ..*_ga*MTg0MDYzOTIyOS4xNzM5NDg5MDk2*_ga_0WF1R5QW3K*MTczOTQ4OTA5NS4xLjEuMTczOTQ4OTExMy4wLjAuMjY0NTQwNDU.

 

£130!!!! ....and thats not their cheapest model.

 

How can it be so cheap?  Can anything so cheap be playable.

[Hellzero]

You would be amazed if you recall these unplayable cheapo instruments we started playing on in the early 80's...

[Lozz196]

Yep, I look back fondly at my memories of my Kay EB-O like bass bought in 1980 but it wasn’t a good instrument, I can get a much better bass now for a fraction of the cost in terms of monetary equivalent of now compared to then.

[Jean-Luc Pickguard]

Quote

how is this possible?

CNC Machines#

[Buddster]

I bought one, and yes it's playable. But it's very light and the body wood is quite soft and dents easily. The hardware is ok ish. Couldn't really get a good action on it. It served its purpose of trying a fretless, but an upgrade would be quickly needed. 

But yes, it's ok for £130, but feels like £130.

[NickA]

10 hours ago, Jean-Luc Pickguard said:

CNC Machines#

I was  thinking slave labour.  The materials are awesomely cheap too.  Pine body and "poplar laminate" ( aka plywood) fingerboard.

 

Bet it's still better than my £90, 1970s grant jazz was tho.

[neepheid]

It's getting harder and harder to eff up making a solid bodied instrument.  Not quite that cheap, but I picked up a £150 G4M bass last year and was pleasantly surprised by it.  Of course it needed work, the tuners were gash and the pickup left a lot to be desired, but the bones, the wood and the basic construction were sound.  Oh, and it was far too heavy for those who's first question in a sale or NBD thread is "what's the weight?"

 

If it ever arrives, keep an eye out for a thread related to this - I set myself a challenge - "New, 'giggable' bass for £150" - all new stuff, no second hand stuff.  The starting point for the project is an £82 (new) bass...

Edited Sunday at 09:58 by neepheid

[NickA]

20 minutes ago, neepheid said:

It's getting harder and harder to eff up making a solid bodied instrument.

 

Especially if you copy something that already works.  And once you ditch the endangered tropical hard woods, multi-layer laminations and hand soldered electronics it can evidently be very cheap to do.

 

Over several years I converted my cheap bass into something that I hoped would be somewhere between a Wal and a Warwick, with elements of jazz bass.  Added all those fancifications.  Cost an f'ing fortune.  Doesn't sound like any of those things either. 😂

[Jack]

I've owned one Harley Benton (the single coil P) and played loads more. You could honestly play one of those and never need to upgrade. Mental what £100-£200 gets you if you aren't bothered by the brand. 

[Paul S]

Can only agree.  I bought a Harley Benton Shorty which, at the time, cost around £70.  Straight out of the box it went on my gigging bass rotation - it sounds just like a P bass should and it is easy to play.  I changed the pickup after a bit, not because the stock one was bad (it wasn't) but because I wanted something more aggressive.  And I changed the pickguard because I have an irrational dislike of white pickguards on black basses.  The tuners aren't the best but I have basses with worse.

[BigRedX]

In 50 years of guitar and bass ownership, at all sorts of price points, I have only once had an instrument where the machine heads were actually problematic and that was a 1960s bass where 20 years of abuse meant the gears had worn to the point that they slipped when approaching proper tuning tension. The shop I bought it from had disguised this by tuning it down a tone to a point where they didn't slip and therefore I didn't notice it when trying it out. Everything else has had machine heads that functioned perfect well and so long as I cut my strings so that I wasn't winding unnecessary coils around the tuning posts they held their tuning perfectly well. IMO these days the only reason to change your machine heads is because you don't like the look of the existing ones.

[neepheid]

1 hour ago, BigRedX said:

In 50 years of guitar and bass ownership, at all sorts of price points, I have only once had an instrument where the machine heads were actually problematic and that was a 1960s bass where 20 years of abuse meant the gears had worn to the point that they slipped when approaching proper tuning tension. The shop I bought it from had disguised this by tuning it down a tone to a point where they didn't slip and therefore I didn't notice it when trying it out. Everything else has had machine heads that functioned perfect well and so long as I cut my strings so that I wasn't winding unnecessary coils around the tuning posts they held their tuning perfectly well. IMO these days the only reason to change your machine heads is because you don't like the look of the existing ones.

 

Well, that's your opinion, but I have had a couple of reasons to change them - on an Epiphone Embassy where the play in them was unacceptable (like an eighth of a turn of nothing when changing direction) and a cheapy G4M bass where none of them were great but the D string tuner was particularly weird where it would get tighter and more difficult to turn as the string came up to tension.

[NickA]

I guess the p bass is pretty easy to replicate. 

 

The endless "has anyone cloned a Wal" threads would suggest some basses are a bit harder! 

[BigRedX]

1 hour ago, NickA said:

I guess the p bass is pretty easy to replicate. 

 

 

Any manufacturer who still can't make a good P or J copy shouldn't be in the business of producing bass guitars.

[tempo]

Also, that £90 bass in 1980, is (inflation linked) a £360 bass now - basically a Squier CV, which in most people's mind, mine included, is very much a genuinely good quality gig-able instrument. 

[Len_derby]

On 16/02/2025 at 10:36, Paul S said:

Can only agree.  I bought a Harley Benton Shorty which, at the time, cost around £70.  Straight out of the box it went on my gigging bass rotation - it sounds just like a P bass should and it is easy to play.  I changed the pickup after a bit, not because the stock one was bad (it wasn't) but because I wanted something more aggressive.  And I changed the pickguard because I have an irrational dislike of white pickguards on black basses.  The tuners aren't the best but I have basses with worse.

 

 

Spot on. After asking Paul’s advice I bought a HB short-scale P bass. I was happy with it straight out of the box, at £79, and gigged it for a couple of years. I’ve now passed it in to a youth outreach project who get teenagers to form bands.

[kodiakblair]

On 16/02/2025 at 09:29, NickA said:

I was  thinking slave labour. 

Admittedly guitar factory wages aren't high but it's hardly slave labour.

 

 

If you're in the 'Land of the Free' and work for Ernie Ball you can expect $16ph, work for Fender in Corona and it's $18ph. For a comparison, the In-n-Out burger bar down the road from the Corona plant pays a starting wage of $22ph. 

 

It's just factory work so workers get factory wages.

 

Over in Zheng'an, China the cost of living is 1/5th that of California but the guitar factory folks are on $4.5 - $5. There a few reason why bosses there pay a bit better. It's home to 130 guitar factories, if next door pays more you risk losing your workforce 🙂 If none of you offer OK money then you all risk losing your workforce to the big cities. Prior to the Guitar Park opening 25% of the county's migrant workers were in the big city guitar factories, keeping them happy and productive is now vital to the local economy.

 

Exception to the $4.5-$5 rate is Zhang Weiyi. His place produces about 180 guitars per year but they carry $8000 price tags, he needs the cream of the crop for his work force 👍

 

South Korea has a higher cost of living than China but still much lower than the US. $9 - $9.25 is the going rate there.

 

 

 

[HeadlessBassist]

I have a couple of pupils who have the Chinese G4M basic basses. I have to say they take a bit of setting up, but for the money... They're not terrible.

 

They're good enough as starter instruments for kids.

[crazycloud]

I bought a Tele guitar copy from Artist in Australia for $A279/140 quid and it's awesome. It was a return, probably because it's a tad heavy, but that doesn't bother me. No set up required, no fret issues, FnF is perfect and the PUs are great. Haven't tried any of the basses as they're FSOs and don't appeal, but I'm sure they're of similar quality.

 

On 16/02/2025 at 09:36, Jean-Luc Pickguard said:

CNC Machines#

This. The location of the machine doesn't matter as factory quality machines will all be pretty good these days, and a moderately xhilled labour force in a lower wage country means good quality output and numbers for a modest price out the door. The lumber shipping costs to Indo or China are basically free as most is going in the other direction and shippers are happy to get whatever they can for the return trip instead of carrying mainly empty containers.

On 16/02/2025 at 20:29, NickA said:

I was  thinking slave labour.

Maybe in some places, but I've heard the guitar factories in Indo are sought after and well paying jobs, at least in local terms.

Edited Tuesday at 00:16 by crazycloud

[kodiakblair]

17 hours ago, crazycloud said:

The lumber shipping costs to Indo or China are basically free as most is going in the other direction and shippers are happy to get whatever they can for the return trip instead of carrying mainly empty containers.

Money is also saved as lumber is bought from USA sawmills which are either owned by the factories or they have a part share in. Kawai and World Musical Instruments were pioneers there, setting up their own mills back in the early 80's.

 

18 hours ago, HeadlessBassist said:

I have to say they take a bit of setting up

Is this a budget instrument thing ?

 

Common complaint folk trying Fenders in music shops make  is the poor set ups.

 

Do you think shop staff grab some tools and mess about before putting the basses out for the public ?

[HeadlessBassist]

1 minute ago, kodiakblair said:

Money is also saved as lumber is bought from USA sawmills which are either owned by the factories or they have a part share in. Kawai and World Musical Instruments were pioneers there, setting up their own mills back in the early 80's.

 

Is this a budget instrument thing ?

 

Common complaint folk trying Fenders in music shops make  is the poor set ups.

 

Do you think shop staff grab some tools and mess about before putting the basses out for the public ?

 

I tried a couple of high end Fenders, brand new and just delivered to Andertons a while back (I think one was the launch model of the original American Ultra Jazz, and the other was the active Flea Bass), and both were utterly unplayable from the factory. 

[kodiakblair]

2 hours ago, HeadlessBassist said:

both were utterly unplayable from the factory. 

Nothing unusual there.

 

I'm a regular visitor to Talkbass, plenty complaints about dog basses coming from Sweet "we do a 55 point QC test" Water 🤣

 

Folk often cite set up issues with budget basses but they can be found at all price points. Thing is there's a weird guilt mindset with budget gear, buyers are desperate to find a fault; same faults get tagged as quirks with bigger ticket items. 

[shoulderpet]

4 hours ago, kodiakblair said:

Do you think shop staff grab some tools and mess about before putting the basses out for the public ?

Yes, either that or Fender being misleading about "Fender spec" setup, I played a Squier once (I know it's not a Fender but made by Fender so as good as) that had the most horrific fret buzz.  I only discovered it when I lowered the action from what must have been a 5mm action, someone had blatantly raised the action to hide the fret buzz.

[Minininjarob]

On 15/02/2025 at 19:03, NickA said:

Back in around 1980 the cheapest playable twin pickup bass I could find was a rather awful jazz copy ( blockwood body and puny pickups that picked up police radio).  Maybe the 40W valve combo it came with was included ..not sure. Anyway, £90 ( I wanted a fender jazz, but they were £440)

 

But now, in this modern age, see here:  gear4music "Chicago" ( with a gig bag, cable, strap and a plectrum).

 

https://www.gear4music.com/Guitar-and-Bass/Chicago-Fretless-Bass-Guitar-by-Gear4music-Natural/1V6V?_gl=1*1koznj7*_up*MQ..*_ga*MTg0MDYzOTIyOS4xNzM5NDg5MDk2*_ga_0WF1R5QW3K*MTczOTQ4OTA5NS4xLjEuMTczOTQ4OTExMy4wLjAuMjY0NTQwNDU.

 

£130!!!! ....and thats not their cheapest model.

 

How can it be so cheap?  Can anything so cheap be playable.

Plenty of YouTube videos reviewing these suggest that most of them, with a little bit of setup, are actually decent instruments capable of more than you would believe. 

[itu]

On 18/02/2025 at 22:53, kodiakblair said:

Folk often cite set up issues with budget basses but they can be found at all price points. Thing is there's a weird guilt mindset with budget gear, buyers are desperate to find a fault; same faults get tagged as quirks with bigger ticket items. 

"It doesn't fit my playing style so it is faulty!"

 

The first thing after buying a bass is I change strings to my preference (and clean the fretboard). Then I check bridge adjustments (height, tuning, width). I play the bass one week and adjust truss rod, if necessary, and if there's one.

 

Cost: some time, and a string set.