New Guitar Day: Slapa Da' Bass Edition

About a month ago I had a longtime friend of mine decide to clear out some of his old basses.  He's a touring musician, and has collected quite a few instruments.  He told me that he's made a lot of friends across the country, and would pick up instruments at great deals.  But all those great deals were taking up space in the house, so a few had to go.

He posted a photo of a Squier Classic Vibe 60's Jazz Bass, and said he was happy to let it go for $100.  I immediately said, "That's an awesome price.  Someone will snatch that up for sure!"  I would have bought it, but I already had a Dean Juggernaut bass.  That's their version of the Fender Jazz Bass.

But then I got to thinking.  I remembered when the Classic Vibe Jazz Bass series came out.  It was everything I wanted in a bass.  The Olympic white with red tortoiseshell pickguard was the exact color scheme I love in a Fender type guitar/bass.  I also really liked the fact that the neck was a golden vintage tint with a rosewood fretboard.

After about two weeks I messaged my friend, and asked him, "Say, has anyone bought that bass from you yet?"  Shockingly, he said, "No."  When those basses were new they cost $400 plus tax.  $100 was a steal.  So I told him, "I had to have it!  When can I drop by?"

So I dropped in the next day, and handed over the cash.  I wish we could have talked more, but with the Covid-19 craziness happening we had to keep it short.  But it was good to see him, even if for a short time.

I immediately loved the bass.  The set-up was different than how I set up a guitar or bass, but somebody really took the time to make it easily playable.  What has shocked me the most on the entire Squier Classic Vibe series are the pickups.  They have installed some extremely awesome pickups for a guitar or bass at that price point.

Before I go into my tinkering I'll post some photos of her.

I have to say someone had performed a wonder fret-dress on this bass.  It was smooth.  Again, everyone has preferences on how they like their instrument set up.  With this bass I decided to shim under the neck.  This way it would lower the strings from the fifth fret up.

I know I said I loved the pickups, but I still had to tinker with them.  A few weird coincidences happened.  I had a Jerry Sentell Jazz Bass bladed bridge pickup that was going to go into another build.  That build never happened so I've had it laying around for a while.

I also managed to snag a used Seymour Duncan Vintage Jazz Bass neck pickup for a good price.  So I installed both pickups into this bass.  I also used some really thick and strong foam to push the pickups up closer to the strings.  I also changed the strings to my usual GHS Boomers.  I also prefer to install Fleor strap-locks, so I did that as well.

All in all it didn't require too much work on my part.  I cleaned it up a bit with my favorite Ken Smith polish.  I also used a large paintbrush to knock some of the dust away from the bridge saddles, but after that I could call it a day.

I gotta say I'm having fun with it.  I don't play bass that often so it takes me a while to get back into the groove when I pick one up.  Now I just have to find a place to keep it.  Like my friend I'm starting to run out of room here.  Oh well.  Such is the life of musicians.