Many, if not all bass guitar bodies are computer cut, and therefore are very consistent. The only thing you are really paying for in a musical instrument is the quality of the electrical and hardware componants, as well as some minor detail work. The basses made in America are the best, however will generally cost you much much more. I highly recommend FENDER bass guitars for several reasons, the first being that with Fender you tend to get the most for your money. Fender instruments are also extremly easy to upgrade, modify, and repair, and are very well built. As you can probally already notice, I am very biased towards Fender, but for good reason.įender has been around since the 50’s boasting years of experience, and their instruments have been used by countless musicians. I have owned a Jazz bass, and P-bass for 4 years and haven’t had one problem yet. When purchasing a bass, there are many features that you should consider such as fretted/fretless, single coil/humbucker pickups, and neck shape. These features are honestly all personal preference and I would highly recommend visiting a music store and seeing what YOU like. Although I feel Fender is the best choice bass-wise, I would also recommend Gibson, Calvin, Tobias, Rickenbacker, and Dean basses. However, I would stay away from the Squier line of basses made by Fender, as I feel they are of very poor quality. Like I mentioned earlier though, you really can’t go wrong with a Fender. The second area that comes into play when looking to play bass guitar is your amplifier. Without a decent amp, your bass will sound, well…….not so pretty. The amp is really the key to sounding good. As with guitar you can own a crummy guitar with a great amp, and still sound decent. The same concept applies to bass as well. Today, their are many decent bass amp companies out there. Ampeg, Fender,Harke, and GK are what I like to call the Big four.
They are the biggest brands, and tend to produce the best products.
Hartke, Fender, and GK produce fairly priced amps that sound great and give you more bang for your buck.
(They also produce higher end “pro” lines, but most of those products tend to be overpriced.) I would caution you to stay away from brands like Behringer as they tend to be poorly made. If you are an absolute tone freak like myself, go with a Ampeg and you won’t be disapointed.