@eastcoasteddie yea always did like that bass you put together. Curious so I’ll check the reviews on the QC issues I was not aware of them, I thought it was the weight, even the dealer I grabbed it from mention they weren’t moving because they were so damned heavy… I’ll go and check out Lobsters review later today.
Nice, what pre and pickups did you end up with, I play passive basses so I don’t have a way to really gauge this active, it sounds super nice to me “as is” and I am partial to ceramics so there’s that but I am still curious, no plans to gig with five so mine will likely stay as stock, thanks.
I spent my first five years playing a passive P, then ~20 years playing an active Warwick, and the last ~10 years playing passive P basses. So I know active, and have come to prefer passives (P basses). I'm not a J-bass fan when I'm playing them, but I like the sound when other people play them. That's my background.
When I got my contemporary active Squier bass, it was purely to find a cool looking gold colored instrument to match the color scheme of a band I've joined; black and gold.
I found the stock pickups ok sounding, actually great sounding for the price, but kind of dull and uninspiring for actives. They didn't get the big punchy tone I'm used to from active, and they didn't get a great passive tone when turning off the active boost-only bass/treble eq knobs. Everything was just kind of, ok.
So I researched pickups first to find some that sound great both passive and active. I also prefer a P bass tone, so kind of was looking in that direction. I settled on the Nordstrand Big-Splits, which essentially are a P/J configuration with a P neck pickup and J bridge pickup. They do sound great passive so I'm glad I went that route. The best sounding P/J setup I've played (and I've tried a bunch).
Then I researched onboard preamps like crazy. I really wanted an Audere or John East, but I also really wanted the ability to play and function in passive mode without a battery, which Audere doesn't offer, and John East cost too much with too many bells/whistles that I don't need. I ended up with the Nordstrand 2-band preamp (2B4c). The Nordy knob layout is the same as the stock Squier preamp, but with a push/pull volume knob to go from active to passive mode. Passive mode actually sounds good while the volume, blend, and tone knobs all still work without a battery even installed. The active eq is very nice with these pickups, and offers boost and cut as well.
I also found a full set of gold hardware for $50 here, so got that to add more gold. I've installed the gold knobs, bridge, machine heads, and pickguard screws. I'm toying with the idea of removing the pickguard to expose more gold... Oh, and I added LaBella gold flatwounds, but they have quickly lost most of their gold sheen. Black tapewounds might look good on this bass... Funny enough, these cheap no-name hardware upgrades (tuners and bridge) actually improved the bass's natural tone and response! That makes me think the original hardware was extra, EXTRA cheap.
Congrats on your bass, it looks great! I do like that neck much better than the stock one.
