This review will be updated as I continue on with the ownership of this instrument.
For context I am a bass convert who also owns a pre ernie ball era stingray and another (very old) Harley Benton, an entry level PJ-5 deluxe from the days of yore. I was a guitarist for over a decade and have owned some really legit instruments, EBMM, USA B.C. Rich stuff from the golden years, various Ibanez prestiges, MIJ Yamahas etc. As a result this review will be uncompromising and I am not holding back anything.
The good:
-Fit and finish are IMMACULATE, I was eyeing local used six strings before getting this and in terms of FnF it surpasses everything I tried (even some custom stuff from local luthiers and some Korean MTDs), I am not sure if I won the QC lottery but it feels like a bass four times it's price. Sounds great unplugged too despite the thick lacquer (polished to the crispiest of standards, not one rough area!).
-Setup from the factory was also great! Low B at a hair below 3mm, E-C going from 2-ish mm to a hair under 2 on the C string, great shinny fretwork, very nicely dressed fret ends, intonation is excellent, there is zero buzzing, dead notes etc. played like a pro level bass right out of the box! I did change the strings and bumped the strings up by some gauges which meant a new setup from my end but it was a breeze, the truss rods were quick to settle and now I have the bass playing somehow even better (2.8mm-1.6mm B0-C4) again with zero buzz etc.
-The stock pickups are really nice, no noise and great dynamic range, they react great to playing in different areas of the body and they can stand on their own easily regardless of context, I mainly play Jazz, fusion, funk-fusion and gospel, you can nail a lot of the boutique-esque tones of these genres by just being careful of your finger-slap positions. I play mine direct into my audient interface with the Mark Studio 2 plugin and it's got tone for days.
- The fretboard is great, a real dark slab of beautiful ebony in mine, wasn't dry at all and it has just a bit of grain showing, I looked through it with a fine tooth comb and I saw zero cracks or anything worrying.
-Nut was cut very nicely, the material is as advertised and it was bang on for the height needed, great job!
-The 35'' scale length makes the B0 sound gigantic, throw some chorus and compression with a bit of reverb and you are in 80s-90s synth slap territory. Despite that the bass plays easy and doesn't feel ginormous
(I am 188cm tall with Steve Vai hands).
-Wiring is also very clean, no loose connections, no crackling pots or ground issues, which leads us to...
The "mid":
- The preamp while flexible is noisy, especially when boosting treble, this a thing that happens with a lot of active basses but the convenience of having the pre-eq on your bass is unmatched. One detail I really like and made me keep it in the mid category was how there's no volume jump between active-passive modes, really even! I essentially use it as a "solo mode" switch, cutting treble and boosting mids to get that Patitucci style solo tone.
- Despite great fit and finish, there is quite the gap on the fretboard edges (especially on the C side, it's got almost 6mm of useable space) and it could safely be at least a 17mm string spacing bass (the 24th fret is 87mm, divided by 5 we get a maximum safe spacing of 17-ish mm) maybe even an 18mm spacing bass. Big spacing is a hallmark of boutique sixers and it's a shame we couldn't have it here, maybe in the next refresh ;) ? All this leads us to the few bad things.
The bad:
-Hardware! The tuners have a lot of play and they creek, what happened here ? The tuners on my old HB PJ-5 are to this day the most stable ones I've had in any instrument, I've had guitars come over with evertunes that couldn't match it's tuning stability. Maybe a by-product of their skinny post design ? They are stable enough to keep their tuning for a good amount of time but they are nerve wracking to use, I feel like they'll explode if I tune a cent higher than standard. Also I don't like the bridge, half the adjustment screws don't grab well and it's very finicky to do micro adjustments on, it was grounded properly at least! 16mm spacing ain't that terrible either but I'd much rather have at least 17 or 18. Also the knobs are questionable to say the least, no clear indication of where you have set the EQ and Balancer at a glance and you have to find the middle position and adjust them again and again. A simple dot would even be better but some Smith-Lusithand style Aluminum knobs (which WSC also makes ;) ) would make it feel even more premium.
- Factory strings were not it.
Overall the "bones" of this instrument are great and I will upgrade it's hardware to fit my needs (the beauty of luthiery!). If we consider the boutique six string bass it's own instrument this is a great entry into it's world before pulling the trigger on something you can buy once in your life time (Smith, Fodera, a real Tobias etc). Just get some good tuners and maybe a new bridge and have fun learning modern standards!
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