P
Decent Beginner's Instrument
Unlike a lot of HB guitars, HB basses have a long way to go. To keep this short and sweet:
Tuners: must be replaced immediately. This was to be expected - the tuners on this bass are laughably bad. You'd be tuning between each song if you took it onstage.
Neck: straight, but fret sprout was atrocious. Took multiple passes cleaning up the fret edges before this thing was playable.
Pickups/sound: Not very good. I have a passive Mexican Fender Jazz and P-Basses and, stung up with the same brand of strings and through the same amp... this thing is not even in the same universe. Sounds cheap and junky... which it is. In the case of this instrument, you're getting what you paid for.
On the other hand it's affordable and it looks awesome. But you would need to do the above and then go ahead and swap the electronics and pickups to get this thing on the level of a mediocre Mexican Fender. This could turn out to be a very costly exercise on a 5-string.
If you come into this with the mindset of needing to spend another $300-$400 to make this a bass you play in the studio or onstage. At that point, you're approaching the cost of a used Fender bass.
I've been happy with my guitar purchases from HB, but this bass? If I could do it all over again, I'd have just saved up and bought a used 5-string Fender. Much better resale value, less hassle.
Tuners: must be replaced immediately. This was to be expected - the tuners on this bass are laughably bad. You'd be tuning between each song if you took it onstage.
Neck: straight, but fret sprout was atrocious. Took multiple passes cleaning up the fret edges before this thing was playable.
Pickups/sound: Not very good. I have a passive Mexican Fender Jazz and P-Basses and, stung up with the same brand of strings and through the same amp... this thing is not even in the same universe. Sounds cheap and junky... which it is. In the case of this instrument, you're getting what you paid for.
On the other hand it's affordable and it looks awesome. But you would need to do the above and then go ahead and swap the electronics and pickups to get this thing on the level of a mediocre Mexican Fender. This could turn out to be a very costly exercise on a 5-string.
If you come into this with the mindset of needing to spend another $300-$400 to make this a bass you play in the studio or onstage. At that point, you're approaching the cost of a used Fender bass.
I've been happy with my guitar purchases from HB, but this bass? If I could do it all over again, I'd have just saved up and bought a used 5-string Fender. Much better resale value, less hassle.
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