Mid level bass ideas

[honedawg]

My son (13) has become very interested in playing bass guitar. He's been using my cheap Washburn ($150) that I just bought on a whim to lay down some low end, and my wife and I are thinking of upgrading to to mid-grade 5 string for him. From reviews i've seen I'm leaning toward a Traben. Any thoughts for a good value bass in the $400-$500 range? He plays stuff like Gorillaz, Gnarlz, and Chili Peppers. We're planning to audition some next week but would like a good starting point.

[photoresistor]

to be honest, ive always just been a fan of good old fender basses... you really cant go wrong.

i would suggest you take a look at a fender deluxe active jazz bass if you can. i played one recently and was very impressed... $589. made in mexico, but hey, it felt great to play and sounded awesome so who really cares? plus im a sucker for that brown sunburst... i might actually pick one of these up as my second bass pretty soon (main bass is a ernie ball bongo 5).

ive seen one used on my local craigslist too so you might even be able to get it at a better price.

[c7sus]

I bought a G&L Tribute for my kid about a year ago. Great bass for the price, although we did need to replace the plastic nut with bone pretty quickly after we got it. That was $90. We had it setup with flatwounds and it plays and sounds great.

It's a long-scale bass, so that may be an issue depending on how tall your kid is. My 13-yo is about 6' tall and doesn't have any problems, but my youngest (12) is about 5' tall and it's a reach for him.

[Jouni]

I'd say a jazzbass too. Fender prolly is the best, Actually never played one, though, I've been much too happy with my Fernandez copy, for ten years now.
A bit off topic, but I've played last two years with H,E,A,D -strings, sometimes tuned up to D, and the neck is fine.

Recently bought a Peavey bass with humbuckers, and if not a mistake, it isn't suitable to anything with serious low end. Too rock-crunchy..

Definetly a jazzbazz..

And if dude is young as 13, I'd seriously check the action over good looks. Semi-puberty fingers and that stuff might popup in the equation?
5-string neck.. Enthusiasism, playing hours on end and not getting cramped?.. I've got no kids so dunno how strong they are..

[rayc]

Epi have a new SG style shortscale bass going cheap. try it.

[cephus]

It seems like bass players don't really like fenders to me. The last time I played with a guy who played a fender was 15 years ago and the guy was 50 something then.

I see most guys have off-brand stuff I never heard of that costs as much as all my guitars put together. Fortunately, Ibanez makes a couple that look just like those in that 4-500 price range.

I only brought it up because us guitar players are like "Get a fender. They're the coolest", but bass players seem to prefer function over that great american brand name. I could read a lot more into that, but I just think it speaks to a difference between people who play guitar and those that choose bass.

[lbanks]

G&L Tribute L-2500
Korean Spector Q-5
Fender Jazz
Fender P-bass

[kojdogg]

I have a MTD Kingston 4 that I love, also there are some nice Ibanez basses in that range.

[honedawg]

I appreciate the input, we'll be trying your suggestions:

G&L Tribute L-2500
Korean Spector Q-5
Fender Jazz
Fender P-bass
Epiphone
Ibanez
Fernandez
MTD Kingston

This weekend.