This was the first serious instrument that I bought (whilst at sixth form - errrr a LONG time ago!). The choice was this or a 1972 Rickenbacker 4001. The Rickenbacker had tape wound strings and sounded awful. I didn't know any better and so bought the Fender (not a smart investment move there Mark!)

When I bought this is had a really cruddy additional J-type pickup at the bridge. I replaced this with a Schaller one in the mid 80's and it does a much better job (maybe I will replace it with a Seymour Duncan or DiMarzio pickup in the near future). It's also recently had a bit of a makeover with new scratchplate, volume/tone knobs etc.

Before I moved to Scotland Mark Willmot (a superb repairer/maker and a thoroughly nice bloke to boot) gave the bass a proper setup, thus returning it to the land of playable instrumentation.

It sounds great - really loud and clear with plenty of that old style Fender grunt.

Whilst this bass is capable of making Billy Sheehan type noises, its owner, unfortunately, isn't.