Home Bass
In the mid-‘90s, I finally got serious about the bass. I’d been farting around with a Hofner copy. Ridiculous thing. Piece of junk. Probably had a pretty bad something or other here or there, but I had a group of guys forming a band, the old post-college band, and I needed something.
My first bass love was my friend Chad’s blue 4001 fretless with googly eyes all over it. A Rickenbacker, of course, and just the coolest. So that was always in the back of my mind.
Well, I was waiting tables and had cash for basically the first time in my life, so I went to a place herel called South Austin Music. They had two Rickenbacker basses, which you see now, but you really didn’t see back then. It wasn’t as easy to find used instruments in the ‘90s. They just weren’t around. It’s hard to explain.
I played the two. I don’t remember what color the other one was, but this was a white, turned-kind-of-yellowish one. Which wasn’t my first choice, but it was just the one, for whatever reason.
And I think I’ve said it here before, but through feast and famine and apartments and robberies and girlfriends and randoms and irresponsibilities, here I am in 2026, and I still have it.
Not only do I still have it, but I’ve started playing it again in the last week. And all I can think to myself is, why did I ever buy another bass?
I can make an argument for having a P-bass, which I have two of, or you could argue that I have three, with the old ’80s Squier half-Mustang, half-P-bass contraption. But really?
It is totally home base for me. No awful pun intended.
I really feel comfortable playing it. It’s a little heavy, but I love the weight. The neck is great. It doesn’t buzz. I don’t know how old the strings are. Easily fifteen years old.
I remember replacing one, and I mean one. When a string broke, I bought one string and replaced that. It sounded brighter than the others for months, even though they’re flatwound. But now it’s been long enough that I don’t remember which string it was.
I don’t have a wrap-up to this. I don’t know why I own anything else.
Yes, you need a cheap and cheerful if you’re playing out a lot. I’ve got that. But I just think about all the basses I bought in between. That’s really the weird part. All the different iterations and trying this and trying that.
I did get negative feedback from one guy who’s still a friend, and I’ve played with him.
He’s like, “I don’t know about Rickenbackers, man. They’re too clicky-clacky.”
I said, “But this one’s not.”
He said, “Yeah, I don’t know, man.”
And I think maybe at the time I could have taken that to heart. But really, that was the only negative I heard about it.
Because back when I wasn’t a very good player, playing through Gallien-Krueger amps, the same stuff I’m playing now, all I heard was, “Man, your bass sounds great.”
Which is a really weird thing to hear, honestly.
And when I play a Rickenbacker through a Gallien-Krueger, I hear it.
Coincidentally, when I play my main P-bass thru that rig, I hear that too.
Yet I have other basses and have gone to other basses and tried everything and this and that. It’s just so weird.
I could have just been happy with the Rickenbacker, gone on more walks. I don’t know.