Fender blue ashbory fretless elecric bass guitar with gig bag Review

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(More customer reviews)First of all I'd say if you want to know anything about this bass, visit the website largesound (google for it).
It has all the reviews, comparisons and whatever else you may want to know about this bass!
My bass arrived now 3 days ago, and I have a lot to say about this bass.
My main comparison will be towards an electric bass, as I've been a bass player for over 5 years now; and I will try to name the good the bad and the ugly in this thread!
Upon arriving I was startled how small and light the package was, only to find there was a smaller box within the box. And in that box was a (yet smaller) gigbag, and within that gigbag was the ashbory bass. Needless to say how over(under)whelmed (size wise) I was by it's tiny appearance!
At about 75cm (29,5") roughly seen, and not even weighing one kilo (2 pounds), this instrument is pretty remarkable, and about the same size as a regular guitar!
I went with a blue "The Armond" bass, however they sent me a Fender one.
*Edit: The Armond basses are taken over by Fender nowadays. They are just Fender basses without the Fender logo on the front.*
I personally like the blue color, it's more a blue purplish color, less IN YOUR FACE than the red one, but a little more character than a regular black bass.
Black really looks the coolest, but with a black bass chances are noone would notice your exceptional instrument, and mistake it perhaps for a guitar.
"Weren't you playing the guitar?"
For those interested in the technical details:
The logo on the front just says "Ashbory" and "TM" in small next to it.
On the back there's written "Designed and backed by Fender, and crafted in Indonesia"
The serial number has a format of "ICF 10000***" (with the 3 stars as last s/n numbers).
I picked it up and immediately noticed a couple of things:
1- the tiny gigbag, which seemed very basic, toy like but upto the task of gigging when well taken care for.
2- the guitar how light weight and small it was! Together with the color made it look more like a toy than a real instrument!
3- The neck is made from a shiny fingerprint attracting plastic (just like the rest of the body; you may want to have a soft wiping cloth that leaves no scratches).
Then I noticed some good things about the bass, and things that surprised me:
The bass was responsive, did not have overwhelming peaks or bursts of volume in the attack you'd get from most piezzo pickups.
The sound could be both upright-ish, deep, or mid/agressive-ish like a fender Jazz bass played on the rear (bridge) pickup.
The bass was remarkably simple made! A one piece stick with most basic stuff of a regular electric bass except for a visible pickup, and much smaller and lighter.
The jack cable fitted very snugly and tight.
The bass actually does not look as bad in real life than on photo's! At first I disliked the shape of the body and headstock a lot, but upon seeing the bass in real life, and since it's smaller than I had expected, those areas on the online pics where you'd think they wasted a lot of wood on empty (useless curves space), are less obvious on the real thing, than on the photos I seen!
Now the normal things I noticed, the bad (and the ugly)!
I personally think you can learn more from reading a negative (but true) review than reading only about the good and praises!
I have a lot to say about this bass that may be negative, but wanted to let you guys know I thoroughly enjoy playing this bass, even with these many faults and negative points!
My greater joy comes from playing a moderate bass I know cost me very little to nothing, than playing an expensive bass that broke my bank account.
I see this bass as an ultra portable variation on an electric or electric upright bass (cause that's how it somewhat sounds like).
Sound quality:
Don't expect to have a $1200 electric bass sound, far from it!
Due to the nature of the stings the highest frequencies the piezo pickup picks up (from the strings) are between 2 and 3kHz. There is some mid-bite in the sound, and some lows. I yet have to test it in live situations with vibrating lows from the amp!
The treble knob works well for that 3kHz frequency, and gives plenty of boost.
I find the bass knob, which is hard for me to notice where it focuses around, probably around 100Hz, does not make as much difference when you dial it in!
*Edit: see below*
The volume knob seems to be silent in either full open or full closed position.
The more you turn the knob to half open, the more static you hear, passing half open, the more the static disappears, and the more string volume comes through.
Slapping the bass gives a loud 'thud' between 500hz and 1kHz(and sub harmonics), and I would seriously recommend anyone using this bass as an upright (with plucking and thumping), to use it in combination with a good hard knee compressor or limiter that limits the initial thump.
This bass is not made for thumb/slapping. It does not give you desired high frequencies for that.
The strings:
The equipped strings arrived about 5 notes below the standard EADG tuning, so I gently pulled the strings upward, out of the nut, as I tried tuning them more and more towards the EADG tuning, so that the nut might not 'scrape' the already weak strings!
As some may have said, the first time it's impossible to tune, and took me a good 30 minutes of slightly over tuning for the tuning to sound right for 10 minutes, before being out of tune again.
The second day the strings only detuned for 2 semi notes.
Again, slightly overtune it, and after a minute or two tune it down to the right tone.
The third day the bass was detuned for only one semi tone on some strings.
The string tension differs between strings,and are not the same high tension as with an electric bass!
The G string, the smallest of them all, seems the only string which feels like it has the right pressure and tension (though I can imagine why it'd break so fast with that tension).
The E and A feel very sloppy. I wish there was a way to add tension to the string, which is seemingly impossible or it'd be out of tune.
The E and A string kind of feel like on a 5 string bass you'd detune your B-string to a low low F.
The build quality:
Here's where the bass' weakness lies.
Although the fretboard is made out of plastic, it's good enough for nylon or rubber strings,and I don't expect it to wear down anytime soon from use!
It also keeps the neck in position (makes it harder to bend forward).
The sound you can get from the fretless fretboard can be very nice, but is very hard to get good notes sounding!
The frets closest to the nut are actually about as close to each other as an electric bass' last octave frets (closest to the pickup).
From somewhere halfway the fretboard it's nearly impossible to play dead on! Intonation, and using vibrato is a necessity there!
It kind of reminds me of playing a violin!
The frets on the second octave on the neck (12 and up) are so close together, that at two octaves my thumb is as wide as 3 frets.
The nut seems very bad made. First of all it is too thin and sharp, causing the strings to be slightly damaged in there. My estimation is that:
1- When you continue to play the strings, there is a possibility that the strings will weaken and break at the nut, especially the weaker G-string.
and,
2- when the nut has bent the string in an angle (corner) the angled part of the weak silicone string is damaged.
As the string loses tension, and you wind it up to keep the note, the damaged part also gets wound towards the tuner.
A couple of months later the bent section of the string will start to give in, and because the string did not break at the nut, no one really suspects it's actually the nut that causes the destruction of the string; not a random event!
Also, not only is the nut too thin, it's also pretty high.
Strings are about 3 millimeter from the fretboard (AT THE NUT). For those who like their strings low, and don't mind a bit of silly looks, I would suggest you'd take a round file, and file off the nut 'till the string groove is as high as the fretboard.
Then cut a small piece of paper, bend it 3 times(bend to double, double bend to quad, quad layer bend to upto 8 layers of paper if necessary), and place it in the nut groove, and place the string over it.
If everything is alright you should have 0.5 - 1mm of string height at the nut, good enough to get sound without buzz, and the string does not get bent in a sharp curve because the paper is rounding off the tension at the corners of the nut.
The string height at the second octave is insane!
At 9mm it is starting to become as high as some uprights!
I do admit that string height must be higher than on an electric bass because of the lower string tension, but it could be lowered by 4mm easily!
There is a problem lowering the strings at the bridge.
The bridge is too high as well (like the nut) but you can not simply file in the bridge like that, and the bridge is not adjustable. You might be able to get something off of on the D and G string, but the E and A string are already as low as they can get (because they are very loose).
The bridge is a very peculiar thing, it seems to exist out of 3 pieces,where of 2 visible ones.
The first piece seems to be the base piece,mounted on the body. Underneath it is the piezo pickup. On top of the bridge (and the piezo), there is something like a nut, kept in place by what looks like...Read more›

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