LeftyBassist.com

Due to make it's debut at Summer Namm '09:

http://www.squierguitars.com/products/s ... 0326722521

(Maple body? Odd, unless it's a typo.)

I'm not sure what these will be selling for, but the MSRP on the righty is $500, so my guess is a street price of around $399.

Wow I'm kinda glad to see this. The VMs have a good rep and the righty ones I have picked up have felt solid.

Maybe the soft maple bodies will allow us to relic them, instead of us having to pay an upcharge to have someone take a dremel tool and a router to the bass???

Hi folks! Andrew, PJ-- OK, yes I know I need to get busy on the posting (4 posts since October 2008= embarrasing) but I'm still here and I promise to get going with some stuff. With that said...

Am I the first guy on US soil to get my hands on one of these? I was cruising around doing a search for a left handed one and every listing that I found was for a UK or Euro store except this:

http://www.elderly.com/fmic/items/SVMJBL.htm

I know the folks at elderly pretty well from shows, etc. so I immediately got on the phone- turns out they only had ONE-- and the guy I spoke to wasn't even sure how they got one already-- but it's now in my hands as of today!

As I'm turning it around in my hands, my first immediate observation is WOW--this is a Squire? The pics are a fairly accurate representation, but the bass is actually MUCH BETTER in person in every respect. Fit and finish is well executed in all areas. The body is a 3 piece but the seams are so nicely matched that you won't notice unless you're looking for them. The finish is immaculate- the butterscotch-ish color is very elegant looking. The routing is pretty clean, and the neck pocket is tight as a glove-- the neck is a thing of beauty unto itself, great feel and finish on the frets, binding etc....I'm at my office and haven't plugged it in yet, but I have a solid maple-bodied Schecter diamond J from a few years back when they came equipped with the same Duncan Designed JB101 Jazz Bass pickups with Alnico V magnets, and it sounds great-- so I'm anticipating similar tonal performance.

No question at this price point Fender has this thing nailed and are now their own worse enemy because value per dollar this easily completes with their MIM Jazz. My hat is off to the quality control being done in Indonesia on these; it's not quite up to MIJ levels, but in terms of the overall feel and vibe this bass definitely feels more closely related to my Japan reissue basses than my MIM Jazz.... I assume the raw materials may be slightly lesser grade than MIM but I really don't get any immediate sense of that in any way that matters significantly.

We can only hope they are considering expanding the Squire line to include lefty versions of the Classic Vibe Series Precision Bass ’50s (please!!) and ’60s, and Jazz Bass ’60s... if you haven't seen this Guitarworld Classic Vibe comparsion on youtube, check it out, pretty entertaining: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6Cd98DH__U.

I find myself tempted to rub that Squire logo off the headstock, replace it with a vintage reissue decal, replace the chrome knobs with vintage Jazz knobs, and go happily on my way to the stage...

Again, the disclaimer is that these are my "right out of the box" observations-- I have yet to even get home with it, set it up and plug it in, but it makes one hell of a first impression!

Summer Namm just ended (July 17-19)- so does anyone know when this is supposed to be readily available in the US market so the rest of you guys can get one?

Interesting to say the least. Maybe Elderly got their hands on a prototype? That looks too darn good for a production run Squire.

Welcome back Carmine. Hope you're doing well, which it seems like you are if you're still buying up basses.

Good to hear a positive first-hand review of these. Those pickups alone should put these basses above and beyond the other low end J knockoffs out there. I assume the black block "inlays" are not true inlays but painted on at this price point?

I was thinking they're probably painted too, but it still looks good. Good looking bass... looking forward to your review after having a chance to plug it in...

Saw a righty one today at my local shop. I didn't get a chance to plug it in, but I can comment on the fit and finish.
The blocks are painted on. I wasn't too impressed with the neck pocket fit, the gaps were too large for my liking, but they werent huge by any means.
It weighed a TON. Maybe two.
The knobbies felt solid.
The finish was applied well. The color was between caramel and butterscotch, closer to caramel. Made me want to run out to my nearest Dairy Queen for a sundae.
The wood grain was not visible on this specimen, but you could easily tell it was a 3 piece body from close up.
The bridge looked decent, the tuners looked decent, the neck profile and action were good ( not great ), fretwork was average.
For the money - I think it was $375 - it is a good value for a Fender. I didn't ask if it came with a case, but at that price, I doubt it.

Other than the weight - I have back issues -I would consider putting this on my want list.

Sounds to me like Carmine got hisself a goodun'.

- Marc

Zzounds has got one left:

http://www.zzounds.com/item--SQU0326722

The Perfect Bass also has one, with some half decent pics as well.

http://www.theperfectbass.com/explore.c ... Y&modify=0

Nice to see these are starting to become available. But looking at all the pics, the bass at perfectbass.com (1st pic) looks not nearly as nice compared to the one I got from Elderly (2nd pic). Overall fit and finish is hard to judge unless you've got the bass in hand but from what I can see it looks like a more "generic natural" finish vs. the butterscotch, and the body seams are way too obvious for my tastes (I hate that...makes me think of an SX).

Marc may be right-- either I got an early proto or a goodun'-- and I was fortunate that I was able to confirm the bass in the pics was exactly the one I was getting. Judging from the righty Marc handled and the pics from theperfectbass it would appear that the production runs are going to be inconsistent (no surprize) so ideally you'd want to do an in hand inspection before you buy-- but good luck finding a walk-in store that stocks a lefty...

Haven't had time to properly set up and review yet, hopefully this weekend-- but I did at least plug it in and run up and down the neck a few times, and the good news is that all the reviews are right about playability and tone- it sounds GREAT, gives very nice growl. I would hope that the tone characteristics will be consistent from bass to bass, even if fit and finsh isn't.

I accidentally ran into one today while visiting a Dutch shop to try out some amps. I had brought my MIJ '75 Jazz reissue, so I had a nice opportunity to do a 1 on 1 comparison.

The Squier looked nice and the fit and finish were very good. Tight neck pocket, very good-looking natural finish, the fingerboard binding looked real (I thought both binding and blocks were painted-on, and the blocks were indeed, but I really had my doubts when looking at the binding) and the hardware was OK. The three pieces of soft maple used for the body didn't really match, but then again they weren't different enough to actually bother. The neck felt OK, although I would have preferred a smoother finish. This particular one could use a setup, the neck was a little concave, so it required a bit more digging in and working to play. But I really liked it! Plugged into a SWR Working Pro 700-head, Goliath Jr and Working Pro 115 it sounded really good. It had a bit more mid bark than my MIJ and the highs were a bit sharper than those of my MIJ which sounds a bit rounder and warmer, but it certainly did have that Jazz Bass thing going on. If I needed a backup for my MIJ right now, I would be seriously tempted.