LeftyBassist.com

Not sure if anyone here has heard of these guys, but the company is getting a lot of buzz for building a super rugged and roadworthy upright bass that still sounds really good... AND the proprietary electronics supposedly sound great.

Anyway, I just contacted Jason from Blast Cult and asked him about lefties... his response?

Now that's what I call an answer, and answers like that deserve some love.

Here's some info for those interested...

Website: http://blastcult.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/blastcult
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1bCMzvJPv0

Wow, cool!

Excellent! He's absolutely right, and they're beautiful instruments to boot!

Definitely the right response! Great picture, makes me want one..... where's the Drool icon when you need it!

Those look great!

Wow! And just last weekend I was testing the waters with my teachers right hand upright. Too bad I can't afford one, or have the room for one.

So what's the price range of these?

I found this post on a DB forum...

"The price for the One4Five in satin black, satin blood red stain, and satin antique white is 3700.00 USD. The satin bad luck green pearl, satin copper pearl burst, satin tobacco burst stain, and satin blood burst stain is 3900.00. If you want fully polished mirror finish add 500.00 except piano black which is 1000.00 extra. We can also do custom paint for an upcharge based on the amount of extra work done."

GAUGH!!!!!! (:^O

But at those prices I am sure the quality is great. Judging by their telephone number they are some where in Orange County about 20 miles from me. I may inquire to see if I can get some sort of factory tour or something.

I do have a crappy upright I bought new from eBay for $500. The quality is meh and action is terrible. I only play it at home and basically use it as a conversation piece to fill up an empty corner in my living/dining area. I have always wanted to have and play an upright, but they're so hard to come by. I have noodled around with righty uprights at World of Strings in Long Beach and I can tell right away they are well built and MUCH more playable than my POS. Ah well, maybe when things get better....

I'm sure with the custom paint jobs and the built-in electronics, the prices aren't too out of whack. And no doubt a little more to the base price (heh) means that righty players help subsidize any additional costs that may be incurred with building left-handed models. And that's the way it should be. Why have them pay $3400 if we have to pay $4100? Equal price for either hand.

Yeah, I guess I'm not too shocked by that price... in fact, I'm actually pretty surprised that's it's as low as it is... and I'm NOT a wealthy man.

A completely hand-made-to-order lefty upright bass with built-in electronics by a small Southern California boutique builder for only $3700?

I dunno... seems like a pretty sweet deal to me... it'll definitely take a little saving and a little selling to make it happen, but I'm definitely looking in that direction at some point down the line.

An interesting development. I called them up and indeed they are relatively close by. I spoke to Miguel and asked if there was any local store I could try the basses out and he said there weren't any at the moment. He then invited me to visit the factory, which I will do next week. He says they have a one off bass that they convert from right to left for demos (naturally if one orders a lefty it will be completely lefty). So he said they will switch that bass over so I can play it (that'll be a laugh) and see how it feels. He said I could take pictures so I will do so. I also found this video from NAMM 2012 of Jonny Bowler playing a lefty Blast Cult bass:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USmQ1-mcu3U

I will post pics and any interesting notes from the visit.

Sa-weet! Looking forward to your tour review.... watched the video clip... cool that he's a lefty! His percussive 64th-note slaps are awesome to watch! Thanks for posting that....