I’m toying with the idea of picking up a bass for travel. Why? We went on holiday back in January for almost three weeks and as much as we had an incredible time, with me being a novice it set my back my progress quite significantly. We’re going away again for a couple of weeks in September and I’m thinking of buying another bass to take away so I can practice. This time, we’re off to the Maldives and there’s little else to do other than lie on the beach or read a book so taking a bass, along with my Tone Pocket, seems a good idea.
I already have two basses, a Squier PJ and a Fender J. I really don’t want to take either of them; my Squier was the first serious birthday present my wife bought for me 22 years ago and my Fender, Christmas pressie from my wife, is, well, a Fender. I’d rather not carry either as hand luggage on a plane, particularly if I’m forced to put it in the hold.
My local store has a leftie Cort Action Plus PJ in stock, it’s not expensive anyway and it’s priced below retail. I like the look of it and it feels good in my grubby paws. I like it although I’d prefer the red one, which they don’t have in stock.
I also travel on business and can be away anything from half a day to several weeks. Either way, the bass won’t gather dust and will be used.
Anyhoo, would buying this bass for travel be a (relatively) sensible thing to do or would it be a little bit pretentious?
You could buy a travel bass. There are a few on the market. Some of the guys here own them. @JerryP and @John_E come to mind. You could also consider a short scale.
Maybe you can rent one locally??? Saves you the hassle to haul it with you…
But, really, a (short) break from playing bass is not necessarily a bad thing - you come back feeling hungry and you’ll be surprised how fast you get back into the groove. Also, I usually take a notebook and a pen with me on travels and like to work out “theory” stuff or rhythms etc on paper. A lot of this stuff sticks better when you write it down for yourself (as opposed to just reading about it)
I’m quite limited in choice being a leftie but I’d be interested to hear from @John_E and @JerryP what specific travel basses are out there.
Another thing I found with the Cort was that it felt incredibly light; I had my Fender with me as I was test driving the Tone Pocket and the Cort felt lighter. I guess it might just be down to something as simple as weight distribution but it felt lighter anyway.
@joergkutter the only things that were for rent last time we were there was water sports gear. I do end up in some seriously ‘off the beaten track’ places where I doubt I find a bass for rent, especially a leftie.
I take your point about a bit of time off can be good but I only usually find time to practice on weekends and never more than two hours over the whole weekend.
Might want to put tapewounds on that bass to play on the beach in the Maldives… otherwise your strings will rust faster than you can play a major scale
Both @John_E and @JerryP have Travelers TB4p. Inspired by Sonny T from Cory Wong and the WongNote, I switch the nut and reverse the string to make it left and play it upside down right handed. It works like a charm. You just have to reset the intonation.
There’s a headphone jack and AUX port ready to go.
@Barney when I was in the guitar store, they gave me a righty acoustic which one of the boys seemed to think it could be turned but the other pointed out a potential issue with a connection of some sort. I dunno, it went over my head.
Yeah it’s pretty straightforward. If you reverse the strings the G will fit in the bigger slot where the E string was. But the bigger E string won’t fit into the smaller slot for the G.
