Epiphone Jack Casady Signature Bass - Sparkling Burgundy Review

Thanks for the nice bass Mr. Casady!

The Epiphone Jack Casady Signature Bass will add a whole new color to your paintbox. The best feature of the JCB is the sound. The bass has it's own unique character. I'm not exactly sure how to describe it, but it speaks with a completely different voice than a solid body bass. The pickup has plenty of lows and highs, and also a pronounced full range brightness to the mids. The… read more Vari-Tone switch takes the tonality from warm to bright and gives a volume boost as you increase the brightness.I have no idea how the Vari-Tone works, but it gives you 3 really nice tones to work with. Plus there's also a standard treble roll off type tone control. Set the Vari -Tone on 50, roll the tone off and pluck by the neck, and the sound is almost like an acoustic bass. At the other extreme with the Vari-Tone on 500 with the tone full up, and the JCB has a pleasingly zingy brightness. The playability of this bass is awesome. One of the first things I noticed is how light it is. For me, this is a huge plus. The balance is surprisingly great too, despite the semi-hollow body and the giant headstock. The very slight tendency to neck dive is easily fixed with a wide strap. The neck is a little wider and thicker than say, a Jazz Bass, but it's still very comfortable to play. The Sparkling Burgundy finish looks fantastic. It works well with the vintage vibe of the bass. The appearance of the color changes from bright red to a more muted tone depending on how the light hits it. I like that the neck, back and sides are dark stained maple that shows the wood grain instead of red - it's a nice visual contrast. Since I almost never use a pick, I took the pick guard off to reveal more of the finish. The build quality is good. The bass stays in tune really well. The tuners work great and the large clover style keys compliment the old school look of the bass. With a few tweaks to the 3 point bridge it was easy to get the JCB playing the way I like. I was prepared to have to change the strings out, but the medium round wounds that the bass came with sound pretty good, so I left them on. I found a couple of minor QC issues. The volume and tone knobs were very loosely attached to the pot shafts. The volume knob would actually fall off the shaft when I'd go to adjust it, and the tone knob wasn't much better. I applied a little teflon tape to the shafts of the pots and that seems to have fixed the problem. Also, the bass was delivered with a small divot/dent on the bass side of the fingerboard between the nut and first fret. It's pretty small and doesn't effect the playability of the bass, so I can live with it. Overall, I like this bass a lot. It's relatively inexpensive, surprisingly versatile, very playable, looks sweet, and sounds great.

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Back to the 60's

Fit and Finish: Acceptable at this price point. Playability: Decent but not an easy player. Sound: With a set of flatwound strings, I am happily achieving those rich and resonant hollow body tones of the 60s era. Definitely pleased. With the roundwound strings it arrived with, you have a pretty good tone palette. All kinds of useful sounds can be achieved. I am happy with this… read more purchase!

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Great Product For The Price

Great all purpose instrument for it's value!

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