Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

What are these like to play & how do they compare to a 4001/4003?

Forgive me everyone....

I always thought mine felt and sounded very "P" bass-ish.

That is a fair comparison Dave. The 2030 is pretty ballsy and has a nice thin neck (mine does, anyway).

My 2030 must be some fancy version because it came with these four knobs and a little switch on the front. If you monkey around with them you can get all kinds of interesting tones out of it.....and the ones I like the best don't sound like any P-Bass I've ever played. If you also monkey around with what kind of strings you use it gets even more interesting. I've actually been using Pedulla Nickel Rounds on it because they give me a bright, clean, almost acoustic-bass-sounding, woody tone with tons of sustain that I can't get on my other basses. Granted, I replaced the body and moved the bridge pickup back a bit, but I don't thing the changes made a lot of difference in the sound.

http://webpages.charter.net/tbradshaw/Ric%20Bass%20test%202005.mp3

Why is it known as the Hamburg bass?

Todd - really nice tone! As you said, almost acoustic sounding. It has that leaning to it. I also like the little ditty.

just bagged this one. Quite looking forward to joining the 2030 club.

that looks like an 80s model ... they have single coil pickups and a massive body and a very thin neck ... these are nice players ... they have the thinnest neck of any Ric bass ...

Nice snag, Bob. Great price. I ended up paying $1,300 for the later (albeit prettier) 2060 FG back in February.

Thanks Chaps, and a big thanks Paul for the heads up.

I was getting close to buying another Fender (Iknow, I know...)and I hope the 2030 will give me some of that without a change of fretboard scale etc.

the 2030 neck is different than the 4001/4003 ... it is the same scale but it tapers like a fender neck ...

Great price!