Making the switch from bass to 6 string guitar

So how did i start on six string guitars?

My father has amongst a few others, a Hofner Galaxie (like this one here), red, covered in switches, and despite one pickup thats had winding issues its still in fantastic shape aside from being played out on the neck, so much so he won't play it unless begged. Suffice to say with its rhythm and lead switch, individual pickup switches and tone control, and a single master volume its capable of moody dark Cure-like tones all the way to trebly Surf. It doesn't hurt that it plays like butter either. 

Playing bass is fun, its my key instrument and influences my tastes in music today, but as a solo affair, its a touch dull. So I decided i needed to at least be passable on electric guitar.

Even 25 years ago, they were out of my price range, so I went for a Hondo Les Paul copy that ironically now seems to collect many times the amount I paid for it - at least if i'd left it original but thats for another post. That guitar too played well, but was lacking sonically and also has started to show signs of fret-wear. 

I thought again of the Hofner Galaxie now I earnt a bit of money  - then I saw the price had gone up faster than my wages! Chris Rea, The Raveonettes etc seem to have catapulted it into the cool class (along with WEM it seems), and quite frankly the re-issued Galaxie HCT just misses the point that it would take a lot of work to reinstate the features that make the original Galaxie so special.

This left me looking for a ‘nearest alternative’. Whilst the Galaxie is in many ways a kind of ‘superstrat’ its actually really much closer in soul to the Fender Jazzmaster. Theres a huge amount of love for the offset Fenders and prices match. So I went on a partscaster binge which will be covered in other posts!

In the end, through much misadventure and learning from Dave's World of Fun Stuff - YouTube I ended up with a weird scale surf green Strat style body that wouldn’t take any neck i tried, which was a shame as it sounded interesting with Wilkinson P90’s. As a last stab, I tried a Squire Jaguar neck I scored cheaply which didn’t fit either!!

To my luck this neck was from one of the real star guitars of late, the Squire Vintage Modified Jaguar, noting its pedigree from the Jazzmaster and its scale length closer matching my familiarity with Gibson style guitars - so I gave it a shot and imported a body from California, paid the staggering pile of import fees (on a second hand body!!! HMRC do like to rob me…) and started on building the Jaguar, concluding my guitar assembling chapter