Ernie Ball Music Man has launched a new online service that lets bassists spec up their own custom StingRay bass guitar. The Custom Design Experience allows players to select four and five-string variants, right or left-handed models, and then to choose from an array of specifications to build their dream instrument.
It’s a bit like the Fender Mod Shop. Users are presented with a portal that allows you to drop in specs, preview them in a 360-degree environment, before swapping them out or moving onto the next section. The build price at the bottom helps you keep track of where you are at, budget-wise.
It is a lot of fun to mess around with but be warned; it does get addictive. And there are a lot of options to choose from.
Some of the decisions are easy. The orientation? No problem. Everyone knows whether they are right or left-handed. Others less so. Even the fundamental choice between a four-string and five-string bass poses its own difficulties.
Thereafter, there are options, lots of options. You can spec up a single-pickup StingRay or double up on the humbuckers. The choice then is what colour of pickup, white or black? Mercifully, some considerable thought has been put into the user experience here; listing the pickup and pickup pole piece colour options in with the hardware section allows you to make quick edits and colour-match pickups with the hardware.
Hardware choices comprise chrome, black and gold. Pickups can be black or white. Pickguards can be tortoiseshell, black, white, vintage white pearloid or white pearloid.
The finish options are ridiculous; there are 30 all in, encompassing classic colourways like Natural Gloss, Vintage Sunburst and Black Gloss, and more avant-garde options like Galactic Pearlburst, Cherry Pearlburst, and Slymer Pearlburst, which sounds like a condition you might get from swimming in contaminated water.
While the specs are readily customisable they don’t stray far from the formula that has made the StingRay one of bass guitar’s most enduring designs. These all have a bolt-on neck (choose from maple or for a $300 premium roasted flame maple). Fingerboard options include maple, rosewood and ebony, or pau ferro if you want a fretless bass – and you can have that fretless fingerboard lined or unlined.
Once you have chosen neck profile, pickguard, hardware, etc, you can finetune the build and choose which gauge of bass strings you want it to ship with.
The Custom Design Experience is live now. We couldn’t help drafting a couple; one StingRay 4 in Cool Cactus Satin, with a matching headstock to boot, and two pickups ‘cos why not. And one StingRay 5 in Transparent Purple, gold hardware and figured maple on the neck and fingerboard. You can spec up your own now at Ernie Ball Music Man.
