Dean Guitars Pace Bass

This review is for a Dean Pace electric upright bass. Don't know the year it was made, or where it was made. 34-inch scale fretless bass with heavy duty stand, (this part is rare!)PASSIVE electronics, black on black in color.

Without the buffer pre-amp, The Pace is a little shallow on tone with a lot of treble. Fortunately, I use an outboard pre-amp on all of my passive basses, and it was just finding the right one for this baby. Again, and fortunately, that didn't take long to find!

There was not much set-up on this bass. However, I did have to replace the tuners (one of them broke within the first week I had it!), and I had to replace the grounding strap on the peizo element. None of the repairs were expensive though.

Since replacing the few parts needed, this bass is now bullet proof! It's got great tone, and is definitely a lot of fun to play.

No probs. They walked me thru everything I needed as far as info goes.

As said earlier, this thing is a blast to play! I play in primarily a funk/classic rock band, and I always get a lot of wild-eyed looks when I play some of those classics (especially funk!!) on this bass. I was originally an upright player back in the day, so this thing is definitely where it's at as far as the portability issues go (NONE!!!). A lot better than carrying the doghouse around!!

2008 Fretless upright bass.
35" scale (shorter than a 3/4 upright, which is 41.5" ussually)
Uses standard bass string, Piezo pickup, single volume control, solid body (no feedback!!)
the stand system is awesome, you walk up to it and start to play. If I want to move a bit when i play i just ease off the setscrew on the ball and let it float.

Great for Jazzy upright bass.. I play it through a fishman bass DI to a Genz Benz accoustic amp, everybody seems to like it. You need to boost the low end and pull off the highs a tad.

It was great! no issues at all.

Don't know yet. I did get it so I wouldn't have to worry about carting around my accoustic

No issues yet

I've played for 5 years, and am a bit of a gear head. I play guitar, pedal steel and stand up bass. I have wayyy to much gear to mention.
I bought this as a nice inexpensive traveling EUB.

Hvae to say that apart from the grounding issue, I'm becoming more and more impressed with the sound of this Bass. One of the soundguys at the Goulburn Festival actually gave a damn and didn't automatically do the "smiley face eq/suck all the mids out of the Bass so I don't have to actually think or put any effort in" and pulled a great sound almost like a mic'd double bass with a hint of mwah in the sound.

This is a follow up to my previous review. I was playing a gig and suddenly the bass developed a HUGE hum during the first set. It went away but as I was waiting to go back on at the end of the night (it was a one day mini-festival and the act was opening and closing) I was jamming backstage and the hum returned big time, but intermittently. I ended up using my Precision for the last set.

As I had to fly out to Goulburn for the Australian Blues Festival a couple of days later, and I can't trust any of the local so-called repair people to respond in a timely manner to what was an emergency for me, I decided to do some trouble-shooting myself

Obviously it was a grounding issue so I decided to start at the bridge - voila! This bass has a problem with it obviousy being designed to be slung together quickly by unskilled labour. The ground wire comes out of a hole drilled in the body between the electronics cavity and the bridge then the bridge is just clamped down on top of the wire. After a time, the wire presses a little indent into the body wood, becomes loose, and contact between the bridge and the ground wire becomes intermittent.

Easily fixed by someone with some basic electronics skills (like me), but not something which should be an issue on a nearly new instrument, and I can see it being a major unnecessary panic situation for someone electronically-challenged who has to run off to the repair dude for every little hiccup.

Electric upright bass made in China. Active preamp with volume, bass and treble. Piezo bridge pickups. Mine is the slightly metallic blue finish.

I really wish the tone controls were "normal" exterior controls rather than board-mounted trim-pots you need a screwdriver to adjust. Although they are accessable without having to remove the plate on the back, it's still an innecessary pain in the butt, in my opinion.

Bridge is a piezo with adjustable saddles. One thing I like is that the ball ends just drop into slots from above - no having to thread the strings through a hole in the bridge. Not a big deal but if you've ever had one of this style (I have), you'll appreciate it.

The neck is almost Double Bass profile i.e. really thick.

It comes with a sort-of o.k. hard foam case. I'd say the zipper will die before too long, and I'd be careful about loading anything on top of it. Treat it like it's a gig bag and youll be o.k.

It has a couple of issues which I'll outline below.

I really like it's sound. It doesn't sound exactly like an upright and it doesn't sound exactly like an electric - it's definitely got it's own vibe which is what attracted me to it in the first place. I use it with a swing/blues/50's band I play with sometimes and also when I gig with a young acoustic roots singer guitarist (think Xavier Rudd style). It's not noisy, and I've played it through some pretty hefty concert systems.

Mainly through a Markbass SA450 and Eden D210XLT. SOmetimes just into the PA, depending on the monitoring available.

I haven't recorded with it as my intonation occasionally still isn't what it should be.

One issue with high powered PA's is that when the subs are pumping, there is occasionally some intermodulation with the Bass due to it sitting on a stand on the stage. This varies depending on how solid the stage is.

The first time I played it in this situation I was going nuts 'coz I couldn't play D on the 3rd string in tune - it took me ages to figure out that the subs were resonating a bit at a frequency slightly sharp of the D and anytime I played D, the out of tune resonance came out and made it sound like I was playing sharp. The next night on the same stage but with a different PA the note was E, but more in tune, so it just sounded like I was using an octave pedal every time I played E.

I'm currently sorting out a system which will isolate the bass, acoustically speaking, from the stage floor.

I've made no adjustments as the bass was perfectly playable, apart from the tuners (see below), straight from the store. The neck is non-adjustable; I assume due to it's almost double bass profile it won't warp or bend.

The finish is fine.

I have some doubts about the long term durability of the stand. It's just a standard cymbal stand so it shouldn't be too hard to replace with something decent. Now I've pretty well sorted what height and angle I want the bass at, I'll get a better stand or possibly get one made permanently set at the right height and angle.

Now for number one problem. The big issue with this bass is that the tuners are CRAP, RUBBISH, AWFUL, UNUSABLE. They are the WORST tuners Ive EVER seen on an instrument in 30 years of playing, and this includes the really horrible beginner instruments which were available back in the 70's.

I'm not exaggerating. I can't over-emphasise how bad they are. Whoever authorised or ordered these tuners should be fired. Really!

I immediately had to replace the A tuner as the teeth just sheared off when I attempted to tune it. Fortunately a standard OLP machine head screwed straight on. I want to replace the strings but I dare not until I can find a set of tuners. It's unbelievable but I'm having a hard time finding a set of 2 to a side standard bass tuners around here.

I'd give it a 7 or 8 in this category, but the sheer OVERWHELMING AWFULNESS of the machine heads drags it right down as far as I'm concerned.

I've been playing pro and semi-pro for over 30 years now and gig in a couple of bands and as a casual/sub and do sessions. Mainly Blues and Swing but also Country/Rock/50's/60's/Jazz/Cabaret etc.

I've played instruments from cheapie Indonesian P-Bass copies to Alembics, Music Man, etc.

At the moment I'm getting back-to-basics and mainly play an old Precision through a Markbass SA450 head and Eden cab.

This bass has definitely got me a bunch of gigs and has paid for itself already. I know a lot of it is visual (not many folks 'round here have seen an electric upright) but it also delivers sound-wise. And it's a LOT more portable than a Double Bass. I do a lot of travelling away gigs and transporting a Double Bass to many of them would be a nightmare.

I do like it apart from the tuners. I bought this one because I'd played it and liked it and a while ago someone I know in the industry got me this one at a ludicrous price. If I'd paid full price for this bass I would have demanded a set of quality (Schaller, Gotoh, etc.) replacement machine heads. If it were stolen I'd get another electric upright, but perhaps not the same one depending on what was available.

This is basically a 35 inch scale fretless bass on a stick. It comes with a passive volume control, a piezo pick-up for each string and a ball joint adjustment for body angle. The neck was some form of rosewood and the body finished in a beautiful black finish. The tuners were very basic and tend to be unresponsive to minor adjustments. You must start low and slowly pull into pitch. You cannot slowly back off and expect the tuning key to respond. It comes with a nice case that tends to lack a lot in the durability dept. The plastic zippers must be treated with utmost care.

Sound was good after adding a Sans Amp Acoustic DI and a Boss DD5 Echo I could get a very believable upright sound on stage. I was running it through the effects return of an SWR X350 with my 5 string running through the normal pre-amp system. This worked extremly well giving two totally different sounds from one amp and made it extremely easy to swap instruments.

This particular instrument was set up with the bridge set a little sharp and string action a little low but adjustment was easy and straight forward. The strings supplied with this bass were a joke. The "D" string started unwinding the second night. Replaced them with GHS tapewounds and really improved the overall sound and playability of the instrument.

My bass lost the "A" string piezo after about two weeks. The ball joint for the body adjustment had a soft plastic ball and was never secure. This instrument was mass produced in China with very little regard for quality control and it quickly shows. I would never gig with this bass without some kind of back-up. Mine was totally undependable.

Fortunately I bought this one from Musicians Friend and they were extremley helpful. As it had only been 14 days since I bought it they refunded my money and paid for return shipping. Can't get any better than that.

I play a Pedulla ET5 and a '66 Precision most of the time. I own an older Dean five string acoustic bass and it is almost bullet proof. I asssumed the quality would be the same with the "Pace" but I was wrong.

This is a new Dean Pace Bass made this year. It was made in China. It's a 5-string electric upright and sort of resembles a fence post on a snare stand.
The body is solid maple which I'm sure adds to the solid sound
It's got a piezo pickup in the bridge with one master volume control. There are trim pots on the preamp board for treble and bass that are accessible through holes in the backplate. It's active with an 18 volt preamp.The thing I really like is that it's made for electric players. It has a 35" scale and the fretboard is flatter than an upright. I started playing it on gigs right away.

This was the perfect transition to upright for me. I didn't have to relearn an new instrument and it plugged right into both of my bass rigs (Phil Jones for small gigs/Epifani for larger) without any preamps or external stuff. The sound is HUGE. It doesn't really sound like an upright or a fretless. I think it has a very unique sound. I get a lot of attention and I think this bass has gotten me hired for gigs where I might have been otherwise overlooked.

The fit and finish were great out of the box. I was the first one to play it at the store so nobody got the chance to mess with it before I did.
The set up was a little lacking but the neck was arrow straight so it just took a little bridge adjustment to make it wonderful.
Dean really needs to fire whoever let it out playing that way, though.

I've played this bass on several gigs and it has never let me down. It's sturdy and reliable delivering the same rich sound over and over. I've inadvertently banged the finish a few times with the headstock of my fretted bass and have yet to make a dent. I've taken it out of the case in tune more than once.

I had some questions when I first got the bass so I called Dean Customer Service. Tommy and Scott were amazing. These guys should train customer service guys at other companies. Oh yes, and there is a real person who answers the phone. Not a machine. I even talked to the guy who designed the bass once. He was really accessible, answered all my questions, and even gave me a little history as to how the Pace came to be.

I've been playing professionally for over 35 years and this thing is the first instrument that I've been this excited about in a long time. If this were stolen I would have to replace it. It's become the main tool in my toolbox and I couldn't do without it. I looked at a lot of electric uprights but this one was the most affordable and, now that I've had it for a while, the best sounding. Kudos to the Dean design team for coming up with this one