Peavey Cirrus 4

The Peavy Cirrus series basses are American made instruments. This Peavy Cirrus 4 has a Beautiful three dimensional tightly flamed maple top with an alder core and is a neck-thru constructed of lightly flamed maple with two purpleheart stringers and a pau ferro fretboard covering two octaves with medium sized frets. It has a 35" scale length and the lower cutaway provides complete access to the entire fretboard. The pickups are Peavy designed soapbar type low impedence and internally active. The preamp is an 18 volt 3 band with cut/boost controls for bass, mid, and treble and a blend control for the pickups. The finish is a high quality high gloss polyurethane which tapers off at the base of the neck which has an oil finish. The neck is reinforced with two graphite rods and has a dual action truss rod. The hardware is gold colored and complements the natural wood nicely. The bridge is a bell brass ABM bridge with stainless steel saddles. The bass also came with a high quality strap and strap locks. For the price this bass is definitely feature rich!

I am definitely an amateur bass player. I have been a guitar player for ~22 years and just recently (~4 years ago) began playing bass. Although I haven't been playing bass for very long I'm very particular about tone. I play a wide variety of styles (rock, jazz, blues, pop, country) and I've been looking for a single bass that provides enough flexibility to fit in whatever style I choose to play. I own and have owned some very nice basses (Rickenbacker 4003, Fender Am.Std. Jazz, G&L ASAT, Tobias Growler, Mike Lull PJ) and I love playing all of them. The Peavy Cirrus 4 is one of the most flexible basses I've yet played (I found the Roscoe basses to be quite similar in this regard but significantly higher in price). The notes have a nice blossom and the attack when playing with fingers has alot of impact. With the EQ set flat the bottom is full but well defined and the mids are rich. I'm not a big fan of Pau Ferro as I find it a bit brittle sounding but I hear none of that in this instrument. The highs are transparent and add just a little teeth under heavy finger attack and lots of bite with a pick. The blend control is much more flexible than on my Jazz bass (where most tonal variation occurs near the center). The entire sweep is highly useable and even small adjustments will effect your tone. This bass is great with fingers or a pick, light to heavy attack. little changes in playing hand position also has more effect on the tone on this bass than any other bass I've played. I find it easy to get just the right tone for any situation just by adjusting the blend control and changing my playing position. The EQ is dead quiet and the bass and treble controls on this instrument do just what they should - add or cut highs and lows without coloring the tone. The mid control is great for effecting the 'growl' in this instruments voice.

I am still playing on the factory setup. I will eventually set the guitar up but the factory setup is so nice I haven't bothered yet. The nut is cut correctly and the frets are level and well seated. The fretwork, though, is fair at best. Yes, the ends are smooth and unnoticeable when moving around on the neck and, as I said, they're level but there are significant filing marks on the fret ends and where they meet the fretboard at the ends. I will have a professional fret job done in the future but they are so playable and comfortable that I see no need to rush this. I have also noticed a couple of tiny finish imperfections but they're really tiny! Other than the fretwork (which is visibly messy and doesn't effect playability) it's well made.

I havent had the bass long enough to make a judgement on this issue but I wouldn't sweat trusting this instrument playing out.

My experience dealing with Peavy in the past has been positive and word on the street says they're support is still great. The warranty is 2 years but I don't forsee having to use it.

If this instrument were stolen or lost I'd buy another that day. I haven't found anything (aside from sloppily dressed frets) that I don't like about this bass. As I said before I feel this bass stood up to the Roscoe in playability and tonal flexibility. I consider this bass to be an excellent value!

The Cirrus 4 I purchased is fretless, with a Flame Maple/Alder body. The body has a transparent finish, which tapers off at the bottom of the neck into a smooth oil finish. The neck is a 5 piece neck-through, Maple/Purpleheart. The fretboard is Pao Ferro with maple lines. All Cirrus basses use a 35" scale. There are 5 controls; volume, pickup balancer, treble, bass, and mids. The dual soapbar pickups are run through an 18v active circuit. All the hardware is gold plated, which works nicely with the wood selection. The ABM bridge offers plenty of room for string modification (height, spacing, intonation). The bass comes with a hardshell case and gold straplocks.

The electronics on this bass are extremely quiet. The 18v electronics never gave a hint of hissing or unwanted noise even with all controls boosted to the max. Pao ferro works very well as a fretless fingerboard, allowing plenty of that distinctive "mwah". I play mostly jazz, yet the electronics offer enough variation in the sound that it could find use in other applications. Overall, I would describe the sound as refined. I run the bass through a Carvin 100 watt 15" combo.

There were a few flaws with the bass as shipped (I received it directly from the factory). First of all, the action was very low. Playing over the neck pickup to get the fretless "mwah" resulted in string buzzing in 1st-5th frets. A very light attack was also needed, as a hard attack resulted in the clanking sound of the string bouncing off of the fingerboard. The factory setup is something that I could've gotten used to, but it was a bit too drastic a change for me. I was disappointed in the flame maple top, the one I received has fairly subdued figuring. The neck is very smooth and playable. On the front of the body, adjacent to the base of the neck, there is a small sanding mark noticeable on close inspection.

I don't play live gigs, but this bass feels solid, yet lightweight.

I got my bass through a music store, who didn't have what I was looking for in stock. It was estimated it could take as long as 3 months to special order it. They called Peavey, who had what I wanted sitting around, and promptly shipped it off. I received the bass about 6 days after I had asked about it (would have been 5 had it not required a signature). I have not dealt with the company otherwise.

I have been playing for about 4 years, the Cirrus being my third bass. Even though adjusting to fretless took me a while, I enjoy playing this bass the most (the other bass I currently own is an Ibanez Ergodyne 700). I compared the Cirrus to a Warwick Corvette fretless, which was much heavier, and would have cost about $300 more than the Cirrus if I wanted a lined fingerboard. I have two favorite features; the smooth neck, and the excellent electronics. The only thing I dislike about the bass in the maple top, I really wish it had more figuring on it. This bass is a great value, considering all the features. I am currently considering a 5 string, the Cirrus is definitely a contender.