A good proggy bass guitar!

Simple answer - "not really". 

This is the same 2006 reissue as mine. Not sure how much my particular reissue goes for now, you can't get them anymore. Besides, I'm in the UK. Have a look on eBay. 

Chibson just doesn't have the same ring to it. ;)

Also I very much doubt you'd get anything like a similar sound, to be honest. You have to introduce so many effects that the sound of the bass disappears and you're just left with the effects. 

Even with modern VST technology, you can't really replace real instruments. You can get an approximation, but a $150 plugin will not come close to, say, a real Moog modular. It gets especially bad when trying to simulate brass or woodwind instruments, I hear so many VST saxes which sound absolutely toe curlingly appalling. Actually, I used to do a lot of sax session work for bands who assumed that a VST sax would sound passable, and then found it didn't. 

As Chopper says, a discount bass will still feel like a discount bass. If you have pickups which ... don't, and the body is made out of an outhouse door, you can't add to what's not there. And it'll play horribly as well. Having said that, starter basses are a lot better quality from the absolute rubbish I started on many, many years ago. 

There's a good point above that buying a Rick will not make you automatically sound like Chris Squire. 

Older readers may remember no-hope guitarists buying white Strats by the shed load: for some strange reason, this didn't automatically turn them into Jimi Hendrix. Can't think why. 

Bass is really all about technique. It's easy to play bass badly and get into bad habits: getting a good sound out of a bass is very subtle indeed. You certainly won't get a fantastic sound out of a cheap instrument, but buying an expensive bass doesn't guarantee that you'll sound good, either. 

Also small things like skimping on strings or having a bad setup will destroy your tone. I can just pick a guitar up and tell if someone can play or not judging on how well it's been set up. 

The good news is that there is a huge selection of basses out there all better made than the planks of wood I (and many others) had to start with in the 1980's. Most are better made than "quality instruments" of the 60's and 70's. 

If the question is "what constitutes a "prog" bass" then that depends on a lot of factors, to be honest. 

The_Jester wrote: I'd like to buy a new bass guitar somedays. I was wandering how much should I save for a good bass guitar and what are the best bass guitar I could try. I'd like to have a proggy sound. Like a signature sound. Or maybe something unusual. I always wonder if there's an unknown company out there that makes quality basses who are cheaper than the big names. I already have: A Douglas (Hofner imitation) bass wich is the first I bought. An Ergodyne Ibanez A Takamine acoustic bass And A Gibson SG bass