Marcus Miller M2 5 TBL 2nd Gen 4-stars Reviews

Awesome bass

I wanted a 35 inch bass so i tried this one, i was impressed! Sounds great, easy to play, and not too heavy. The bridge is ok, i only wish the trussrod access was somewere else.

Good, just not necessary great

First impressions out of the box - it looks and feels great. I really like neck profile, it is kinda rounded and feels really nice (for me). Actually I think it is the most comfortable 5er I've ever played. Transparent blue finish looks really nice.

Quality - well, not so great. Few painting defects around the edges, plastic knobs are just awful, finish is really fragile and chips easily. Pickup cavities is so tight that you can't event get pickups out, not mention change pickups height! So prepare your chisel for that. It had few high spots on the frets. Also nut slot for A string has been too low.

Sound - didn't really like it, maybe just not my kind. Of course it has a lot of features, like active preamp with parametric EQ, but I found it really not that usable. Frequencies band width is really wide, so boosting low end, for example, makes it mutter. In fact I personally liked it in passive mode most.

All in all - it is good bass. It required full setup (including fret leveling, fret end dressing etc.), but after that it plays really great. As for sound - well, it is a matter of preferencies after all. It is not like "bad" by any means, but it my opinion it just not "great" at same time.

Good value for money

Overall it's what I've expected to get for this price. The look is pretty decent and this transparent blue finish (actually more of a green for me) is really beautiful. With the preamp built-in you have many options for a sound, but eventually I ended up with everything boosted up to a maximum. Sounds really bright and full so I'll go with it as an everyday bass.

The neck profile is quite strange for the bass defined as a modern one. It's much more thicker comparing to the one of my Musicman bass and it takes some time to get used to it.

The build quality is not as good as it looks like. I have corrosion traces on a first few frets. There are some little painting defects on the edges. And preamp knobs are poor quality too. First the tone knob doesn't have much affect on the tone itself. I've even not sure if it works at all. Next is that dual knobs don't work as designed. When you turn one it always turns another, so you can't adjust it with one hand. You have to hold one knob with other hand while you turning another. So it's not something that I'll request for a money-back for but this is a bit disappointing for a bass named after Marcus Miller.