ilovefuzz.com

No Jimmy said it in passing so I took advantage of it so if I get yelled at so will jimmy ... in theory....

Should I grab a Peavey Firebass head on sale near me for $200?

Any way you can try it first?

It's on craigslist, but I'm sure I can if I make the trip.

Although I don't have a bass yet

Here the link to the Firebass
http://boston.craigslist.org/nos/msg/1930674042.html

some other cheapies I found
http://providence.craigslist.org/msg/1900757073.html
http://providence.craigslist.org/msg/1915283655.html
http://boston.craigslist.org/nwb/msg/1937520362.html

Or there is this Sunn
http://worcester.craigslist.org/msg/1933331080.html

bigchiefbc knows more about Peavy then I do, try and get his opinion. You could always take a guitar if need get to get a concept of the tone.

Yeah, I was planning on taking a guitar if a bass was unavailable.
I'd probably bring a fuzz pedal as well.

Any suggestions for solid cheap basses? (new or used is cool)

What have you played so far?
What types of tones do you like?
Do you want a 34" or 30 scale?
Thin or wide necks?

Tones I like: Jesse F. Keeler, Dave Alexander, Flea (when he's not using slap), Scott Reeder, Nick Oliveri, the bass tones from Houdini by the Melvins, and Brian Gibson. (A bunch of others who I'm forgetting as well)
I guess I'm looking for a desert/stoner punk tone? I'd be tuning down a step, occaisonally dropping the D to C.

I played a reissue of a Gibson Eb-3, a Musicman Stingray, and a Fender P-bass (I don't remember what type).
My favorite was probably the EB-3. The Stingray was nice as well, seemed to have better cleans, but wasn't as great with fuzz. The P-bass seemed really flawed, but it probably just needed a setup.
This was all going through an Acoustic 450.

Scale length doesn't really matter to me.

First the thing about fenders and their clones: you are just going to have to go through a ton of them Ps and J are just that way. Because they are thrown together at random you get a lot of "erms" and a few good ones. So this means you can luck out and find a good sounding one cheap if you dig around. The SG bass is what it is but I thought the one I played was a little over priced for how it sounded. The epi EB-3 is just cheep, I've played a few that were ok but no matter what you would have to drop a bill on a new pickup to get anything out of it, it really is too bad they don't make a "middle" version

For $200 I think used will get you farther then new. also you can always upgrade the pickups and stuff down the road. In that range I would look at: Ibanez, Yamaha, Fender/Squire, Peavy,ESP/LTD [maybe if you can find one that low] and also keep your eyes out for oddballs. For instance I have two 80's Ibanezes that sound as good or better then your average Fender and they were both around $200. The key it to really look. One observation I'll make from what you have said is you might like basses with humbuckers better, but, I think you should try a J bass to see how you like it for fun. Personally I find finding a good J very hard and ended up making my own out of parts.

Or if you can find an Ibanez ATK, yea they're a bit heavy but DAMN! Rivaled my Stingray for a while :D

You also get the Scott Reeder connection with a ATK too

Yeah, the SG bass was definitely overpriced.

Thanks so much for the help Mudfuzz!

Any time! Just play a bunch of basses, that way you can really pin down what you really want and then you can really zoom in on what can get you closest to that at your budget.