Review - Sterling Ray2 Intro StingRay Bass

The Sterling Ray2 Intro series StingRay Bass aims to bring Music Man’s most famed bass design to the masses. While it’s a laudable ambition to provide a relatively cheap version of these iconic instruments (some collectable ones costing northwards £3,000 – and some going for five figure sums on auction sites), it’s an increasingly competitive market.

For example the Marcus Miller-affiliated Sire brand has successfully matched looks, feel, sound and pricing to create some very desirable basses at a more affordable price. The Sterling Ray2 has an RRP of £349.00 and does deliver aesthetically and tonally, but to our hands felt somewhat clunky around the neck and not as refined as other similarly priced brands.

Complete with a maple neck and featuring a good selection of high-end components from the poplar body, versatile pickup and robust hardware, this is a great starter bass for any player who’s got a couple of years’ experience and is looking to step up to a more grown-up instrument.

With the poplar body and hard maple neck combining to create a balanced tone with strong mids, resonating lows and that characteristic high-end brightness essential for a bright slap-and-pop tone. And the Ray2’s contoured body and overall weight would not be an issue for longer playing stints.

The single ceramic passive humbucker provides plenty of heft but with just a single tone control to vary the timbre, most of the tonal shaping will come from your fingers. With the brightness rolled off it sounds somewhere between a P Bass or a Jazz bass on the neck pickup, but still has that nasal StringRay sound. Crank the tone up and there’s a lot more detail for finger style or thumb lines and the Ray2 can definitely replicate that classic tone. In conclusion, if you’re curious about the StingRay aesthetic and love that sound (as championed by the likes of Tony Levin, Flea and Louis Johnson) then this is a great place to start. Yet for more experienced players the Ray2’s cheaper materials and mass production finish (albeit good) may well frustrate.