Spector NS-5 Avalanche Split Fade (pre-owned)

The NS body was drawn by Ned Steinberger in 1977 — that is what the NS stands for — and Spector’s USA shop in Woodstock, New York has been carving it by hand ever since. This one left the bench on 22 July 2024, signed and numbered #1796 on the back of the headstock. It is a custom order rather than a catalogue spec, and the option list reads like somebody knew exactly what they wanted.

The Avalanche Split Fade stain is the reason you stop walking past it. Bookmatched quilted maple goes from deep charcoal at the edges into a bare, almost bone-white centre, and the quilt figure stays visible straight through the fade instead of disappearing into the dark end. The back and the neck carry the same idea in reverse — black-stained body, natural maple headstock — and it is all finished in oil, not gloss, so the wood still feels like wood under your forearm.

Swamp ash back with a customer-selected bookmatched quilted maple top — the top-and-back build Spector’s USA shop uses when the body has to do two jobs at once. Swamp ash brings the light weight and the open, slightly scooped midrange that keeps a five-string from turning muddy; the maple cap tightens the attack and adds the high-end snap that the EMG set then makes the most of. There is no weight relief in this body, and it still comes in at 3.99 kg — the NS carve does the rest, hanging and balancing like it was cut for a strap, because it was.

The neck runs straight through the body: three pieces of maple, no heel, no bolt plate, glued into ash wings and sculpted flush. That is where the sustain comes from, and it is why the top of the register on an NS never feels like an afterthought — you can get to the 24th fret without fighting a joint. The profile is Spector’s Thin shape, genuinely slim for a five, and the birdseye maple fingerboard is dense and fast under the fingers, with mother-of-pearl crown inlays and black side dots that stay discreet against the pale board.

34″ scale with standard 17 mm / 0.66″ spacing at the bridge. That combination is what makes this bass practical rather than specialist — the low B has enough string length behind it to stay tight and articulate, and the spacing sits close enough to a Jazz bass that you can move across from one without relearning your right hand. The matching wooden headstock overlay with its mother-of-pearl logo is a custom-order detail, and one of the quickest ways to tell a Woodstock-built NS from the imported lines.

A 2024 build that has been properly looked after. The oil finish is clean and even right across the top, with no dings, no buckle rash and no wear along the edges, and the black-stained back and sculpted body carve are equally unmarked. The chrome hardware is bright, with no pitting on the bridge or the tuner housings.

The frets show no meaningful wear — no divots under the first-position strings — and the birdseye board is clean with every crown inlay intact. Electronics are fully working: the HAZ preamp is quiet, the blend sweeps evenly between the two pickups, and both EMG X units are at full output. The neck is straight and set up ready to play.

It comes in its hardshell case with Dunlop straplocks already fitted. Serial #1796, signed and dated 7-22-24 by the Woodstock shop on the back of the headstock.

The EMG P5X / SJ5X set is the aggressive end of the EMG catalogue. The X-series preamp inside each pickup runs at far higher headroom than the standard actives, so the pickups keep their dynamics instead of compressing when you dig in — you still get the familiar EMG clarity and near-silent noise floor, but with an open top end and a lot more room before the note flattens. The split-coil P5X at the neck gives you the thick, centred fundamental; the SJ5X at the bridge is the growl and the string separation.

Behind them sits the Spector HAZ 9V, the two-band circuit that has been in Spector’s USA basses for decades and the one most players mean when they talk about the Spector sound. It is laid out as volume, pickup blend, bass and treble, with internal dip-switches that let you shift the bass and treble corner frequencies to suit the instrument. The boost is generous and musical rather than surgical — a small amount of treble turns the maple cap and the birdseye board into real presence, and the bass control adds weight without ever loosening the low B.

What you end up with is the sound that has been carrying rock and metal records since the early eighties: hard-edged, fast, and with a B string that arrives on time. Blend towards the bridge and it cuts through anything; roll back to the P5X and it sits under a band with real authority. A genuinely USA-built five-string, under 4 kg, with a neck this slim and a top this good is not a long list — and this one is only two years old. We would take it over most of what gets called boutique.