Customized Fender Precision Bass Formerly Owned by Donna Dresch

This early 1980s Fender Precision Bass was customized, signed and played by Donna Dresch from the mid-1980s to 1996 with bands Team Dresch, Dangermouse, Screaming Trees, Dinosaur Jr., Lois, Mary Lou Lord, and others. 

Donna Dresch is best known as the bassist and namesake behind Queercore group Team Dresch and the founder of the zine-turned-record label Chainsaw. Formed in 1993 in Portland, Oregon, Team Dresch earned a loyal following for their aggressive sound and unflinching lyrics that addressed LGBTQIA+ rights, bigotry and self-worth. Dresch’s Chainsaw label championed influential acts such as Excuse 17, the Frumpies, the Third Sex, Heavens to Betsy, and Sleater-Kinney, and became a powerful advocate for feminist and queer Punk in the Pacific Northwest. 

Deeply involved in the Northwest scene since the mid-1980s, Dresch played this early 1980s Fender Precision bass with numerous bands and customized the instrument with the neck from a Fender Jazz model that Soundgarden bassist Ben Shepherd had smashed onstage. She later replaced the pickups and added a Badass Bass II bridge given to her by Minutemen bassist Mike Watt. As a finishing touch, she changed the instrument’s body color from red to green and applied the AIDS activism sticker “Action = Life.”